The Dylan Gemelli Podcast - Episode #7 Featuring Dr. Amie Hornaman, THE THYROID FIXER! The most COMPREHENSIVE Thyroid Analysis Discussion in the Podcast World!

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Starting point is 00:00:52 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. All right, everybody, Welcome back to the Dylan Ginelli podcast. I hope you're ready to have some fun today because my guest and I like to get into some pretty good conversations that are extremely fun. And she's going to bring a ton of education. She is a functional medicine doctor, but is best known as the thyroid fixer.

Starting point is 00:01:34 And she is a good friend of mine. And I'm so excited for our conversation today. So my friends, this is Dr. Amy Horneman. Welcome, Amy. Dylan, how you doing? I'm excited to be here. I am so happy to have you.

Starting point is 00:01:47 Every conversation we have is. It's fun. I know. It is. It is. We go down so many rabbit holes. It is. I will warn everybody now if you're sensitive, we are a couple of sailors here on how we talk sometimes.

Starting point is 00:01:59 So if you're sensitive, you might want to just stop being weak about it. All right. So, you know, one of the things that I really get into is a lot of wellness, a lot of hormone optimization, a lot of panels, everything. But one of the things that I'm severely lacking, and I am disappointed in myself, and I can't wait for your expertise is all about thyroid. But I want to, before we get into that, I want to talk about your background. I know that you were a competitor before. Everybody's kind of got a cool story that gets them into health and everything.

Starting point is 00:02:33 So what's your story? Why did you, and why did you pick the thyroid? And why did you get into functional medicine? Yeah. So, like you said, many of us are somehow, in this health arena because of shit that we went through in our own lives, right? And my story's no different. So this goes back 20-some years ago, I was competing in figure competitions. I was doing fitness modeling. And I had done plenty of these. And I did the whole diet down procedure.

Starting point is 00:03:01 I was not walking around like a little tiny stick figure with boom that just had to diet for two weeks. Like I had to diet for the full 12 to 14 weeks every single time, even if it was a photo shoot, I would prep that same way. And so, you know, I knew how my body was supposed to respond. I'd done it plenty of times. And this one show I was getting ready for was an MPC Pittsburgh, bigger show. And I was working with a coach because we can't do this alone. So working with a coach sending him my progress picks and my weight every week.

Starting point is 00:03:32 And this show I'm getting ready for, I'm doing all the things. And the scale keeps going up. And every time I get on the scale, it's going up. Well, you know, when you first start and you're looking at the scale, you're like, all right, I just don't have it dialed in yet. Maybe I need to restrict a little bit more. Maybe I'll kick it up to three times a day at the gym instead of twice a day. You know, I'm doing my fasted morning cardio.

Starting point is 00:03:53 Maybe I'll throw an extra one in in the evening or whatever. So you start overthinking and overdoing naturally, but even that didn't work. And every single time I stepped on that scale, it went up. And I mean 25 pounds total. That's when I stopped getting on. I am certain that it went higher than that. But at that point, I didn't want to know anymore. I knew I was out of the show.

Starting point is 00:04:17 I knew my body was rebuilding against me. And I really just wanted answers as to why. So I started going to doctors because that's what we do when there's something wrong with our body. We all do it. So went to my first doctor. And I say first because there were many more to follow. First doctor who told me. And I don't, I don't know the tests that were ran back then.

Starting point is 00:04:40 I wasn't in this space. I didn't know what to ask for. and that's really why I try to educate people and drill it into them. Like, no, you have to ask for a specific test. So I got some testing done. Yes, they tested my thyroid. They said, you're normal. I'm using the air quotes here.

Starting point is 00:04:56 Normal and everything is fine. So I left there. I'm like, no, I'm not normal. I'm not fine. I'm going to go for this second opinion thing. So I kept going. Went to another doctor. I was told, well, you know what?

Starting point is 00:05:08 Your labs look good. It's all in your head. Just eat less and exercise more. And at that point, I'm thinking, oh, my God, I'm going to die if I eat less and exercise more, right? I was already restricting. I was in full show contest prep mode and just really could not restrict any further without completely starving myself and shutting my body down. So I kept going, went to doctor number three, four or five, and six. All of them dismissed me.

Starting point is 00:05:34 They all told me I was normal. Everything is fine. Now, I'm rushing through this story, but the reality was I was really depressed. You know, I went into the whole wearing big sweatshirts at the gym. I felt judge. I felt like people were talking about me like, oh, she couldn't stay on the diet. You know, she ate too many donuts and dropping out. And that wasn't the case.

Starting point is 00:05:56 I was actually more strict than anyone there. But my body was just rebelling against me. So I finally went to one endocrinologist in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, big, I mean, I was in a huge major medical system. Think Cleveland Clinic, Mayo Clinic. UPMC Pittsburgh is a major medical system. So I was in this system thinking I'm going to get the best treatment, right? So I'll travel.

Starting point is 00:06:20 I'll travel to see this doctor. That's fine. And she touched my throat and she said swallow. And she said, okay, you have a goiter on your thyroid. I'm looking at your numbers here. It looks like you have hypothyroidism. So I'm going to give you a pill. And I left her office pump up.

Starting point is 00:06:37 I'm like, I have a name. I have a diagnosis. and I got a pill. And it's all going to change, right? It's all going to change. And five months later, nothing changed. There was not one pound dropped on the scale. I was tired.

Starting point is 00:06:52 I was depressed. I was losing my hair. I mean, that was kind of a side to all the weight gain that I had put on. So then I kept hearing the name of this functional practitioner. And back then, we didn't use the term functional. It was integrative as alternative. So he was just a genius in all things. He was a naturopathic position.

Starting point is 00:07:12 He was an integrated medicine doctor. He was a pharmacist, so he knew the medicine side of things. I kept hearing his name. So finally, I'm like, okay, Lord, okay, I get it. I'm going to go. I'm going to go. So I went and he sat down with me for 90 minutes. All the other doctors, I got like five to six minute visits, right?

Starting point is 00:07:31 He sat with me for 90 minutes, went over this book of labs that he had ordered and started putting the pieces of the puzzle together and explained to me, oh, this is how your body is working and this is why you're feeling this way and this is what we have to do. And it was my answer. It was the change. It was the thing that I needed to literally get my life back. So from that point on, I changed careers. I knew that this is what I wanted to do. I knew that just because I got the runaround in a major medical system, how many other people out there in smaller cities are getting the freaking run around by the medical system? Something needs to be done. Now, this is 20-some years. ago and we're still in the same boat.

Starting point is 00:08:12 We're in the same. Now, there are more people like myself, more functional practitioners out there doing the work, but, you know, I mean, I see this every day, Dylan, people in and out of my practice, listening to the podcast, my Facebook group, whatever, just my doctor won't listen, my doctor won't run the test, my doctor won't treat with anything but T4. And that's what I was given, by the way. So I was given, we can dive more into this.

Starting point is 00:08:34 I was given a medication called T4, Lebo-thyroxin, synthroids, Tricin, it's all in the same category and I'm going to give you a stat and we can certainly dive more into this. 98% of us need T4 and T3 combined. Only 2% of the population do well on T4 only. And the reality is in the conventional system, it's flipped. 98% of those with a thyroid problem are put on T4 only and told, good luck. We get a little pat on the ass as they're sending you out the door after your five to seven minute visit.

Starting point is 00:09:08 And that's the reality of it. So we need a massive change in thyroid treatment. I got several questions on this that we're going to get into. Real quick, because I want to get into the functional doctor aspect of things. But because of what you just said, I think I know the answer, but I want to hear it from you. Why are they only putting people on T? Yeah, that's all they've learned. So real quick story, years ago, I gave a talk at an integrative wellness practice to a bunch of physicians. And they brought me in to talk about the thyroid. So I talked about the importance of proper testing. We talked about free T3, reverse T3. And then I also talked about being in the cthroid box. Meaning that's all you guys are prescribing. And I said, you know, it's funny. If someone comes in and

Starting point is 00:09:53 they're depressed, you'll give them another antidepressant. And then you'll try another one and you'll try another one and you'll tag on some Abilify and you'll throw them a benz-o for sleeping. But somebody comes in with a thyroid problem, you can one medication, why is that? And when doctor raises his hand and goes, that's all we've learned. Like, that is all they have learned. They have learned. You check T-SH. If T-SH is above a 4.5, which is the current cutoff, you give T-4.

Starting point is 00:10:18 Done. Like thyroid lesson done for the day. Meanwhile, the thyroid is the master gland that controls the whole body. In my opinion, it should be like a three-month course. in medical school, but it's not. See, this is the type of shit that I do deal with with cholesterol, with all the people that I coach with cholesterol, where the answer is let's look at one marker.

Starting point is 00:10:39 Let's not look at the comprehensive marker, like what we're going to talk about, that I want to talk about which tests with you a little bit later, and they'll do with statin, statin, statin, when in reality the statin's causing 50,000 other problems and creating new ones for people that don't need it. And so sounds like that's what we're running into here. Now, let me ask you this.

Starting point is 00:10:57 I'm curious because I don't know the answer to this. But even with my limited knowledge of thyroid, I know how important running them both is and the importance of T3 being used. Now, that's from being in the bodybuilding community that I learned that. But still, it doesn't matter. I still know it.

Starting point is 00:11:14 So is there any issue writing scripts for T3 insurance-wise? No. No, and that's what kills me. There's, no. So doctors, and I've heard this, Gosh, you're on a multitude of patients, obviously. And if I could, I should really write a book on just like shit patients here from their doctor that is wild. But I've heard doctors say T3 is going to give you a heart attack.

Starting point is 00:11:40 It's going to cause bone loss. That's a common misconception that has been debunked. So that's, you throw that up the window. I mean, I have heard things like doctors literally telling patients you're going to die. If you take T3, I've heard patients being fired. because they asked for T3. I mean, every wacky thing that you can possibly imagine, I have heard come out of a doctor's mouth to a patient

Starting point is 00:12:04 and my jaw drops on the floor. No, insurance will cover it. I pick my T3 up from Walgreens and my co-pays $20. Like, that's it. It's all about getting the doctor to understand how to properly treat the thyroid. And the thyroid is such a nuanced, beautiful gland. It really takes someone in the know.

Starting point is 00:12:25 We cannot one size fits all this treatment. And that's what conventional medicine tends to do. Yeah, that's what I don't want to be a complete ask, because I have friends that are regular doctors that are general practitioners, but it's the same thing. And it's like seriously. And I want to stress, and I say this often, that's why they're called a general practitioner because the knowledge is very general. And you're going to see that everywhere. I want to talk to you about the functional medicine and because I'm in the middle of it, integrative health practitioner certification right now and a cellular health coach certification.

Starting point is 00:13:03 So I'm curious with what does one have to do to become a functional medicine doctor? And if you can just briefly or as easily as possible explain, what exactly is a functional medicine doctor and how does it differentiate? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we dive to the root cause. So if you think about, and you're right, Dylan, I don't want to bash all docs because sister's a doctor. Like, I get it that conventional medicine is a beautiful thing.

Starting point is 00:13:31 If you have an infection, if you need your knee repaired, you know what I mean? Like, we need that. Yeah. But when it comes to hormone balancing the endocrine system, you actually don't want to go to an endocrinologist. So we'll get into that. So functional medicine, instead of putting bandaid drugs like a statin, instead of putting bandaid drugs on someone.

Starting point is 00:13:51 We actually figure out the why. So, okay, hey, I have high cholesterol. My doctor said I'm diabetic. What's going on? I restrict my carbs. What's happening? I'm gaining weight no matter what I do. I'm tired. I'm losing my hair. I don't poop every day. That's not cool. I can't sleep. You know, so why? Okay, well, we could give you a sleeping pill and an antidepressant and a statin and a blood pressure medicine and all the things to bandaid all of those symptoms, or we could figure out why this is happening inside your body. And I always go right to the master gland first. I'm going to check that first. And then at the same time, look downstream, okay, where are your sex hormones? Where's your insulin? What's your glucose control? How's your nutrient status? How are you eating? Are you sleeping? All of that. But we have to start with

Starting point is 00:14:37 the thyroid. So that's really what functional medicine is, is it's diving into what, what's at the root of these symptoms. And let's fix the root cause. Instead, it could be your gut. gut. It could be your adrenals, but let's get to the root cause. And really, functional medicine training is just taking all of that knowledge and going deeper. I was trained to, and now I had the thyroid experience even before I went through functional medicine training. Based on my own experience and then training under my functional medicine doctor who became my mentor. But what I learned, too, is just all the different gut testing and how to read that and look at that. And then we have functional testing like salivary cortisol to check your adrenal function. We have the ductal. We have the ductal

Starting point is 00:15:18 Dutch tests, the check hormones. So there's all these other really cool things that we can look at beneath the surface and functional medicine. See, one of the things that problems me so much in a lot of people that hire me, all they hire me to do is hormone optimization and reading blood panels and getting to the actual cause of things. My problem is, is I don't have the actual credential that you do. And so my curiosity, and I'm sure many that would fall into the same boat that want to lean towards what you do, I know you have a master's degree. What your master's degree and then how did you utilize that particular, you know, degree to get the doctor title into where you want to be right now? Yeah, so I did my master's in clinical nutrition. Then I did

Starting point is 00:16:00 my doctorate in clinical nutrition. Then, yeah, then I went to do the functional medicine training. Okay. So you've got that basically, yeah, you've got a lot of experience of training. So yeah, that's what I kind of figured on. I figured it was probably intense, but if you enjoy it, it's not nearly as tough as intense as some other things, I'm sure. Well, as you know, you're going through it right now. It's fun learning about something that you love. It's fun learning how to even explain to a client. You know, let's look at your labs and let's unpack these and what do they mean?

Starting point is 00:16:36 And you know what? I'm sorry, I'm going to counter your statement. You don't have to have credentials to be able to look at a set of labs and know what they are telling you. And in fact, I am huge in training people to read their own labs. So, I mean, I have a whole program that, listen, if you're not ready to work one-on-one with us, that's cool. But you better learn what your lab say for you so that you can be your best patient advocate. You can advocate for yourself. And you can have an educated discussion with your doctor.

Starting point is 00:17:08 If he or she is bulky and, you know, arguing back at you. Like, wait a minute. No, this is within normal limit. you go, no, no, I learn that this number needs to be here and that's the optimal range. And so therefore, what that tells me is that I'm on too much D4 and not enough T3. And I 100% believe that people can learn to read their own labs and know what they need to do to change. Well, they certainly most certainly can. You know, the thing is, like, for instance, I send a lot of people in and they like, well, can you just tell me what labs to get?

Starting point is 00:17:42 And I'm like, oh, here we go. This is going to be fun. and I'll write like I want your proactant check or something that's just conventional. And the doctors get pissy and don't want to do it. So what I do is I have outlets where I send them like here, go, I have a coupon code, go buy your labs like private empty labs, go to Quest and do it that way, send them to it. I'll analyze them. But, you know, that's one of the things that I want to know for you.

Starting point is 00:18:04 How do you feel about that when doctors won't, they don't want to test what you want to get tested? Yeah. I mean, what the fuck? Yeah. I have a rule. If your doctor says no to testing, it's time to get a new doctor. Thank you. Because it's no money out of their pocket to write you a lab order.

Starting point is 00:18:22 The problem is that they don't know what to do with it when it comes back. And that's a huge red flag for you. Yeah. Yeah. It is. And that's the thing, too, is I really get upset with the lack of comprehensive testing and they don't look into anything. So what you're saying, what you do and what my passion is, is the, I say, root cause and you know i mean it's it's funny because like you know that was thrown around politically

Starting point is 00:18:48 but that's the actual like digging into that and finding it is is what it's all about so what you do and what you believe in and like what i believe in is preventing not just treating right and and then if something does need treated actually finding out what it is as opposed to just going oh here's the answer oh here's the answer because you get that five to seven minute visit and it's next next next next it's like getting your hair cut of great clips man like you know what i mean It's the same type of deal. Okay. All right.

Starting point is 00:19:17 Now, we were talking about the T3 and the T4. Now, let's talk about the T3 first because you brought up side effects and things that were sad and BS. So my thing with T3 with bodybuilders was because it was being misused. I told him it'll eat your muscle away because you're abusing it. You're doing this. And I'd say run it clinically properly. I'm all for it. Talk about T3.

Starting point is 00:19:42 in general. What exactly is it? What does it do? Like, what's its function and how does it actually help the thyroid in general? Yeah. Okay. So a little biology lesson here. Get your pen and paper out. So T4 is inactive. So our thyroid gland produces two thyroid hormones, T4 and T3. T4 and T3. T4 is totally inactive, meaning it has no effect on your body in and of itself, whereas T3 is active. So T4 has to become T3. It has to convert and become T3 in order to get to your cells to turn on that cell. So every single cell in your body has a receptor site on it, just like a lock and key mechanism, has a receptor site on it for T3. There are no receptor sites for T4. So in that conversion of T4 to T3, I attributed to running 10 tough mutters.

Starting point is 00:20:40 in a row. It's really hard for your body to do, and there are a lot of obstacles. So if you're estrogen dominant, insulin resistant, magnesium deficient, vitamin D deficient, selenium deficient, if you have a genetic snip, on and on and on, all these other factors that can come into play, then that can prevent T4 from properly converting a T3. So you go, well, okay, how do we know that? We do a test on something called reverse T3. So if you picture T4 is sitting here, it has two paths. it can choose. It can go down this path and become free T3. Awesome. It can go down this path and become reverse T3. Not so awesome. If it becomes reverse T3, then you are actually starting to block T3 itself from getting to the cell, from attaching to that receptor site, turning it on to turn on your metabolism,

Starting point is 00:21:30 your brain, your energy, your hair growth, your muscle growth, whatever. T3 can be given in and of itself. So sometimes we have to skip the middleman and we have to give people T3 and sometimes we have to give T3 only. So as it turned out, kind of going back to my story, I was given T4. I said it didn't work. Five months didn't work. Well, as it turns out, I have a reverse T3 problem. I actually have one of the, I have one copy of both genetic SNPs that really pretty much say like you don't convert very well. You don't convert your T4 to T3 very well. So now I found that out after my functional med doc said, you know what? I think you're a T3 only candidate.

Starting point is 00:22:15 We're going to do that. And way back in the day, he changed me to T3 only. And that's what I've been on for decades now. And it's funny, I will do experiments on myself while I'll add in T4. And in a week, I become clinically depressed and gain 10 pounds. So I know I truly do not convert. And what I do is I take that T4. I convert it to reverse T3.

Starting point is 00:22:35 And it puts my body in the survival mode. Got it. So now that is not to say, and I don't want to get, and Dylan doesn't want to get a whole bunch of emails saying, should I be on T3 only? Not everyone should be because I want you to think of it this way. T3 is checking account. T4 is your savings account.

Starting point is 00:22:54 You don't want to live off a checking. You don't want to not have a savings account. You don't want to be living paycheck to paycheck if you can help it, right? We all like to have some savings. Unfortunately, I can't. I have to live off my checking every day. T3 comes in and goes out, comes in and goes out, comes in and goes out. I don't have a storage of T4. But if we can give you that storage, so like when I'm working one-on-one with someone, I always say, okay, if we have to use T3 only for a little bit to bring down your reverse T3, let's do that, but at some point let's bring in the T4 so you can build up your savings account. And we're just going to see if you tolerate it or not. And this is where this nuanced art comes in, of, of really like reading labs and looking at a person and looking at all the different things that factor into their conversion and and dosing them properly and possibly changing things up along the way. I know that's way more than what you wanted, but that is T4 and T3 in a nutshell and kind of

Starting point is 00:23:50 how it works in the body. That's, I want more. I want to leave it from a, you saw B write notes. I don't generally do that on a podcast. So here's another question. So when you run T3, do you need, so So, for instance, when you're running testosterone, you know, shuts down your natural testosterone production. And then if you're trying to recover it, if you run testosterone too long, you're not going to ever really recover. You can try to run clomid, Nolodex, all of that. But in reality, if we'll be honest, it's going to be a hell of a time. Is there any kind of like post-cycle therapy required with T3 if you have to run it too long?

Starting point is 00:24:25 Will it shut down your natural production? Or does your body just start producing it? Or how does that work? Yeah. So this is not something that you would run temporarily and then expect to come off of it and be okay. You stay on. This is an either or. And this is the question I get.

Starting point is 00:24:41 So I'll talk to both sides of the fence, bodybuilders and then people who actually have a thyroid problem. So the people who actually have a thyroid problem, I still get this question. Do I have to take this for the rest of my life? And I say, well, here's the thing. If your body is truly not producing enough hormone, then yes, you have to replace that hormone. As soon as you stop replacing that hormone, it's going to go back to the levels it was before, possibly lower. Right.

Starting point is 00:25:07 But here's the thing. If your body isn't producing enough anyways, like you have an employee that's not quite doing their job. Are you going to replace that employee? Are you going to hold on that employee and wish on a rainbow that one day they're going to kick it up a notch and actually do their job? You're probably going to be wasting a lot of time and money if you do the latter. So it's much better to replace.

Starting point is 00:25:28 And then the other analogy that I gave, that really packs a punch is if you had a child that had type 1 diabetes and that doctor walks in the room and goes, your child is going to have to take insulin the rest of their life. Would you go, oh, yeah, no, I don't really want to take them to take a medicine the rest of their life? Because the doctor will go when your child's going to die. Right. Because insulin is a hormone and it's needed for life. Now, thyroid is a hormone. It is needed for life. You're probably not going to die immediately if you stop taking your medicine, but you're not going to live a great life for the time you have left without thyroid hormone. So if you truly need it, let's replace it and give you

Starting point is 00:26:02 your life back. Flip side, bodybuilders. So this is going to tie into when we talk about T2, but I'm going to bring it in now because this was such an impactful interview that I saw. This was, I forget the name of the guy, but he was a bodybuilder trainer to the pros, and he did mostly women. And he said, you know, I don't let my athletes take T3 because exactly what you said, Dylan, it's going to burn their muscle. It's going to burn fat, but it's going to burn their muscle too. And then they're going to come out the other side of the show with a thyroid problem. And you know when you see the girls, and this is what has prevented me from ever competing again, I saw enough of this a few years ago when I was in, you know, like a competing gym. The girls,

Starting point is 00:26:49 two, three weeks later after the show, they are 30 to 40 pounds heavier easily. Now I know there's the rebound effect but I look and I go, they took T3 and now they're off T3

Starting point is 00:27:05 because they're after the show and now their thyroid has shit the bet completely and they have no metabolism left whatsoever. So now they actually need thyroid hormone replacement for the rest of their life because they shut down their own thyroid. So this trainer goes, you know, I don't do that, I give T2, which we can dive into more.

Starting point is 00:27:22 T2 does not burn your muscle. It only burns your body fat and has no negative feedback loop. So we can strategically use T2. Anybody listening that's competing, maybe think about this instead of T3 because it does increase your base on metabolic rate. You know, T3 is fantastic if you really have a thyroid problem. Yeah. I've been so anti-T3.

Starting point is 00:27:43 And then part of the problem is, as I'm sure you know, is that when people run T3, the automatic thing is to run clenbuterol with it. And that's a whole other story in itself. But like you said when you see that weight gain after, it is the combination of exactly what you said with the thyroid issue. And then also coming off clenbeterol, which we both know is heart damaging. So you certainly can stay on that long term. At those doses, I mean, that.

Starting point is 00:28:08 And so you're going to gain that weight back too and probably more. So combining those two together is like the biggest. I can't tell you the battles and how much. much money I've turned down for people that want me to coach them on using those two, and I just refused. I just won't do it. The money, the conscious, the guilty conscience, it's not worth it at all to me. So, thanks for that explanation because that was super beneficial. So I'm curious, and if you don't have the exact statistic, that's fine. But what age do most people, when they start to have thyroid problems, let me ask you this, is it more prevalent for men or women, or is it both? And

Starting point is 00:28:43 then what age do you tend to start to see like the decline or the problem starting? So more prevalent for women. And this is because actually testosterone is very, very protective against autoimmune conditions. And men just have naturally more testosterone than women do. So women are more prone to autoimmune. 95% of all hypo, low and slow thyroid function is Hashimoto's. That's the autoimmune form where your body attacks your thyroid, thinks it's a bad guy. And so right then and there you can see the gender difference.

Starting point is 00:29:17 So men are going to be more protected. Age-wise, it's the hormonal change ages. So it's puberty, pregnancy, perimenopause, which I call actually thyroid pause. So the definition of thyroid pause is when your thyroid gland hits the bed after the age of 40 due to fluctuating hormones, that it pretty much hits every woman out there over the age of 40. But if we go earlier, pregnancy. Okay, it's natural. women were built to do it.

Starting point is 00:29:44 Huge stressor on the body, roller coaster of hormones. Right. And that stressor is enough to turn on the Hashimoto's switch. So if you think about Hashimoto's and hypothyroidism as like a light switch, it's going to stay in the off position for a while. You might have that genetic predisposition for autoimmune, but what's going to turn it on? And that's usually a major stressor, a major hormonal shift.

Starting point is 00:30:10 Okay, so in terms of the causes for a thyroid problem, what are your typical causes? And are there any ways to avoid that? Let's just throw on an example. Like, you know, for a lot of things, it's always diet related or exercise related. Does that fall into this category or no? Yeah, if you're overdoing it. So over-exercising, over-diening is a stressor on the body. So that stressor, well, that over-exercising, I think, over dieting can directly affect the thyroid. So it can be more like a primary hypothyroidism where the thyroid gland just shifts the bed. It just goes, you know what? Enough is enough. It has nothing to do with Hashimoto's. It's not your immune system. Thinking your thyroid's a bad guy. It's just like your thyroid is just like, you have used and abused this body enough and it gives you the bird. And then we have the other side where it's Hashimoto's. It truly is, maybe it was over-exercising, over-dieting. Maybe it was just, you know, even a death, a divorce, a major life change, whatever, that that stressor was enough

Starting point is 00:31:15 to turn it on. So it really could be either. And then we have like that little 2% over here that's radiation, chemotherapy, birth control ladies, really harms the thyroid, certain beta blockers and medications, that can have a direct effect. So Hashimoto's, what causes that? Is that just like a genetic hereditary thing or is there something that actually causes that? So with all autoimmune, I love this question too, by the way. All autoimmune, we have a three-legged stool analogy. This is not like thought of by me. I give credit to Alessio Fasano.

Starting point is 00:31:50 He has actually the father of gluten sensitivity and celiac. He talked a lot about it about 10 years ago. And he used this analogy, and I love it. Three-legged stool. So in the one leg, you have that genetic predisposition. Somewhere in your family, there's autoimmune. Type 1 diabetes, celiac, Crohn's disease, whatever. Or Hashimoto's.

Starting point is 00:32:09 And then you have the other leg of the stool that is leaky gut. These days, who doesn't have a leaky gut? Gluten exposure, toxins, just kind of eating away at our insides, all the processed foods, chemicals. And then you have the trigger. So, yeah, the theory is if you kick out a leg of a three-legged stool, the stool can't stand. So we have to remove one of those legs. Well, we can't remove the genetic predisposition. We can heal the gut.

Starting point is 00:32:35 We're really controlling of stressors. I mean, are you going to be like, you know what, I'm not going to get pregnant because I don't want to risk having Hashimoto's. No, and you're still going to go through paramedopause. None of us are aging like Benjamin Button. So you're still going to lose hormones at some point of time. So really, I mean, how do we avoid it? It is said that, yes, you can do gut healing protocols. You can remove gluten.

Starting point is 00:32:58 You know, you can remove all of the toxins coming into the body. And that absolutely can't help. But honestly, in my opinion, it's like, if it's coming, it's common, and we deal with it. I thought so. Well, okay, so is it a curable disease or is that a lifelong thing? Yes and no. So we can push Hashimoto's into remission. If we catch it really early, we can actually do things to keep people off of thyroid hormone replacement.

Starting point is 00:33:24 Not that that's a big deal if you have to go on it like we talked about earlier. But yes, we can catch it early and possibly push it in the remission. But then at the same time, it's like I just tell people like, it's okay. So it's okay, you got to die. We can take care of it, though. We can make it so that you don't even realize that you have it. I take my thyroid medication every day. I have a joke that I live in optimization land.

Starting point is 00:33:48 I'm good. Right. I'm fine. I'm living life. It's good. So we can bring people into that world of not suffering, not dealing with all of the hyposymp symptoms. They can live a fantastic life. It just takes that proper thyroid hormone replacement, i.e. medication, that proper dose.

Starting point is 00:34:07 And I get this question too a lot, well, what is your favorite medication? So I say the one that's going to work for you. Right. And the combination that's going to work for you in the dose that's going to work for you. And that's my favorite one. Yes. Yes. It's all subjective.

Starting point is 00:34:21 And there is, it really comes down to that. And that's just like in all aspects of like, but pretty much everything that we too. I think it's important. And I'm glad you stress that here's something that I'm wondering in terms of side effects and definition. I think, and just to keep it simple, so we've got hyper and hypoactive thyroid, one is overactive, one is underactive. Are the symptoms and side effects similar, or are they differentiating factors there? And then is one more treatable or better or worse than the other one? Yeah, good question.

Starting point is 00:34:54 So totally different. Okay. More people get hit with hypo than hyper. Okay. Hyper is, it's kind of like you can sound it out and think about what the system is. symptoms would be hyper, agitated, jittery, like you drank too much coffee, weight loss, sweating, insomnia, anxious thoughts. And this is where we'll see the thyroid eye disease where the eyes start to bulge out. Okay.

Starting point is 00:35:18 The problem with that, you know, a lot of people are like, give me the weight loss. Well, no. It starts to affect your heart too. Your heart rate is increased. Your blood pressure is increased. That can be a really dangerous situation. Yeah, yeah. And normally in hyper, we see it in the autoimmune form of grace disease.

Starting point is 00:35:33 Okay. those with hyper tend to swing. They do this pendulum swing. So you might have someone that's like, yeah, I have a Graves disease, but I'm gaining weight and I'm tired all the time. It's like, that's because the pendulum is swinging to the other side. Most of the time you have Hashimoto's and Graves antibodies at the same time. So you'll swing between those two autoimmune pendulums, you know, size of the pendulum.

Starting point is 00:35:57 And then hypo is exactly what it sounds like too. Hypo low and slow. So low metabolism, low mood, low inner. energy, low gut motility, low cell turnover. Just everything is just flowed down in the body. Okay. All right. So with the hyper, would you see like an increase in blood pressure too?

Starting point is 00:36:18 Okay. I kind of figured that. So, okay. Well, then taking that into consideration is being, is there one that you find to be more common than the other or is it just kind of? Hypo all day long. I would say, I mean, we really, I don't specialize in hyperthyroidism. I might have had two patients in the last five years that we treated for hyper because

Starting point is 00:36:44 they were on the pendulum swing. And, you know, it gets, you asked the question earlier, which one is better to treat? Quite honestly, hypo is because when you're hyper, oftentimes we have to use medication that suppresses your thyroid. And then what's going to happen? You're going to go to the other side and then you're going to be, you know, and then you're going to be too low. And then we're playing this like balancing game. I actually, I don't want this to come across wrong. I want to preserve someone's thyroid as much as we possibly can.

Starting point is 00:37:13 We want to avoid removal or radioactive iodide. There are cases where it has to be done, like in cancer. Like we got to take that thyroid out. It's okay. I got you. We're going to replace your thyroid hormones and you're going to be fine because I know what to expect after a thyroidectomy and I can guide patients that way. But in the case of Graves disease, my best friend's mom had it. And she was swinging, left her. She would be on methamazole to suppress her thyroid. Then she'd be over here on Synthroid because she went too low and she would gain the weight and all that. And she wasn't really compliant either. So it's like, it's time to just take it out. Right. It is time to take the thyroid out and we'll put her own thyroid hormone replacement and

Starting point is 00:37:53 rebuild those thyroid hormones so that she comes out of that hypostate and that's where she's going to live because this pendulum swing is not good for anybody. That sounds like a nightmare. It really does. Okay, so being, I want to talk about the hormone aspect of this then. So would hormones play a role in causing thyroid problems? Let's say like somebody with low testosterone, for example, or somebody that is using steroids or abusing testosterone too high of testosterone, would these have effects on your thyroid? Not necessarily. Estrogen dominance can. So if, you know, we see a lot of women battling picos, polycystic ovarian syndrome, which is usually like a low progesterone, estrogen dominant, sometimes androgen dominant state. But not, no, not so much with testosterone

Starting point is 00:38:42 because it's so protective. Where my heart goes out are my dudes who have hypothyroidism or Hashimoto's. It's the other way. It's that because they have low thyroid function, their testosterone will always be in the toilet. And of course, I mean, as you know and talk about, doctors will say, Well, you're normal because your testosterone is a 330, even though you're 35 years old, you know. So theoretically, if a male has Hashimoto's, they would feasibly need to be not only on TRT, but also T3, T4, or some kind of thyroid treatment. Well, yeah, because then if, like, let's say we have a guy walking around with Hashi and low testosterone and someone catches the low T, like he goes to one of the puppy milk clinics or whatever where they prescribe everyone testosterone. And he gets the testosterone. I am literally speaking from a patient that I had who's in his 20s.

Starting point is 00:39:36 They give him testosterone. The testosterone goes, the 500. He's on 200 makes a week. That doesn't make sense at all. What is keeping his testosterone low? Oh, look, there's this thyroid problem over here that nobody's addressing. And the thyroid's the master gland. So once you start working on the thyroid, now we can give him the testosterone,

Starting point is 00:39:57 and we see those levels go up because the thyroid, is actually helping the whole system work better. So let me ask you this then. Could you theoretically start with the thyroid, treat it, give it better, and then see testosterone function improve without doing TRT? Or would you? And I know this could depend on the age of the person. I understand that.

Starting point is 00:40:17 But let's say like with your person you're talking about in their 20s, instead of putting them on TRT and then screwing them over forever, could we address it without doing it? Yeah. Yeah, depending on where they're at in their journey. So, like, if they've been on TRT now for, like, two years, you know, I mean, you know, coming off with that, that's going to be hard. But, yeah, if they, like, just went to the puppy mill clinic and just started on testosterone, it's like, wait, let's stop that. Let's fix your thyroid first or let's drop your dose and bring your thyroid up the same.

Starting point is 00:40:50 Let's see what happens. And then if a guy's 50 years old, it's like, well, dude, your testosterone's not coming back up by just fixing your thyroid, but let's do both. No, but you do have some hope there. And so my thing is, and one of the things that I've talked to with a lot of the people that I find to be quite brilliant, is that they get people that have a lower testosterone number, lower free test number, but they don't simply just go, okay, you need TRT. We start to dig and see what the cause is first. See if we can get around using TRT, you know, first. And that's something, that's a marker. And what I'm stressing here to people listening is your thyroid could be.

Starting point is 00:41:28 a marker for you to look at before you just go think you need TRT. Right. Exactly. Everybody thinks that it's just that they're just got the short hand of the stick when they get low testosterone, and that's just not always the case. Sometimes it is and sometimes it's not. So I'm glad that you covered that and pointed that out. Okay. So I'm going to stay on thyroid, but shift gears at the same time.

Starting point is 00:41:50 So you and I have had several discussions about GLPs, and my assumption here is that you probably get people that have like an underactive thyroid that assume the people that may not understand that, oh, I'm going to take a gLP and lose weight. Okay. So let's look at this in a couple sections. What? Are they going to find that something like ozeppig or zepotitis is not nearly effective if they have an underactive thyroid? And two, do, does taking either of those or a gLP have any effect on the thyroid in terms of improving it or worsening it? Okay. So first question, is a strong yes. I have had many patients come into the practice. They were months and months on a GLP did not work. And months and months on a GLP at a pharmaceutical level dose. You know,

Starting point is 00:42:40 we're talking like, let's say we're talking tozebitide, five, seven point five, ten milligrams. Like a dose that you're like, that should have worked. Right. So that doesn't really make sense. And then we look at their thyroid. It's like, okay, that's why. So yeah, 100%. Now if we go into does the GLP hurt or help, we're kind of seeing that it helps if done in the right way. So microdosing GLP is, which I'm a huge fan of, reduction in inflammation. Well, whenever we take down inflammation in the body, the body is going to work better, whether it's your thyroid, you know, your hormones, whatever. So we are seeing improvements in the gut with GLP's done the right way, not where it stops your gastric motility completely. It has to be done the right way.

Starting point is 00:43:24 we're seeing improvements in gut function. We're seeing improvements in brain function. We're seeing alleviation of depression and anxiety that is just crazy. So there are so many benefits to GLP is when combined with parlor thyroid and hormone replacement that it's kind of exciting, but it's all about doing it the right way. I don't want to say that I've developed an obsession with it because that's not it in terms of my studies. But after sitting in on some of these conferences that turned out into all-out wars, my fascination and like my in-depth reading and analyzing the facts from the people that are really full of shit. So what I'm finding is you said for the most part.

Starting point is 00:44:06 And now I'm actually coaching people on it. So I'm taking real data because I'm certain, I need it. Yeah. I mean, even with the other benefits, I certainly don't want to start making my possibility of losing weight as hard as I've worked to fix my diet. But I'm monitoring people of seeing, you know, the people that are highly responsible. like you and like several other people that you and I both respect that are so strong and firm on the microdosing aspect. I am very careful in my personal recommendations and I'm curious about you in terms of running it higher unless it's like totally therapeutically needed because you and I both know most of people that use it don't actually medically need it. I mean, let's just be real here.

Starting point is 00:44:48 There are plenty of people that do need it. but do you find that people that don't need it run into problems as they start to go a little too high on the dosing and what you've observed or heard or been around? And are you finding that people have trouble when they discontinue using it, keeping the weight on? Yeah. So when people use it who don't need it, you're seeing the classic loss of facial fat, the ozempic face. you're seeing women walking around with no butts because they're losing all of their muscle. Right, right. You know, they look heart. They look anorexic.

Starting point is 00:45:26 I mean, let's face it. Like, people are looking horrible because you do lose muscles. So quick story back, gosh, whenever Munjar first came out, I was like, all right, I'll try it because, you know, I mean, we're biohackers. We'll try anything first before we tell somebody else to do it. So I'm like, I'll try this. I was trying to have five milligrams. And, yeah, I was losing weight. Had not noticed the muscle loss yet.

Starting point is 00:45:49 But then Peter Atia comes out with this article. I was like, you know, we're seeing like a 40% lean muscle loss with these GLPs. I was like, no, it's fine, Peter. We don't have to worry about that. And then I shit you none. It must have been like two to three weeks later. I'm looking at my arms. I'm like, see my mom's arms.

Starting point is 00:46:06 Like there's extra skin. I'm like, really? Yeah. Yep, go. Right? What's happening? Yeah. And that's exactly what was happening is I was losing lean muscle tissue.

Starting point is 00:46:16 So I stopped completely. I'm getting a little bit of weight back. But basically, I'm metabolically healthy, so I can stay within a realm. But then I got off, I wouldn't touch it. I would not touch. I was like anti-GLP all the way. I'm like, this stuff is horrible.

Starting point is 00:46:33 You're going to burn your muscle. But then the microdosing, you know, aspects started started digging into that, going down that rabbit hole. And you're right, it's fascinating. And so I was like, okay, I'll come back and I'll try it. I'll try like one milligram, maybe two, not this five. And that's where it's at.

Starting point is 00:46:50 It's finding that sweet spot of your microdose where you don't lose your appetite. And my side note, my lean muscle loss was not due to lack of protein. Yes, you have to eat protein like it's your job if you're taking a GLP, but that wasn't it. It was the GLP's direct effect on my muscle at too high of a dose. Yes. Microdosing, nothing. In fact, I'm actually seeing like, I don't want to say an improvement in my muscle, but almost like I get better pumps when I'm working out.

Starting point is 00:47:21 I'm definitely like keeping and putting on. Of course, it's really hard to put on muscle at the age of 50, but you can do it. But see, I have a better muscle shape and really overall musculature now than when I competed in my 20s all day long. That's beautiful. And not to say this is going to make you a mass. because you and I both know this. But one of the things, and I recommend this, whether you're taking a GLP or not, is the addition of creatine and running that with a microdose will certainly help alleviate

Starting point is 00:47:51 things. And one of the things that I sat in at the A4M, me and Queenie went to one of the conferences on GLPs and I have a whole thing of slides I say from one of the doctors there talking about a diet on GLPs that I'm analyzing and I'm put together some content for. So I'll let you know when I. I've got more detail to get into it. I'm working on it, you know, in my spare time, but I'm going to do a, part of possible diets that could alleviate muscle loss and atrophy and things like that.

Starting point is 00:48:20 Because, you know, losing muscle, I understand that when you're losing 100 pounds, you're going to have to sacrifice your muscle loss. Sure. Yeah. When you have this mindset or idea that, oh, I don't care about how much muscle I lose, I freak out. I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on. That'll kill you.

Starting point is 00:48:37 Yeah. That's ruin your quality of life. And it's going to short your lifespan. So I think that that's something that a lot of like these clinics that sell it or whatever, they need to address this and educate their patients on beforehand because loose muscle is extremely detrimental. You know, when you're talking mass quantities. Yes.

Starting point is 00:48:55 Oh. Yeah. And I don't know if you have any other hacks, but I think certainly creatine is something that you would want to add, even in a microdose, unless, you know, just to preserve that muscle. And the methodology of training, I would be more on like hypertrophy type of training. So the volume is more like 8 to 12 reps, 70, 80% of your max. So you're keeping that kind of muscle growth going. Just conscientious things like that.

Starting point is 00:49:19 I don't know. You have any other thing recommend where you've seen. Aminos. You know, just taking in aminos. And really the key, if you're doing a GLP and you lose your appetite or you get any side effect, you get herpurned, you get nausea, you get the fatigue, you lose your appetite. You're on too high of a dose. Yes. Yes.

Starting point is 00:49:40 None too high of a dose. So yeah, I do want you doing, do a protein shake, do a 50 gram protein shake. And ladies, yeah, you can absorb that. It's cool, especially if you bookend it. One really interesting study, I don't know if you've heard of this one, Dylan, but one really interesting study showed that women can absorb over 30, 40 grams of protein if you bookend it. So beginning of the day, end of day is their best absorption points. of having a higher protein meal. So, yeah, I mean, I'll do a 50 grand protein shake just to make sure I get that big bowless. And I do it more because I get busy during the day and don't get enough food until the beginning and the end of the day. But for my GLP peeps out there, yeah, drink a protein shake. But if you're not hungry, you're on too high a dose. Exactly. And, you know, one of the things that I just discussed, I was talking to JJ Virgin about it.

Starting point is 00:50:39 She said that the things that she gets a lot is, I don't know how to get the, you know, X amount of protein. I don't know how you do it. And I simply stated, like, for instance, before you and I started, I had a 12-ounce piece of salmon. Now, that might be big to some people because of the fat content, but to me, it's starving still. But 72 grams of protein in one setting that fast. You know what I mean? And I'm like, it's not that hard. four ounces of the chicken, you're like 26 grams.

Starting point is 00:51:04 So it's X amount. So my point is that it's not that difficult, you know, to get that kind of protein at all. Okay. So I wanted to get into, because you wanted to talk about T2 a little bit. So let's get into that. What is it? Why is it important?

Starting point is 00:51:19 And what's its function? Yeah. So I love talking about T2 because, you know, you're going to have people listening to this podcast that they are going to be stuck. Maybe they are on T4 only. maybe they have a slow metabolism. Maybe they kill their metabolism from amusing T3 because you can beat it and use it. So if you're in that place of, oh my gosh, my metabolism sucks.

Starting point is 00:51:42 I can't burn fat no matter what I do. I'm trying all the things. This is where T2 can come in. You don't have to have a thyroid problem and take it. So T2 is a thyroid hormone metabolite. If we look at the thyroid gland, like I said earlier, it produces T3 and T4. it also produces T1 and T2. T1 is inactive. We can just kind of set it over here off to the side. T2 is very active and they compare it to the activity on our metabolism to T3. However, it does not

Starting point is 00:52:15 burn muscle. It only burns body fat. It works at the mitochondrial level to produce ATP. So it's going to improve your energy for nice, steady energy through the day. It's going to brown white adipose tissues. That's why we jump into cold plunges is to brown our white squishy fat that we want to get rid of. So that makes us more metabolically active. It stimulates mitochondrial protein uncoupling. Thermogenesis. I mean, that's the basic way of, what is that? Increasing thermogenesis, improving lipid panels, improving insulin sensitivity. So it does all of these things without that feedback loop on your thyroid. So it's not going to tell your thyroid, you know what, just stop producing thyroid hormone now because someone is taking thyroid hormone.

Starting point is 00:53:04 Your thyroid gland is still going to produce the same amount of thyroid hormone. But by adding in T2, you're increasing your BMR, your basal metabolic rate, the amount of fat that you're burning at rest. So this comes back to what I heard that interview, the trainer to the pros, say about using T3 versus T2. Now, this was way back in the day, and I have been studying T2 for about 50. 15 years. I originally started using it because it was only available in like bro-science, angry bodybuilding supplement lives. And if I'm sitting across from a 40-year-old woman who's struggling with weight, I can't tell her to go to, you know, blow your face off.com and buy something with a gorilla on it. Like, it's not going to work. She's going to look at me like,

Starting point is 00:53:50 I got five heads. So now I was doing that because that was the only way that we could get it. So I was, I'm like, try this. Try this. Try this. It really would just trust me. Don't look at the name. Just try it. And I was getting massive results because it was available in supplement form. They didn't need a prescription. So fast forward to three years ago, I knew I'm like, it's time that I bring this to market to the masses so that my 40-year-old woman can go and buy it from a normal site and feel comfortable about what she's taking.

Starting point is 00:54:21 So the very first product that released in my fixer line was thyroid fixer, followed by my test. I call it thyroid fixer because it's after the brand. It's after me and it was my flagship product, not thinking that people would actually get confused and go, do I need a thyroid problem that take it? So thyroid fixer does contain T2. Yes, you can take it if you don't have a thyroid problem. And then metabolism fixer also contains T2. But T2 is just, it's amazing. It's amazing what it can do for your metabolism where you don't have to increase your T3. You don't have to beg your doctor for T3. You don't have to abuse T3. if you don't have a thyroid problem. So you don't really need a prescription for it then? Nope, not yet. Fingers crossed. But, you know, with the new admin coming in, I think we'll be good that the FDA isn't going to be a bunch of assholes and start wiping out our supplement industry.

Starting point is 00:55:12 I think we're good for at least four or more. Hopefully a lot longer than that. By that time, I hope then it sticks and that with the amount of people that are so pro, which I'm sure they will be, we won't have any issues. But we'll see. Okay, sweet. So let's talk about your supplement line. I've checked it out, but that's not for me to explain.

Starting point is 00:55:30 That's for you to explain. So tell us a little bit about your product line. What are some of the areas that you're addressing there? Obviously thyroid help, but you talked about metabolism help. What are the, are there any other areas there? And how long have you had the product line out? Yeah, it's been three years now, and I literally built it from what I see in my practice, from what I see on blood work and what I hear from my ladies.

Starting point is 00:55:54 And we have a men's line too. it's the low testosterone. You know, these women that they have low testosterone, half the doctors out there don't even realize that women have testosterone as a hormone. And they certainly will not prescribe testosterone because these women are getting told, like that's an dude hormone.

Starting point is 00:56:11 We can't give that to you. So these ladies are walking around with low testosterone, so I came out with hormone fixer. That is specifically targeted for women with low testosterone. It will raise your total by at least 20 points. So it absolutely is a fantastic alternative if you cannot get straight up to your tea or you don't want to take it. We have Hashimoto's fixer targeting Hashimoto antibodies, black cumin seed oil, lowers inflammation, reduces antibodies across the board of all autoimmune conditions.

Starting point is 00:56:42 And black cumin seed oil is one of the only, we'll say ingredients. Ingredients in a supplement that you can say actually helps prevent cancer because there are a multitude of studies behind it. that show that and prove that. So black human seed is part of my kind of no-dah supplement line, meaning, duh, of course you take it every day. Like you would take vitamin D every day. Like you would take iodine every day. Like you would take magnesium every day.

Starting point is 00:57:07 Like black human seed, I feel, should be in every person's protocol. And then we just kind of went from there. So then I was getting the guys that I told you about that would have low testosterone. So, I mean, I don't know how you feel. I should throw this question to you, but turkestrone, podosia. You know, I see great thing. When you have a man that cannot get testosterone, you know, maybe he can't afford to go to a clinic.

Starting point is 00:57:33 Maybe his doctor won't recognize that his testosterone of a 400 is not cool. So we got to give him something that can help them over the counter. So that's where I use tergesterone for dosia, beta exosterone. That's for my guys. We use testicular glandular. That's called my nuts fixer. My husband named that. So I had to, I had to put it out there.

Starting point is 00:57:54 Here's the deal. Here's the honest to truth deal when it comes to natural testosterone boosters. There's obviously some that are full of shit and some that actually do something. You're going to run a battle with the bros that are only used to steroids that think that if it's not increasing your testosterone number of thousand points that it just doesn't work. And that's just not true. Now, if you're expecting a miracle and trying to gain six or seven hundred points, then you just don't understand how it, worst. However, they absolutely can make a difference, how significant depends on how severe your hypogonal condition is, but for a female, shit, yes, absolutely. That is so perfect, unless there's something so severe going on that the only way around it. But certainly for a man, there is benefit,

Starting point is 00:58:44 there is help, and you're using proven ingredients that I know there's studies on that I've seen work, you just have to temper your expectations and understand. And when we're talking about the bros were talking about a niche audience and you're not targeting them. Nobody really gives a shit because they don't care about anything other than getting big. So it doesn't matter. But if we're, you know, if we're keeping it fact and we're keeping it real expectations, just like with anything else where it's at. But I think that's phenomenal for the women, especially because 20 points, I mean, those ingredients certainly can do that all day and make a difference on how you feel. Well, let's talk about that. So,

Starting point is 00:59:24 Are you finding, because I know that you dig a lot deeper and a lot of doctors don't. I happen to have spent a lot of time with women. I'm a mama's boy. I'm very close with my wife and my stepdaughter. And I just, I take women's health so serious. You know, I had when I was starting doing this, I had so many women coming to me like, why don't you do more and focus more on women? I'm like, shit, I just don't know.

Starting point is 00:59:46 You know, so I said, you know what? I'm going to study, study, study, study. But I don't, you know, it's better coming from a woman. doctor to talk about like what you experience with because I'm sure you have way more women patients than I ever dream of. How prevalent is a low testosterone issue and how serious really can it be for a woman? Yeah, it's pretty prevalent actually. So when we're looking at the hormonal cascade of a woman's life, we know that progesterone will go down first, sometimes as early as a woman's sometimes 20s if she's having consumption issues, but definitely 30s, 40s,

Starting point is 01:00:24 congestone takes the nose die first. Testosterone usually follows, although sometimes we can get this like weird surge or testosterone in menopause. But when I say surge, I mean, really a woman will spike to like, you know, 40 nanograms for deciliter total. And my cutoff, my optimal for women is 50 or above when it comes to the total. So she'll get almost there, but not quite. but then she'll drop down low again and then followed by estrogen last.

Starting point is 01:00:53 So low testosterone is really prevalent. I honestly, I'm thinking of all the labs that I've seen through the years. And unless she's in her early teeth, it's very rare that I look at a testosterone level and go, well, this looks good. Like nothing's, nothing's needed here. It's fine. And sometimes I even see low T in a woman's 30s and then you have to go, okay, do you want to get pregnant again? Like, if not, then we can start replacing this now because it's really low.

Starting point is 01:01:19 or we might actually use like a minuscule dose because you need to have normal testosterone levels to get pregnant too. So it's, yeah, it's very important. I call it to get shit done hormone. It helps us with everything. It helps us with the drive and motivation and getting things done. Women are multitaskers. You know this.

Starting point is 01:01:38 We have so much to do during the day. And if we don't have enough testosterone, we're not doing anything. You're not going to have the motivation to go to the gym and to get a work. out and take care of myself and take care of everybody else and then go to work and clean the house and make the dinner and you have help with all that. You're just kind of like, no motivation whatsoever. So yeah, it's vital. It's vital. It's my second favorite hormone next to thyroid. Okay. So a couple things then since we're talking about that. So, you know, it's troubling to me that a lot of women are so misinformed when it comes to testosterone and I'll bring it up.

Starting point is 01:02:18 and then there's always this fear. You know, it's scary. Like, you know, I don't want to look at that or do that. How could that help me? Why would that be? It's kind of like a lot of women that think if they go lift weights. Oh, I'm just going to get so big. And it's like, like, like one or two pounds of lean muscle, even as a man, you're really doing something.

Starting point is 01:02:36 Like, if you're keeping it and gaining it. So how do you overcome that? Because I'm sure you get that a lot when you bring it up. You have to. I mean, because I, you need to select few. I speak with, they have this utter fear. Yeah. What do you do?

Starting point is 01:02:54 I mean, how do you handle that? Well, you know, you just got to educate the ETO. You got to tell them the pros and the cons. And the cons really only come from overuse. Now, there will be this select few subset of women. And again, if I had to pay maybe three in the last like five to ten years that have been like this, where you give them a, drop of testosterone and they're breaking out and they're growing a beard and it's like a man and there actually is in the Dutch test we can test something called five alpha reductase. So that's the enzyme

Starting point is 01:03:30 that pushes your testosterone to diehydrotestosterone. And if someone has a propensity to push down that pathway hard, then yes, she might get some androgenic symptoms from just a tiny little amount of testosterone. So for her, we would use hormone fixer actually instead of TRT. But for the majority of women, if you dose it properly, then you're going to be fine. You know, most of the time I hear women come back and like, oh my God, this is amazing. I have drive. I have motivation. I have a libido again.

Starting point is 01:04:04 My husband thanks you as well for fixing my testosterone. So, you know, and it just improves life across the board. So when women actually experience it, we'll start low, we go slow, we'll start. because I want to see how you, you react to the testosterone as well. Yeah. And then we can always increase from there and adjust your dose. Yeah, it's just, it's like anything else. If you used properly, when it's needed, it's got its extreme benefits otherwise.

Starting point is 01:04:29 Yeah. So you brought up progesterone. Let's touch on that a little bit. What is it in simple form for everybody? And why is it so important to a female? Yes. Progesterone, progestation. So it's vital for fertility.

Starting point is 01:04:46 It cycles during our 28-day month, if you're still cycling. Progesterone goes kind of on a wild ride of going high and then going low. And when it goes low, that's the time where you shed, you shed your unerine lining because that drop in progesterone. So it's vital all the way through a woman's life because it also is very protective. So it's anti-prolific, meaning it's protective against cancer and cancer cell proliferation. It helps protect our bones. It helps with bone remodeling. Gosh, it helps T4 to T3 conversion.

Starting point is 01:05:20 It just has so many benefits. It helps us sleep. It takes the edge off, anxiety. I always say the classic low progesterone is when a woman goes, yeah, everybody in my family is asking me why I'm so bitchy all of a sudden. You got low progesterone, that's why. So, yeah, progester is a beautiful hormone, and then estrogen, since we're talking about all the hormones. Yeah. Estrogen, bone, brain, breast, heart protection.

Starting point is 01:05:45 You know, progesterone falls into that category, too. Estrogen reduces your risk of Alzheimer's by 67%. Like, that is huge. It is protective against breast cancer. I don't care what your doctor told you. Hormones don't cause cancer. Yeah, the benefits are just tremendous. So really, without hormones, we die.

Starting point is 01:06:04 So if we look at any mammal, they start that decline into death when they can no longer procreate. And we have figured out ways to extend our life. Thankfully, we get to enjoy more years. But it is a false assumption that, well, menopause is just now. No, menopause is the beginning of death. So as soon as you lose all your hormones, you are at a much higher risk of cancer, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes. obesity, not to mention just, you know, like wrinkling before your time, losing your hair, just all of that. So hormones give us life. Let's replace those hormones so that we can have our

Starting point is 01:06:46 best life. So in saying that, which makes so much sense, and I'm so glad you said that, when a woman starts to experience premenopause even, I think it would be, and you tell me if I'm wrong, I think it would be extremely important to start examining your hormones, looking at them, seeing what type of effect it's having and addressing it now before you let it get so bad that it's such a disaster and mess to fix. Yes. Yes. We replace those hormones as they go down. So I don't care if you're 30 and your progestones in the tank. Let's do progesterone. Now let's do testosterone. And then eventually when you need estrogen, we're here for you. We'll do that too. So we're going to yell at my wife when we're done since she has somebody in the house that

Starting point is 01:07:27 tells her constantly to check all of this shit and doesn't listen to me. So, You and I are going to handle that when we're done because this is a house where every time something's wrong with Dylan, everybody's on his ass and Dylan goes and checks everything. But then when Dylan, if everybody to do it, nobody does anything. Have an intervention. We're going to have an intervention when we're, and I know she's in there and can hear me right now. So. We're having an intervention. briefly touch on peptides a little bit because I know it's something that you do have some interest in.

Starting point is 01:08:09 Let's talk about, first of all, do you prescribe them? Can you prescribe them? Second of all, what is, do you have experience? And if so, what's your favorite or what's some of the ones you've used that you like? So we can prescribe them, but, you know, like we talked about on my podcast, I'm totally fine with people getting them from a reputable source like the ones that you mentioned. And, you know, let's face it, they're just cheaper. So if you're getting it from a reputable source, I'm fine with that. Yeah. And my favorites, BPC 157 for all things. I mean, just any kind of healing you need to do. I'm getting a laser procedure done next Monday. I still have BP. I just order from a number. I'm like, fast ship, two-day ship, please. BBC, thank you.

Starting point is 01:08:53 So, you know, BPC, GHCU and TB 500 for any kind of healing stack. Gosh,

Starting point is 01:09:01 what else? I still have not used the Impererrella that you told me, I have it. I haven't served

Starting point is 01:09:05 yet, so I'll report back to you on that, any of the, the HCH. But you know, you know

Starting point is 01:09:12 peptides better than I do. So I'll use the base, I'll call them the basic peptides. And then, you know, your knowledge gets into all the crazy areas. You always can feel free to ask me.

Starting point is 01:09:24 I will tell you this, though, that my, quickly to the top of my list is Tessa Marellon. Okay. Shit. You know why I love Tess Marellon so much is because Tess Marellon's main thing is fat loss, but it's so good at preserving and still adding the muscle. It's like recomposition in a bottle if you're dying. You know what I mean? And, of course, any type of something that causes weight loss, you have to,

Starting point is 01:09:48 accommodate your diet when you're trying to recomb. But everybody's goal in theory would be lose body fat, gain muscle mass. Forget about the scale because if you're losing body fat, you're looking good, you're being more healthy, and you're gaining lead muscle in the process, which in turn loses more body fat, right? So if you look it right, it's very, look, it can be done. You can do it without help. But if you have something that really works to your advantage, it makes it a hell of a lot.

Starting point is 01:10:18 easier. So that would be, that's one that we're going to have to talk about in the future. And then the GHKU, I've actually been using a cream on my skin. So I love it in cream form. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I have the capsules and then the cream form. So we're, I'm just working some some stuff here. And then I'm, I'm working with some might appear now too. So, you know, I'm doing everything I can to try to stay in my 30s here. So. I have a question for you then. Yeah. sarcatropin. Someone just sent this to me today. And it's, it's an oral. Now, everything that you've ever told me and taught me about any kind of,

Starting point is 01:11:01 I'm assuming with the name tropein, it would still be under the HGH kind of category. Yeah. Sports lane body masks, you know, oral solution to promote normal muscle recovery. Girl swears by this, but I don't know. I mean, would it even work orally like that? What's your opinion? Like, I'm not going to sit here and act like I have a big long fact sheet on it. And I know it's supposed to generally be termed or used as a replacement for sermoreland.

Starting point is 01:11:29 Look, everything right now, they're really trying to develop peptides in general to be able to take an orally in terms of capsule forms. And then they're obviously looking at more like gel-like substances. And there's a big thing going on right now. all of these formulations, just like, you know, like the OZemic tablets now and things like that. I will always, always, always preface this by saying the injections when it comes to something like HGH with peptides is always going to be your number one. It's going to have the most efficacy. It's going to be the best delivery source. This particular one that you're talking about, I need more data on to trust it. Just like the Kaiser Trex for the TRT that's now an oral.

Starting point is 01:12:14 I don't yet, although, like, Dr. Yourth stands by at a million percent and I respect her out of the building. So I have some trust there, but I haven't tried it and I need more data, especially when it comes to, it's hard to make a pill or anything in that form without some toxicity added or some kind of alpha appellation, you know, done to it, modification. So it's supposed to not supposed to affect your liver, but, you know, I'm hesitant just because of what I know. Yeah. But I'm always receptive and open to something new and I've seen things done. Just with that particular one, I don't have enough daddy yet. I just know bits and pieces of what it's meant to be. You just have to sometimes as much as I like to try shit and I know you do, sometimes it's better to just wait.

Starting point is 01:13:00 Yeah, yeah, see what comes out. Yeah, exactly. So for you, do you take patients then regularly now? How does that work if somebody wants to be a patient of yours? What are they going to do? Yep, absolutely. So just go to Dr. Amy.com and click the book of call page. And you'll look a free call with my team.

Starting point is 01:13:19 They're going to go over your whole health history, where you're at, what you're taking, or how many doctors you've seen, right, what you've been told, all of the things. And then we'll go over the different options for you based on what you've been through and what you're looking for. So yeah, we prescribed all 50 states, most of Canada. You book that call, then we can put you in a program if you do need the thorough testing. because your doctor won't order the testing. You need thyroid hormone replacement. You're looking for bioidentical hormone replacement.

Starting point is 01:13:47 All of that we can do. We can do the gLPs. We can do peptides as well. But really, it starts with you just booking a call and finding out what the best path is for you. And we have a really cool lab assessment now. We actually just released it like it's out today. And if you go to Dr.imi.com forward slash labs, you'll be able to take a walkthrough. Now, I know you might not have all of the labs, but you can get them, you know, order your own or whatever, just so you have that data.

Starting point is 01:14:17 And then as you're going through this decoder, you're getting real-time feedback for each one of those lab markers. So we're looking at thyroid and hormones. That's what we focus on in this decode your lab platform. But it's going to tell you exactly what your labs mean. And we go by those optimal lab value ranges, not just normal. So with all of the markers, whether it's testosterone or. whether it's T3, we want you in the optimal range. And that's where you can plug in your value and get real-time feedback.

Starting point is 01:14:49 So we're talking the real optimal range, then not the bullshit one, right? Right. Right. I do. I do it. I just said to throw that in there so people knew. You know, I want people to recognize and understand this too with you is that you have one of the most successful podcasts in the health and wellness.

Starting point is 01:15:07 I've looked at ratings and how they fluctuate. You're always right there. How long have you been doing your podcast for? And what's the motivation and goal with it? Yeah, four years now. Okay. And the motivation and goals, because I just love the talk. Like, you and I love this, right?

Starting point is 01:15:24 This is probably the best part of our day. Exactly. It's just having a discussion with somebody else and educating people. And it's about getting this message out, getting the education out, getting the knowledge out, and really empowering people with this knowledge of how they can up love with their health. I could do this all day long. So that's really the motivation for it. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:15:45 Well, you have some amazing content and it's always fun and it's always great to listen to. And I know so many people respect you. And when I met you, you came so highly recommended. And it was just, it's so cool to have these conversations with you and the things that you and I talk about and convers about and different,

Starting point is 01:16:02 like, you know, just and people that are listening. So you know, like what types of things that people like us talk about. It's, we're always looking for something, and some kind of answer or some kind of new methodology.

Starting point is 01:16:13 And that's the type of shit we talk about. Because, you know, some people, they talk about gossip. They talk about this. They talk about that. Well, that's what we talk about. And that's how we learn is we learn from each other. That's what I love doing this so much is that for so many years, I was so resistant to, like, do it. Because I felt territorial because I was the only one doing things on YouTube at the time.

Starting point is 01:16:34 And once I grew up and stopped being a dick and walking to people like you and everybody, It's this is what it's all about. This is how we learn is sharing it with each other and learning from each other. And I think that it's a blessing to have people like you that we can, you know, that are willing to talk and willing to share and be honest and tell people the facts. So, you know, just I guess what I'm saying is thank you. It's greatly appreciated, you know, what you do and how long you've been doing it. Pleasure. I love it. Love doing it. Awesome. I know we both kind of, we went long and that's okay because we probably could go. another several hours and we'll probably have to do a part two because I have other things I want

Starting point is 01:17:12 to talk about. So you can do that for sure. Well, like if you want to again give out your social media stuff where people can follow you too and I'll link everything in the description like I do so everybody can follow you. Absolutely. Yeah, Dr. Amy.com, D-R-A-M-I-E is where you can pretty much get anywhere. So you can find the labs, Dr. Amy.com forward slash labs. You can book a call. You can get to my store from there as well. If you want to grab T-2, thyroid fixer, metabolism fixer, thing at all. And the Thyroid Fixer Podcast that Dylan was a guest on as well, a lot of good information. And yeah, just dive in. Listen, Facebook, we do have a Facebook group called Just Fixer Thyroid. That's a great place for people to jump into. You can post your lab. So yeah, you can take

Starting point is 01:17:58 the decode lab quiz, but you can also post your labs in there. And I'm in there. My nurse practitioners are in there. Group experts are in there, giving you real time feedback as to what we're looking at. So it's a huge, loving community, tons of support with real answers for you. I didn't know. You had that. I'll join the group, too. Yeah. Oh, my God.

Starting point is 01:18:17 Yeah. For sure. I have to tell you something about a lab I just had a poll that was quite shocking in a good way, too, that you're going to be shocked, I think, when you hear. Okay. Cool. That was the LP Little A lab, you know, that I have had done multiple times. So, yeah, we'll get into that later. So, but thank you so much.

Starting point is 01:18:34 It's so greatly appreciated. It's always so fun talking to you. and it's just, it's always a pleasure. So thank you. Absolutely. My pleasure. Awesome. All right, everybody.

Starting point is 01:18:44 Well, you've got plenty of education on thyroid and many other things, so I hope you enjoyed it. Stay tuned for plenty more to come. Dylan Jameli and Dr. Amy, the thyroid fixer, sign it off.

The Dylan Gemelli Podcast - Episode #7 Featuring Dr. Amie Hornaman, THE THYROID FIXER! The most COMPREHENSIVE Thyroid Analysis Discussion in the Podcast World!

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