The Livy Method Podcast - Week 4, Day 32 with Dr. Paul Hrkal

Episode Date: October 15, 2026

Which supplements are actually worth taking? And why do so many people lose hair while they’re losing weight?Naturopathic doctor Dr. Paul Hrkal joins Gina Livy to walk through the five foundational supplements he considers safe and effective for most people. Then he breaks down six common causes of hair loss, and why an expensive hair gummy may not fix what’s really going on. They also cover obesogens, the everyday chemicals linked to weight gain, and simple swaps that lower your exposure without the panic.Where to Find Dr. PaulInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/drpaulhrkal/Website: http://www.paulhrkalnd.com Upcoming Offering:6-Week Energy Reset ChallengeStarts October 19th$50 off for members using code LIVY50https://academy.paulhrkalnd.com/dr-paul-s-6-week-energy-reset-challenge-fall2026This podcast aligns with Day 32 of our Fall Program, members can find video in our Livy Method app or Livy Method Community Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/livymethodThere is still time to join the Fall Program and there are two ways to join you can purchase the Fall Session for $99, or become a member for $20/month for year-round support, access to every session, Livy AI, member perks and more. The program is meant to fit into your life, not make your life the program. So start when you’re ready, make it work for you, and visit livymethod.com to join us. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

New season, new name, bigger conversations. Welcome to Live Lighter with Gina, because lightness isn't something you find. It's something you create in your body, your mind, your home, and in your life. Real conversations, no bullshit. So let's lighten things up for you. If you're looking to lose weight and you want to keep it off, you have got to check out the Living Method. Better than ever, easy to follow.

We have the most incredible community, and it works. head over to living method.com to sign out today. Hello. Good morning, Gina. Hello, everybody. Nice to see you and nice to be back. Yeah. I mean, for any of our new listeners or members or watchers,

Dr. Paul's been with us for a while now. I mean, you know the ins and outs of the program. You've had an opportunity to work with quite a few of our members. You know the things that people are struggling with. You know the things that are working. I want to start today with what's the number one thing you're worried about with people in their health? And has that changed over the years? Yeah.

So first of all, you know, I really try to encourage my patients not to worry as much as possible, even though they're in the most serious situation. So I know you walked into that one a little bit. But a lot of times the worry about something, whether it's like, oh my gosh, I think I might be sensitive to gluten. and the research shows is that you can actually increase your reactivity to certain things, to foods, for example. So that aside, I personally as a clinician, I think that one of the things that is really coming up more and more is the impact of all the things that we are surrounding ourselves

with electronics, invisible things like electromagnetic radiation, microplastics. I've done a webinar on this recently. We've talked all about this. And these are the things that science officially, the stances, I don't really know what it does. But when you look one layer deeper, it's kind of like what trans fats were 10, 15 years ago.

You know, they were like, well, you know, maybe not that bad. And then before that it was smoking, maybe not that bad. But now there's more and more data coming out. So a lot of this stuff is like, okay, let's look at our environment. So we talk about food a lot. the program. You're talking about what you're putting in your mouth, what you're eating. But then the way that that food is processed and the way it's housed and the way it's warmed up and the way that you're actually storing it all makes a difference, Gina. Yeah. You know, it can be overwhelming.

You just this always goes back to the insulin resistance conversation. Many, many years ago where the people who science were like insulin resistance is pseudoscience, it's not a real thing. And now not only do we know it is a real thing, but it's affecting a lot of things. So where's the line there, right? Because I get it. We need to science. It's really important. But science is science until it changes.

And we don't know what we don't know. And there are some studies and some stuff that's saying, hey, creatine for your brain, for example. So creatine could be beneficial. The most studied supplement, it could be beneficial for your brain. health. There's not a lot of studies for that benefit, but no doubt five years from now, though it'll probably be a lot. So how do we navigate this? Because do we just only listen to science, or do we keep our minds open to, okay, maybe there's something to what people are saying about X, Y, or Z? Yeah. It's a really good distinction because there's a saying that one of my professors

when I was in naturopatic medical school used to say, it's like, you want to be open-minded by not so open-minded that your brain falls out. So it's kind of like, yes, right now, here's the reality of our current medical system, is that the medical system at the family primary care level, family doctor level, is probably 10, 15 years behind the actual science, right? So when they're saying, you know, hormones don't have evidence, it's unsafe. That's BS because we now know that all that's coming out and being proved, that it actually is very safe, much safer than it was originally, we were told,

and a lot of people were denied based on that kind of unsafe. So now we know that there's a lag time. So I think the fact that people are here listening to this very conversation in a program like yours where it's on the leading edge of what's happening, where if you're one of the people that's like, no, you know what, I just trust my doctor 100%. Everything they say is like the word of law. that's where I think people get left behind instead of being like, you know what, I'm going to take a little bit of ownership and advocacy from my health. And I think the fact that you're, again, listening to this is a big indicator that you are already on that side, on that team.

Now you're going to be able to listen to people that are going to be talking about the actual recent evidence. And even as it evolves, because, you know, I'll be the first one to say that if something changes, I'll be, I'll say that I, you know, maybe I was. mistaken about that before. And that's okay. A lot of people think that they have to be like beyond reproach. No, it's it's a matter of being honest. But I think the data so far is indicating that certain things that were exposed to are in our environment. We may not have the full story, but the signal is that it's not leading down the right direction. And the last thing I'll leave it off because I love that you said insulin resistance. Yeah. I don't know if you even meant it in context of some environmental connection. But

There is molecules that are in our environment, that are in our skin care products, that are in our foods that are called obesity. Yeah. They're called diabesogens, meaning that they cause diabetes and obesity. And what this means is that these chemicals that are found in all these daily things that people are possibly being supposed to change the receptors and the way that we communicate, cells communicate. communicate leading to or contributing to, maybe not the only cause, but contributing to you being overweight. So when you say, and this is one of the reasons we started working together over six years ago, when you were like, your body's detoxing.

There were people that heard you say being like, Gina's, woo, you know, that's like, but as a natural doctor, I was like, yes, give me some more. I'm here for that because that actually is what I think on a cellular level is happening. your body is not just getting good stuff in, it's now processing some of the stuff out. Yes. I mean, and detox, I still have it. I'm yet to sell any detox cleanses or tease, y'all. Because the body is very capable on its own.

We're all about helping the body be as efficient and healthy as possible. That's what we're all about, especially when it comes to the way we eat, but also the way we're managing stress and trying to get better sleep and moving our bodies and whenever we do talk about supplements. I just want to revert back to that science conversation. and just kind of give some examples. So one, when it comes to our doctors and no one is knocking their doctors. I love my doctor.

I'm grateful for doctors. But look at the menopause conversation. That's a great example where they were taught only so much. And now the learning has happened so fast that the doctors are trying to catch up with the learning. And that is a perfect situation. Well, a research study said this. And then when people finally dug into it, that wasn't necessarily. necessarily the full picture or the Canada food guide.

Canada food guy has been around forever and no disrespect. Our good friend, Dr. Sean Wharton, has a hand in that Canada food guide currently as it stands. But it didn't have a focus on 30 grams of protein at each meal. And it had something like 11 servings of grains, 11 servings of grains. So I don't want you running out and buying every Wackadoo thing that someone is suggesting on the cutting edge of, you know, research or science or whatever, but we do want to have open conversations about these things. Obesogenic environment, because when you talk about obesityogenic foods, for example, processed foods that are designed to be addicting. You talk about microplastics.

And, you know, it's hard. Tony and I watch that. We watched that documentary. We've tried to get rid of all the plastics in our house. But everything, your food is wrapped in plastic. It's just like to what extent do we worry about these things? Let's talk about that worry word. Yeah. So first of all, again, I'm going to go back to it. I'm not worrying about anything. I'm going to look at this is the same thing that I'm looking at technology,

the same way I'm looking at light exposure late at night. This is all like sleep hygiene and sun hygiene and actual hygiene equivalence. It's like, okay, so are you now chemically hygienic? and which is a funny way of thinking about it, but looking at the things that you're consuming, you're never going to go to zero. Let's put that out there. You're never going to have no exposure to plastic or chemicals.

You know, we don't live in the jungle, in the deep Amazon rainforest. That's just not the case. However, even they have phones. Even they have phones now. They have phones and they have lots of runoff from the mining in the next valley that has a ton of arsenic in the water.

So the point is, is that we are in a, we're a global people that is impacted by lots of environmental things. So A, don't worry about it because it's very easy for people to be like, oh, my gosh, Dr. Paul just did a webinar on microplastics. And he told me about that it's in my perfume. It's told me it's in my cream. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm losing it. They're going to the cupboard. They're ripping it apart. Okay.

There's some simple things. I'm going to give you some action items. And again, it doesn't mean that you have to be off the reservation. Okay. Number one. Okay. Start considering just the same way that probably the beginning of the Libby program, you started reading the ingredient panel a little bit more closely.

Start considering what is that food being housed in? Because you're now taking the majority of microplastics and the majority of these chemicals are coming in through the food that we eat. That is the reality. Now, of course, there's the air that we breathe. We have less control over that. Get outside. The air outside is healthier than inside.

A little simple thing like that. So getting outside, exercising, especially when the weather is still good. Number two, start evaluating the other things other than food. So I talked about food packaging. The more processed food it is, the higher the chance of having these chemicals in it. Because all those things you can't pronounce, they are the ones that are often contaminated by some of these chemicals. Okay. So already by eating whole foods, you're minimizing that.

Yeah. So you want to. Yeah. Yeah. Already so much. Okay. Let's start there and then unpack that and then talk about all the different things we can do to be healthier. Yeah.

Because you're already doing so much when it comes to falling in the food. Always already so much with being hydrated, eating good nutrient rich foods. Again, trying to get better sleep, moving your body, trying to help your body recover from stress. You're already doing so much. This is this is kind of preempting the conversation next week, which is, you know, leveling up the things that you were doing. And it's not by necessarily doing more. We're not adding more to your plate. It's about being mindful about the things that you are doing or or or not doing. Just some simple smart substitutions. I'll give you a couple real practical examples. Number one.

Okay. You are what kind of water are you drinking? You are you obviously being asked to hydrate. Are you drinking bottle plastic water? Are you drinking top water? Those are the ones that have the higher chance of having some of these chemicals and things like plastic molecules in it because it's sitting in that plastic bottle for months sometimes, right? And so there's a little bit of leaching. If you freeze your water bottle or let it heat up in the car and then obviously taste funky, well, that happens on a micro level. So switching, making a switch, moving over to a filtered water system. Start with something like a Brita system better than nothing, getting the chlorine now. Then you can move on to one of those like gravity fed, Sotivia type of systems. Again, no affiliation. And then finally, a reverse osmosis. If there was

one investment thing, I would suggest you do for the amount of water that you drink, invest in a reverse osmosis system that goes underneath your sink. Those are the ones that are very cost effective and it has a remineralization component on it. It's going to be great for the environment because you're cutting out all that plastic stuff. The stuff on the fridge, if you have a water filtration in the fridge, that is better than a Britta. It often has a carbon filter, but it's not as good as a reverse osmosis. So something as simple as that. Like, you're drinking now liters of water and you're increasing that. So obviously we need to try to make sure we're eating a drinking that healthiest type of water. So what about, what about water bottles?

You know, you read all sorts of things like your plastic water bottle is like just a cesspool of germs and and let alone the plastics. What about steel versus glass versus I mean obviously you would recommend not using plastic? What about the BPA or you know whatever free? Yeah. So BPA became really like a thing because it is one of these molecules that's linked to, you know, being overweight. It disrupts hormones. It disrupts fertility. BPA is a plasticizer. So it's put in a bottle to make it a little bit softer or harder. And there are as many businesses. Phenols. There's bisphenol A, but there's also bisphenol B and C. They don't care about those. They care about just pulling out one bisphenol that got all the, that I got all the media attention.

That's all still in there. So if it says BPA, I still think that it's better to avoid plastic. I would suggest glass, if you can. So like this morning, I drank my electrolytes and my creatine and my vitamin C powder in a mason jar, like an old school mason jar. that you can just like put the top, mix it up and drink it. You can have it as simple as that. Obviously stainless steel now is super popular. In my house, I have five kids, and there's probably 25 water bottles at any given time on the countertop.

I hate it because it's such a clutter. And a lot of those bottles sometimes we try to avoid this, but they're kind of cheap. And so a good quality one doesn't break down. So a lot of the good ones are going to be. be ones that kind of last the longer, the little bit more solid. If it's flimsy, it can be, it can start to kind of lose some of its integrity. And so yeah, overall glass and stainless steel is by far the best, you know. Okay. What else? What's the next thing? What's something else we can

do to level up our health that we're not really thinking about. Okay. So you know what? I'm going to now give you an example of something that I think from a technological perspective, we can actually benefit from it. So there's a number of different apps that you can actually use to check the barcode to see if this product does have some ingredients that have been connected to some of the things we've been talking about, some of these endocrine disruptors. The one that I use is called Yuka, Y-U-K-A. Everyone can actually probably pulling out their phone. You can go to the app store and you can download it. You don't have to pay for it. I don't think I'm using a free version of it. And basically what you can do is you can just scan your barcode that of anything in the store,

like, for example, a skin cream if you want. And it's going to say, hey, these ingredients are suspect. And it gives you like a little red warning. Or it says, you know what? This one actually is pretty good. And they give you like a rating out of 100, I believe. Huh. For some reason, it's signed me out right now.

But anyways, I would otherwise I would have shown you. Check out that. There's other options out there. But literally it's as simple as like scanning it. And they're like, you know what? I don't have a pee. HD and chemistry. I don't know what all these like,

poly, this, that mean, but there's technology that can help you. So maybe trying to switch some products from the ones that are not really rated well. So think about cleaning products. Think about skincare products. Think about cosmetics. Think about foods. You can scan all that.

It gives you a rating. And then this gives you at least a place to start. If you're not a fancy person. People are using it. They love yucca for all my skincare products. Love the app. app, love the app. Okay, that's great. I mean, all of these things, they do add up. I remember I went down the rabbit hole of like EDTA and all these like food additives in my journey, my weight loss

journey and why wasn't I losing weight? And for a while, I just spent a billion dollars on organic foods when I didn't have a good billion dollars to spend on organic foods. And I read all these books about toxins and all the additives and that, you know, they added North America versus versus Europe and EDTA was like it's an anticoagulant, which isn't a big deal on its own, but in large doses can lead to cancer. But then it's in our shampoo. It's in our products. And it's in all of these things.

And then sometimes we try to avoid products like on food products where we don't know the name, but sometimes the name is like actually either, you know, a healthy preservative or, you know, vitamins and minerals added to it. So you can't necessarily just avoid anything. You can't. name. So this is great. You know, people are, people want to talk supplements. Okay. What, what? People want to talk supplements, um, Dr. Paul. So, creatine, um, people are like, please tell me there's nothing wrong with my creatine, of course.

I know, I know you're going to say there's nothing wrong with your creatine, but give me like the taught, like, give me that what are, what is, what do you, what do you must have, obviously working with your own health care provider, but, and then what are some new, what's some new stuff? Yeah. Okay. So let's start with my founding. five or the Fab Five. I think you already talk about this, but I'm just, my five, five, I think lines up pretty closely with yours. Yeah. And the reason, just to give you some context here, Gina, is that these are, these are ingredients, these are molecules, these are vitamins and minerals that are a, in short supply, or B, we need because of our current environment, high stress is a big component

into that. And we also, these are appropriate for most of the people that are listening here at this stage in life that are, and it's very safe. And so there's the three criteria. So number one, magnesium. Magnesium is something that is not found that readily in diet. It's found in a lot of kind of like pumpkin seeds and like dark green leafy vegetables. And we just generally don't eat enough of that. And those foods don't have as much. So, magnesium really helpful for cardiovascular health, inflammation, blood flow. And blood flow is really king in the body. If the tissue is getting blood flow, it's generally healthy, it's being nourished and detoxifying. Yeah, what's your favorite kind of magnesium? So I use probably seven

different types in my practice. I have lots of different types. So it depends on, it depends on what your need is. So this is why you go see a naturopathic doctor. It's nuance. It's very personalized. There is nuance. But I mean, that being said, people always try to pin me down say like if I was lost in the forest and which one would I want to take with me? Probably magnesium glycinate, but I don't like the 200 milligram one because it's adulterated with magnesium oxide. Well, people don't know this. There was a little slight of hand that happened probably 10 years ago where the companies were

like, you know what? I'm going to up the dose because more is better, obviously. Not really, but. Yeah. And I'm going to mix it with mag oxide. Megoxides and found in the laxative bile. So you're getting maglycinate, mix with magoxy, so the amount goes up because it doesn't take of a lot of space and you have less magnesium glycinate.

So actually like a lower dose that's pure 100% if possible. And that makes it a lot easier in your digestive system. All right. I know you love Magcom and Megam is helpful for a lot of people that suffer with constipation and a lot of people that need to have a little bit of a boost for sleep. I know a lot of sleep doctors say that's BS. Magnesium doesn't help with sleep. I'll tell you different because in my practice, people do say it helps me to sleep.

So I don't care what you say about that because I've seen it. However, it usually happens early on in like the first couple weeks of you using it. And then it's often because like their muscles are tight. So they have a little bit more relaxed. Yes. It's not a sleep aid. It's not going to take it during the day. You're not going to sleep.

Yeah. No, not at all. There's nothing sedative about it. It just helps your body do what it's normally trying to do. Also the fact I like glycine because the meg glycine, the glycine component is a calming amino acid, Gina. So I really like that as an added bonus because it's the combo of the two. that also makes it extra therapeutic. So maglycinate is number one.

Number two, I'm a big fan of vitamin D for Canadians. I'm a Canadian, you're Canadian, everyone that is living north of kind of like that sunbelts. Yeah. You're not getting sun outside. Also, even in the winter, you're not making vitamin D, Gina. You're not making vitamin D at 9 o'clock in the morning when you go for a walk. You're not getting vitamin D when you're at, you know, outside,

sitting by the pool at 5 o'clock in the summer, in the evening. You only make vitamin D between 10, maybe 11, and three here in this area of the world, which is we live in the Toronto area. I just want to say right there, because someone's like, my doctor told me I don't need magnesium because I most likely get enough for my diet, but how would she know? And I think this is the thing with supplements and there's research. There's like, it's like we don't, we're not going back to the 80s with their, you know, you pee it out and there's not enough research. There's a lot of research behind the benefit of supplement. Supplements are there to supplements. Exactly.

Like if you're, if you are deficient, it's hard to build that back up through through your food alone. And when it comes to magnesium, for example, you would have to specifically curate your diet to make sure you are getting enough. And we are adding in the leafy greens and the nuts and the seeds and, you know, those high magnesium foods. But this is for every supplement you'd have to basically curate your diet to make sure you are getting enough.

And vitamin D is one that we're not. really getting from our food sources. And unless you're actually bare chest out in the daylight for what was it, 15 minutes, twice a day. Yeah, it would be at least 15 minutes, yeah. You're not getting your vitamin deep. Okay, cool. And almost every single person's skin care has some SPF in it. Check it. I bet you, especially women. Mine it every day. I don't fucking leave the house without it. Yeah, exactly, right? So I want to maintain my, but that's preventing those. Probably has microplastics in it too and I'm fucked. Whatever. Yeah, exactly.

That doctor that says you probably get enough of your diet, they're probably like a big fan of the Canada food guy. They probably think that's the best thing because they have the same kind of mentality. Now, again, you have to think about this. You're on a journey to better health. You're trying to lose weight. You're trying to ask more of your body. You are asking to go above and beyond the bare minimum that you've been stuck at. And bare minimum, you're just not happy with because it's led you to where you are right now.

and you're in this program because you're looking to improve and change and level up. So why wouldn't you also level up your nutrition, including nutrients that your body needs more of when you're asking more of it? Yeah, I love that. You're asking, like you're in the pursuit of change. You're asking a lot from your body to not just, you know, release this fat, but also to get healthier. Yeah, I love that. Okay, so magnesium vitamin D, what's your next? Magnesian vitamin D, omega-3s, for sure.

There's a lot of data. Of course, there's a couple naysayers saying, omega-3s are nonsense. This is going to be the same for everybody, for every supplement. There's always going to be somebody that's going to say it's useless. Omega-3s are the most research supplement in the world, more than creatine genome by far.

Probiotics number four, I used to not have them on my list, but the more I looked at the research and the more I've been practicing, the more I think that our guts are constantly being assaulted by different things. Stress. You know that if you have any sort of stress right away within a couple of minutes, your one cell thick lining, your gut starts to become more leaky. So now it's letting in more food proteins.

So you're getting more. We get ulcers. We get ulcers. That's like the worst case scenario. But even on like if you don't have ulcers, you still can get a negative impact on your gut is what controls. Here's that word, inflammation. And inflammation is the signaling process that really dictates a lot of chronic health issues,

including obesity, by the way, and being overweight. So probiotics help reduce that. Now, there are, again, if I said seven magnesium types, there's probably 25 different probiotics that are all very specific. So this is where if you have struggled with probiotics before in the past, then I would suggest you seek out someone that can help guide you in finding the right one for you. because there's probiotics, Gina, that are specific for women. If you get UTI infections, there are great probiotics for you.

But if you have IBS, we're at the level that the research shows that there's specific strains for you. If you have acne, if you have eczema, if you have depression, there's literally strain-specific probiotics for each and every one of the things I just mentioned and many, many others. What about hair loss? Is there a probiotic for hair loss? We have people saying, what can I, what vitamin, supplement, mineral, whatever can I take for hair loss? Is there? So it would be general. There isn't one for hair loss because that is a, that hair loss is a symptom. It's not a condition or a disease. And so it usually tells us about certain things. But you know what? Since you brought out hair loss and I know people are going to go bonkers in the chat because hair loss is such a sensitive thing. My wife just talked about it periodically over the last five years. Forget my stomach lining. My hair falls out. Like it's finally growing back in. But yeah. Yeah. Okay. So let's talk about what are the reasons that hair loss can. be occurring. Number one, any sort of change in your life, whether it's even positive or negative.

I'll give you an example. I've had the opportunity and the honor to work with so many people that have worked through the Livy program. There are people that have lost 40 pounds and then lost hair during that time. So even sometimes that process of changing, whether you call it detox or whether you call it weight loss or whatever, that can cause hair loss. Number two, you mentioned it already, stress, usually negative things. So this is, again, one of your ways of your body reacting to stress. Usually it's temporary and transient. You'll start losing hair in different areas.

Number three, if you're deficient in certain nutrients, iron being the biggest one, zinc being another main one, you can test for both of those, Gina, by the way. And most hair, skin, and nail products have zinc in it. Number four, you start thinking about your hormone. So adrenales and thyroid. a huge one. Thyroid is one that can be tested on blood. I test a lot for adrenals. I could probably talk three hours on adrenal health. If you don't know what adrenals are, it's your stress coping system that produces cortisol. And I know you've all heard of cortisol. Yeah. And that's number four.

Number five, reproductive hormones and imbalances in there. So for example, it doesn't even have to be metapausal. You can have this happening if you have polycystic ovarian issues. If you have menstruately regularities that have to do with too many. male pattern hormones. You actually, women will start getting thinning hair at the top. They'll start getting a little bit

of the male pattern hair loss. That particular pattern is related to those types of hormones. And finally, number six, it's something environmental. So whether it's like a treatment you put on it or it's a chemical that you're being exposed to, usually people are pretty savvy with that.

And then genetics. Some people, like if their mom is thin hair, some people, try their hardest, Gina, and they still lose some hair. But I think I covered a lot of options that are modifiable. So I would have to like look through all those. And if you don't really change, then find somebody that can help you with that. You know, this is just, gosh, this is so where it is so nuanced. And this is the problem with social media is that you're getting 30 seconds, 60 seconds of

this. We wanted, we're desperate to find something for our hair loss, but it could stem from a variety of different issues. And so this is where, I don't know, I don't want to like, you know, be a downer here. I'm actually quite excited because these conversations are awareness. So maybe if you're stuck and you just chose to buy this super expensive hair gummy, that's not working for you. I was just going to say the same thing. Probably not what you needed in the first place, right?

And we've had extensive conversations with Dr. Paul. Like we, you know, I'm going to get the team to go through so many. We've talked about cortisol. I want you to finish up magnesium vitamin D omega-Omega-3 probiotic. What was number five? Number five is B vitamins. So this is a family of vitamins that often are needed in higher levels when we're under stress, when we're detoxifying. Those are the two big ones.

The number one most commonly depleted class of vitamins due with medications, things like antibiotics, things like the birth control pill. All that stuff is being kind of suppressed and used up in the body. The only place to really get B vitamins, unfortunately, sorry for the plant base crew. is that it's through animal meats. There's very small amounts in plant-based foods. And so, again, and everyone knows this. Anyone that's vegetarian or vegan is right away thinking about, I got to take iron.

I got to take B12. Well, your B12 also has seven other brothers and sisters that work in the same kind of vein. So they all have like their little subspecialty with like nervous system or, you know, DNA repair or whatever it might be. that they do. They help with metabolism, but B vitamins are often under the radar kind of like suboptimal. Okay. So, you know, the takeaway from this conversation is the nuance behind it. Magnesium. There are different types of magnesium, vitamin D. Do we need the K with the D or just

the D or like, what's the deal there? Yeah, ideally you would have K. There's lots of new emerging research that's been around actually lots of research for decades showing that vitamin K tells the calcium, which the vitamin D absorbs in the gut, to go in the right spots. Because we don't want to put calcium into our blood vessels. That's what makes it them stiff, right? Okay. And we've seen like a calcified hose. So yeah, I would say if you can do it, absolutely. Unless you're taking a really high amount of vitamin D because your doctor said, you know, you're low and we got to raise your levels, then maybe use vitamin D by itself, but then

vitamin K2 would be helpful. Okay. Then we have omega-3. And then we have probiotic, prebiotic, which is for a variety of different things. And then we have the Bs, which is a variety of different things. Like, so this isn't really the, like, we just go to the health food store and we're like, let me buy a magnesium, a vitamin D and omega three. Like, what, what is, and I don't want to use the word safe, but what would be reasonable for us to kind of be like, you know what, I think I could benefit from these things without having to go see a natural pathic doctor and, you know, spend a shit ton of money on a blood plant panel, which is worth your investment, by the way. And, but where's the line there?

Because they're available. They're all available at the health food store. Where's the line there, Paul? I think that, Gina, the primary supplements that you talk about in the program are basically the five that I just talked about. And I think those are generally primary. They're foundational for a reason. So I think most people would be very safe in exploring that list and trying to implement that.

Again, read the descriptions that are in your program. you go through, you give them a lot of great information, combine that with some of the things I shared here with you. I'm never going to go on and say, everyone should go take all this. But I think that those foundational five are foundational again for a really important reason. They're generally really effective and needed and safe for most people. Now, if you're a person that has some complexity to your health, if you have multiple medications, if you if you're under the care of you know multiple doctors you know that's where i think that you have to

be much more cautious and that's where you should go in and get get assessed or if you're like you know what i've been putting this off i've been taking all this stuff i have no idea if it's doing anything i see a lot of people like that jina they come to see me they say dr paul i need somebody to give me a health second opinion and i need somebody that's got to quarterback my health i actually did a post on this recently the things that a naturopathic doctor does and again i'll just, I'm going to shamelessly plug my profession here for a moment, is that they know a lot about a lot of different areas. And a lot of people are confused about what should I do next? I have this particular issue. And I'm seeing all these specialists. And the specialists are not

really talking to each other. I'm seeing, you know, the gastro guy for the gastro stuff. Then I'm seeing the neurologist for the neural stuff. But there is a connection often between all these things. And so I think that's the role that I fill is I really help people say, you know what, that's worth your time and you should maybe do that second. Do this first. Implement these things. And it's not all like here's a pill for that or here's a change in diet. I actually do a lot of helping people come up with a plan, a blueprint for their recovery. And not all of it has to do with what I personally do because I have people in my network that actually take care of that or people go to their providers that they're already seeing. Well, I, you know, gosh, I just, I want to say

here, like look at what happened with menopause and our doctors. And even my doctor was like, I'm sorry, I didn't know. They just didn't teach. They just, this was like a, I don't know, morning course. And the same thing goes with supplements. And sometimes if your doctor is blowing you off the supplements, they just don't have the time to explain or the knowledge. Or the knowledge. But let's say they had the knowledge. They don't have the time to talk about the nuance. I know I keep saying that word over and over behind it, right? Okay. So, So people are asking more information on these supplements. So these are all available in the app.

We have, if you go to the supplement guide, we have extensive information on the supplements. We've had so many brilliant conversations with Dr. Paul, especially cortisol. I mean, we could get into cortisol and all of that. We've had so many incredible. So we'll list that for you. But if you want to go into the app today and you go to the supplement guide, it's all there. It talks about what we're kind of talking about, recommended doses, things to keep in mind, talk to your health care providers, right?

You're a doctor, your natural path, your pharmacist, make sure you're not just running out and taking something because we can. And there's one more thing you can talk about before we go. We don't have a lot of time. What would it be or something that you want to talk about next time you're with us? What is it? Like, what do you itch into? Yeah, you know, this is something that has been kind of recently really near and dear to my heart.

I was kind of thinking like, you know, what do I really want for patients? What do I really want for my followers online to understand? And, you know, I've been really talking about energy recently. You know, I talked to you about the energy reset program that I have. And really, this was, this came out of if a person's in your program, Gina, but they're like, you know what, I'm so tired. I can't actually even have time to cook the things that are these great recipes that are being talked about or can, don't have energy to go and exercise.

And one of my like passions is helping people have to get better energy to. to do the things that they want to do, maybe that they need to do in life, but also to reach their health goals. So that's why I did this like six-week energy reset program in the spring. And I'm doing it again here in the fall. We're starting on the 19th. And it's basically walking people through. What's the blueprint to get better energy? We talk about sleep. We talk about circadian rhythm and light exposure. We talk about hormones, you know. We talk about diet. But we all talk about it from a way that isn't like, you know, you have the diet covered. I actually don't talk about the diet in the way of like, here's all the things you should eat.

But here are things like timing. Here are the order of foods. Here are the things that you should be kind of doing while you're eating. These foods might help you with that. So we get really like specific about really fine-tuning how your body makes energy, how you fuel it, and how it recovers. and I walk people through a really easy step by step. So that's what I'm really passionate about recently. I think if you don't have energy, you're not going to love life.

You're not going to be able to do life. I find that really interesting. You could talk about a million things and energy is the one that, I mean, we are zapped. Our energy is zapped because we're juggling a million things because of how stress affects us or inability to recover from it, the quality of our foods. I would imagine medications that we're taking. Oh, my goodness.

Okay. We will add, so if you're interested, in reaching out to Dr. Paul. Finding out your course, the energy reset starts on, you said the 19th, that's a Monday. I know that because my book watches on the Tuesday. It's on the Monday.

Do we have any information we can put up? Paul Herkel, ND. So that's Paul H-R-K-A-L-N-D.com. You can also follow him on Instagram at Dr. Paul Herkel. We'll add the link in the notes to this post. We'll add the link about his energy reset so you can find out more information.

about that and then we will add the link to the supplements post in the app where you can find that. Oh, someone, Nikki, just, we have the best members. Dr. Paul, always a pleasure. I just, we need like 17 million hours to get into these. I know. I feel like we just scratch the surface. You know, every time we talk, it's like there's a thousand things that I want to say. I just don't have time to say and we're trying to keep it succinct. You should have seen like when we started, we were having like hour plus conversations and we were just and then people were like,

okay, I love this, but, you know, there's a lot drinking out of fire hose. But that's kind of like why I started this program is that like, you know, I want to have these conversations. I get on and talk Monday, Wednesday, and Friday in the morning and I kind of like drip this out to people rather than like, you know, like fire it all at one time because it can get overwhelming. And I really want to leave everybody with. I hope you leave with this conversation not like, oh my gosh.

And now I got to go check all the things that are in my cupboard and my fridge. Do not worry about it. That does not add. anything positive to your life. However, think about this as information as power. We gave you a little bit of nugget of information. You're now going to put this into your health equation, and you're now going to use that as a lens from where you go forward.

You can't change what you did in the past, but you can do a little small, little change. So even the smallest changes, like the type of water you drink, or maybe you're going to use less of those BPA bottles, you're going to make a positive difference. So I really want this to be a hopeful. message, you know. Yeah, me too. And I hear you about like, imagine all the content I'm trying to drip out. It ended up being like a university course. People don't get time for that,

although I do feel a shift back to long form conversations. People have had enough of those 30 seconds, 60 seconds. And, you know, we broke these down into half an hour to make them more digestible for people. And then people are like, but I want more. And you know, I've been talking about AI too. Like I just look online and I'm like, oh my God, this is so AI. And And it's like, it has like a visceral reaction for me now where I'm like, that's not real. I want like real conversations with real people talking themselves, not like some AI generated blog or some AI generated course or content. No, it's like, it's like I love that you're here.

You're putting in the time. I'm, you have guests on. That's, to me, that's what people want. So if you're in that camp of like, AI makes me like sick, I know it's helpful. and I know we all use it. Like you're probably going to like punch in like five foundational supplements into chat GPT after this. Where do I get the best ones?

Yeah. But understand that. Yeah. There's, there's, you have to use it in the right way. Anyways, I could talk. I could talk all day. I know. Me too.

We got to go. Okay. I appreciate you so much. I'm already looking forward to our next conversation. Have a fantastic rest of your day. Everyone. We'll see you next time. Bye.

Bye, everybody. Take care.