Live Like a Girl with Dr. Mindy Pelz - Solutions for the Anxious Menopausal Brain - With Dr. Carrie Jones and Dr. Mindy Pelz

Episode Date: April 15, 2020

Welcome to The Resetter Podcast, where Dr. Mindy interviews experts on everything to do with a fasting lifestyle and beyond! Dr. Carrie Jones is a Naturopathic Physician with a Master's in Public Health and the Medical Director for Precision Analytical; creators of the DUTCH Test- the most cutting edge hormone test on the market. She helps hormonally challenged people feel less crazy.In this podcast we cover: Why we get anxiety. Cortisol, adrenaline, glutamate, and GABA. How to stress less. Menopause, perimenopause, and lifestyle changes to manage symptoms. Get a DUTCH test reading from Dr. Mindy here: https://bit.ly/3b5IuDQ 

You put your whole self in, you take the excuses out, you let itophagy win while stem cells grow and sprout, you cleanse detox and couple balance hormones up yourself out. That's what resetting is all. Okay, resetters, Dr. Mindy here. And on this episode, I got to pick the brain of one of my hormone heroes, Dr. Kerry Jones. So if you guys have been following me or you've read my book, you know that I am a huge fan of the Dutch test. The Dutch test will let you know what your hormones are doing, will let you know what your adrenals are doing.

It is just, I think every woman should have the Dutch test in their hands. Well, Dr. Kerry Jones is the developer of the Dutch test. So we dove into some of the findings that I see in my clinic. We've done over thousands, thousands of Dutch tests in my clinic. We've talked about what controls sex hormones, what we can be doing on our own to manage and balance our hormones as we go through menopause. She is a true hormone expert, and it was such a pleasure to pick her brain and to bring you guys a whole other layer of understanding of your hormonal health. So enjoy. Hey, welcome everybody.

I am incredibly excited to bring to you this next next. guest. So a lot of you guys heard my interview with Dr. Zach Bush on Friday, and I am so excited to bring you Dr. Carrie Jones because she has a wealth of information on hormones and anxiety. And we're going to dive into a lot of topics. But let me start off by just welcoming Dr. Carrie Jones. Thank you so much for being here. Oh my gosh. I'm so glad that you reached out and we got to connect and here we are. So yay. Beautiful. So as I told Dr. Jones, before we got on, just to fill you all in, is that I adore her Instagram. If you guys have not followed her, are you on any other platforms? Are you just on Instagram primarily? Well, I'm on

Facebook, but it's in Twitter, but they're tied in. Like, anything I post on Instagram just gets like auto-populated. Okay. Okay. Well, she, I mean, here's what I adore about your Instagram is that you're straightforward, you're helpful, you give good information. Like, this is not a waste of anybody's time, like you can go and follow you and what you have to say is just really profound. So thank you for everything you're doing there. Yeah. And then the other reason I wanted to bring Dr. Jones on is because we're such a fan of the Dutch test. And I don't know, what's your official title with? I'm the medical director. I'm the medical director. So funny enough, just the lab opened in like June of 2012. And I started volunteering for them in maybe like December 2012, January,

2013, so I'm one of the originals. Wow. Wow. Wow. Well, we'll talk about the Dutch test at some point here because it is our favorite hormone test. And, you know, our clinic, my online world, we're dealing so much with women over 40. And I want to dive into that a little bit as well. But we have to start this conversation off with a IGTV I saw of yours yesterday. And it was around anxiety and the amygdala and how we all could be quite hyper-reactive right now. And as a 50-year-old woman going through menopause, my first thought was like, this is messed up. Like, I'm already, my progesterone's already the lowest it's ever been. I'm already dealing with menopausal anxiety. And now you're

going to put this on top of it. Right. And everything else, right? Yeah. Absolutely. It's like the last, you know, obviously we take it very seriously. But it's like the last thing the world needed right now in regards to like our anxiety. Yeah. For women. Yes. So help us understand because you had a, you had like 30 different things and but help us understand like what is going on

with that anxiety part of our brain and what can especially the woman over 40 do right now. Yeah. To calm herself in this crisis. You know, I made that video because I had a lot of people, um, wanting to know why. You know, why, obviously, right, what's happening right now is extremely anxiety provoking and fear and panic provoking for the whole world, absolutely. But I had people who were writing going, I feel like I'm having an over response. Like, I've completely shut down. I feel like I've completely frozen.

I don't know what to do. And I don't know why. Like, normally I get anxiety, but I can actually put one foot in front of the other. And this is, this seems over the top. And so I created it because I was, I feel like when you understand the why behind what's going on, then it's easier to point an identification. and be like, oh, that's what's happening. That's why I'm having so much more anxiety and fear and panic and hypervigilance. And so the way to explain it, it's very, it's very simplified. Obviously, anxiety and fear and panic is a multifactorial kind of complicated thing. But if we look for,

focus on four hormones. If we focus on cortisol, if we focus on your other stress hormones, epinephrine and norophenephene, which we lump together kind of as adrenaline, noradrenaline. And then we add in a neurotransmitter called glutamate. Glutamate is an excitatory hormone in our brain that we need. Too much is not good, but we need a fair amount. And then our calming, relaxing hormone that you talk about, right? Gabba. Gabba is our relaxed, inhibits, sleep, anti-anxiety. Like, women like Gabba.

Yeah, we love Gabba. Calm and sane. It's why our kids haven't been killed and, you know, we stay married. Yeah, exactly. Thank God for Gabba. Thank God for Gabba. And so what happens is when we. have too much cortisol and too much epinephrine, noraphyran, and too much glutamate,

pounding this part of the brain called the amygdala. The amygdala is an emotion-based memory part of your brain. There's a lot that I'm just simplifying it, but emotion-based. So when you are triggered by something and emotions come to the surface and it's fear, it's hypervigilance and anxiety, it's the amygdala that helps put that into play. Now, once or twice, not a big deal. It's to protect us, right? Like, we're going down a dark alley, and we get this sense of like, wait a minute, I should be really fearful. I should be hypervigilant.

I should maybe run. I should maybe find light. And again, it's protective. But when it's everyday events and then we get a big event on top of it, like COVID right now, the amygdala has this fast track system that goes right to fear, panic, hypervigilance. There's no logical processing. There's no stop and like, you know, we should probably think this through. We should probably just be prepared.

It's going to be okay. Like, yeah, have a healthy amount of fear. Just, you know, anxiety. But at the same time, like, we're one foot in front of the other. Like the amygdala is like, no, no, no, no, no, no. We're going to go right to panic. We're going to get right to anxiety. We're going to go right to fear.

And so it's just this fast track that happened. Like we just snap, right? The amygdala is just like, whoa, this is too much. And so in these instances, whereas before you might just have felt anxious in the every day, you add this on top of it. These hormones are pounding the amygdala and the amygdala just fast tracks. The only emotion it knows, which is fear, which leads to panic, anxiety, hypervigilance, aggression in some people, mood swings, right?

We just get our patients run thin. We alternate between angry and, you know, freaked out. We don't sleep. we snap at our family, or we do the opposite, we go inward and we have a hard time, you know, getting off the couch or doing anything. And so when I can explain this to people, like, oh, there's just little gland in your brain that's fast-tracking your emotions. And we just, we have to nip that fast track in the bud. Then it's for a lot of women, I had so many write me after the fact and go, just knowing that I could, like, I had one woman who wrote and

go, she goes, I talk to that gland now. I tell my amygdala, like, we're going to logic, you need to process this. You're reacting too quickly. You need to slow your role. Yeah. Yeah. It's so true. And I think just knowing it is so powerful because I can tell you like, you know, I, I've spent a lot of time analyzing my menopause journey and realizing that as hormones shift and decline, like how I never, at 40, I didn't really actually appreciate my hormones very much. At 50, I'm like labeling them, naming them, talking to them, analyzing them, like, doing everything possible because it's so easy to look at stress outside of us and say, that is why I'm feeling this way on the inside. But what I hear you say, what I'm hearing you say is that we're just getting locked in that amygd and it's just firing so fast right now. Yeah, especially right now. And even before right now, for a lot of people think PTSD, you know, just these people who, chronic panic attacks, just a lot of people were already struggling. And then this just just takes it

to the next level. And for the people who are sort of mild, low level anxiety, or, you know, mild low level, fearful, fear-based people, you know, they make people who make mountains out of molehills, like this just throws it right over the edge, unfortunately, when it comes to their emotions, because that gland doesn't know any better. It's getting conditioned over and over and over. Like be fearful, be fearful, be fearful. And so we are. So we do. And so by just by knowing that, like I said, it can, so there's, there's a lot of ways to stop it.

But sometimes it's just nice when you feel fear and anxiety, you can be like, wait, no, my amygdala is overreacting, you know? If you can't say amygdala, right? If you can't remember, just be like, my brain is just, it's just being snappy. And, you know, like, I can stop this. I can stop this. And so what are your thoughts, before we go on to what you can do to calm this thing down, what are your thoughts on things like watching the news or talking to that friend that's totally spun up right now?

Yeah. How do you feel like that's going to impact the amygdala? Huge, because that's just information overload, right? And I tell people, there's a difference between aware and conscientious, right? There's a, you know, I want to know if, for example, I actually live in the state of Washington, but the state below me, which is just literally across the river, the state of Oregon, the governor is ordering, she's going to have an executive order that's going to come out today. And so as somebody who works in the state of Oregon, I want to know what's the governor going to say,

but I'm not glued to the TV. I'm not reading every single article that comes out, every expert, and then every comment. And because I feel like that just revs it up and just triggers, triggers, triggers. And I get that feedback from people, men and women, men and women who were like, I can't get off social media. I can't get off, you know, the news. I can't get off CNN. And I, and I've just spiraled. And I'm like, right, because everybody's saying the same thing, gloom and doom, gloom and doom. And the amygdala just continually receives that message of, you know, be fearful. And so it is. It's emotion based. It's not an action-based gland. It's an emotion-based gland.

If we had an action-based gland, then it would be great because we would be fearful and then we would get up and do something, you know, it's not action-based. Yeah, so true. Are you familiar with Dr. Joe Dispense's work? Yes. Yeah. And one of the things I love is this idea that the more we think these thoughts over and over again, we just keep hardwiring those neurons. So you have to change the thought. So okay, plasticity, right? Plasticity. So before we dive into other hormonal talks, so what can we do about right now, like what can we do about the amygdala? Yeah, absolutely. So I'm a big fan of anything that you can do, I mean, I like the supplements and we'll talk about that, but anything you can do just for yourself. So easy things, it's saying statements, right? It's, I am safe. I, you know, it's,

it's my amygdala. I am healthy. I'm happy. grounding techniques. When you're spinning, sometimes just saying the obvious, my name is Dr. Carrie Jones. I'm in my house in Washington. I'm sitting at my desk. Today is Monday. My dog is at my feet. Just like bringing the brain back to reality of what's happening right now. And those are true statements, by the way. my dog is literally up. And then even to break the process, grounding again, things like washing your hands in cold water. We're washing our hands anyway, so make sure it's really cold water, putting your hands in cold water, holding an ice cube. Anything that breaks the neural transmission and refocuses other places is really helpful.

Just like you were saying what Dr. Dispenza says, your brain doesn't know any better other than what you tell it. So if you write down, you know, if you put it on sticky notes, if you have the pop-up reminders in your phone, just like quick, easy, positive statements about you and what's happening for you right then can be really helpful. And obviously, if it's, you know, if you need help, get help. Don't feel like a murder. Don't feel like you have to, you have to like, oh, well, everybody else is suffering,

so I'm going to suffer too. Like so many counselors, therapists, coaches have gone online and they're there to help you. all the crisis lines for suicide, for depression, if you just want somebody to talk to, you know, they all have textability now. So you can text them and a counselor or therapist will text you back and just, you know, don't feel like you have to go through this alone. And don't feel like you are alone. The hundreds of, you know, and thousands of people that comment and write and what have you on social media are like, this is exactly what I'm going through also. And so,

reaching out to family and friends watching your watching this. It's like what get you do the fun stuff. Do do do FaceTime, do Zooms, do, you know, watch really funny cat memes. Yeah, oh my gosh. You know, like and just laugh and play. Watch Disney movies, but the funny ones, you know, like just you don't, don't watch documentaries for the love of God. I've had several people like, oh, Dr. Jones, here's all these documentaries I suggest.

And it's, you know, it's about outbreaks. God. You know, like, no vaccine stuff. I'm like, this is not what I need to watch right now. Yeah. I ended up down a path of research on conspiracy theories last week. And then I felt, I felt horrible afterwards. I was like, I can't do that anymore.

Like I need, so I got into, do you watch Ellen DeGeneres on Instagram? I do now because she's calling her friends and checking on them. Oh my God. So my 17-year-old son, like I sit down. with him, I'm like, we're going to watch Ellen. Let's say we watched her try to do a puzzle and like, oh, she's hysterical. And then I move from that to memes. The memes right now are the best. You know, it's the memes. The memes are what give me hope in the American people, to be honest. You know, like people are so, they're still so funny. And everyone's taking, well, not everyone,

but most everyone's taking this very seriously and they can still generate these memes that they're so true. And they hit close. And their things were all thinking. And they're all hilariously funny. and I'm like, okay, America's going to be okay, because the meme is strong. It's amazing. It's amazing. So, okay, on your post too, and I just want to throw this out there for people because you, it was like, I was actually in my hyperbaric oxygen chamber listening to your post. And I was like, oh, my God, I got to take notes on this. This was great.

So there are supplements that you can take to calm you as well. If you're watching the memes, you're off the news and you're still spinning. Talk to us a little bit about some supplements people can take. So, and I want your help too. You chime in with things I've forgotten about. So one of my big favorites is El Theanine. So El Thienine, which is relatively really pretty safe across the board, it helps lower glutamate. So when you are over excited, right, over anxious, over panic, over, over, over, then Thionine helps calm that down. So a big fan of El Theanine. I'm a big fan of some herbs like Passion Flower and Skull Cap. A lot of people just have normal stuff on their shelf,

chamomile tea. A lot of people are into essential oil. Use the calming essential oils right now. You know, put them everywhere. Get them. That's really, really helpful. Don't, you've got them on your shelf. You're in your drawers. Like, time to pull them out and start using them.

Put them in your baths. Pull that tea out. Start drinking it, absolutely. And so even other things, we talked about hormones, you know, for those women who are on, like, progesterone, they don't skip your dose. Because that was not the time to skip your testosterone. That is going to help raise your progesterone when it goes. through breaks down, breaks down, breaks down, breaks down. One of the metabolites, it turns into

supports GABA, so calming, relaxing for a lot of women. Another similar hormone is Pregnanoons. Pregnant alone will also do the same thing. It'll support GABA in the system. Some of you have GABA at home, the actual supplement GABA, which can be really, really helpful. A lot of you have CBD at home. That's my favorite. There's good research to show that quality CBD can actually increase GABA, decrease glutamate. Vitamin B6. Don't skip your B vitamins, B6, B12. Really helpful for making GABA and helping to reduce stress. All of the adrenal, adrenal support of things like Ashwaganda, very calming,

olivococcus, very calming. I'm careful of the stimulatory adrenal herbs right now. Like I don't necessarily recommend licorice. I don't know that I would recommend panics, ginsing, like the fiery things. I don't think people need fired up. We need more calm. Holy basil, one of my absolute favorites. I drink Holy basil every single day. It's very calming. You'll find it in teas. If you dare venture out and go to the grocery store, you can buy Holy Basil. It's

called Tulsi, Tulsi, Tulsi, Tulsi. So when you're looking for that camomile, I'll look for that Tulsi as well. And that can be really, really helpful. I just calming it down. Yeah, so I'm a huge fan of CBD. I think there's so, I've experienced it with my own self. I see it with my patience. It's just incredible. Gabba, I'm like obsessed with trying to get Gabba in my in my life. So there's a couple ways that we've used. One is, have you ever done four, seven, eight breathing? Yes. Yes. That actually works really well. I always tell the story that when my daughter was, my daughter's 20 now, when she was like 16 and I would walk into the house and she would be like, why are you staring at me? Why did you ask me about my day? I would like remind.

myself like oh it's her not me so I would actually be in the driveway before I would go in and I would do four seven eight breathing a couple of rounds of that before I went in so I could go in calm otherwise it was that amygdala moment where we would just be fighting at each other and I didn't want to I wanted to be the one that took myself out of the argument right so that one and one of my colleagues post dr. Kelly had she posted she called there's a four square breathing So it's right, in for four, hold for four, out for four, hold for four. So it's right, a four square. So it's really, so for some people who it's just easier to remember four, four, four, four, but that's similar outcomes, right? Similar outcomes is just as far as far as breathing goes.

And emotional freedom technique, do you. I do it on myself. I'm by no means an expert, but yeah, tell us about that. I have to follow along the videos because I actually have a thing saved in my five, a picture of somebody who did it and I haven't saved my phone, so remember. So it's a tap, literally like a tapping thing that you do on your body. And it's to help reset neural networks and let things go and help you work through things and center yourself. And you say, you say sort of sentences and affirmations as you do. You repeat them.

It's not like a paragraph. It's like a sentence that you repeat as you're tapping various areas of your body. And it sounds completely goofy until you do it a few times. And then you're like, oh, this really works. Like this is really easy. to do on myself and oh by the way i feel better at the end and it can help me just bring it down ground and and let certain things go and so emotional freedom technique eFT google it youtube it you know look it up there's so many resources there's so many resources it's so many reasons it's so simple it's not complicated

you can do it on your kids i have lots of moms that will tap their kids you know you can do it on your significant other you know if if they're you know if they're kind of hyped up and having a hard time you can actually do it to them while they're repeating after you the affirmation. I love that. It's so easy. Yeah. And you will feel like you're doing nothing. Like you'll laugh at yourself. The first time I did it, I'm like, I'm a science gal. I love the science. And I'm like, what kind? What is it? Like, I was so like self-conscious. I didn't even want my husband to see me. I was like, oh, he's going to be like, what you've lost it? What are you doing to yourself? But it really works. And then you feel better after a couple goes, you know, and you just like, oh, wait a minute. And you know, and some, I've had people go, well, it's placebo. I'm like, I really don't care. Yeah. I really don't care, right? Like, whatever it takes. If you do, if you feel, if you do emotional freedom technique and at the end, you, it brings you from a 10 to a five, like, and you're not panicked anymore and you're centered and you can get up and go about life again. Like, that's really ultimately all I care about. So yeah. Yeah. Right. Who cares? And, you know,

the placebo is actually quite effective too. So we know that now. So yeah. And then the other one, you know, I told you we do a lot of fasting in our group. And 24-hour fasts have shown to produce quite a bit of GABA. Nice. So now I'm like not telling everybody they should fast right now. We're into fasting variation. Like there's a lot of different ways you can fast. And I'm a big believer in feast famine cycling.

And so, but it does, it is amazing that if you are already metabolically flexible and you can fast and you're, you'll find at the end of the day, you're a little calmer because GABA goes up. So right. That doesn't surprise me at all. Yeah. I do I don't I do 16, 8 or 1410 sort of depending on how I'm doing. And then like other mornings, what yesterday morning? Yesterday morning I woke up starving. And I was like, all right, we're going to eat. Yep. Yep. I got the signal I'm starving at 8 in the morning. We're going to go ahead and just eat and my body was so much happier. And that's why I think we call it fasting variation is that there's, you know, we become zealots for one eating style. And I'm, like do them all. They're all great. And they're all the fasts are great. So okay. I've got the most important one. Magnesium. Oh, magnesium. How about magnesium? And a lot of people have it at home already. A lot of people have absent salt for the bath and you never take. Go ahead and do it. You have time. You have time on your head. And those oils in your drawer that you never use, the calming oils and the soothing oils. You put those in your absent salt baths. Yeah. Amazing. Amazing. Okay. So we have to dive into this because this is one of the reasons I

brought you on and I just really wanted to pick your brain on it. Just changing topics here. So one of the things that I realized in my own health journey and I see with the women in my clinic is that when we hit 40, there is something hormonally that shifts in us in such a wicked way. And I always tell people that when I hit 40, I had one goal and that was to fit into my skinny genes. And at 50, I have one goal and that is like to stay happy and sane so I don't kill her.

everybody around me. So I had to shift what I thought was already a healthy lifestyle. I really had to shift my and to meet the demands or the lack of hormones that were happening into me. So talk a little bit about what happens as we move into our 40s and we go into peri-menopause. I know it like in 10 minutes. No, I'm making them sound because it's like a joke all the time. Whoever designed the female body can suck it, right? Yeah. And I know a lot. I mean, there are a lot of women that actually do really well. They sail in a perimenopause and they're lying. And, you know, God bless them.

We're not talking to you. So, you know, get out of our sandbox. So, but the majority of women, I'm 42. I'll be 43 in June. And every single night when I, if I'm ever hot in bed, I will wake up the next morning and stay to my husband, were you hot? You hot last night? Was it just me?

And our bedroom will start cold and end up, it'll get hot by the end of the night. And my husband's like, no, no, it was actually really hot bedroom last night. I'm like, not today. Not today. Yes. But yeah, what I call perimenopause reverse puberty. Yes. Because if you remember, when it's going into puberty when we're young teenagers,

it's like starting up, you know, a brand new machine, you know? Like it has to get going before it can finally produce the thing it needs to produce. In our case, it's hormones. And then it gets clunky and it gets going. And that's what puberty is, right? It's clunky and it's awkward. And these hormones are firing. and sometimes they get it right.

A lot of times they get it wrong. And we have all these side effects and symptoms like, you know, mood swings and acne and trying to figure out who we are as people when we're teenagers. And then we go through life. And then in perimenopause, it's the reverse of that. It's the machine is now, you know, like ready to retire. And so it starts to slow down. And as a result, we lose these hormones or these, like sometimes the machine works and

sometimes it doesn't. And so sometimes we get great hormones and sometimes we don't. And sometimes we get too many hormones. And so we feel like we're on this crazy, unpredictable roller coaster sometimes. And women start to complain of hot flashes and night sweats and brain fog and skin changes and hair changes and the awesome weight gain. Like who thought of that out of nowhere? Like nothing changes.

And 15 pounds later, you're like, I literally didn't change anything. Like, yeah, I know. Like, freaking sucks. Sucks. You know, and like vaginal dryness. Who thought of that? Right? Low libido.

And just, you know, all the things start to happen because these hormones start to come and go as our ovaries are literally sort of working. Yeah, they're working their way out. And sometimes the follicles have the cells to make the hormone and sometimes they don't. And then eventually we're out of follicles and we stop making hormone out of the ovaries. We make them other places just in really tiny, tiny amounts. And now we're, and then we become fully met. We lose our cycle and become fully menopausal. But nobody talks about that. No, until you hit it as a woman and you're like, why did nobody talk to this? Right. What? Yeah. So I just wrote a book. It's called the menopause reset because I've spent the last 10 years trying to reset these ridiculous symptoms. And one of the things I wish somebody had done to my 40 year old self is like tap me on the back and say, I just want to let you know you're in for a heck of a ride and here are some things that you can do. When I, when I, when, I started feeling all of my symptoms. Many of my friends were like five years older than me. And I would go to them and like, you know, tell me, what do I do? And they just shake their head and be like, you know, buck up. Yeah. And then one day I was actually in at a science fair, my kid's science fair. And I was, we were looking at science projects and one of the other mothers was an OB. And I finally, I never talk shop when I'm in a place like that. But I thought, well, let me pick her brain, see what she's doing for women like me. And I said to her,

So tell me, like, what are you doing for women with all these symptoms? And she turned and looked at me and she was like, Mindy, I have a practice full of women like this. And my medical textbooks have failed me. I have no idea what to do. What are you doing for these women? Like she didn't know I was talking about myself. She was like, what are you doing for these women? Yeah, let me realize that there are some things that women in general, I think, are doing that they just, we don't course correct in our 40s and there needs to be a little bit of course correction. So talk a little bit about that. It's definitely a, like we've, is women, we generally, I mean, this is a pretty big stereotype, given that like my practice, like your practice is, was primarily, you know, women. So I've seen lots of women in my lifetime. And now I work for a lab that does lots of lab testing on hormones, primarily on women. So I've had a lot of experience with this. You know, women are the caretakers and they're the doer of all the things and they, you know,

generally are in charge of a lot of the family and just, you know, they're just nurturers generally by trade. And so when we get, as we get into our 40s, we have been able to handle it all. Generally, handle it all. And then we, and our hormones have been right. relatively stable, not always, but relatively. Nothing, nothing like menopause, you know, generally hits us in our 20s, you know, 30s and even early 40s for a lot of women. And so, but what happens is, I describe it as the trampoline effect. So we've always had this really robust trampoline that as women, we bounce on. And when bad things are stressful things or crazy things happen to us, we just bounce right back up. And over time, over the years,

our trampoline gets thinner and we get more threadbare and sometimes there's holes. And so now, is when we hit perimenopause, it's almost for some women, it's like the trampoline's been pulled out from under them. And for others, it's like the holes have gotten bigger and the trampolines thinner and more threadbare. So when we go to jump, we hit the ground and we don't bounce back like we used to. And so it's, it's the time of like divorce and our parents are older and our kids are graduating from high school and going to college and or we're struggling with like, you know, depending on when you had children, like the puberty, like you're going into perimenopause and your daughter's going into puberty. It's awesome.

Great timing, you know, and it's, and in a job where a lot of women, for a lot of women in perimenopause, they're at the height of their job. You know, their senior level, their leads, their managers, they're whatever. They've been doing it a long time. They're experts in their field, whatever they've done. And so there's just a lot. And then we throw hormonal chaos on top of it and the body's like, that's it. Yeah. I have supported you for all these years. I literally, like, this is what I don't know. You're going to have to rebuild your trampoline because I'm out.

Yeah. The arteries are done. They're getting done. And we've lost that support. So it's a big losing the ovaries. When the ovaries start to shut down, it's, it's, there's such a huge key part of being a woman. And the adrenals rely on them and the thyroid gland relies on them and the pancreas relies on them and the brain. relies on them and our skin relies on our immune system is like really reliant on estrogen you know like everybody's reliant on the ovaries and when the ovaries start to shut down everybody's like whoa whoa wait what happened to the ovary yeah yeah and as a result that's why like all the systems start to panic because you know it's like when mom it's like when you're like is a mom right when a mom is a sick day right when the mom is literally sick in bed and the family's like what do we do like how do we feed the dog like where's the refrigerator like who gets the mail Like, how do we, you know, like, you know, mom, I know you're sick, but like, how do we do this?

Yeah. Well, and that's the thing about that I feel like what I want to talk about with women is that you literally have an organ that's like, I'm done. Yeah. Like, I've served you for a really long time. And now I'm not going to work anymore, but other organs are going to have to take over. But nobody tells the other organs. No. There's no, like, coordination between, it's not like the ovaries who are like, hey, adrenalin's and thyroid.

So I'm going to be out, right? You got like a year to figure it out, and then I'm going to retire. Throw me a party, you know, like put me on a cruise. I'm done. Nobody does that. It's the ovaries work. And then gradually they don't. And the adrenals and thyroid are like, I love it.

Hold on. Yeah. No, that's exactly right. That's exactly right. And so, okay, so what are the, let's talk about the other organs that kick in. And how can we help them? Because that's one of the sand pits I got myself in. Yeah, so I would say big workhorses, I think, like big stability workhorses are our blood sugar management and our HPA, so hypothalamic, pituitary adrenal.

So our adrenal system. Thyrate is very, very important, but what I have found is that the thyroid often reacts as women get into 40s. It's not their 40s. It's not necessarily a cause per se. However, a fair number of women already have hypothyroidism or hushy. Motos or something, thyroid, going into their 40s, and then it gets worse because they've lost the trampoline and the adrenals aren't doing that great. And, you know, their blood sugar management's not that great. So if we just look at blood sugar management and adrenals, as women get into their 40s, and you talk about this, you know, we don't have the ability. Our insulin, what's the word I'm looking for? Not resistance. Well, we become more insulin resistant, right? We become less able to process the carbs that we eat and the chocolate that I love and, you know, the sugary drinks.

And even though we think we're eating, a lot of women are like, well, I eat really healthy. I eat, you know, organic and I eat whole grain and I like dark chocolate and I use, you know, maple syrup, not sugar. And I use, you know, I'm like, well, yeah, but still. That was me. That was me. I was like, I eat healthy. And then I, that's, and that's part why I fell in love with the ketogenic diet because it is the ultimate in insulin management, but it shouldn't be done all the time. Right. And it's the same with fasting I found as I've gotten older.

Like I was saying earlier that when I do a 16, 8 or 10, 14 with fasting, I just, I know, I do better and I feel better. And I know as I continue to get older, like I said, I'm almost 43. Every day, I look at my dark chocolate and I'm like, is it today? can I not say it today that I can't eat you? Right. And our liver changes. So when it comes to like wine, wine is a big one, right?

A lot of women enjoy a glass of wine and then they'll tell us, I can't drink wine anymore, right? I can't sleep. It brings on hot flashes and night sweats. I feel like it's contributing to my skin and my weight gain. Like it is. I'm sorry to tell you, it is. Yep. You could totally process it fine in your 20s and 30s, usually.

Yep. And then you hit your 40s and 50s and like, oh, God. I'm sorry. And why is that? Is that just because the liver is toxic by that point? Or it's breaking down estrogen? That's a really good question because I do have women that, quote, get it back. They get the ability back. I've had tons of patients over the years who went through perimenopause with me as their doctor and then came out the other end. And they're like, hallelujah, I can drink a glass of wine again. I don't have hot flashes and it doesn't affect my sleep. And I'm like, is it a enzyme thing? Is it a transition thing? Is it a blood sugar thing? Is it all the above? I don't know.

There's not a lot of research into why perimenopausal women can't drink shouldn't and the symptoms they get because of alcohol. But yeah, it's and that's another like horrible curse. Like thank you. You know, we've got teenagers aging parents like high performing jobs and freaking alcohol. It doesn't even work for us anymore. Like thanks a lot. I know. Even though like I got a body. of, um, it's like low, you know, low glyphosate, you know, one dry farm. It was not, it wasn't dry pharma. It was something else. And I wish I could remember who it was because I would give them a, give them a shout out. My friend Tyler recommended it. Anyway, so, um, and I was like, maybe I, maybe I can have a glass of wine. This would be great. Nope, kept me up. I'm like, damn it.

Still alcohol. Right at the end of the days that I tell women, especially if you're struggling with estrogen related issues, like estrogen and alcohol and the liver, you know, they don't play well together. And so, and alcohol wins. Alcohol will win the race for processing and estrogen gets pushed to the back. And then your PMS is worse and your weight gain from that and, you know, moodiness and heavy periods. And so on. So what, tell me the HPA access. What, what part of that, other than just overusing your adrenals, what part of that does toxins play a part? Yeah. Everything from the brain down, actually, because toxins affect the, so the whole, your whole stress cascade starts at the brain. about the adrenals, I have adrenal fatigue.

My adrenals are tired. It's like, no, unless you actually have what's called Addison's disease, which is the true autoimmune word, the adrenals are tired and they do shut down. The communication starts at the brain. And toxins affect the brain. So they're going to affect the part of the communication center in your brain that sends the signal to say make cortisol, you know, or at a proper time. It'll affect the rhythm.

And a lot of these toxins look like estrogen. So these toxins will affect our estrogen, which just puts more, you know, stress on the body. And again, that affects the liver, which puts more stress on the body. And then, you know, affects blood sugar. So then now cortisol has to get involved because cortisol plays a big role in blood sugar. And the cycle just goes round and around. So toxins can absolutely affect how our stress system sets off. And the toxins affect our immune system. Cortisol is extremely important for our immune system. Immunity, you know, it's very anti-inflammatory to a point. And so we, it's, yeah.

Yeah, one of the things we do a lot in our clinic is heavy metal detoxing. And that was the one thing that really helped my insomnia when I was like 43, 44, was just realizing that my heavy metal load was really high and getting that out. And all of a sudden I started sleeping again. But prior to that, I was like, you would like my, you know, if a teenager was downstairs chewing their cereal and I was trying to go to bed, I'd come down like, oh, the flippin A is chewing down here. I could not sleep for anything, but toxins saved me and detoxing that and getting that out. That's incredible.

I don't know that I've heard that yet. So that's amazing. Yeah. I mean, again, if you go back and you look at pituitary hypothalamus penil gland, there's no protective barrier. And as our hormones are going up and down, many toxins like lead that get stored in bones will actually come out of those bones, go into the bloodstream, go up to those vulnerable areas. and then they change our whole cycle. It's a piece of the puzzle. It's not the whole puzzle, but for many women, it can be like that thing that just, like, gives them their life back.

So we are big fans of detoxing in general. And I think the woman going through menopause really needs, along with managing her stress and managing her insulin and detox has to be a piece of it. And it's neat. You mentioned the pineal gland, which, you know, I feel like so many women, especially as they hit their 40s, obviously sleep sleep sleep and weight i've gained weight and i can't sleep or like the number one and number two here right all the time and i and obviously hormones heavy metal so many things get in the way of that but at this and um i find that a lot of women really abuse the sleep hygiene thing and and abuse is a strong word but they're like oh i can work i can get a second wind and work i can make sure the kids are in bed

and then i can work from like eight to 11 or nine of midnight you know or i can i'm gonna i need to i need to relax I'm going to stay up and watch Netflix and I'm going to watch these things. Like right now, people are watching the news, which I don't necessarily recommend. But normally people are like, okay, I just need some downtime. I'm going to watch TV. I'm going to be on my screen. I'm going to be scrolling social media. I'm going to do all these things.

And then they think when they're ready for bed, they can just go to bed. And it turns out as we get older as women, we can't. Like we really have to be mindful of our melatonin production, which happens at dark, when it gets dark out. And getting cortisol down at night. and, you know, working on relaxing and calming activities, calming things of which the news is not one of them. I was just going to say, so watching the presidential address at 8 o'clock is probably not a great idea. Probably not a good idea. No, no, absolutely not. Yeah. So I definitely want to talk about the Dutch test because you're the expert in it. And also, we do so many Dutch tests in our clinic. And I feel like a fortune reader or an astrological reader when I get one of these tests.

back because I can sit with somebody. I mean, that's just for both men and women. And I can say, you know, you're not sleeping. You're, it can't relax in your body. Like, you, that test is a freaking miracle. And I feel like, I feel like we need to get it in every woman for sure because of the estrogen metabolites and what it shows there, methylation pathways. So talk a little bit about this test and help me in my cry for all women getting it. For all women, for all women taking this darn test because we could stop things like breast cancer and ovarian cancers and things if women had a better idea of where their hormones were at. Yeah, even just understanding where their hormones are out and probably help like save marriages. Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

Just make people like more energy and more pleasant and easier periods and you know, just all the things for sure. So it's a, it's um, that's just an acronym for those who don't know. It stands for dried urine test for comprehensive hormones. So it's these pieces of filter paper that you urinate on four times in the day. So it's not saliva per se. It's not a blood draw. It's not a stool test, which I often will get asked as well. It's literally kind of like a pregnancy test.

You just urinate on this little piece of paper four times in the day. And what it gives you, just like you were saying, is all the hormones, estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, DHEA, S, cortisol, melatonin. but it also gives you what are called metabolites. And so when you have a hormone, it's nice to know where does it go? Like after you make estrogen, where does your estrogen go? And so it's nice to see the phase one and the phase two part of your detoxification. So I can say, look, you have a higher risk for potentially developing breast cancer. Or, oh, here's why your PMS is so bad because you can't get through phase one or phase two detox.

And therefore your estrogen just circulates and circulates and circulates and circulates and causes also. all sorts of problems. Same for testosterone. I can say, you know, oh, here's why you have so much chin hair and cystic acne on your jaw. Like, you're going down the pathway that causes it. And it's really nice to show women like, no, it's not in your head. I have a pathway right here. And yours is upregulated and let's do something with your diet, your lifestyle, and maybe some supplementation to course correct. Yeah. Yeah. And that's exactly what I found is that so many women just kind of breathe a sigh of relief when we show them their Dutch because they're like, oh, thank you. Like, you get me. Like, thank you. So it really is an incredible test. What about women that are on

HRT or bioidenticals? Do you recommend they take the Dutch test? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, for sure. And it's true. We have a lot of people that will do it because they'll want to see, again, are they going down the right pathway? Do they are they on the right dose? And so do they need to add in more hormones? You know, some women will start slow, right? They'll say, well, just want to try progesterone. I don't, you know, and so they'll do, they'll go on progesterone and then maybe three or four, six months later, they'll retest and, and, and some things are better, but not all. And we're like, you know, maybe we should try DHA now or maybe now it's the time to add an

estrogen. And so, or maybe not. Maybe we're like, hey, yay, look, everything looks great. This is working. Keep doing it. So, yeah, you can test well on HRT. And okay. And how often do you recommend a woman does the Dutch test?

So I'm, it's very specific on to the person itself. And so I say, um, you know, If you are stable, everything's great, doing great, you know, maybe once a year, especially if you're on HR hormone replacement therapy. And if you are, if you just started a whole bunch, like a treatment plan, supplements, diet, lifestyle, what have you. And then I generally recommend three to six months later. So if you get to the three month mark and you're like, yeah, I feel better, but not great,

then I would test. And if you hit the three month mark and you're like, nailed it. I feel amazing. This is good. Keep writing it out. And maybe at the six month mark just to make sure. go from there. Yeah. So what do you?

Yeah. That's that's good. I've been doing like six months to a year, but I like that three month mark. Yeah. The three month is specific. Like, you know, like clearly things need to change, right? Like, like, it's working, but not great. I'm like, ooh, let's see where we missed.

Let's go back. Yeah. Awesome. And then, of course, we're talking about it for menopausal women. My mind thinks of it for menopausal women, but this is a test. This is a test for everybody. And I have a 20, I have a 20 year old daughter. and I've been thinking about running it on her,

what's the youngest age you would run it on? The youngest stage are, we have, we have, so our reference range goes down to 18, but we actually can test down as young as 12. We highly recommend that they've had some couple periods under their belt. So she's 12 and just getting into puberty and hasn't had a period yet, but she's, you know, moody and all the things.

I'm like, don't do it because it's changing literally by the day, which you can judge by her mood symptoms. wait until she's had a few periods, three or four, and then do the Dutch test. But if she's 12 and she's, you know, I've had doctors are like, well, she's 12 and she's had a period for a year. I'm like, she can do it. She can test. Go for it. Yeah. We very rarely, very rarely will have like precocious puberty. We'll have a nine-year-old, even a six-year-old will test. We don't have the reference ranges for that, though. But sometimes the doctor will want to know their cortisol. They'll want to know

melatonin. They'll kind of want to know some other things. and so they'll choose to do the Dutch anyhow with somebody that young. And because it's a urine test, it's easy, right? If you're old don't want to get their blood drawn, that's scary, but they're telling them to pee in a cup and it's pretty straightforward. Yeah. And then you can just dip the strip. So mom find it easier.

It's super easy. You just have to remind yourself when you do it. I had to let them all dry out in my office. And I had to just let everybody know, like, don't know in my office right now. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, because they are strips and you do have to let them. them dry for 24 hours. Yeah.

If you do it at home, just be careful of kids and cats and dogs and, you know, that's right. You do have to set them out, let them dry. So, yeah. Okay. And what about men? We have run several Dutch tests on men. So, yeah. All ages, we have men that are 18.

I've, we have men in their 80s who run it because they're, you know, in a new retirement home and they want an erection. I'm like, you know what? Good for you. Like, yeah, you do. That's awesome. It's great. I think so too. So, yeah, men will run it.

A lot of men will run it for, you know, energy, you know, mood, motivation, weight gain as well, erectile issues, fertility. We have a lot of men that will run anxiety, depression, can't sleep. It's all the same women. Same things. It's all the same exact reasons. Men get hormonal too. They're just less likely to admit it. Yep.

So, yeah, we have a lot of athletes. We have a lot of professional NBA, NFL, NHL athletes that will run it. because they are looking to get next level in their game. You know, if cortisol makes a difference. If they're, you know, whatever, androgens make a difference, of course. So I mean, we run a few organic acid markers. We run a B12 marker, a B6 marker, a DNA damage marker, glutathione. And so we will have sports teams that are like, yeah, we want to know all this.

Just, you know, they get paid a lot of money to be these athletes and whatever edge helps them. Yeah. And this is why I think everybody should run it on. I mean, we should know what our chemicals are doing in our body outside of just the CBC that gets typically run up by your MD. Did you hate that when you talk to a patient? They're like, no, no, I got, I got blood work done. It's all normal.

And it's a CBC, maybe a chem, maybe a lipid. You're like, it tells me nothing. Yeah, right. And it was all normal. It wasn't even like in functional ranges. It's like, what? So, yeah, and actually talk, you bring up the blood test. I also get a lot of women that will say to me like, oh, yeah, no, my OB ran, you know,

ran a test and I'll say, do you know what day? Like, do you still have your cycle? And they'll say, yeah, I'm like, do you know what day of your cycle they ran it on? And like, yeah, Tuesday. That's right. Tuesday. Yeah. No, I just went to the lab. I went in and they told me. So explain why you do it during a certain window. Yeah. So any hormones you draw, any hormones, not even Dutch testing, blood draw, saliva test, urine test for hormones. Doesn't matter. If you still have a cycle, you want to do it in the second half of your cycle. So you're looking at like days 19, 20, 21 of a 28-day cycle. If you know when you ovulate, some women know, some women are tracking, some women can tell, then it's technically it's five to seven days after that. So I tell women,

if you're tracking ovulation or you feel, you notice mucus changes, you get little twinges, then that's the day you ovulate, five to seven days later do the hormone test. The reason is your progesterone should be at its peak point then. And we are trying to test estrogen and progesterone at a very specific time in your cycle, to say, see if you ovulated, for real, and then how much progesterone do you make? If you test early, if you test like the third day of your period, you do not make any progesterone then. It should be very, very low. And it tells me nothing about your ovulation, which is really important for women for lots of reasons, which you talk about. And so that's why. Now,

there are other tests that Dutch doesn't run, but like some women will run like an FSH follicle stimulating hormone. You do that on day two or three of your periods. period. And so I have, like you, I have women that are like, well, my FSA is whatever. Like, when did you get it done? Like, yesterday? Like, ah, you know, like, I don't know. And so it's, it is, yes, your hormones go up and down. And yes, you can be different months to month to month. And so I tell women, if you were the same every month, if you, you know, if your PMS is the same every month and your periods are heavy every month, if you get a migraine every month, then you're probably about the same. If you don't, like, let's say you know every second month you get migraines or every

third month, you know, as you're tracking, you know, some women are really good at tracking. You want to test on the quote bad month because we want to see where you are at your worst. And the reason for that is that the ovaries are sisters, not twins, which I get it like twins are sisters. But you know what I mean? Like they don't have to do the same thing, right? They have righty and lefty can do different things and therefore that can make, you know, the month of March different than the month of April. But most, a lot of women are fairly consistent or go back and forth or maybe have two months or three months the same and then it'll flip. And then two or three months the same, and then it'll flip. But I'm like, oh, you're just probably switching ovaries. Yeah. Interesting.

And why do you think OBs don't do this more? I mean, you guys, you working at precision analytics, you probably get a lot of OBs, but the people that I get, oh, you don't. We get functional OBs, but we don't get traditional conventional OBs. And just training. It's just their training. And they don't have a lot of time to spend with patients, right? When you're OB and you're seeing 30 patients a day, you don't have 30 minutes to go over a Dutch test with them and explain everything. And even RE is reproductive endocrinologists don't either.

We get asked, we have a fair amount of fertility that run practitioners, but not necessarily like a fertility clinic or a reproductive endocrinologist. And the same thing, they're not trained and they're very, they're very blood-oriented and they have a very, you know, they have a playbook, right? And that they've, they draw your blood. And unless you are, if you're letter A, then you go down this path on the playbook. And if you're progesterone as letter B, then you go this way. And it's very controlled. And unfortunately, I think time has a lot to do with it. I think a lot of OBs would love to spend 30 minutes. And I think a lot of OBs are really fascinated by this and would really like to be able to do this. But when in dictates otherwise and you're running from patient to patient. It's really unfortunate. So, yeah, I don't blame them. I think it's just time and training. Yeah. It does take a lot of time to read that test. There definitely is like a let's roll up our sleeves. Here we go kind of moment. So it's awesome. So this has been great. And I, again, I just so grateful for the information that you're putting out there. I'm so please tell the people at precision analytics that we just, we love the Dutch test. And I tried to get up to your.

guys live event last year, but it was my 50th birthday. And so it was like, go to Sedona or go to a Dutch to the Dutch fest. Yeah. I was like, as much as I love studying hormones, I think I'll go to Sedona. Yeah. So, but let's end on this. I always love asking my guess if you, and today it may be a little different, but if you had one message for the world, like if there was one thing you could pour from your heart to tell the world, what would it be? Yes. So I wish I remember her last name. I take no credit for this. I heard a woman. She's a, um, her name is Christine something. I feel terrible. But anyway, she was doing, I was listening to one of her webinars and she's very, she's an energetic worker and she said healing happens at joy. Right. When you

look at the levels of like anger and fear and, you know, they're all down here. Right. And then as you move up and then you get to, you get to joy and then you get to love and you move. And you move. sort of, you know, up in your radiance. And she said, you know, healing happens at joy. And so I'm like, and I literally journal, I write. It's one of the affirmations I write. And so I'm like, healing happens at joy. And then I'm like, I find joy. I am joyful. I, you know, I look for joy. The world brings me joy. And so especially with everything going on right now, if you can find a little bit of joy, even if it's the most hilarious meme you've ever seen. And that's what brings you two seconds of joy in your day. Like healing happens at joy. And so find the joy. Look

for the joy and be joyful. Radiate the joy and then, you know, get joy in your life. I love that. When you find her name, I'm going to, I want to quote it, send it, send it to me. So we give her credit. She's a speaker on Mindvalley, mind valley. Mindvalley.com. It's terrible. I can't remember her name, but yeah. It'll come to you. Yeah, yeah. I'll find it and send it to you. Send it to me. So because I, because I, uh, Will Cole, you know, he wrote keto, um, ketotterian. He had a statement that I love that was you can't heal a body that you hate. Yeah. Gosh, that's good. And it's like those are like really help put all of this in perspective.

So yeah. So but you're awesome. And again, I just am going to encourage everybody to go to your Instagram and to stock you and and find you there and your message. Please do. Yeah. So thank you so much. And we'll pass this on to our group and make sure everybody gets this really powerful information. So thank you.

Oh, thank you. Uh-huh. That's what it's all about. We're fast cycling and fast types out. That's what resetting is all.