If you’re a woman over 40 wondering “What is happening to me?”—this episode is your permission slip to get curious, not quiet. Dr. Jannine Krause and Theresa Lear Levine dive deep into the hormonal maze of perimenopause and menopause—from brain fog and bloating to ADHD symptoms and anxiety—and explain how these changes ripple far beyond your period tracker.
We talk hormone replacement therapy (HRT)—the myths, the magic, and the marketing of “bioidenticals.” We break down the often-missed links between gut health, detoxification, emotional regulation, and your hormone story. And yes, we talk about the things nobody wants to admit: the not so pretty results of various cleanses, the relationship between estrogen, binge eating and emotional outbursts, and why relational healing is hormonal healing.
This is the conversation your doctor probably hasn’t had with you—but your body is begging for it.
🧠 Top Takeaways:
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Perimenopause isn’t just hot flashes—it’s emotional, mental, and deeply personal.
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Hormonal shifts can trigger or worsen ADHD symptoms, anxiety, and overwhelm.
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Estrogen detox is directly tied to gut health.
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How xenoestrogens from plastics, beauty products, and cleaning supplies are hormone saboteurs.
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Why detox pathways must be supported, especially in your 40s and 50s.
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Weight gain is not just calories—it’s chemistry and quantum physics.
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HRT is not one-size-fits-all and why saying Bioidentical-HRT is "natural" is misleading
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Mental clarity, mood, and libido are all influenced by estrogen and progesterone.
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Your emotional and nervou system health affect your hormones.
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Healing happens in safe, supportive relationships—this is nervous system work we're overlooking
✨ Notable Quotes:
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“All healing is relational healing.”
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“It’s not just about the uterus—your whole life changes.”
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“You can’t out-supplement
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Teresa and Janine here ready to talk about something that women over 40 sometimes evenover 35 start to experience the fun stuff of perimenopause into menopause.
Teresa, yeah, yeah, we have to talk about it.
We have to talk about it, especially today.
Like before we hit record guys, there was like so much fun banter of like what's going onwith you.
(00:23):
And I think, you know, a lot of gals are starting to open up conversations about
What's going on with perimenopause and menopause, but I don't know.
Are you talking with your friends about it?
uh
don't think that people talk about it enough.
(00:43):
I unabashedly bring it up in places where it might or might not be as welcome like it tobe.
But I just think, hey, you know what, even if I make somebody a little uncomfortabletalking about what's going on, I think it brings more awareness.
And I think that's exactly what we've been missing as women.
so it's part of the solution, make people a little uncomfortable.
(01:06):
and also introduce them to things they haven't thought about.
mean, when I look back even a year in my journey and I think about all the things I'vedone in the last year to improve the way my systems are functioning, to clean things up,
to make things easier, and to try things so that I can combat these different symptoms andfeel more like my somewhat younger self, I didn't know all this a year ago.
(01:34):
And you don't know what you don't know until you know it.
So these are the conversations that are really important so that people can go like, gosh,never thought about trying that or never thought that my liver and my kidneys or my colon
could be affecting my perimenopause systems because that's just my uterus or there's somuch more to the picture, right?
(01:55):
my gosh, so much, so much.
And yeah, that compartmentalization thing is real.
We've been taught that through the conventional medical system, that this is one partexperiencing that, that's one part experiencing that.
And thank goodness for, there's a lot of conversations out there now about howperimenopause and menopause shifts, and I call it changing of the fuel, in the body is
(02:17):
really affecting every part of your body.
And it's like...
I mean, some days it's comical, some days it's frustrating, and because I'm experiencingit too, I feel like it's, I guess if I was younger, I feel like I wouldn't be able to
relate to my ladies, and now I'm like, my God, I'm experiencing all these things.
(02:37):
And even like you said, a year ago, I was looking back at some of the things that I wasexperiencing and was like, I had no idea that that was probably part of hormone shifts
too, and just kind of the effect of the whole shift on my body.
It's a while.
And do you relate with like the ADHD type symptoms yourself?
(02:59):
Okay, I thought so, but I didn't want to make any assumptions.
I obviously do.
And I knew there could be some overlap, but...
I think that that is one of those things that is getting majorly overlooked when peopleare getting diagnosed.
mean, looking at my own story, of course I know without a doubt that ADHD was part of mylife since childhood.
(03:21):
We weren't really diagnosing it back then or doing much about it.
I just have always kind of tried to embrace the upsides of it.
But I would say that in my early 40s, it got a lot more challenging.
And that is when I got my official diagnosis.
There was enough going on at that point where I was like, maybe I do want to see ifmedication would help, or maybe I do want to know is this what's really going on?
(03:46):
And also several of my kids had been diagnosed, so just made sense.
Like, don't get the diagnosis, we're all in this together, let's see.
And it strikes me so oddly now when I'm thinking about this, because that was like 42, 43.
Now I'm 46, close to 47.
And never.
along that journey?
Did anybody say anything about hormones?
(04:09):
It was just a diagnosis for the ADHD and I dabbled with Adderall for a bit, didn't loveit.
It was great for a little while and then, so I was like, I'll find other things.
But still the symptoms and the kind of stagnation and the brain fog and the having a hardtime with like productivity and following through on things.
(04:32):
got worse than I feel like it ever had been.
It felt like a much more like uphill battle.
And, you know, get to this later, but I feel like fixing stuff with my hormones has made ahuge difference more than anything that was ever done to address ADHD alone.
Hey, know, it's interesting you mention that because so many patients of mine, because Ithink there's more awareness on ADHD too, right?
(04:58):
But I think so many more patients of mine have been diagnosed within the last, I'd say,couple years with ADHD, but then I'm looking at their ages and we're, you know, late 30s,
40s.
I am the same age as you, 46 going on 47.
And yeah, I also like, you know, I never identified with ADHD.
I was usually pretty focused, get stuff done, but then in the last couple years,
(05:19):
I found myself just like sitting there going like, what?
You know, just like bizarre like behavior that wasn't characteristic for me where Icouldn't focus on stuff, where I was pinging all over the place and had started all these
different projects and never finished them.
And I was like the one who would always like get something done, then move to the nextthing and get something done.
(05:42):
And then I was like juggling five different things and nothing getting done.
And I'm like, that's not me.
Right.
And so I'm like, I never was like, I'm gonna go for ADHD diagnosis, I, you know, hearingyou talk, hearing other people talk, I'm like, that was probably the start of the estrogen
really starting to go on the roller coaster that I'm on and having those really big bottomouts, I think, are what, and what I'm experiencing now to like a more severe degree, I
(06:12):
guess you could say.
Yeah.
So for me, it really culminated last year.
I was having a lot more ups and downs emotionally.
I was having a reemergence of hormonal acne, cystic-type hormonal acne.
The brain fog, like I said, was worse than ever.
I was tired.
(06:33):
I've been through times in my life raising young children and things where I was tired.
But this was different and these feelings almost being like narcoleptic, like must takenap or I don't know what's going to happen.
of tired.
And then the hot flashes.
So for me, the hot flashes started originally about a year and a half ago, and I was ableto take some supplements at that point that really helped.
(06:57):
And I was like, cool, know, whatever, take care of this and no big deal.
And then it was so good that I went off of the supplements like last summer and didn'treally have any problems until last December again.
with the hot flashes, but this time when they came back, the same supplement didn't help.
(07:17):
and one of my practitioners who I saw quite a bit last year had said, yeah, that's kind ofhappened sometimes.
Like what you respond to the first time doesn't work when they come back a littlestronger.
But this time it was awful.
Like I was having like 12 plus hot flashes a night where my sleep was majorly interrupted.
and I wasn't getting a lot of sleep, so I don't do well tired.
(07:39):
Like I'm usually very good at protecting my time to rest.
I go to bed when I'm supposed to to get like a good seven hours of sleep, which for me isoptimal, but I wasn't getting it.
I was getting maybe like four or five between like all the waking up and everything else.
So yeah, hot flashes and then like the libido kind of starting to tank and that's not meeither.
(08:00):
So I was like, we gotta do something about all of this.
Plus like just bloating.
and things like that that I just hadn't dealt with before.
And I think a lot of women don't understand how all of these things go together.
Do you see this a lot when you're helping people with hormones?
Absolutely, absolutely.
mean, you know, the bloating, you know, because let's face it, we have phases in thealternative medicine space where there's parasites.
(08:25):
You know, that's kind of what's hot right now.
And back like a few years ago, it was SIBO.
And back a few years before that, it was Candida.
And so a lot of people are still stuck trying to do multiple gut protocols and thinkinglike...
Why can't I any better?
Like what the heck's going on?
And I myself, I would say that this was probably one of the areas that I was kind oftrying to tease out for clients and myself because I've had some really like crazy gut
(08:54):
stuff happen over the last couple years.
And you know, I was doing all my protocols, right?
Like got.
probiotics and the colostrum and the tributrines and the this and that and nothing wastouching it and so I was like my god and then I think a lot of people too will take the
bloating as weight gain and not you know then try to cut calories do that kind of stuffand not really realize that you know it may be worth it to look deeper and for a lot of
(09:20):
women the other thing too is fibroids showing up and the fibroids causing that bloat thatlike you've spent a
bunch of money on all kinds of different gut protocols, nothing's working.
And then we do a transvaginal ultrasound and there's this like softball size fibroidhanging out in there.
And you're like, oh.
And so part of it, you know, I mean, I'll be fully honest.
(09:41):
Like I'm learning as I go here as a lot of the things I'm like, oh shoot, that was thehormones.
But at the same time, yeah, you were mentioning like, you were mentioning like you wereworking on your gut, you used some supplements too.
You know, I think we have to say that like,
and this is something I know you're gonna dive into because we chatted about it before wehit record is that like you dialed your body in over the last year to help the hormones
(10:06):
work better and the guts so much integral part of it so it's not like it's a wastespending the time on the parasite cleanse and the this and that it's just more you know
figuring out like what when to when to move on from that when to move from the next thing
So I want to hear like what supplements, think a lot of people might be thinking like,Teresa, what supplement did you use at first for the hot flashes?
(10:30):
And then what have you been kind of doing with your total body restoration or regulationor I don't know what you want to call it.
I'm throwing random words out.
I'll let you word that.
Yeah.
I used the first time my one of my doctors had recommended and it's called femgard hf andit's um I don't have like a thing with let's see I can look it up tell you what the main
(10:52):
ingredients in it.
It had taurine spruce lignans gamma orisanol vitamin e isomers and something from Japanesesofora extract fruit.
Mm-hmm.
I don't know, none of that means anything to me, but it worked.
So uh yeah, if anybody is kind of dealing with it on a beginning kind of level, I highlyrecommend it was really helpful.
(11:16):
It took about seven to 10 days before it really worked.
So stick with it.
You'd probably wanna invest in a bottle or maybe two to make sure that it's doing itsthing.
But I found that to be really helpful.
And then, uh I do think there's like an energetic component in like balancing out thebody.
And that's what I really wanted to be responsible about doing.
(11:37):
as I kind of went through these different protocols.
So I worked with a bioenergetic practitioner and we uh did hair testing to kind of seewhat was going on in my different systems, which is kind of like a quantum lie detector.
So where you can kind of see what's going on and we noticed a lot of different thingswhere...
(12:04):
Like, my different organs could use a cleanup.
That was kind of the first line of attack was looking at things with my liver and mykidneys.
Had me doing like gallbladder liver flushes every like five or six weeks pretty much.
And I don't know that that seemed to make a bit of a difference.
(12:26):
Now I'm also not just bloating, I definitely have weight gain.
Like over the last few years, I've probably put on like 40 pounds.
So pretty significant weight gain for me.
uh Being that even like before
And after the weight gain, still like, work out, I lift weights, I walk, I get a lot ofsteps in, I'm very active, I have four kids.
So not a whole lot changed.
(12:47):
And I eat very well and very healthy, I think too.
I, throughout the last four years as I've gained weight, I tried different things, know,more high protein, kind of keto style.
I tried eliminating different things.
In fact, when I started doing these protocols last summer and we did the hair testing,there were allergies showing up to things like chicken, pork.
(13:07):
turkey, dairy, trying to think what else we eliminate.
We eliminated a lot for several months.
So for several months, I wasn't eating a lot of those different things that I wouldtypically eat as protein sources.
It was a lot of steak, beef around here, and eggs.
But then when we redid the tests a few months later, and with the different remedies andthings that we did to clean up different systems, I was no longer showing allergic
(13:35):
reactions to those things.
So I'm back to being able to eat those things again.
The dairy is still kind of like hit or miss as far as like I've replaced a lot of thethings that are dairy with other things because it does seem like my body does not love
like the dairy and the cheese.
But other than that, I've been able to add everything else back in and dairy and cheeseare just kind of at my own peril.
(13:55):
So they're not like necessarily like making anything horribly bad, whatever.
So yeah, we did a lot of cleanup as far as the diet and the gallbladder, the liver.
uh
I did things like the Zen cleanse for my colon to get rid of the mucoid plaque and thingslike that.
You can probably speak better to that than I can.
(14:19):
But the idea in cleaning up the systems, the organs around the uterus and things is thatall those things are really close.
It's not like anything's that far apart inside of your body.
So if there's a bigger, you know,
load of toxins or things to clean up in a system that's, mean, your colon's right upagainst your uterus, you know?
(14:40):
So, and yeah, if you look up mucoid plaque and pictures of that in the colon, there's somereally interesting and pretty gross images to see.
And that's pretty much, do this cleanse for 24 hours, which is very easy.
It was very easy to do.
And then um your body releases this plaque over the course of the following days.
And em it's kind of like cleaning out a sewer pipe.
(15:03):
Nice, nice, without having to do a colonic.
Right, now coffee enemas were also something that was recommended during this journey too.
So it's like, I have tried the whole gamut of things over the last nine months or so.
And that also, you know, kind of to see if that would help with both energy and kind ofcleaning out toxins and things like that.
(15:25):
uh Anything to add from you on any of these things that were recommended for me or how orwhy they might work.
You know, I mean, I think it runs the gamut depending on the person and like, yeah, coffeeenemas, they've been around for eons to help cleanse.
And so, yeah, absolutely something that could be beneficial.
(15:45):
You know why it may work?
Well, coffee is America's best laxative for a reason.
And it does pull out a lot of stuff because it's gonna trigger a good squeeze, let's putit that way, on the gut and the stimulant there.
So, you know.
That the mucoid plaque, mean, getting any stuff that's stuck to the inside of your colonis amazing for you and just really helping because one of the things that gets confused as
(16:13):
we get older is the reabsorption of estrogens.
And that's something that I've dealt with for, I would say, much of my life and didn'tknow it in my 20s.
And I'm guessing that's probably why my mom ended up with breast cancer that was estrogenpositive.
think.
she just struggled with gut stuff.
She was more on the constipated side.
I'm more on the opposite side of that department, but it still plays in for somethingcalled beta glucuronidase.
(16:39):
Now, did you do any testing like GI map or GI effects with Genova or did you guys do anyof that or was it more just hair?
So we did the hair testing and we also did a bunch of blood work in labs, just instead ofmy doctor's like, A-okay, everything's fine.
We had a different viewpoint on it where it's like, this can be way better.
So we did find things through both of those tests that showed like congested liver,gallbladder and colon that showed viral loads like Epstein-Barr type stuff that showed...
(17:09):
um
some parasitic frequencies and that also showed that like my adrenal glands were prettystressed out and those inflammatory food responses, I guess it wasn't like allergies, it
more inflammatory.
But it's kind of like no wonder I felt like crap because my body was like in defense mode.
So that's a lot of what we found.
(17:30):
And we started with things like berberine and artemisia to clear bacteria and parasites.
We added in things like psyllium husk as kind of like a gut sweeper.
We added in milk thistle to detox the liver.
We did a bunch of different types of binders so that we could trap those released toxins.
(17:54):
And throughout a few of my different protocols, we would add in
um to clear like excess estrogen or xenoestrogens.
Can you explain xenoestrogens better than I can and how they show up for people?
I'm just like, okay, I listen when people explain stuff to me, but then I usually it getsreleased and I don't remember exactly how to explain it very well anymore.
(18:17):
That's a great question.
Yeah, Xenoestrogens often come from plastic in the environment.
uh One of the most common things that we don't think about as adults, because we're soused to having this stuff around, is like we go and get the to-go cup from Starbucks, and
it's got the plastic cup on top, and we're sipping on that plastic.
Or we may have our like to-go mugs that we sit in the car and we're commuting to workwith, and they have plastic on the top.
(18:42):
You have a very good example there.
looks like the Yeti is this thing.
Yes, silicone and stainless steel there.
And you've got your stainless steel straw too, which also...
silicone tip on it I like to chew on it.
can't stand a hard straw or a paper straw.
It's got to be that in between.
Huh, interesting.
(19:02):
You know, the thing about the paper straws, they melt before I finish drinks and that justgrosses me out so much, because I'm like, what is in that paper?
Oh, yeah, I can't do it.
But here's the thing, a lot of people will go and mix up the coffee or the tea and it'slike a plastic stick there.
So now we like plastic ourselves like four times.
And if you go to a restaurant, chances are that they've heated things in plastic.
(19:24):
You know, we might have scrapes on our pots and pans, all of that stuff.
And if you're doing...
we purchase, you know, the convenience store or whatever.
plastic and it gets washed in hot water sometimes.
know, we can't avoid plastics.
Like know people are saying like, oh, you got to detox all the microplastics, but I reallydon't know how.
(19:46):
Like my, was like, I don't know how we're going to get that all out, but Xenoestrogensreally truly, for most people are coming from plastics.
We also have the ones that are getting converted from pesticides and the chemicals in theair.
You know, it's everywhere.
to detox the microplastics as part of my protocols and obviously that's just not somethingthat lasts.
That's something that, you know, if we're going to detox those kind of things, we need todo it regularly, like every, you few years or something like that so that we can really
(20:12):
have that benefit last for longer.
But yeah, the way that it was kind of explained to me as I was kind of getting into theseprotocols was that like the liver is kind of like a hormonal processing plant.
And if it's sluggish, then you can't metabolize the estrogen.
and fat doesn't burn efficiently and toxins back up in your bloodstream.
(20:34):
it's like everything gets worse if stuff in the liver is not in order.
And I don't think that typically gets addressed with any, know, with a typical likeprimary care physician or somebody who you're going to see about your hormone imbalances
or your perimenopause symptoms.
No, no, unfortunately it's really cool right now to be like, I work on hormones, butreally it's I give you hormones and then you maybe take some supplements that counter it,
(21:02):
but nothing's uh customized and there isn't the prep beforehand.
Because I'll be honest, I'm the one that sees people when things go south with thehormones, when they can't tolerate them, we need to microdose them, we need to go back to
basics and clean the body back out.
Yeah, the biggest thing that's being overlooked, I think, when it comes to figuring outhormones for women is who's got fatty liver going into this and who's got the start of
(21:26):
fatty liver going into this because that is one of the biggest issues that I seehappening.
Estrogens start to come down as a whole.
Chlostrol goes up.
Well, cholesterol is where it's getting processed through that dang liver of yours.
And if you start to see your liver enzymes going up and your weight's going up,
(21:46):
you can do calculations to see what's up.
There's something, I mean the BMI, I do not love it because I'm always overweight on itbased on my muscle mass.
But it does help in using the BMI, find out your BMI and then calculate something calledthe hepatic steatosis index.
And every single one you guys out there right now could literally type in hepaticsteatosis index armed with your BMI calculation, which you can also get online very
(22:13):
easily.
plug in, go to your labs at the comprehensive metabolic panel and you can plug in your ASTand ALT levels right there and you're gonna get your index.
Anything over 36 is considered fatty liver.
Anything between 30 and 36 is inconclusive and what I call probably pre fatty liver timeto really do something.
(22:36):
If you're way under 30 then I'm not worried about you.
I'm like okay, you're doing all right in that department.
So.
That's a big one that like I'm looking at, man, I should have looked at that 10 years agoon myself because I'm pretty sure this process was happening 10 years ago.
Yeah, that's fascinating and thank you for the resource.
That's definitely helpful.
I've never actually looked at that either.
(22:58):
So I'm gonna be hopping over there after we're done to see where my levels are.
Yeah, and there's just, there's so many different components and I'm still trying tofigure out the weight part of it.
And I do think that what I'm doing now is going to help.
Cause like I said, I feel like whenever I have experts on and we talk about like thethings to do when you're in perimenopause to, you either lose weight or maintain muscle
(23:20):
and weight and stuff, like I'm already doing all.
of those things.
So, yeah, and we, as we kind of went through these different protocols, you know, welooked to see, you am I, am I pre-diabetic?
How am I processing insulin?
I even wore one of those, you know, things on the back of my arm for a month to like, youknow, check how my body was responding to different foods and things.
That wasn't a problem.
(23:40):
uh We even went so far as to look at like leptin because apparently like your leptinlevels can have, and the way that you're like exposed to different lights and Lord knows
we've got a lot of weird light sources and things that affect
that these days can make a huge difference on the weight that you put on or don't release.
So my leptin levels were fine.
(24:00):
My insulin and the way I was responding to stuff when I was wearing the continuous glucosemonitor were fine.
And it was at the point where the guy that I was working with was kind of like, I don'tknow, maybe you just start working out like twice as long or whatever.
And I'm like, that sucks, but I mean, I'll try it.
And I even started doing heavier workouts and things and still like...
(24:20):
It's like I'm not budging.
So that's been the biggest mystery.
That's been the biggest mystery, the weight and everything else.
Cause it feels like, okay, all my systems are pretty clean right now and things are goodand meat healthy and still like, still not coming off.
So I think I'm gonna have, I'm hoping I'll have the answers to that somewhere in thisyear's things that I try out and experiment with.
(24:44):
But yeah, there's just so many things that aren't thought about like,
these strategies that nobody gets taught or the way that estrogen supports dopamine andprogesterone calms your nervous system and testosterone fuels your drive.
(25:06):
So when you crash in perimenopause, your mental health might suffer and nobody's puttingit together in a way that makes sense to most people.
So it makes us all feel like we're kind of being like gaslit all the time.
And then I think I talked to you about this too, because so the thing that's been workingfor me right now, the best has been HRT or BHRT.
(25:31):
But.
I had so much confusion when I went, I went first to my primary care physician, because Ihad talked to Jason Persaud, who I was working with on all the other protocols, and he
gave me some final protocols to try, and he's like, oh, you we can try doing like thebovine placenta and the different organs and things, and we can try more DIM, and we can
try this, and we can do that colon cleanse, and I did all of those things.
(25:55):
I still wasn't getting anywhere.
And he's like, or you can kind of.
press the easy button and go get some HRT.
And I was like, but there's part of me that felt like I needed to like try all the otherthings to see if I could fix it in a different way first, which it's like, if I had known
how good this was gonna be, I probably would have skipped a lot of the other stuff.
But I also feel like what we said before, like I set myself up right by doing thosethings.
(26:19):
So I went to my primary care physician first and you know, it was just a tele-visit.
and she was perfectly willing to prescribe the estrogen patch and the progesterone to takeat night and give that a go.
But I was confused because I was like, is this bioidentical or is this not?
And so I went and she also told me that no matter what, she would not prescribetestosterone.
(26:45):
So it's kind of like, hmm, interesting, but also like whatever, mean, that's the way youdo things, that's the way you do things.
So I wanted to get somebody else on my team that would at least test and give me optionsfor that if I needed it down the road, and also would prescribe something bioidentical,
because my doctor's telling me this isn't bioidentical, what she's prescribed, and alsotelling me it's not necessary, it's whatever, but if you want to do that, you can go to a
(27:08):
compounding pharmacy and you can get it.
It's like, okay, and also I've heard the other side of it, so I'm confused now more than Ialready
I go to see another doctor about it who prescribes bioidentical hormone replacementtherapy.
And what do you know?
She prescribes the exact same thing that my primary care physician prescribed and told mewasn't bioidentical.
(27:33):
And then I reached out to you, I remember, and I was like, what the fuck?
Basically, like, what is this?
it's just a marketing term.
It's just a marketing term, but like...
They make, it was so frustrating.
I'm like, extra, extra copay, extra visits, extra research, all this stuff.
Like, could nobody just say, it's just a marketing term.
(27:57):
You know, it comes from the days of some of the old school stuff that's still out therethat is uh like 100 % synthetic.
so, but most people nowadays are gonna prescribe bioidentical patches.
That's what they are, bioidentical for everyone out there.
Bioidentical does not mean natural.
It is all synthetic.
(28:19):
And that's where people are saying that too.
And I'll get a lot of patients coming in and saying like, I want the natural hormones.
And I'm like, so you want herbs?
And they're like, no, I want a patch and I want this.
And I'm like, that's not natural, it's all synthetic.
But it works like you're saying, it works like the Dickens, you know?
I don't have, like I tell people, I don't have anything natural that is as strong as thesethings.
(28:42):
And they work, amazing.
If the body is primed beforehand.
If they don't, and I'm the person, like I said, I'm the person people come to when stuff'shitting the fan and they're like, my God, I don't know how to do this.
And so we do kind of crazy microdosing.
things to figure it out and sometimes blend the herbs, but with the bioidenticals.
But yeah, bioidentical really is, I mean, for lack of a better term, like yes, they lookmore like your hormones are in the body, but really it's micro, I mean, it's marketing now
(29:13):
because we're mostly using, even in the conventional space, the...
bioidenticals and it's usually and just to get this out there because for folks who arelike, oh, maybe I want to just try what my doc has because it goes through my insurance.
Most of the time they are programmed to prescribe you 200 milligrams of progesterone and a0.05 patch.
(29:35):
That's what you're going to get.
And that's like the standard because the research shows that the 200 milligrams ofprogesterone orally is the best protection for the uterine lining.
And the 0.05 patch is kind of like the middle of the road.
And this is your blanket hormone stuff.
And that is hands down what people will get when they go to a doc who's taking a coupleclasses on bioidentical hormone.
(30:01):
I was prescribed like less than half of that.
originally and we've been like working on tweaking things.
ah Now of course my primary care physician didn't want to work on tweaking anything untilJune.
The other doctor is already like working on like a month into a hormone replacement isalready like, hey, let's raise this up a little bit.
Let's leave this where it is.
(30:21):
Let's add in some estrogen cream.
Let's like see.
And she's a little bit more, I'm like, why should I suffer for like an extra few months ifwe can make this better?
Exactly.
And what you're describing is exactly what happens.
So the second person you went to is more well versed to know to start low, go slow,adjust, you know, as, you're going in and then adding possibly a vaginal cream because
(30:46):
dryness, because people have pelvic floor dysfunction.
We may need more than just Estriol because Estriol is kind of like great for the tissues.
I'm like soon we will have lotion for the whole body with Estriol.
because we've now discovered that it's great for all of our skin.
But Estrella's not strong enough vaginally for someone who is having prolapse and theexercises aren't doing all the thing and the radio frequency.
(31:12):
So radio frequency treatments for pelvic floor, by the way, game changers for people.
It's spendy.
It's about three to four grand for uh a package and I think it's like maybe four to sixsessions.
don't know, I don't wanna get exact on that.
thing?
No.
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
(31:58):
We were giggling the whole time because I was like, my god, it feels like you're doing amassage of my vagina, but like not in a sexual way.
I'm like, this actually feels like it's loosening like all this tension that I've had foryears.
And like, no joke, her one session got rid of a back pain that I had had for ever sincethat disc herniation a couple years ago.
(32:21):
And it's not, that pain has not come back to this day.
It's come back differently.
but not that same deep right-sided like no one can get to it with the massage kind ofpain.
And that radio frequency, that little wand just went and it just went.
So what kind of places offer this?
Mostly med spas.
And the device is a Morpheus, is what it's called.
(32:45):
And it's also used for like skincare too.
So they have a Morpheus 8 that has micro-needling, but you can micro-needle your vaginaltissue, which may sound terrifying to people, but don't worry, there's a numbing agent.
It's not that bad.
And I have not had it done because I don't have severe prolapse, but I have patients thathave.
(33:07):
Yeah.
I've never understood why this slang for one is used as an insult because I'm like, theyare some tough things.
they can handle some microneedling.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, and obviously with the numbing agent, but like the truth is, like, I'm seeinggreat results with those.
And you know, depending on how severe, like there are some cases where it's not gonna helpbecause it's so severe, but everyone that I've sent over there has had benefit.
(33:34):
And this is empowered MedSpa and Tacoma.
If you go to their website, you will see what it is.
It's RF radio frequency treatments, and then Morpheus 8 is what they're using.
And I mean, just like, MSL, don't waste your money.
Don't do the sitting thing.
no, I wasn't planning on it.
I wasn't sure if that's what you were talking about or not.
(33:54):
I will try this though.
I will definitely look for places near me that do that because I did pelvic floor therapywith my PT after my now eight year old was like a year or so old and had really good
results with it.
But then I feel like it's gotten worse over the last couple of years again and the samethings aren't fixing it.
(34:17):
So.
this could be a good alternative and sounds like it's pretty awesome so I'll give it atry.
Yeah, yeah all these things that yeah people just don't even know about because they'renot the kind of things that regular doctors are talking about but I gotta say that
as soon as I started the HRT, like less than 24 hours in, I slept better the first night,even just with, you know, the first night taking the progesterone along with it.
(34:46):
My focus, like I knocked out my to-do list that first day.
And I, like I mentioned before, when I was diagnosed with ADHD, I did try Adderall and Ihad really good response to it at first.
Like I had a few like really great weeks on Adderall where I was like, this is amazing.
And then it wasn't amazing anymore.
uh
but with the HRT I was like, wow, this is like better than Adderall was.
(35:07):
Like I felt good, I had good energy, I was like in flow, I was motivated, my productivitywas like soaring and yeah, literally it was better.
So it felt like to me when that happened that I was like, ah, I have found the missingpiece, not just for my brain, but for my whole being and that felt really good.
(35:31):
I get so many texts or voicemails of like, why did I wait so long, know, kind of stuff.
And that's the beauty of it.
Like it really does benefit, but I have to stress like you put in the work ahead of time.
And this is where I have a lot of people who will try things and say, my God, I feelworse.
Everything's terrible.
And this is where it's like, right, we gotta go back.
(35:53):
to basics and I don't let people suffer.
I will put microdoses of hormones on while we're working on the back end of things, butI'm not gonna throw in like the 200 milligrams of progesterone with the like 0.05 patch.
it's not gonna help a lot of people that haven't done the pre-work and that's where I'm atpersonally is trying to do my pre-work before really loading myself up.
(36:19):
I mean, I use progesterone half for like 10 years.
and it's helpful for sleep, for sure.
But estrogen I can't do consistently like we were saying yet because my, not because I getperiods by the way, a lot of women have been told, and I don't know if you were told this,
when you were still getting your period, that you couldn't do estrogen.
(36:39):
Were you told that?
No, no, em no.
mean, my periods just started getting like really irregular in the last like six monthsand then like I haven't had one for a few months.
So it wasn't that far out from not having one when they put me on HRT.
(37:00):
So it's like still I could have had one any day.
uh
Yeah, I still could.
mean, who knows?
And I think just the idea of perimenopause and menopause in general sometimes getsmisunderstood too.
I remember it being like a really big eye-opener for me when I think I was reading, oh,what is the book about perimenopause?
I think it's like Menopause Brain or something.
(37:24):
I'm gonna look at my audible library so that you all know what it is and you can look atit if you want to.
Menopause Brain, yes, by Dr.
Lisa Mosconi.
So she talks about the different stages and she talks about all the different angles andthings and that was really helpful.
know Megan Swan, who was on my podcast, recommended that book when we were talking aboutperimenopause on my show.
(37:45):
But she talks about how it gets really misunderstood that...
You're in perimenopause up until you have 12 consecutive months without a period.
And then people always talk about, I'm in menopause now or whatever, but menopause itselfis a 24 hour event.
Which is like, oh, I was like, I never heard it explained that way.
(38:05):
And I was like, oh, that makes total sense.
And then you're post menopausal for the rest of time thereafter.
So.
That was interesting to me.
And then anything that should set that back, know, maybe six months without a period andyou have one, then you're back to that 12 month counter again, waiting for that one day
and then postman puzzle.
(38:26):
So there's just, there's so much that nobody talked to us about.
This is not stuff that my parents or I don't, haven't found anybody who, you know, grewup, maybe, you know, Kate Northrup, whose mother was like, you know, educated in this.
You know, you don't hear about a whole lot of people who grew up with.
an education around their cycle or what happens when their cycle stops or anything.
(38:51):
And this is like, it's a huge part of our life.
know, perimenopause through postmenopause is like 50 % or more of our life.
It's a long bit of big chunk of it.
So understanding how to manage it and make the best of it seems really important.
And I know I talked about the stuff I did kind of physically to clean things up, but quiteliterally the work that I do with my clients is also work that I do with myself.
(39:21):
And that's super important also for, know, nervous system regulation is really importantfor hormonal harmony.
So yeah, it's.
Because it's inherently this time of like physiological change, which can feel likeinternal chaos.
And we have a lot of emotional reactivity, a lot of mood swings, and even a lot of peoplewill have, you know, increased panic or anxiety tied to these fluctuations.
(39:49):
things like I do with EFT tapping can be really, really helpful to calm the amygdala, thatstress center in the brain, to regulate the cortisol and the stress hormones.
to reduce the fight-flight dominance that can happen and really create more emotionalsafety in a time that feels really unfamiliar, therefore unsafe to the nervous system and
(40:12):
create more of like a fertile internal environment for hormone healing to occur.
So I think that's really important too, along with subconscious reprogramming because yougo into this part of your life and all of a sudden beliefs and things come up to the
surface like,
I'm not enough or I'm losing control.
(40:34):
I'm aging.
It's all downhill
my body's betraying me, all of these things, these beliefs will surface and that canreally create a lot more resistance to healing and feeling the way that you want to.
So when you can learn to powerfully visualize or to use hypnotherapy, you can access thatsubconscious part of the mind that's controlling that.
(40:59):
You can reprogram all of those fear-based loops and then you can reinforce the empoweringbeliefs around worth
and confidence and femininity and aging because it really is a beautiful process and it'snot going away.
And then you can have more acceptance.
You can have more trust in your body and you can have more fun.
(41:21):
So I think it's really important to mention that the subconscious and the nervous systemare really important when it comes to uh weight release, when it comes to sexual
confidence, when it comes to feeling safe to be seen still or again.
oh
Those things are really important.
so huge, so huge.
(41:41):
And I think for a lot of people, um if it's that they've been healthy most of their lifeand they've done a lot of the, I get a lot of women who, they're like, I've done all the
cleanses, I maintain a very clean diet, I work out all the time, what is my problem?
I'm like, it's your nervous system.
because you've done all the other things.
(42:02):
And I think a lot of people forget that we're switching fuels.
We go from ovary fuel to adrenal fuel, because your adrenals are what take over for yourhormones after your ovaries are like, yeah, I'm done, we're done.
And if your adrenals aren't balanced, that's the biggest problem.
And I think for me, yes, my gut, but I think my other biggest, just so that folks can kindof hear my side of it, I think for me, that's where things went off the rails is my
(42:28):
adrenals started to have.
such a hard time keeping up with the businesses, but also keeping up with like my monkeybrain of the thoughts and yes, the not enough and the I'm not smart enough where, you
know, blah, blah, blah.
This is probably more than all the info out there right now.
(42:51):
I still think we haven't hit on this enough.
I mean, and so many perimenopausal symptoms are just exacerbated by unprocessed emotionsand trapped energy.
know, like if you have grief that you haven't processed, that can often show up ininsomnia or in like a feeling of tightness, whether it's in your chest or somewhere else
(43:16):
in your body.
If you're dealing with repressed anger, and most people are in one way or another, that'sliver congestion.
And that can be a problem there.
If you're afraid of change, then you can have real resistance to the hormonal shifts thatare going to happen one way or another.
yeah, when we can learn to process these things on another level, not just throughphysically changing things or taking a medication or a supplement or a protocol, then you
(43:48):
can really uh heal things on an even deeper level.
This is why I have often, and probably annoyed a lot of people in my practice, that Idon't do as many supplements as I used to.
One, because I think there's a point at which your body can't handle that many, and Idon't wanna, it's just too much.
I think people in my profession do outdo what someone could actually handle.
(44:11):
But also, I think a lot of it is energetic, and that's what drew me to you when we had ourfirst podcast.
And I was like, I have to work with Teresa because this is what has been.
underlying everything for me and so I wanted to share with folks you know how important itis to look at your nervous system.
You know yeah I'm an acupuncturist, yeah I'm supposed to be super zen but like truth is weall have our crap.
(44:34):
Like we have it and I'm you know only now really processing a lot of things I was superangry about you know like losing my mom so young.
You know those kind of things stick with you and so I think you know for a lot of women
going through this time in life, but also if you lost your mom, you're looking at the agewhen she passed and you're going, my God, I'm almost there.
(45:00):
And we know like cancer starts 10 years before it's supposed to show up.
My mom died at, got her diagnosis at 52, died at 62.
And I was 26.
And you may say, okay, someone who's 26, they're old enough, they can handle, yeah, right.
I was a baby.
I didn't have the emotional processing.
(45:21):
even though I was almost done with naturopath school.
But the truth is for so many women they've lost their moms or they've been estranged ormom didn't talk about things.
I mean, there's a lot of family dynamics that I think are a lot of the underlying of whywe struggle when we go through this time in life.
And I'm glad you're doing what you're doing.
(45:41):
that you're doing what you're doing too.
Because people need somebody like you that can actually like look at their labs and givethem the feedback that they need instead of just the basic stuff they're getting at the
doctor.
They need somebody that has alternatives because most people don't want.
the stuff that's being recommended right off the bat and don't wanna accept certainanswers and they don't need to.
(46:04):
You you've been really helpful at helping me sort things out and helping my family sortthings out.
So, you your wisdom is much needed as people navigate this time in their life.
And it just happens to be that we're navigating it too.
And it's like I always say when I'm helping people with whatever it is that they've cometo me for, it's like, we're all walking each other home.
(46:27):
None of us have all.
the answers, but we do have pieces to the puzzle.
And we also have the ability to hold space and energetically support and guide each otherin ways that we can't do on our own.
I do truly believe that all healing is relational healing.
the things that kind of get messed up in us uh happen in relationship and they also healbest in relationship.
(46:53):
So when we have people to support us along the journey, that's the most important thing.
And, you know, when it comes to the work that I do, the nervous system is the containerthat holds these hormones and things that we're talking about today.
And if it's dysregulated, then like even the best supplements, if you want to takesupplements, aren't going to work because
(47:14):
the mind body part of it is what is really the game changer.
And that's what you facilitate in your work, even though it's with acupuncture needles andminds with more like tapping those spots.
Like we both kind of do the same thing in a different way that helps to get the mind andthe body in sync and balanced.
so huge and definitely something to think about and not ignore, you know, those of you outthere who are like, hmm, you know, what do I need to be focusing on?
(47:40):
I'm always asked that.
Where to focus first?
What do I do first?
And honestly, I do think getting your relationship with yourself right first is a reallygood step and then going into gut and those kinds of things, your relationship with
yourself is ongoing.
It's not like, you know, you fix it.
And then you're done and I think the same goes for hormones too.
(48:02):
All of this is an ongoing process and knowing that it's a work in progress, it's not a setit and forget it.
Absolutely.
So I guess what I would say to anybody who's listening, if...
you're feeling a little stuck with your health.
If you're feeling like somebody kind of stole your sparkle or you're gaining weightdespite doing everything right, or maybe your libido is tanking and your patience is thin
(48:27):
and your brain just doesn't want to focus the way that it used to, just please know itcould be something much more than just like your mindset.
It could be your hormones and there's so much that you can do to support yourself.
Seek out the answers.
questions for me or for Janine, reach out.
I'm always happy to share things I've tried or names of products or whatever else might behelpful for you.
(48:53):
And we can all help each other and walk each other home on this journey.
That's where it's at.
That's where it's at.
Tracy, thank you so much for meeting up with me today and sharing all of your story withus.
Let's tell folks where they can find you and uh connect with you, especially.
Absolutely.
(49:13):
The best place to connect with me is in my free school community, which em I will give alink for for the show notes.
If you're on school SKOL, you can go to the discovery page there.
So school.com forward slash discovery, type in my name, Teresa Lear Levine, you'll see thebecoming more me community come up and you can request to join.
I have all of my best resources in there.
(49:35):
And it's the place where you can kind of get free coaching from me interact with otheramazing people kind of on the same journey.
and that's the best place.
Otherwise, you can find me on Instagram at Theresa Lear Levine.
How about you, Janine?
Where's the best place for people to find you?
Find me on my podcast, The Health Fix.
Of course, we're working on trying to get a community together.
(49:56):
We'll see how that goes.
It might be a joint venture with my new practice in Wisconsin, so stay tuned for that.
And then drjkrausnd.com is my website.
And then of course on Instagram, you'll see me here and there, at drdrause.
And yeah, those are the best spots to find me.
And if you're in Wisconsin or Washington, you can see me in person.
(50:18):
Oh, I hope to be someday.
Or wherever you are.
It'd be fun to be able to meet up in person and give you a big hug and all of that.
So thank you so much for coming on and sharing all of your wisdom today too, Ginny.
Appreciate you.
Teresa and Janine here ready to talk about something that women over 40 sometimes evenover 35 start to experience the fun stuff of perimenopause into menopause.
Teresa, yeah, yeah, we have to talk about it.
We have to talk about it, especially today.
Like before we hit record guys, there was like so much fun banter of like what's going onwith you.
(00:23):
And I think, you know, a lot of gals are starting to open up conversations about
What's going on with perimenopause and menopause, but I don't know.
Are you talking with your friends about it?
uh
don't think that people talk about it enough.
(00:43):
I unabashedly bring it up in places where it might or might not be as welcome like it tobe.
But I just think, hey, you know what, even if I make somebody a little uncomfortabletalking about what's going on, I think it brings more awareness.
And I think that's exactly what we've been missing as women.
so it's part of the solution, make people a little uncomfortable.
(01:06):
and also introduce them to things they haven't thought about.
mean, when I look back even a year in my journey and I think about all the things I'vedone in the last year to improve the way my systems are functioning, to clean things up,
to make things easier, and to try things so that I can combat these different symptoms andfeel more like my somewhat younger self, I didn't know all this a year ago.
(01:34):
And you don't know what you don't know until you know it.
So these are the conversations that are really important so that people can go like, gosh,never thought about trying that or never thought that my liver and my kidneys or my colon
could be affecting my perimenopause systems because that's just my uterus or there's somuch more to the picture, right?
(01:55):
my gosh, so much, so much.
And yeah, that compartmentalization thing is real.
We've been taught that through the conventional medical system, that this is one partexperiencing that, that's one part experiencing that.
And thank goodness for, there's a lot of conversations out there now about howperimenopause and menopause shifts, and I call it changing of the fuel, in the body is
(02:17):
really affecting every part of your body.
And it's like...
I mean, some days it's comical, some days it's frustrating, and because I'm experiencingit too, I feel like it's, I guess if I was younger, I feel like I wouldn't be able to
relate to my ladies, and now I'm like, my God, I'm experiencing all these things.
(02:37):
And even like you said, a year ago, I was looking back at some of the things that I wasexperiencing and was like, I had no idea that that was probably part of hormone shifts
too, and just kind of the effect of the whole shift on my body.
It's a while.
And do you relate with like the ADHD type symptoms yourself?
(02:59):
Okay, I thought so, but I didn't want to make any assumptions.
I obviously do.
And I knew there could be some overlap, but...
I think that that is one of those things that is getting majorly overlooked when peopleare getting diagnosed.
mean, looking at my own story, of course I know without a doubt that ADHD was part of mylife since childhood.
(03:21):
We weren't really diagnosing it back then or doing much about it.
I just have always kind of tried to embrace the upsides of it.
But I would say that in my early 40s, it got a lot more challenging.
And that is when I got my official diagnosis.
There was enough going on at that point where I was like, maybe I do want to see ifmedication would help, or maybe I do want to know is this what's really going on?
(03:46):
And also several of my kids had been diagnosed, so just made sense.
Like, don't get the diagnosis, we're all in this together, let's see.
And it strikes me so oddly now when I'm thinking about this, because that was like 42, 43.
Now I'm 46, close to 47.
And never.
along that journey?
Did anybody say anything about hormones?
(04:09):
It was just a diagnosis for the ADHD and I dabbled with Adderall for a bit, didn't loveit.
It was great for a little while and then, so I was like, I'll find other things.
But still the symptoms and the kind of stagnation and the brain fog and the having a hardtime with like productivity and following through on things.
(04:32):
got worse than I feel like it ever had been.
It felt like a much more like uphill battle.
And, you know, get to this later, but I feel like fixing stuff with my hormones has made ahuge difference more than anything that was ever done to address ADHD alone.
Hey, know, it's interesting you mention that because so many patients of mine, because Ithink there's more awareness on ADHD too, right?
(04:58):
But I think so many more patients of mine have been diagnosed within the last, I'd say,couple years with ADHD, but then I'm looking at their ages and we're, you know, late 30s,
40s.
I am the same age as you, 46 going on 47.
And yeah, I also like, you know, I never identified with ADHD.
I was usually pretty focused, get stuff done, but then in the last couple years,
(05:19):
I found myself just like sitting there going like, what?
You know, just like bizarre like behavior that wasn't characteristic for me where Icouldn't focus on stuff, where I was pinging all over the place and had started all these
different projects and never finished them.
And I was like the one who would always like get something done, then move to the nextthing and get something done.
(05:42):
And then I was like juggling five different things and nothing getting done.
And I'm like, that's not me.
Right.
And so I'm like, I never was like, I'm gonna go for ADHD diagnosis, I, you know, hearingyou talk, hearing other people talk, I'm like, that was probably the start of the estrogen
really starting to go on the roller coaster that I'm on and having those really big bottomouts, I think, are what, and what I'm experiencing now to like a more severe degree, I
(06:12):
guess you could say.
Yeah.
So for me, it really culminated last year.
I was having a lot more ups and downs emotionally.
I was having a reemergence of hormonal acne, cystic-type hormonal acne.
The brain fog, like I said, was worse than ever.
I was tired.
(06:33):
I've been through times in my life raising young children and things where I was tired.
But this was different and these feelings almost being like narcoleptic, like must takenap or I don't know what's going to happen.
of tired.
And then the hot flashes.
So for me, the hot flashes started originally about a year and a half ago, and I was ableto take some supplements at that point that really helped.
(06:57):
And I was like, cool, know, whatever, take care of this and no big deal.
And then it was so good that I went off of the supplements like last summer and didn'treally have any problems until last December again.
with the hot flashes, but this time when they came back, the same supplement didn't help.
(07:17):
and one of my practitioners who I saw quite a bit last year had said, yeah, that's kind ofhappened sometimes.
Like what you respond to the first time doesn't work when they come back a littlestronger.
But this time it was awful.
Like I was having like 12 plus hot flashes a night where my sleep was majorly interrupted.
and I wasn't getting a lot of sleep, so I don't do well tired.
(07:39):
Like I'm usually very good at protecting my time to rest.
I go to bed when I'm supposed to to get like a good seven hours of sleep, which for me isoptimal, but I wasn't getting it.
I was getting maybe like four or five between like all the waking up and everything else.
So yeah, hot flashes and then like the libido kind of starting to tank and that's not meeither.
(08:00):
So I was like, we gotta do something about all of this.
Plus like just bloating.
and things like that that I just hadn't dealt with before.
And I think a lot of women don't understand how all of these things go together.
Do you see this a lot when you're helping people with hormones?
Absolutely, absolutely.
mean, you know, the bloating, you know, because let's face it, we have phases in thealternative medicine space where there's parasites.
(08:25):
You know, that's kind of what's hot right now.
And back like a few years ago, it was SIBO.
And back a few years before that, it was Candida.
And so a lot of people are still stuck trying to do multiple gut protocols and thinkinglike...
Why can't I any better?
Like what the heck's going on?
And I myself, I would say that this was probably one of the areas that I was kind oftrying to tease out for clients and myself because I've had some really like crazy gut
(08:54):
stuff happen over the last couple years.
And you know, I was doing all my protocols, right?
Like got.
probiotics and the colostrum and the tributrines and the this and that and nothing wastouching it and so I was like my god and then I think a lot of people too will take the
bloating as weight gain and not you know then try to cut calories do that kind of stuffand not really realize that you know it may be worth it to look deeper and for a lot of
(09:20):
women the other thing too is fibroids showing up and the fibroids causing that bloat thatlike you've spent a
bunch of money on all kinds of different gut protocols, nothing's working.
And then we do a transvaginal ultrasound and there's this like softball size fibroidhanging out in there.
And you're like, oh.
And so part of it, you know, I mean, I'll be fully honest.
(09:41):
Like I'm learning as I go here as a lot of the things I'm like, oh shoot, that was thehormones.
But at the same time, yeah, you were mentioning like, you were mentioning like you wereworking on your gut, you used some supplements too.
You know, I think we have to say that like,
and this is something I know you're gonna dive into because we chatted about it before wehit record is that like you dialed your body in over the last year to help the hormones
(10:06):
work better and the guts so much integral part of it so it's not like it's a wastespending the time on the parasite cleanse and the this and that it's just more you know
figuring out like what when to when to move on from that when to move from the next thing
So I want to hear like what supplements, think a lot of people might be thinking like,Teresa, what supplement did you use at first for the hot flashes?
(10:30):
And then what have you been kind of doing with your total body restoration or regulationor I don't know what you want to call it.
I'm throwing random words out.
I'll let you word that.
Yeah.
I used the first time my one of my doctors had recommended and it's called femgard hf andit's um I don't have like a thing with let's see I can look it up tell you what the main
(10:52):
ingredients in it.
It had taurine spruce lignans gamma orisanol vitamin e isomers and something from Japanesesofora extract fruit.
Mm-hmm.
I don't know, none of that means anything to me, but it worked.
So uh yeah, if anybody is kind of dealing with it on a beginning kind of level, I highlyrecommend it was really helpful.
(11:16):
It took about seven to 10 days before it really worked.
So stick with it.
You'd probably wanna invest in a bottle or maybe two to make sure that it's doing itsthing.
But I found that to be really helpful.
And then, uh I do think there's like an energetic component in like balancing out thebody.
And that's what I really wanted to be responsible about doing.
(11:37):
as I kind of went through these different protocols.
So I worked with a bioenergetic practitioner and we uh did hair testing to kind of seewhat was going on in my different systems, which is kind of like a quantum lie detector.
So where you can kind of see what's going on and we noticed a lot of different thingswhere...
(12:04):
Like, my different organs could use a cleanup.
That was kind of the first line of attack was looking at things with my liver and mykidneys.
Had me doing like gallbladder liver flushes every like five or six weeks pretty much.
And I don't know that that seemed to make a bit of a difference.
(12:26):
Now I'm also not just bloating, I definitely have weight gain.
Like over the last few years, I've probably put on like 40 pounds.
So pretty significant weight gain for me.
uh Being that even like before
And after the weight gain, still like, work out, I lift weights, I walk, I get a lot ofsteps in, I'm very active, I have four kids.
So not a whole lot changed.
(12:47):
And I eat very well and very healthy, I think too.
I, throughout the last four years as I've gained weight, I tried different things, know,more high protein, kind of keto style.
I tried eliminating different things.
In fact, when I started doing these protocols last summer and we did the hair testing,there were allergies showing up to things like chicken, pork.
(13:07):
turkey, dairy, trying to think what else we eliminate.
We eliminated a lot for several months.
So for several months, I wasn't eating a lot of those different things that I wouldtypically eat as protein sources.
It was a lot of steak, beef around here, and eggs.
But then when we redid the tests a few months later, and with the different remedies andthings that we did to clean up different systems, I was no longer showing allergic
(13:35):
reactions to those things.
So I'm back to being able to eat those things again.
The dairy is still kind of like hit or miss as far as like I've replaced a lot of thethings that are dairy with other things because it does seem like my body does not love
like the dairy and the cheese.
But other than that, I've been able to add everything else back in and dairy and cheeseare just kind of at my own peril.
(13:55):
So they're not like necessarily like making anything horribly bad, whatever.
So yeah, we did a lot of cleanup as far as the diet and the gallbladder, the liver.
uh
I did things like the Zen cleanse for my colon to get rid of the mucoid plaque and thingslike that.
You can probably speak better to that than I can.
(14:19):
But the idea in cleaning up the systems, the organs around the uterus and things is thatall those things are really close.
It's not like anything's that far apart inside of your body.
So if there's a bigger, you know,
load of toxins or things to clean up in a system that's, mean, your colon's right upagainst your uterus, you know?
(14:40):
So, and yeah, if you look up mucoid plaque and pictures of that in the colon, there's somereally interesting and pretty gross images to see.
And that's pretty much, do this cleanse for 24 hours, which is very easy.
It was very easy to do.
And then um your body releases this plaque over the course of the following days.
And em it's kind of like cleaning out a sewer pipe.
(15:03):
Nice, nice, without having to do a colonic.
Right, now coffee enemas were also something that was recommended during this journey too.
So it's like, I have tried the whole gamut of things over the last nine months or so.
And that also, you know, kind of to see if that would help with both energy and kind ofcleaning out toxins and things like that.
(15:25):
uh Anything to add from you on any of these things that were recommended for me or how orwhy they might work.
You know, I mean, I think it runs the gamut depending on the person and like, yeah, coffeeenemas, they've been around for eons to help cleanse.
And so, yeah, absolutely something that could be beneficial.
(15:45):
You know why it may work?
Well, coffee is America's best laxative for a reason.
And it does pull out a lot of stuff because it's gonna trigger a good squeeze, let's putit that way, on the gut and the stimulant there.
So, you know.
That the mucoid plaque, mean, getting any stuff that's stuck to the inside of your colonis amazing for you and just really helping because one of the things that gets confused as
(16:13):
we get older is the reabsorption of estrogens.
And that's something that I've dealt with for, I would say, much of my life and didn'tknow it in my 20s.
And I'm guessing that's probably why my mom ended up with breast cancer that was estrogenpositive.
think.
she just struggled with gut stuff.
She was more on the constipated side.
I'm more on the opposite side of that department, but it still plays in for somethingcalled beta glucuronidase.
(16:39):
Now, did you do any testing like GI map or GI effects with Genova or did you guys do anyof that or was it more just hair?
So we did the hair testing and we also did a bunch of blood work in labs, just instead ofmy doctor's like, A-okay, everything's fine.
We had a different viewpoint on it where it's like, this can be way better.
So we did find things through both of those tests that showed like congested liver,gallbladder and colon that showed viral loads like Epstein-Barr type stuff that showed...
(17:09):
um
some parasitic frequencies and that also showed that like my adrenal glands were prettystressed out and those inflammatory food responses, I guess it wasn't like allergies, it
more inflammatory.
But it's kind of like no wonder I felt like crap because my body was like in defense mode.
So that's a lot of what we found.
(17:30):
And we started with things like berberine and artemisia to clear bacteria and parasites.
We added in things like psyllium husk as kind of like a gut sweeper.
We added in milk thistle to detox the liver.
We did a bunch of different types of binders so that we could trap those released toxins.
(17:54):
And throughout a few of my different protocols, we would add in
um to clear like excess estrogen or xenoestrogens.
Can you explain xenoestrogens better than I can and how they show up for people?
I'm just like, okay, I listen when people explain stuff to me, but then I usually it getsreleased and I don't remember exactly how to explain it very well anymore.
(18:17):
That's a great question.
Yeah, Xenoestrogens often come from plastic in the environment.
uh One of the most common things that we don't think about as adults, because we're soused to having this stuff around, is like we go and get the to-go cup from Starbucks, and
it's got the plastic cup on top, and we're sipping on that plastic.
Or we may have our like to-go mugs that we sit in the car and we're commuting to workwith, and they have plastic on the top.
(18:42):
You have a very good example there.
looks like the Yeti is this thing.
Yes, silicone and stainless steel there.
And you've got your stainless steel straw too, which also...
silicone tip on it I like to chew on it.
can't stand a hard straw or a paper straw.
It's got to be that in between.
Huh, interesting.
(19:02):
You know, the thing about the paper straws, they melt before I finish drinks and that justgrosses me out so much, because I'm like, what is in that paper?
Oh, yeah, I can't do it.
But here's the thing, a lot of people will go and mix up the coffee or the tea and it'slike a plastic stick there.
So now we like plastic ourselves like four times.
And if you go to a restaurant, chances are that they've heated things in plastic.
(19:24):
You know, we might have scrapes on our pots and pans, all of that stuff.
And if you're doing...
we purchase, you know, the convenience store or whatever.
plastic and it gets washed in hot water sometimes.
know, we can't avoid plastics.
Like know people are saying like, oh, you got to detox all the microplastics, but I reallydon't know how.
(19:46):
Like my, was like, I don't know how we're going to get that all out, but Xenoestrogensreally truly, for most people are coming from plastics.
We also have the ones that are getting converted from pesticides and the chemicals in theair.
You know, it's everywhere.
to detox the microplastics as part of my protocols and obviously that's just not somethingthat lasts.
That's something that, you know, if we're going to detox those kind of things, we need todo it regularly, like every, you few years or something like that so that we can really
(20:12):
have that benefit last for longer.
But yeah, the way that it was kind of explained to me as I was kind of getting into theseprotocols was that like the liver is kind of like a hormonal processing plant.
And if it's sluggish, then you can't metabolize the estrogen.
and fat doesn't burn efficiently and toxins back up in your bloodstream.
(20:34):
it's like everything gets worse if stuff in the liver is not in order.
And I don't think that typically gets addressed with any, know, with a typical likeprimary care physician or somebody who you're going to see about your hormone imbalances
or your perimenopause symptoms.
No, no, unfortunately it's really cool right now to be like, I work on hormones, butreally it's I give you hormones and then you maybe take some supplements that counter it,
(21:02):
but nothing's uh customized and there isn't the prep beforehand.
Because I'll be honest, I'm the one that sees people when things go south with thehormones, when they can't tolerate them, we need to microdose them, we need to go back to
basics and clean the body back out.
Yeah, the biggest thing that's being overlooked, I think, when it comes to figuring outhormones for women is who's got fatty liver going into this and who's got the start of
(21:26):
fatty liver going into this because that is one of the biggest issues that I seehappening.
Estrogens start to come down as a whole.
Chlostrol goes up.
Well, cholesterol is where it's getting processed through that dang liver of yours.
And if you start to see your liver enzymes going up and your weight's going up,
(21:46):
you can do calculations to see what's up.
There's something, I mean the BMI, I do not love it because I'm always overweight on itbased on my muscle mass.
But it does help in using the BMI, find out your BMI and then calculate something calledthe hepatic steatosis index.
And every single one you guys out there right now could literally type in hepaticsteatosis index armed with your BMI calculation, which you can also get online very
(22:13):
easily.
plug in, go to your labs at the comprehensive metabolic panel and you can plug in your ASTand ALT levels right there and you're gonna get your index.
Anything over 36 is considered fatty liver.
Anything between 30 and 36 is inconclusive and what I call probably pre fatty liver timeto really do something.
(22:36):
If you're way under 30 then I'm not worried about you.
I'm like okay, you're doing all right in that department.
So.
That's a big one that like I'm looking at, man, I should have looked at that 10 years agoon myself because I'm pretty sure this process was happening 10 years ago.
Yeah, that's fascinating and thank you for the resource.
That's definitely helpful.
I've never actually looked at that either.
(22:58):
So I'm gonna be hopping over there after we're done to see where my levels are.
Yeah, and there's just, there's so many different components and I'm still trying tofigure out the weight part of it.
And I do think that what I'm doing now is going to help.
Cause like I said, I feel like whenever I have experts on and we talk about like thethings to do when you're in perimenopause to, you either lose weight or maintain muscle
(23:20):
and weight and stuff, like I'm already doing all.
of those things.
So, yeah, and we, as we kind of went through these different protocols, you know, welooked to see, you am I, am I pre-diabetic?
How am I processing insulin?
I even wore one of those, you know, things on the back of my arm for a month to like, youknow, check how my body was responding to different foods and things.
That wasn't a problem.
(23:40):
uh We even went so far as to look at like leptin because apparently like your leptinlevels can have, and the way that you're like exposed to different lights and Lord knows
we've got a lot of weird light sources and things that affect
that these days can make a huge difference on the weight that you put on or don't release.
So my leptin levels were fine.
(24:00):
My insulin and the way I was responding to stuff when I was wearing the continuous glucosemonitor were fine.
And it was at the point where the guy that I was working with was kind of like, I don'tknow, maybe you just start working out like twice as long or whatever.
And I'm like, that sucks, but I mean, I'll try it.
And I even started doing heavier workouts and things and still like...
(24:20):
It's like I'm not budging.
So that's been the biggest mystery.
That's been the biggest mystery, the weight and everything else.
Cause it feels like, okay, all my systems are pretty clean right now and things are goodand meat healthy and still like, still not coming off.
So I think I'm gonna have, I'm hoping I'll have the answers to that somewhere in thisyear's things that I try out and experiment with.
(24:44):
But yeah, there's just so many things that aren't thought about like,
these strategies that nobody gets taught or the way that estrogen supports dopamine andprogesterone calms your nervous system and testosterone fuels your drive.
(25:06):
So when you crash in perimenopause, your mental health might suffer and nobody's puttingit together in a way that makes sense to most people.
So it makes us all feel like we're kind of being like gaslit all the time.
And then I think I talked to you about this too, because so the thing that's been workingfor me right now, the best has been HRT or BHRT.
(25:31):
But.
I had so much confusion when I went, I went first to my primary care physician, because Ihad talked to Jason Persaud, who I was working with on all the other protocols, and he
gave me some final protocols to try, and he's like, oh, you we can try doing like thebovine placenta and the different organs and things, and we can try more DIM, and we can
try this, and we can do that colon cleanse, and I did all of those things.
(25:55):
I still wasn't getting anywhere.
And he's like, or you can kind of.
press the easy button and go get some HRT.
And I was like, but there's part of me that felt like I needed to like try all the otherthings to see if I could fix it in a different way first, which it's like, if I had known
how good this was gonna be, I probably would have skipped a lot of the other stuff.
But I also feel like what we said before, like I set myself up right by doing thosethings.
(26:19):
So I went to my primary care physician first and you know, it was just a tele-visit.
and she was perfectly willing to prescribe the estrogen patch and the progesterone to takeat night and give that a go.
But I was confused because I was like, is this bioidentical or is this not?
And so I went and she also told me that no matter what, she would not prescribetestosterone.
(26:45):
So it's kind of like, hmm, interesting, but also like whatever, mean, that's the way youdo things, that's the way you do things.
So I wanted to get somebody else on my team that would at least test and give me optionsfor that if I needed it down the road, and also would prescribe something bioidentical,
because my doctor's telling me this isn't bioidentical, what she's prescribed, and alsotelling me it's not necessary, it's whatever, but if you want to do that, you can go to a
(27:08):
compounding pharmacy and you can get it.
It's like, okay, and also I've heard the other side of it, so I'm confused now more than Ialready
I go to see another doctor about it who prescribes bioidentical hormone replacementtherapy.
And what do you know?
She prescribes the exact same thing that my primary care physician prescribed and told mewasn't bioidentical.
(27:33):
And then I reached out to you, I remember, and I was like, what the fuck?
Basically, like, what is this?
it's just a marketing term.
It's just a marketing term, but like...
They make, it was so frustrating.
I'm like, extra, extra copay, extra visits, extra research, all this stuff.
Like, could nobody just say, it's just a marketing term.
(27:57):
You know, it comes from the days of some of the old school stuff that's still out therethat is uh like 100 % synthetic.
so, but most people nowadays are gonna prescribe bioidentical patches.
That's what they are, bioidentical for everyone out there.
Bioidentical does not mean natural.
It is all synthetic.
(28:19):
And that's where people are saying that too.
And I'll get a lot of patients coming in and saying like, I want the natural hormones.
And I'm like, so you want herbs?
And they're like, no, I want a patch and I want this.
And I'm like, that's not natural, it's all synthetic.
But it works like you're saying, it works like the Dickens, you know?
I don't have, like I tell people, I don't have anything natural that is as strong as thesethings.
(28:42):
And they work, amazing.
If the body is primed beforehand.
If they don't, and I'm the person, like I said, I'm the person people come to when stuff'shitting the fan and they're like, my God, I don't know how to do this.
And so we do kind of crazy microdosing.
things to figure it out and sometimes blend the herbs, but with the bioidenticals.
But yeah, bioidentical really is, I mean, for lack of a better term, like yes, they lookmore like your hormones are in the body, but really it's micro, I mean, it's marketing now
(29:13):
because we're mostly using, even in the conventional space, the...
bioidenticals and it's usually and just to get this out there because for folks who arelike, oh, maybe I want to just try what my doc has because it goes through my insurance.
Most of the time they are programmed to prescribe you 200 milligrams of progesterone and a0.05 patch.
(29:35):
That's what you're going to get.
And that's like the standard because the research shows that the 200 milligrams ofprogesterone orally is the best protection for the uterine lining.
And the 0.05 patch is kind of like the middle of the road.
And this is your blanket hormone stuff.
And that is hands down what people will get when they go to a doc who's taking a coupleclasses on bioidentical hormone.
(30:01):
I was prescribed like less than half of that.
originally and we've been like working on tweaking things.
ah Now of course my primary care physician didn't want to work on tweaking anything untilJune.
The other doctor is already like working on like a month into a hormone replacement isalready like, hey, let's raise this up a little bit.
Let's leave this where it is.
(30:21):
Let's add in some estrogen cream.
Let's like see.
And she's a little bit more, I'm like, why should I suffer for like an extra few months ifwe can make this better?
Exactly.
And what you're describing is exactly what happens.
So the second person you went to is more well versed to know to start low, go slow,adjust, you know, as, you're going in and then adding possibly a vaginal cream because
(30:46):
dryness, because people have pelvic floor dysfunction.
We may need more than just Estriol because Estriol is kind of like great for the tissues.
I'm like soon we will have lotion for the whole body with Estriol.
because we've now discovered that it's great for all of our skin.
But Estrella's not strong enough vaginally for someone who is having prolapse and theexercises aren't doing all the thing and the radio frequency.
(31:12):
So radio frequency treatments for pelvic floor, by the way, game changers for people.
It's spendy.
It's about three to four grand for uh a package and I think it's like maybe four to sixsessions.
don't know, I don't wanna get exact on that.
thing?
No.
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
(31:58):
We were giggling the whole time because I was like, my god, it feels like you're doing amassage of my vagina, but like not in a sexual way.
I'm like, this actually feels like it's loosening like all this tension that I've had foryears.
And like, no joke, her one session got rid of a back pain that I had had for ever sincethat disc herniation a couple years ago.
(32:21):
And it's not, that pain has not come back to this day.
It's come back differently.
but not that same deep right-sided like no one can get to it with the massage kind ofpain.
And that radio frequency, that little wand just went and it just went.
So what kind of places offer this?
Mostly med spas.
And the device is a Morpheus, is what it's called.
(32:45):
And it's also used for like skincare too.
So they have a Morpheus 8 that has micro-needling, but you can micro-needle your vaginaltissue, which may sound terrifying to people, but don't worry, there's a numbing agent.
It's not that bad.
And I have not had it done because I don't have severe prolapse, but I have patients thathave.
(33:07):
Yeah.
I've never understood why this slang for one is used as an insult because I'm like, theyare some tough things.
they can handle some microneedling.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, and obviously with the numbing agent, but like the truth is, like, I'm seeinggreat results with those.
And you know, depending on how severe, like there are some cases where it's not gonna helpbecause it's so severe, but everyone that I've sent over there has had benefit.
(33:34):
And this is empowered MedSpa and Tacoma.
If you go to their website, you will see what it is.
It's RF radio frequency treatments, and then Morpheus 8 is what they're using.
And I mean, just like, MSL, don't waste your money.
Don't do the sitting thing.
no, I wasn't planning on it.
I wasn't sure if that's what you were talking about or not.
(33:54):
I will try this though.
I will definitely look for places near me that do that because I did pelvic floor therapywith my PT after my now eight year old was like a year or so old and had really good
results with it.
But then I feel like it's gotten worse over the last couple of years again and the samethings aren't fixing it.
(34:17):
So.
this could be a good alternative and sounds like it's pretty awesome so I'll give it atry.
Yeah, yeah all these things that yeah people just don't even know about because they'renot the kind of things that regular doctors are talking about but I gotta say that
as soon as I started the HRT, like less than 24 hours in, I slept better the first night,even just with, you know, the first night taking the progesterone along with it.
(34:46):
My focus, like I knocked out my to-do list that first day.
And I, like I mentioned before, when I was diagnosed with ADHD, I did try Adderall and Ihad really good response to it at first.
Like I had a few like really great weeks on Adderall where I was like, this is amazing.
And then it wasn't amazing anymore.
uh
but with the HRT I was like, wow, this is like better than Adderall was.
(35:07):
Like I felt good, I had good energy, I was like in flow, I was motivated, my productivitywas like soaring and yeah, literally it was better.
So it felt like to me when that happened that I was like, ah, I have found the missingpiece, not just for my brain, but for my whole being and that felt really good.
(35:31):
I get so many texts or voicemails of like, why did I wait so long, know, kind of stuff.
And that's the beauty of it.
Like it really does benefit, but I have to stress like you put in the work ahead of time.
And this is where I have a lot of people who will try things and say, my God, I feelworse.
Everything's terrible.
And this is where it's like, right, we gotta go back.
(35:53):
to basics and I don't let people suffer.
I will put microdoses of hormones on while we're working on the back end of things, butI'm not gonna throw in like the 200 milligrams of progesterone with the like 0.05 patch.
it's not gonna help a lot of people that haven't done the pre-work and that's where I'm atpersonally is trying to do my pre-work before really loading myself up.
(36:19):
I mean, I use progesterone half for like 10 years.
and it's helpful for sleep, for sure.
But estrogen I can't do consistently like we were saying yet because my, not because I getperiods by the way, a lot of women have been told, and I don't know if you were told this,
when you were still getting your period, that you couldn't do estrogen.
(36:39):
Were you told that?
No, no, em no.
mean, my periods just started getting like really irregular in the last like six monthsand then like I haven't had one for a few months.
So it wasn't that far out from not having one when they put me on HRT.
(37:00):
So it's like still I could have had one any day.
uh
Yeah, I still could.
mean, who knows?
And I think just the idea of perimenopause and menopause in general sometimes getsmisunderstood too.
I remember it being like a really big eye-opener for me when I think I was reading, oh,what is the book about perimenopause?
I think it's like Menopause Brain or something.
(37:24):
I'm gonna look at my audible library so that you all know what it is and you can look atit if you want to.
Menopause Brain, yes, by Dr.
Lisa Mosconi.
So she talks about the different stages and she talks about all the different angles andthings and that was really helpful.
know Megan Swan, who was on my podcast, recommended that book when we were talking aboutperimenopause on my show.
(37:45):
But she talks about how it gets really misunderstood that...
You're in perimenopause up until you have 12 consecutive months without a period.
And then people always talk about, I'm in menopause now or whatever, but menopause itselfis a 24 hour event.
Which is like, oh, I was like, I never heard it explained that way.
(38:05):
And I was like, oh, that makes total sense.
And then you're post menopausal for the rest of time thereafter.
So.
That was interesting to me.
And then anything that should set that back, know, maybe six months without a period andyou have one, then you're back to that 12 month counter again, waiting for that one day
and then postman puzzle.
(38:26):
So there's just, there's so much that nobody talked to us about.
This is not stuff that my parents or I don't, haven't found anybody who, you know, grewup, maybe, you know, Kate Northrup, whose mother was like, you know, educated in this.
You know, you don't hear about a whole lot of people who grew up with.
an education around their cycle or what happens when their cycle stops or anything.
(38:51):
And this is like, it's a huge part of our life.
know, perimenopause through postmenopause is like 50 % or more of our life.
It's a long bit of big chunk of it.
So understanding how to manage it and make the best of it seems really important.
And I know I talked about the stuff I did kind of physically to clean things up, but quiteliterally the work that I do with my clients is also work that I do with myself.
(39:21):
And that's super important also for, know, nervous system regulation is really importantfor hormonal harmony.
So yeah, it's.
Because it's inherently this time of like physiological change, which can feel likeinternal chaos.
And we have a lot of emotional reactivity, a lot of mood swings, and even a lot of peoplewill have, you know, increased panic or anxiety tied to these fluctuations.
(39:49):
things like I do with EFT tapping can be really, really helpful to calm the amygdala, thatstress center in the brain, to regulate the cortisol and the stress hormones.
to reduce the fight-flight dominance that can happen and really create more emotionalsafety in a time that feels really unfamiliar, therefore unsafe to the nervous system and
(40:12):
create more of like a fertile internal environment for hormone healing to occur.
So I think that's really important too, along with subconscious reprogramming because yougo into this part of your life and all of a sudden beliefs and things come up to the
surface like,
I'm not enough or I'm losing control.
(40:34):
I'm aging.
It's all downhill
my body's betraying me, all of these things, these beliefs will surface and that canreally create a lot more resistance to healing and feeling the way that you want to.
So when you can learn to powerfully visualize or to use hypnotherapy, you can access thatsubconscious part of the mind that's controlling that.
(40:59):
You can reprogram all of those fear-based loops and then you can reinforce the empoweringbeliefs around worth
and confidence and femininity and aging because it really is a beautiful process and it'snot going away.
And then you can have more acceptance.
You can have more trust in your body and you can have more fun.
(41:21):
So I think it's really important to mention that the subconscious and the nervous systemare really important when it comes to uh weight release, when it comes to sexual
confidence, when it comes to feeling safe to be seen still or again.
oh
Those things are really important.
so huge, so huge.
(41:41):
And I think for a lot of people, um if it's that they've been healthy most of their lifeand they've done a lot of the, I get a lot of women who, they're like, I've done all the
cleanses, I maintain a very clean diet, I work out all the time, what is my problem?
I'm like, it's your nervous system.
because you've done all the other things.
(42:02):
And I think a lot of people forget that we're switching fuels.
We go from ovary fuel to adrenal fuel, because your adrenals are what take over for yourhormones after your ovaries are like, yeah, I'm done, we're done.
And if your adrenals aren't balanced, that's the biggest problem.
And I think for me, yes, my gut, but I think my other biggest, just so that folks can kindof hear my side of it, I think for me, that's where things went off the rails is my
(42:28):
adrenals started to have.
such a hard time keeping up with the businesses, but also keeping up with like my monkeybrain of the thoughts and yes, the not enough and the I'm not smart enough where, you
know, blah, blah, blah.
This is probably more than all the info out there right now.
(42:51):
I still think we haven't hit on this enough.
I mean, and so many perimenopausal symptoms are just exacerbated by unprocessed emotionsand trapped energy.
know, like if you have grief that you haven't processed, that can often show up ininsomnia or in like a feeling of tightness, whether it's in your chest or somewhere else
(43:16):
in your body.
If you're dealing with repressed anger, and most people are in one way or another, that'sliver congestion.
And that can be a problem there.
If you're afraid of change, then you can have real resistance to the hormonal shifts thatare going to happen one way or another.
yeah, when we can learn to process these things on another level, not just throughphysically changing things or taking a medication or a supplement or a protocol, then you
(43:48):
can really uh heal things on an even deeper level.
This is why I have often, and probably annoyed a lot of people in my practice, that Idon't do as many supplements as I used to.
One, because I think there's a point at which your body can't handle that many, and Idon't wanna, it's just too much.
I think people in my profession do outdo what someone could actually handle.
(44:11):
But also, I think a lot of it is energetic, and that's what drew me to you when we had ourfirst podcast.
And I was like, I have to work with Teresa because this is what has been.
underlying everything for me and so I wanted to share with folks you know how important itis to look at your nervous system.
You know yeah I'm an acupuncturist, yeah I'm supposed to be super zen but like truth is weall have our crap.
(44:34):
Like we have it and I'm you know only now really processing a lot of things I was superangry about you know like losing my mom so young.
You know those kind of things stick with you and so I think you know for a lot of women
going through this time in life, but also if you lost your mom, you're looking at the agewhen she passed and you're going, my God, I'm almost there.
(45:00):
And we know like cancer starts 10 years before it's supposed to show up.
My mom died at, got her diagnosis at 52, died at 62.
And I was 26.
And you may say, okay, someone who's 26, they're old enough, they can handle, yeah, right.
I was a baby.
I didn't have the emotional processing.
(45:21):
even though I was almost done with naturopath school.
But the truth is for so many women they've lost their moms or they've been estranged ormom didn't talk about things.
I mean, there's a lot of family dynamics that I think are a lot of the underlying of whywe struggle when we go through this time in life.
And I'm glad you're doing what you're doing.
(45:41):
that you're doing what you're doing too.
Because people need somebody like you that can actually like look at their labs and givethem the feedback that they need instead of just the basic stuff they're getting at the
doctor.
They need somebody that has alternatives because most people don't want.
the stuff that's being recommended right off the bat and don't wanna accept certainanswers and they don't need to.
(46:04):
You you've been really helpful at helping me sort things out and helping my family sortthings out.
So, you your wisdom is much needed as people navigate this time in their life.
And it just happens to be that we're navigating it too.
And it's like I always say when I'm helping people with whatever it is that they've cometo me for, it's like, we're all walking each other home.
(46:27):
None of us have all.
the answers, but we do have pieces to the puzzle.
And we also have the ability to hold space and energetically support and guide each otherin ways that we can't do on our own.
I do truly believe that all healing is relational healing.
the things that kind of get messed up in us uh happen in relationship and they also healbest in relationship.
(46:53):
So when we have people to support us along the journey, that's the most important thing.
And, you know, when it comes to the work that I do, the nervous system is the containerthat holds these hormones and things that we're talking about today.
And if it's dysregulated, then like even the best supplements, if you want to takesupplements, aren't going to work because
(47:14):
the mind body part of it is what is really the game changer.
And that's what you facilitate in your work, even though it's with acupuncture needles andminds with more like tapping those spots.
Like we both kind of do the same thing in a different way that helps to get the mind andthe body in sync and balanced.
so huge and definitely something to think about and not ignore, you know, those of you outthere who are like, hmm, you know, what do I need to be focusing on?
(47:40):
I'm always asked that.
Where to focus first?
What do I do first?
And honestly, I do think getting your relationship with yourself right first is a reallygood step and then going into gut and those kinds of things, your relationship with
yourself is ongoing.
It's not like, you know, you fix it.
And then you're done and I think the same goes for hormones too.
(48:02):
All of this is an ongoing process and knowing that it's a work in progress, it's not a setit and forget it.
Absolutely.
So I guess what I would say to anybody who's listening, if...
you're feeling a little stuck with your health.
If you're feeling like somebody kind of stole your sparkle or you're gaining weightdespite doing everything right, or maybe your libido is tanking and your patience is thin
(48:27):
and your brain just doesn't want to focus the way that it used to, just please know itcould be something much more than just like your mindset.
It could be your hormones and there's so much that you can do to support yourself.
Seek out the answers.
questions for me or for Janine, reach out.
I'm always happy to share things I've tried or names of products or whatever else might behelpful for you.
(48:53):
And we can all help each other and walk each other home on this journey.
That's where it's at.
That's where it's at.
Tracy, thank you so much for meeting up with me today and sharing all of your story withus.
Let's tell folks where they can find you and uh connect with you, especially.
Absolutely.
(49:13):
The best place to connect with me is in my free school community, which em I will give alink for for the show notes.
If you're on school SKOL, you can go to the discovery page there.
So school.com forward slash discovery, type in my name, Teresa Lear Levine, you'll see thebecoming more me community come up and you can request to join.
I have all of my best resources in there.
(49:35):
And it's the place where you can kind of get free coaching from me interact with otheramazing people kind of on the same journey.
and that's the best place.
Otherwise, you can find me on Instagram at Theresa Lear Levine.
How about you, Janine?
Where's the best place for people to find you?
Find me on my podcast, The Health Fix.
Of course, we're working on trying to get a community together.
(49:56):
We'll see how that goes.
It might be a joint venture with my new practice in Wisconsin, so stay tuned for that.
And then drjkrausnd.com is my website.
And then of course on Instagram, you'll see me here and there, at drdrause.
And yeah, those are the best spots to find me.
And if you're in Wisconsin or Washington, you can see me in person.
(50:18):
Oh, I hope to be someday.
Or wherever you are.
It'd be fun to be able to meet up in person and give you a big hug and all of that.
So thank you so much for coming on and sharing all of your wisdom today too, Ginny.
Appreciate you.
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