Bettering Women's Health w/ Dr. Aviva Romm

This week, Anne and Heather are joined by Dr. Aviva Romm, a combined Yale trained MD and a midwife, specializing in all things women's health, with a healthy dose of kids' health, too. Aviva's practice is all about women’s healthcare, reimagined. She helps women reimagine their relationship with their bodies, cycles, hormones, reproductive health, and more—to be the most powerful woman at every stage. On her website you'll find no-BS natural approaches rooted in tradition and backed by science--basically all the tools you need on your wellness or healing journey, with a whole lot of empathy – and no judgment. 
So pour yourself a cup of tea, and enjoy the episode!
Be sure to follow the pod on IG!
From Straw Hut Media

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Strawhut Media.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Everybody, Well, welcome back to Better Together. Today we have
a wonderful doctor Aviva ram On, who is going to
teach us so much either take it away.

Speaker 3 (00:16):
Oh my gosh, I'm so excited about our guest today.
Today we have doctor Aviva ram She's a midwife and
an internal medicine and board certified family physician with specialties
in integrative gynecology, obstetrician, and pediatrics with a focus on androchronology.
She's also a world renowned herbalist and author of textbooks

(00:37):
Botanical Medicines for Women's Health, which she's going to give
us lots of scoop on that today, as well as
seven other books. She's a practitioner, a teacher, an activist,
and an advocate of both environmental health and women's reproductive rights.
She has been bridging the best of traditional medicine, total health, ecology,
and good science for over three decades.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
I mean it's so special to on, like this is
exactly what we said Better Together is going to be
about this year. We want to learn about our health.
We want to understand how we can do it with
herbs and not only taking and we're going to learn
about this to today, not taking the medicine that has
prescribed necessarily. There are a lot of remedies that help
us and help every generation. She's going to teach us
about each one of those things.

Speaker 3 (01:19):
I think it's a total cliff notes episode. If you
want to listen, Yes, absolutely find out what herbs to
take for if you're struggling with fertility, if you're struggling
with menopause, or if you're just a thirty year old
who wants to be healthy. It's it's it's all in there.
And it's not only about herbs, you know. I don't
just take herbs. I talk about chasing my melatonin with

(01:43):
my lunesta to sleep.

Speaker 2 (01:45):
So we talk about all the remedies and really it's
a fascinating conversation. We hope you enjoy it.

Speaker 4 (01:51):
We're better take good with and.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
So please tell us what kind of doctor you are
and and we're you began your study and why we're
lucky enough.

Speaker 3 (02:01):
To an interesting path to you. In your professional life,
it's a little different, isn't it. So I practice family medicine.
I have an internship in internal medicine and residency and
family medicine, and I treat women primarily and also children,
because I always feel like you know you're someone once
said to me, your a mom is only as happy

(02:22):
as her unhappy as child. So I have to make
sure the moms are happy by taking care of the
kids all the time.

Speaker 2 (02:28):
Really good rule to live by.

Speaker 4 (02:30):
Yep.

Speaker 1 (02:31):
I grew up in a housing project in New York City,
a single mom in the I was born in sixty six.
I'm fifty five, and my way to get out of
that housing project was to use my intelligence to apply
to college really early. I was always kind of a
science geek and a word geek.

Speaker 4 (02:48):
So I got.

Speaker 1 (02:49):
Into college when I was fifteen, left New York City
found myself. It was like two gee houser, Yeah, right,
but before Dougie, I was pretty, and I found myself
in western Massachusetts, in like hippie town basically, and within
a few months I got exposed to herbal medicine and
midwiffery and organic food before there was really even a

(03:12):
thing called organic food.

Speaker 4 (03:13):
It this was nineteen eighty one, right.

Speaker 1 (03:14):
My family literally asked me if I had joined a
cult because I went vegetarian and.

Speaker 4 (03:20):
Started studying these things.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
And I left school at sixteen apprenticed myself to a midwife,
started studying urbal medicine in earnest and before long I
was in my early twenties. I was practicing having my
own kids, and then kind of fast forward a whole
bunch of years. Really wanted to bridge the gap between
what was then extremely fringe. I mean, this was before

(03:45):
it was cool to do herbal things and eat healthy,
and decided to go back and do med school, which
is what I originally went to college for in the beginning.
So now fast forward a bunch of years. I'm in
my mid thirties doing prerecs, going to med school with
four kids in toe at Yale, and along the way,

(04:06):
had written a bunch of books, did a lot of
leadership work, policy work for nonprofits.

Speaker 4 (04:10):
And here I am, how.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
Are we so lucky to have amazing people on this planet?
We are just so lucky. Right now, I'm better together
that we get to talk to these amazing people. You
have four children and you went to college. Did you
have a partner at the time helping you.

Speaker 1 (04:25):
Out of I have had the same I met my
partner when I was fifteen and we have been together for.

Speaker 4 (04:31):
Wow, thirty eight years.

Speaker 2 (04:33):
Come well, that deserves a congratulations of itself. Isn't an
easy thing to do, no matter what you study. As
we all know that want a relationship. How old are
your kids now?

Speaker 1 (04:42):
They are turning thirty seven, thirty four, thirty thirty, and
twenty eight.

Speaker 4 (04:49):
And I have a.

Speaker 2 (04:49):
Goship for people. People listening the doctor looks.

Speaker 4 (04:56):
Oh my gosh, thank you, thank you well.

Speaker 3 (05:00):
And I have.

Speaker 4 (05:00):
The fun part is I have two grand babies.

Speaker 3 (05:03):
Okay, stop it.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
No, I do, and they're seven and ten. And it's
really fun because my daughter in law is a pediatrician
and my son is kind of a public health unicorn
company creator. But they decided to have their babies at
home and I got to be the midwife for my
two grandkids. So of all my credentials and accolades, that's
what I love the most.

Speaker 3 (05:24):
Oh wow, wow, that's okay.

Speaker 2 (05:27):
Well, because they got about their mother in law that
they delivered, they delivered their grandchildren by themselves. That's incredible.

Speaker 3 (05:35):
I don't even know where to begin because there's so
much we want to talk to you about.

Speaker 2 (05:39):
What's your favorite part of the study of herbs and
what are you focused.

Speaker 3 (05:44):
On right now?

Speaker 2 (05:45):
Can we start there with women's health?

Speaker 1 (05:47):
Yeah, So with women's health right now, I'm really looking
into how to bridge the scientific evidence, which is often
quite lacking because there's not a lot of financial incentive
for pharmaceutical companies and medical institutions are not studying botanicals
because you can't patent them and make a trillion dollar
off of selling those right like you can with pharmaceuticals.

(06:09):
So there's kind of a dearth of research.

Speaker 4 (06:11):
So how do we use.

Speaker 1 (06:13):
Botanicals in a way that we can feel really good about,
really smart about, know that they're really working for us,
and that they're safe sometimes even in the absence of
this higher level scientific evidence. So I'm really interested in that.
And then what is my favorite part? You know, honestly,
with spring coming this is so kind of nerdy, but

(06:34):
I love when I find on a hike or just
out in nature on my yard wherever, the herbs that
I'm actually using medicinally. It just gives me this incredible
sense of connection to women going back generations and eons
that these same plants have been part of our healing,

(06:56):
our diet, our medicine for so so long.

Speaker 4 (06:59):
Its magical to find them.

Speaker 3 (07:03):
If you could give us. I know that it's a
very difficult question. But if you could pick maybe three
herbs or a few herbs that would be the most
beneficial to women, because why yes.

Speaker 4 (07:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (07:17):
So there's one herb called vitex or chaste berry, and
that one I love because it's really universally beneficial. So
it can help with period pain, it can help when
you're not ovulating or having regular cycles. In studies looking
at vitexts and women's hormone balance, the biggest quote unquote

(07:38):
I'm doing air quotes, y'all for you can't see me, right,
is getting pregnant and dropping out of studies.

Speaker 4 (07:43):
You've gotten pregnant.

Speaker 1 (07:44):
So it's great for fertility. But now the latest studies
on it also show that it's really beneficial for perimenopause
and menopause symptoms, so sleep problems, mood problems, hot flashes,
irregular cycles that start to happen when we're in our forties.
Half of all of us, half of all women in
the United States right now, are already in menopause. So

(08:05):
we're a force to be, We're a force of nature.
So having a botanical we can rely on throughout our
life cycles and use for our daughters, used for ourselves,
use for our sisters, et cetera, et cetera, throughout our life.

Speaker 4 (08:16):
Sex. I love that. So that's one earth.

Speaker 3 (08:19):
When you say that one more time for the people
who went to go get a pen. What is it
called the end?

Speaker 1 (08:23):
It's called vitex vi t e x or chased berry.
It's the same herb, Chase tree, vitex Chase berry. Another
herb is really a simple one and most people are
familiar with this from cooking, and that's ginger.

Speaker 4 (08:39):
And you can use gingery in your cooking.

Speaker 1 (08:41):
You can use it as a tea. I love making
it into ginger juice, just putting it through a juicer
or making it into a juice with like pineapple and
apple and carrots. But it is incredibly anti inflammatory. It
can be pain relieving. So a couple of studies have
shown that just taking up to two grams of ginger
a day, like encapsules as a powder is equal to ibuprofen,

(09:04):
which is amazing because be kavoc on your gut. And
the other thing with ginger is so it can help
with menstrual pain, it can help with heavy menstrual bleeding,
It can help with chronic pain, chronic inflammation. But Also,
about half of all women struggle with some gut problems ibs,
gas bloating, and ginger can help with that too, So

(09:24):
I love ginger in everything.

Speaker 4 (09:26):
Plus it tastes.

Speaker 2 (09:27):
Great, So whenever we're eating sushi, get that ginger into
our bodies because totally for us, get the ginger it too.

Speaker 1 (09:34):
And then I would say my third favorite herb for
women is something called ashwagandha, and a lot of people
have probably heard of it by now, and it's in
a class of herbs called adaptogens. And adaptogens have a
history that goes back thousands of years, and what they
do is actually help our stress response system adapt to

(09:55):
stress and prevent all the physical and emotional and cognitive
effects that can happen when we're overwhelmed, chronically stressed, a
little bit on the edge of burnout and kind of
who isn't right now? And it also helps me sleep
and some general muscular skeletal pain and inflammation.

Speaker 4 (10:12):
So those three are my go to nice good questions.

Speaker 3 (10:15):
Okay, and what about kids are what herbs would you
suggest for children?

Speaker 1 (10:19):
Yeah, so with kids, you can definitely use herbs with them.
I actually have a whole My first book was Naturally
Healthy Babies and Children. Nice crunchy hippie book, but it's
a beautiful book with a lot of different botanicals that
you can use for kids, both preventatively but also just
when they have common, run of the mill symptoms. And
it's actually quite important because antibiotic overuse before covid antibiotic

(10:45):
overuse and resistance was actually considered the biggest global public
health threat that we had, and it's from over using antibiotics,
and part of it's over using them in the food
system because they're given to animals to prevent them from
getting in fact, but also to make them grow faster
like meat. But also they're widely overusing kids. So probably

(11:06):
seventy percent of the antibiotics prescribed to kids are unnecessary.
It's like a viral infection or we should.

Speaker 4 (11:12):
Wait and see.

Speaker 1 (11:14):
So that's when I lean into things like echinaesia. If
your child has a cold or an earache, sometimes we
can use something like echinaesia to help with that. Elder
for a flu, And of course it's important to get
conventional medicine if you need it for all the things,
but if you've gotten the AOKA from your pediatrician, to
wait and watch on that earache, or wait and watch on.

Speaker 4 (11:35):
That cough and cold.

Speaker 1 (11:36):
Those are some of the things you can lean into.
Another thing is called sort of the classic name is
naturopathic ear drops, and that's just what they were called
in this big study that was done on them. But
for kids who do have ear aches or ear infections,
you can actually use these ear drops made with a
few different herbs. One is called mullein, another is garlic,

(11:56):
it's actually the same garlic we eat, and another is
called Saint John's. There are some cautions around it, like
you want to make sure there's no ruptured ear drum,
but that has been shown to be really effective in
reducing pain and helping shorten the length of the ear infection.
So you can avoid antibiotics when they're not necessary.

Speaker 3 (12:13):
Oh interesting. I know with my kids, I would always
get get the prescription, but then I would always wait,
and it turned out probably tend to I didn't need
to give it to them. You know, I would get
the piece of pay because you know, you don't want
to give it to them if you don't need to,
so so don't rush, you know, if you're going that

(12:36):
route of get exact usay the Western medicine, just don't
don't rush, just wait for a second. Yeah, give it
a minute and see and.

Speaker 2 (12:42):
Let their bodies react and change. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (12:44):
And if that's like new to someone or they're uncomfortable
with it, there are good guidelines that you can use,
and your pediatrician should be able to know. You can
just go right to the setters for disease control and
they have a whole list of how to know when
to give the antibiotic or when you can wait. So
if you're nervous about there's guidelines there, can you.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
Help me with them. I'm going to go back to
menopause since I'm now considered part of your force of nature,
so I'm going to go right with that. I'm one
of those ones that's a force from nature. Is there
anything for losing your keys every single day? I swear
to God? Is this something that is really true? The
forgetfulness that goes on once you hit menopause. It sounds
like an old lady It sounds like an old lady thing.

(13:24):
And I know for me as a kid, I was
always like the menopause that's never going to happen. And
the fact that is Heather and I talked about all
the time, we feel like we're in the best stage
of our life. We're in a very open, more more loving,
free place. So it's the opposite of what I thought
when my mom, you know, or whateverybody anybody talked about
something like this, it was it's not old lady. But

(13:44):
it does start to feel like we don't know times
we don't know whether to blame it on.

Speaker 3 (13:49):
For us, we don't know whether to blame it on
menopause or COVID because we both had COVID and so
we're both like, what is happening to our bodies and
especially with forgetfulness.

Speaker 1 (14:01):
Yes, yeah, COVID can definitely do a number on we
like we know it affects cognitive functions. So it may
be that you just need more recovery time. But I
have to tell you. And when you said, like, can
can you tell me anything about where to put your keys?
I jokingly always tell my perimenopausal and menopausal women, Well,
the first place to look is in the freezer, because
you were probably having a hot flash.

Speaker 4 (14:19):
You opened the freezer and put your keys down.

Speaker 2 (14:22):
Oh my god, that is so funny. I looked in
the refrigerator this morning.

Speaker 3 (14:25):
Now.

Speaker 2 (14:26):
I mean, I just have to say, it seems my logic.
I'm a very logical person, and I mean I'm a
creative person, but I'm also very logical. I seem to
have been a race of some of my my logic.

Speaker 3 (14:38):
Well, let's talk about menopausal Yeah, I know, so you
like you really, you like You're right.

Speaker 1 (14:42):
So I want to add a caveat here for anyone
who's listening, particularly who might think, oh I just heard
a doctor say menopausal women are losing their memory. That's
not what I'm saying. But there are some hormonal changes
that happen as estrogen goes down. One of things is
that estrogen does shape the way our brain works. So

(15:04):
there's a transitional period where you can actually be more
forgetful of where you put things. It doesn't mean your
intelligence or your IQ or your ability to do anything
has gone down, but there can be those momentary hm,
why did I just walk into this room? And a
lot of themen get worried, like, oh am, I having
on a early onset of Alzheimer's And that's extremely rare.

(15:26):
So unless it's happening frequently with other things like you
can't remember, we're basic words, you know, like you look
at an apple and you can't remember what it's called.
It's not likely to be Alzheimer's or dementia. It's just
likely to be menopause. So that's one thing. The other
thing that happens is sleep gets really affected a lot
of times for menopausal and perimenopausal women. So when you're

(15:48):
not sleeping as well, that can affect your sort of
sharpness during the day, and so that's another big piece
of it. So one of the things is just you know,
you know, it's like when you get called in class
and you know the answer, but then the teacher calls
on you and you freeze yes, like when you're worried
about forgetting the word, or when you're worried about where

(16:09):
you put your keys. It adds kind of like a
layer of more stress that makes it even worse. So
just take a deep breath, give yourself a moment to
get quiet, and you know where you put the keys,
Just kind of backtrack a little bit and then trust it.

Speaker 4 (16:24):
This will resolve. It will kind of write itself.

Speaker 1 (16:27):
Once your hormones start to level out, and that for
most women is around fifty four, Like most people are
gonna go into menopause around fifty two. Perimounopause can happen
for even six or eight years ahead of that, But
once your hormones reach that new steady state, they tend
to be fine. And then doing everything you can to
work on sleep, keeping your blood sugar steady, making sure

(16:49):
you're getting plenty of good quality protein, good quality fats,
the things that feed our brain, and exercise and hydrate.

Speaker 3 (16:56):
Yeah, so I's gonna say, what about the weight gain.
That's just the worst.

Speaker 1 (17:00):
Yeah, it's really annoying, I know. So here's what I'm
going to say about that. What happens when we go
into menopause is that our ovaries are done. They're just like,
we don't need to make estrogen anymore because she's not
going to get pregnant. We don't need to do this
game anymore. So your body stops making most of its
estrogen in your ovaries, but it has to make estrogen

(17:22):
somewhere because estrogen is critical for your bone health, your
brain health, your heart health, and a lot of other things.
So what it starts to do is makes estrogen from
your fat, the fat that's on your hips and your
butt and your thighs and so your body starts to
put on a few pounds to have those extra fat

(17:43):
reserves to make estrogen.

Speaker 3 (17:45):
So or fifteen pounds, I think it's really important.

Speaker 1 (17:48):
And I mean this is not any easier for me
than it is for anyone else, because I've definitely gained
five pounds in menopause. Is to remember that your body's
doing it for a reason and that that extra few
pounds is actually really important. Actually I heard I think
it was Tira Banks, she said something when she went
into menopause.

Speaker 4 (18:08):
She said, it's my face or my ass basically.

Speaker 1 (18:11):
And that's another thing to remember with menopause is you
may gain a little bit of extra fat, but that
little bit of extra fat is also what keeps you
from having more wrinkles. It keeps your face more supple,
your tissue more supple. So figuring out how to find
a little bit of peace with it and at the
same time doing all the diet things and the exercise
things that keep it from being like ten pounds and

(18:34):
twelve pounds and fifteen pounds and twenty pounds, like don't.

Speaker 2 (18:36):
Go down the rabbit hole going like I really need
this astrogen, so I'm gonna have that.

Speaker 3 (18:39):
But I do think to Tyre's point, I had a
friend whose grandma would say, you know, you got to
fill in the cracks, so she would eat ice cream.
But I do think that as we age, we do
you know, I lost I had gained a lot of
weight during COVID because COVID kind of coincided with turning
fifty and all this for me, and and I just

(19:01):
lost most of the weight that I gained during COVID.
But I didn't lose all of it because I think
that I have to wait, if you get any skin
your I have to way more as we're older than
we did when we were younger, that it doesn't you know.
I think as we get older and if you look
too thin, you just look frail.

Speaker 2 (19:20):
I'm calling a mental pause doctor, by the way, because
I feel like my brain is on the mental pauses sometimes.
And I do the way too. You know, we live
in kind of a different society where what we look
at is body type is very different I think in
the USA compared to most say European countries, where a
woman's body and the curves of her body are preferred

(19:42):
and celebrated, and totally we don't do that here. We
have these you know, this supermodel mentality, and it, honestly
it's like outdated. Like I don't like seeing women that
look like they haven't had a cheeseburger the last week.

Speaker 1 (19:57):
I know. I always love it when I'm watching like
an Italian film or a French film and I'm just like, oh, yeah,
they're not all botoxed, they're not all facelifted, and they've
got bellies and they've got bodies.

Speaker 4 (20:09):
It's very reassuring about that. I was just talking. I
was just quoting SOPHIAA.

Speaker 1 (20:14):
Wren this morning in a talk I was giving, saying
how she's hearing her in an interview, saying she credited
everything she had to pasta.

Speaker 4 (20:24):
I love it.

Speaker 1 (20:25):
Okay, So one more thing I want to say about
menopause and weight gain, and as you said, mental pause
is and this is not going to be super popular,
but probably one of the best things we can do
for ourselves when we're in those menopausal and perimenopausal years
is eighty six the alcohol. And I don't know any

(20:45):
patient of mine who was having menopausal sleep problems who like,
when she quit the red wine, didn't get better sleep.
And it's weird, like you think of red wine as.

Speaker 3 (20:55):
Healthful, right, But it's just red wine. We could still
have white wine.

Speaker 1 (20:58):
Ye, any wine, any alcohol. It seems to just make
hot flashes worse. It adds to weight gain, it makes
us look puffier, and it screws up our circadian rhythm
and our sleep. So I always telling my patients, look,
if you do want to have a drink, and I
get it, because like, by the time we get to fifty,
you know, that glass of wine or two at the
end of the day, it feels like a really nice
reward and we're relaxing, and especially in COVID, you know,

(21:21):
we all know what that felt like.

Speaker 4 (21:23):
So if you're going to have some alcohol, keep it.

Speaker 1 (21:26):
To like one or two nights a week and lean
into vodka or tequila or gin because those white alcohols
are actually a little bit less disruptive.

Speaker 4 (21:37):
They're not I'm not endorsing them. I'm just saying, sure,
you gave me.

Speaker 2 (21:40):
The solution to wine, because I was worried there for
a second. I can I can push into courage in
thank you doctor. That is not what.

Speaker 3 (21:48):
She's saying my vodka. But but if that's interesting, because
I I will to have wine because I think it's
less harsh than like a hard alcohol, right, But it's not.

Speaker 1 (22:00):
I think it's more sleep disruptive and more emotionally disruptive
for some reason. And of course everyone knows their own body, right.
If you have a vodka and it's not working for you,
then have what works for you. But the bottom line
is just have a little less. Have it earlier in
the evening because it's less likely to disrupt your sleep,
have it with food, stick to one glass instead of
two or three. But anything too close to bedtime that

(22:24):
is so disruptive.

Speaker 3 (22:26):
Well, I have noticed that, you know, And my drinking
has changed as I've gotten older, because it is disruptive.
But for me, it's mostly disruptive when I wake up
the next day, because I feel it if I've had
a couple glasses of one more than I used to,
I feel I've taken to having like you know, if
I am going to have more than two glasses of wine,

(22:47):
I will have like electrolytes in my water.

Speaker 2 (22:51):
You know, before to bring me pedia light just in case,
Like if we were traveling together, she would bring little
packets and pedia like. One I would like to ask
about is sleep, And I'm we love the tips that
you're saying in some of them, I'll follow in some
of them, I want. I'm ready to pound of vodka
right now. Okay, so you said go earlier, don't tap
me with a good time. So here's what I would

(23:13):
like to ask about sleeping and I and it's because
I've had some confusion with the herbs and overtaking them
with melatonin, which just because it's herbal, and is it
herbal or herbal that's another question.

Speaker 1 (23:29):
I happened if you're from the UK or not. If
you're from the UK, it's herbal. Everywhere else it's herbal.

Speaker 2 (23:35):
Okay, So when herbal remedies and you go into a
health in store and then you look at the packets,
I happen to not have on my glasses and down
I'll pop a couple of pills, like hey they're they're herbal.
My sleep was so disrupted and it was because I
didn't I didn't look at the directions or whatever. But
is melatona?

Speaker 3 (23:55):
Did you o d on melatonin? Well?

Speaker 2 (23:56):
Yeah, I mean I was like I took three bills
or something, thinking hey, they're just serbs, and I just
want to I mean, it's a cautionary tale, really, and
I want you to explain the importance of a the
amount we should take and why that's important to look at,
because I do the same with weed sometimes, so I
want to ask you about weed too. But first things first,
what is a good sleep herbal sleep remedy or the

(24:18):
sleep teas good? I like the sleep tease, but to
just calm and also help us not drink so much
wine to because they're really gummy.

Speaker 4 (24:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (24:27):
Melatonin is kind of an interesting one because it acts
as a hormone in our body, and some people just
do great with it and other people are just like,
that was not for me. So my recommendation with melatonin
is always start with the lowest amount, so zero point
three milligrams, and then work your way up.

Speaker 3 (24:47):
Oh god, see I take twenty milligrams.

Speaker 2 (24:50):
Well see, that's what I'm saying. That's why it gets
confusing not to know.

Speaker 1 (24:54):
Yeah, So start with a low amount and see and
just like slowly work your way up and find the
dose that works for you. And you can go up
like every few nights, and if you wake up the
next morning and you feel groggy or even a little blue,
you might just back down your dose. If you're at
the lowest dose, just push through for a few days

(25:16):
if you feel like you can, like it may take
about three days to where you're like, oh, I actually
feel great when I wake up in the morning and
I'm sleeping well. A lot of people have really intense
dreams on melatonin, So again, give it a few nights.

Speaker 4 (25:30):
At the lowest dose.

Speaker 1 (25:32):
The other trick is taking it an hour or so
before bed. Don't take it right before bed.

Speaker 2 (25:37):
Oh that's okay, yeah.

Speaker 1 (25:40):
And that might make a difference for you. As far
as botanicals, as you know herbs, I love the one
I mentioned earlier, Ashwagandha.

Speaker 4 (25:49):
Again, it isn't just about helping you sleep.

Speaker 1 (25:51):
It's really about helping you reset that whole stress response system,
so helping you have healthier cortisol levels, healthier adrenaline levels.
So it has much more systemic benefits than just let
me zonk you out. And it doesn't zonk you out,
which is nice. You can take that with melatonin. You
can use simple herbs like passion flour, even cama meal

(26:14):
and lemon.

Speaker 4 (26:14):
Balm, which are so gentle.

Speaker 1 (26:17):
And then of course so many people are using CBD
with really good results for a lot of people, but again,
it's not for everyone, and you want to make sure
that you get a CBD that really isn't psychoactive because
a lot of CBD products do have some THHC in them.
So again, start with you start with a half a
gummy or a quarter of a gummy, see how you do,

(26:38):
and then work your way up. And really all of
those can be combined. You just want to start with one,
see how you do. Add another.

Speaker 4 (26:45):
And that's not so much for safety. But let's say
you take five.

Speaker 1 (26:49):
Things at once and you don't feel great with it.
You're like, I didn't sleep great. Now you don't know
which one it was.

Speaker 2 (26:55):
Right, right? You have to be your own chemist.

Speaker 3 (26:58):
No, yeah, I mean I've had sleep problems for a
long time, so I I take I mean I take
melatonin and I also have found that I also chase
it with a lunesta if I'm going to be honest,
and then I don't even know what that is, but
it's a sleep aid, it's a pharmaceutical.

Speaker 2 (27:15):
I love to call it a chaser, like I chase
with it. I also have.

Speaker 3 (27:19):
Found taking magnesium has been helpful for my sleep.

Speaker 1 (27:22):
Magnesium is one of my favorite It's probably my first
go to I take it every day.

Speaker 2 (27:27):
Wow, yeah, so what and so can you speak of
those benefits?

Speaker 1 (27:32):
Yeah, So magnesium you can start at like two hundred
and fifty milligrams. You can go up to five or
six hundred milligrams. The thing you need to know is
there's there are many kinds, but there are two basic kinds.
The great one for sleep that's really easy to absorb
is called magnesium glyconate. There's another one called magnesium side
trait that works for sleep also, but it also gets

(27:53):
your bowels moving. So if you're constipated, you can take
the side trate before bed and have a nice benefit
of better bowel movements in the morning. But too much
of it can make you have loose poops, which isn't fun.
So figure out that balance between the glycinate or the sitrait.
If you're not contimpated, just take the glycinate. But magnesium
is critical for calming down our nervous system, and it

(28:16):
just nourishes the nervous system, and it also helps nourish
the adrenals, which are part of where the stress response
is happening. And we also know from studies that a
lot of women are low in magnesium so adding a
little bit even above what might be in your multivitamin
if you take a multi can be helpful. Taking it
before sleep again, maybe an hour half hour before sleep,

(28:37):
just a couple of hundred milligrams can really help you
relax into sleep much more easily.

Speaker 3 (28:41):
Yeah, I really noticed the benefits of the magnesium. What
about going back to menopause? I know that, Like I
had a whole panel of you know, my blood work

(29:04):
and all of this, and one of the things that
I started taking that I noticed that a lot of
my friends in talking to everybody's taking D three vitamin
D is that is that can you talk to us
about what sort of vitamin supplements people you know going
through or anywhere?

Speaker 2 (29:22):
And sunshine is the sunshineer right right?

Speaker 3 (29:25):
Yes, we get let's talk about what vitamins we should
be taking at what age? So maybe let's talk about
vitamins for people our age, and then talk about vitamins
for people fertility age.

Speaker 1 (29:37):
You know, sure, And you know what, honestly, it's really
not that different. So okay, for all of us throughout
most of our lives, taking a multi vitamin is a
great idea. It's always optimal to get everything we need
from our food, but most of us aren't getting everything
we need from our food. Either we're on the run
and we're not getting all of our meals, or we're
not getting all we need in our meals. But also

(29:57):
the reality is is modern agriculture, we know that an
orange today has about one sixth of the vitamin C
of an orange that let's say our grandmothers would have.

Speaker 3 (30:06):
Eaten, right, I didn't know that, So sad, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (30:09):
Our food is just not actually as nutritious as it was.
So a multivitamin is kind of like an insurance policy
that you're going to get all the little vitamins and
minerals that we really need for optimal health met But
most multivitamins don't have enough calcium for women our age.
So once we hit about forty eight to fifty, we
want to get about one thousand to twelve hundred milligrams

(30:30):
of calcium a day. You can again get it from
your food, but most of us don't. And also so
many of us were following different diets where we might
be dairy free or this or that free, so we're
also cutting back on some of the foods that may
have had those things in it. So I like to
add a calcium in about a thousand milligrams, and then
vitamin D three. Vitamin D three is really interesting because,

(30:54):
like melatonin, vitamin D is actually a hormone. It's not
even just a nutrient or it's not a botanical it
is when we take it, our body forms it into
a hormone that is essential for metabolism, healthy weight, healthy
blood sugar, but also critical for bone health as we
might imagine the sunshine vitamin, and also immune health. So

(31:17):
during COVID, for example, studies, really robust studies showed that
people who had low blood levels of vitamin D were
actually more likely to get more severely sick with COVID. Wow,
and giving vitamin D didn't help reverse that once people
were sick.

Speaker 3 (31:34):
But for both of these vitamins that you're saying, calcium
and D three, is that for people of any age?

Speaker 1 (31:40):
Yes, for any age, although if you're younger you can
use a little bit less calcium, like maybe eight hundred milligrams.

Speaker 3 (31:46):
But D three would apply to somebody in their thirties.

Speaker 4 (31:50):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (31:50):
I'm just curious about the gender of it all, and
I'm a are these the same for both male and female?
I know at this point, probably most men who are
listening and if they're like, Okay, this is a menoplause conversation,
but I want to know because I feel like men
go through a similar thing, they just don't have a
name for it or something. But are the vitamins that
you're saying the preventative medicines does the D three? Is that?

(32:11):
Is that a good good preventative for both men and women?

Speaker 3 (32:14):
It is?

Speaker 1 (32:15):
Actually, you know it it these do affect women a
little bit more in the sense that, for example, a
really big study just came out and it was a
really good quality study looking at the impact of low
vitamin D on autoimmune disease. Now eighty percent of all
autoimmune disease affects women, so women are much more likely,

(32:36):
and autoimmune disease is serious, like one of the top
eight causes of death in women. It's not, you know,
it's not just like, oh, who has that auto municy
that's weird.

Speaker 2 (32:43):
Can you explain to us on an auto layman's level,
what that actually is? Autoimmune disease?

Speaker 1 (32:48):
So autoimmune disease is a collection of different conditions that
affect us differently, but the common denominator in all of
them is that it's our own immune system attacking our
own body. And the different autoimmune diseases have to do
with the different parts of the body that are getting
attacked or the different types of cells that are doing

(33:08):
the attack. So one really common one is Hashimoto's thyroiditis,
where people have hypothyroidism. Another really common one is rheumatoid arthritis.
Chrohn's disease is another really common one, and these mostly
affect women, and the studies show that women who had
better vitamin D levels actually were less likely to get

(33:31):
these autoimmune conditions. So everything we're saying, men can get osteoporosis,
men can get sleep problems. They don't really go through
manopause so much. They do have their testosterone levels do
go down, but really it doesn't affect their estrogen or
anything significantly. So they do go through changes, but it's

(33:54):
much more subtle. It's later in their lives that and
it more affects their.

Speaker 4 (34:01):
Than anything. Whereas we go through these.

Speaker 1 (34:03):
Massive overhaul changes that affect our bones, our brain, our heart,
our hormones.

Speaker 3 (34:09):
Let's let's finish our supplements. So we're on where we
talked about taking What did we talk about vitamin D.

Speaker 1 (34:17):
Yeah, so okay, it's a multi vitamin, Vitamin D calcium.
I usually recommend a small amount of magnesium also because
the vitamin D calcium and magnesium is a great combination
for bone, but also the magnesium for stress. And then
if I have patients who are or just women I'm
working with who are vegan or vegetarian, don't get any

(34:40):
fish in their diet, then I usually recommend fish oil
as well. If you're getting the few ounces of salmon
or sardines in your diet two or three times a week.
If they're if they're wild caught, then you don't need it.
If they're farm raised, you're not getting those omega threes,
and so a fish oil is a great idea.

Speaker 3 (35:00):
Also, what about I know that as we age our
hair thins and so I know I take biotin. Is
do you recommend taking biotin?

Speaker 1 (35:09):
I don't, only because the research on biotin doesn't really
show that it helps that much.

Speaker 3 (35:14):
Yeah, I would follow that too, So.

Speaker 1 (35:17):
I usually recommend just a multi vitamin because they usually
have some biotin in them.

Speaker 4 (35:21):
It's in the b vita.

Speaker 1 (35:22):
Okay, so you usually get enough from that some of
it is like just a really frustrating function of menopause
for a lot of us. But some of it is
stress and not sleeping as well. And you know, some
of it we can buffer with some of the hormone change,
the hormone support that we're talking about, and the multi

(35:43):
vitamins and nutrients that we're talking about.

Speaker 2 (35:45):
Right, So i'd like to first of all, we're so
I mean, just could not be more grateful to have
the help and something this up with the preventative medicine
that we've been talking about, the herbal medicine that we've
been educated about, to really help our sustainability as we
go through the changes, and do not look so negatively
at those changes, but embrace them as something we're going through,

(36:07):
get the help that we need, and listen to the
wisdom of our people on the show. Thank you very
much for making us better together. You're welcome.

Speaker 1 (36:18):
You know what you said, Ann is really important and
powerful about how we embrace it. There's some really interesting
research that looks at different cultures and how different cultures
how women experience menopause, and what has been found is
that and I don't want to have this sound like
I'm blaming women that somehow our attitudes cause menopause to suck,

(36:40):
because it can just really suck for some women. But
in cultures that do embrace menopause, it seems that women
have fewer disruptive symptoms. Some of that may be that
there are other aspects, like people eating more plants in
their diet or walking more or just living more healthfully,
but some of it does seem to be how we
feel about it. It kind of shapes our experience of it.

(37:03):
So how can we And I like to look at
role models, you know, I remember seeing Michelle Obama. She
was like fifty eight on a nighttime talk show and
she was wearing a cutout shirt with her her ladies
all pushed up.

Speaker 4 (37:17):
And just looking smoking hot.

Speaker 1 (37:19):
Or I think about Helen Mirren or Yoko Ono, and
I'm like, these women are redefining sexy, smart, effing awesome.
And so I looked to that, and you know, I
was about to be on an interview recently, and I
was talking to a video interview and I was talking
to two young women who work with me, and they're

(37:39):
in their twenties, and I said, you know, it's really
hard sometimes to be on video and be fifty five
and you know, I haven't done the face work and stuff.
And they looked at me and they were like, Aviva,
it's really hard to be on video in your twenties
and thirties, Like we're all struggling.

Speaker 3 (37:58):
That is how.

Speaker 1 (37:59):
We look and all the many points where we see
ourselves on zoom and on Instagram. And it was such
a sobering reminder that it's it's affecting women at all
of our ages. This how we look. And I think
in menopause it becomes so sharp for us when we
look at ourselves and we see those elevens or whatever

(38:19):
the changes are.

Speaker 4 (38:21):
But how do we like, how do we love that?
How do we embrace it? Or do the phase work?

Speaker 3 (38:26):
If that's what you want, you know exactly, whatever makes
you feel good. What is there any herbs that you
would recommend for depression and anxiety because there's so much
of that in our world at this moment.

Speaker 1 (38:37):
Yes, so for depression, the best known, best studied, truly
most effective herb is called Saint John's wort and probably
tons of people have heard of it, and it really,
really really can work equal to prozac and other pharmaceuticals
without the side effects including you know those other pharmaceuticals.

(38:59):
For example, they can just kill your sex drive, they
can kill your motivation, so they make you feel calm
and quieter, but then all that other stuff is affected.
So Saint John's worked three hundred milligrams three times a day.
That's the dose. You can take it in capsules, so
that's probably my favorite for that. And then for anxiety,

(39:20):
my favorite is lavender oil. It's in capsules. There's actually
I don't usually mention brands, but this brand is actually
the best one because it was the one that was
in the studies showing that it worked.

Speaker 4 (39:32):
And it's called Lavella.

Speaker 1 (39:34):
La Vela and you can just take one capsule right
before bad and it helps with sleep anxiety, but also
helps with like performance anxiety, test anxiety.

Speaker 4 (39:45):
So I love that one.

Speaker 3 (39:46):
So that could work for teenagers.

Speaker 4 (39:48):
It can work for teenagers definitely. And then CBD.

Speaker 1 (39:52):
You know, there's a lot of things that are attributed
to CBD that are completely BS, Like, it doesn't help
with all the things that people say it helps with,
but anxiety is one that it really can help with.

Speaker 2 (40:02):
Great. Well, go with libido because that was going to
be my question too. Yeah, we want to add on
a sex they had on a sex note.

Speaker 3 (40:09):
Is there any Well, I'm curious about libido and fertility both,
Like what what what would you recommend for either of
those oysters?

Speaker 1 (40:19):
Yeah, you know, libido is so interesting because it there
are so many factors that affect our sex drive. Like
for men, you know, it's almost like a joke or
a meme, you know, kind of like men won't ask
for directions and it's you know, like these tropes that
we have. But with men, they don't need a lot
for the most part to get aroused. But right, can

(40:41):
you just like a physical thing? They can see somebody
and they're like, oh that does she does a for me?
Boom or bing, I should say. And then for us,
for most women, it's like we want more, we want
and this is really evolutionary, right. We don't want to
just do it and then have the person be irresponsible
and walk away, because we biologically want the partner who's

(41:04):
going to also stick around and be the good dad, right,
Like that's how we're wired, even if that's not the
motivation for having sex, even if we're past that age.
So we want connection, We want something physical that turns
us on we want touch, we want gifts, we want
all the things.

Speaker 2 (41:21):
Dinner and champagne, come on.

Speaker 3 (41:23):
Or do we just want to go to bed and
watch Netflix and be left the fuck alone.

Speaker 2 (41:26):
Well that's the other.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
Pos Even for women in relationship with other women, it
doesn't change our biological drive. We still want those things,
so a lot of things happen right we're tired at
the end of the day, we do want to just
get in bed and watch Netflix. Or maybe you've been
with someone like for ten or fifteen or twenty years
and now they're not twenty or thirty anymore. They're like
fifty five, and you know he doesn't or she doesn't

(41:50):
look quite the same, so the physical cues aren't quite
the same.

Speaker 4 (41:54):
So there's a lot to unpack. And I think it's really.

Speaker 1 (41:56):
Important when our libido's low not to just run and
take the thing right, whether it's the pharmaceutical or the herb,
but to really get honest in what we can do
in the relationship. And sometimes it may be your partner
doesn't look the same way, so you're like mentally fantasizing,
and that's okay. You're thinking of what your partner used

(42:16):
to look like, or you're thinking about what someone else
looks like, but you're still there with your partner, or
maybe you need more stimulation or imagination or whatever the
things are that make you get aroused. There's one study
that looked at long term relationships that found that in
this was done in heterosexual partners, but that for women

(42:36):
who are in their fifties and above in long term
relationships were not necessarily as actively or proactively filled with desire.
But we're receptively filled with desire. So it might not
be like let me jump your bone, just so let
me jump your whatever, but it may be like if
you bring me a little gift, or you stroke my

(42:56):
back and give me a little massage, I'm all fired up,
ready to go. So learning those things for yourself is important.

Speaker 2 (43:03):
And it's a lot of these things too in conjunction.
I mean, we were looking at as we get all
the different things changes, different things shift. But when when
you talk about menopause and the point of view on it,
finding the self esteem and the way that we look
at it and the perspective that we look at and
being able to communicate about it, to communicate with us
if you.

Speaker 4 (43:22):
Don't want to dry coach that doesn't help you don't
have sex.

Speaker 2 (43:25):
I mean there's a given. But also when we look
at whether it's whether it's a heterosexual relationship or board,
it's either way. The other is going through changes and
shifts in their life and looking at it with the
perspective that says the growth of us can also be
enjoyed and embraced. It doesn't necessarily mean like you're saying,

(43:45):
like I want to jump your bones like I did
when I was twenty, but acknowledging and being able to
work through that difficult I feel like once you get
into your fifties, we're working you know, late forties, you're
working through a different part of your life, and that
embrace of that shift and change, if communicated about, can
become what's sensual. Maybe it's less I want to jump

(44:06):
your bones, but a can you appreciate like I have
a little tired, I do want something a little bit different.
Heather and I talked about this a lot and being
able to We had a good show about it last
week with Ryan talking about our needs and our wants
and our desires and something I want to remind them
with the doctor on it to say, you when you
tell the truth about what it is that you're going through.

(44:28):
It embraces the other or another in your experience, and
that's a turn on. It's a turn on on different
levels and in different arenas, but it brings in intimacy,
and that intimacy can reflect in I don't know why
I'm saying this. I haven't had sex in forever, but
you know, but I think there are different ways that

(44:49):
we communicate when when we become adults and we have
different things that feed us. And I just want to
I love with you to look at the shifts in
your life. It doesn't matter if you're twenty, thirty or forty,
it doesn't matter, and embrace them in a way that
doesn't it's not embarrassing to change your life. It's actually
life growth and evolvement. I have to feel Lorette on

(45:10):
my wall, eat some pasta and feel your tips like
let's you know, but embrace it and enjoy yourself and
that change, and it will allow others because we get
embarrassed to talk about what our changes are instead of sharing.
And that's what we're doing on Better Together.

Speaker 1 (45:26):
So true, and it's so gorgeous to be at an
age where you know I remember Helen Mirren saying like
if she could tell at seventy, if she could tell
her younger self anything, it would be to give a
lot less fucks about.

Speaker 3 (45:38):
Things, right, zero fox, Yeah, preaching to the choir. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (45:43):
And part of it is, like that is about being
able to say, this is what I want, this is
what I need. And the beautiful thing is we are
at an age where we're so much more empowered to
be like I want to tell all the twenty and
thirty ye olds, don't wait till you're fifty to do that.

Speaker 2 (45:59):
That's right, it's our responsibility.

Speaker 1 (46:01):
Yeah. And the thing is too, it's funny like, right now,
twenty and thirty year olds are apparently having less less
sex than several generations prior because they're all on their
devices before bad or in bad, and women in their
fifties and sixties.

Speaker 4 (46:18):
Are having better sex than ever.

Speaker 2 (46:20):
No, that's listen to that. Kids.

Speaker 1 (46:25):
So because we know what we want, right, and we're
not afraid to say I want this or I want that,
we're not embarrassed about our bodies in the same way,
and if you have been with a partner for a
long time, you're you know, I mean you.

Speaker 4 (46:36):
Pee in front of them. You do all the things
in front of them, right, Like, what ever, can you
hand me a tamp on? All the things?

Speaker 1 (46:41):
So if you're a menopause you don't need that anymore.

Speaker 4 (46:43):
But yeah, it's a beautiful thing to.

Speaker 1 (46:46):
Embrace that, and I wish we could all embrace it
even earlier.

Speaker 2 (46:50):
Well that's what we do better to get it for
so that their twenties and thirties go listen, we know
the joy, so embrace it earlier. I got you long.

Speaker 3 (46:58):
I just think it's great advice to deal with, you know,
to look at your relationship rather than go straight to
a quick solve. Yes, yeah, because that's important and that's
really the clues behind.

Speaker 2 (47:10):
Why you're not feeling you know all, I'll ticlarly look
at yourself and the distance that you're putting between first
of all yourself and then your partner.

Speaker 4 (47:19):
And how are we judging ourselves?

Speaker 1 (47:20):
You know? And you said earlier about you know, our
body image, right, and that can really change. So, I
mean women are struggling with body image postpartum, you know,
they've had a baby, their body looks different. That can
affect their self esteem, and that can affect their desire
but also affect their willingness to sort of be intimate
and naked on every level. And then postpart I mean

(47:41):
in perimenopause and menopause, we maybe we are we're going
through that same shifting self identity.

Speaker 3 (47:49):
We as friends and partners can help with that because
I know that we can talk about for days like
embrace yourself. Embrace, and when you're in it, you just
don't you just don't feel great. And I think that
that friends and partners can do a lot to be
say like, you look fantastic, you have courage, and that's

(48:11):
a nice thing to do, especially when you know somebody
is struggling with body images. Just remind them how beautiful
and fantastic they are and that that goes, That goes
a long way.

Speaker 2 (48:24):
It does, And for the twenties and thirties year old,
it's fun to be able to have this conversation. It's funny.
It's like, oh my god, now I'm going to feel
bad when I'm pregnant. Now, the fact of the matter
is you're never going to be younger than you are today,
so you might as well embrace that as a truth
and go all the hell's bells. It's not going to
get better tomorrow, So why don't I enjoy what I
am today? But for those generations, there are always that's

(48:44):
what we're called. We are we are evolving creatures, and
there are things that are going to continue to challenge us.
When you say that, your assistance or the girls who
are the young women who work with you, they're like, wait,
we don't have any easier looking at our image. So
you're struggling at twenty, you're worried about yourself. At thirty,
your post you know, you post baby at forty, and

(49:06):
then at fifty you got menopause. So enjoy what you
are today? Is your friends, to enjoy it, share what
it is, and activate the part of you that is
involved with the self self involved in activating your self
esteem and doing that for others. I think that would
be our active participation this week totally, because I ain't
gonna get any better.

Speaker 4 (49:25):
You know, I was in the shower.

Speaker 1 (49:27):
I was in the shower not too long ago, and
I remember having this judgmental thought about my changing body.
And my body isn't It's like, it's not like I've
changed that much either, But I remember having this sort
of like self judging thought and I remember thinking, oh,
like I judged myself when I was thirty, and if
I were seventy right now, I'd be wishing I were
fifty five, right.

Speaker 2 (49:47):
And that's exactly right.

Speaker 1 (49:48):
I just remember having this thought in the shower of
like when does it stop? When do this self judging
thoughts stop? And I just remember that day thinking, Okay,
it stops right now, like I'm just I need to
just shift these thoughts to like I am in love
with my gorgeous self.

Speaker 2 (50:06):
Well, we're in love with your gorgeous Is that? You
know what? Let's take it to heart.

Speaker 3 (50:11):
We can't leave without talking about fertility because I brought
it up and I just want to. I just I
know that there's people listening and.

Speaker 2 (50:17):
That so self as esteem and fertility.

Speaker 3 (50:21):
Let's let's talk about people either struggling with fertility or
thinking about it's time and and what would you recommend
for those people?

Speaker 1 (50:32):
Lifestyle herbs, I feel like the most important thing is
getting all the nourishment that our bodies need, especially the nourishment.
Not to be too reductionist, but like, what do your
ovar eas need to be optimally nourished and healthy to
allow you to ovulate and allow you to grow a baby.

(50:53):
And so it really comes down to getting a really
optimally healthy diet. So we know that we need eggs
for once we're pregnant for our baby's brain growth. We
know that we need essential fatty acids to support babies
brain growth. Getting all the things now that you need
when you're pregnant, and all the things now that you
need to nourish healthy ovulation.

Speaker 2 (51:15):
So if you're a vegan or a vegetarian, do you
have are there different with ways that you can supplement
what those you talked about fish oil? But is that
does it become necessary?

Speaker 1 (51:26):
Yeah, I mean vegetarians actually have great most of the time,
vegetarians have great hormone balance and really healthy fertility.

Speaker 4 (51:34):
It's not usually a problem.

Speaker 1 (51:36):
I personally was vegetarian for my first until I got
pregnant with my fourth baby, so I had four vegetarian,
three vegetarian pregnancy to the first one and eight me.
So I can personally say, no, you can totally do it.
The main thing with being vegetarian or vegan is just
to get the B twelve and just get adequate protein.
It can be really easy to start eating a lot
of brown rice and other carbs and not get enough protein.

(51:59):
So just make sure that you're getting the beans, the legomes,
the nuts, the seeds. If you need to use like
peat protein powder in smoothies, that's fine. If you're willing
to eat some eggs, that's great because eggs are really
beneficial for fertility. We know that having some fish in
the diet can enhance fertility. And you really don't have
to worry too much about coffee and alcohol because the

(52:22):
studies don't show that it interferes with fertility. I mean
to excess, of course, but you're you know, occasional glass
of wine.

Speaker 3 (52:28):
Well, that's how you get pregnant. You gotta wine get pregnant.

Speaker 1 (52:32):
But you know, the main thing is are you ovulating?
And the best thing to do is use an ovulation tracker.
Either you can use a basil body thermometer and check
it yourself, or you can get an app and track
your ovulation. And if you're not ovulating, that's what you
really want to work on and figure out what is
going on that's keeping that from happening. And often that's

(52:54):
you can just really shift that amazingly with diet, some
simple supplements, some botanicals again, I'm Vitex that Chase Berry
earlier has been shown to be great for fertility, and
there's some other things you can use. There's a supplement
called co Q ten which actually has been shown even
with fertility treatments, to enhance the outcomes of fertility treatments.

(53:17):
And as much as you can just.

Speaker 4 (53:19):
Get good sleep, exercise and of all the basic things.

Speaker 3 (53:23):
Some people that I've known that have had a hard
time getting pregnant were very thin and constantly diet conscious,
and you have to kind of let that go and
make sure you're eating enough so that your body is ready.

Speaker 1 (53:36):
I've worked with a lot of women over the years,
and if they're underweight, the first thing I do is
try to help them get to a healthy body weight,
because you have to have again that fat to produce
the hormones right, yes, to support the pregnancy, but to
even just get pregnant, you have to have fat to
make cholesterol, to make estrogen and progesterone and all the
good stuff.

Speaker 2 (53:56):
And that's really scary to women with this body conscious
thing like to do. I like our audience for everybody
who's listening to do what you did in the shower
and say I'm going to embrace today who I am.
I'm not not in that judgment anymore because in trying
to get pregnant, it's very hard to do, very difficult
thing to do. When you say fat, even if you
even if you say that to anybody, imagine a table

(54:18):
full of okay, the tennis ladies and anybody says you
need healthy fat. When you hear when ladies hear that,
they're like, don't tell me.

Speaker 3 (54:25):
You can say.

Speaker 1 (54:26):
Olive oil and avocados and nuts, almonds, that's all.

Speaker 3 (54:30):
That's what I want.

Speaker 2 (54:31):
I want the healthy fats and to embrace that part
of us that needs that.

Speaker 1 (54:36):
One thing I want to say too, is that we
live in a time when all of us are being
exposed to a tremendous amount of environmental chemicals that can
and do interfere with our hormones. We're all exposed to
a tremendous amount of stress, and these are things that

(54:58):
are somewhat beyond our control.

Speaker 4 (55:00):
And it's so easy.

Speaker 1 (55:01):
Like whenever I ask women this question, and I'll ask
you all, what when you have something going on, either
with your own body or with your kids, Like if
your kid is facing a challenge of any kind, what's
probably one of the first questions you ask yourself.

Speaker 3 (55:16):
What am I going to do?

Speaker 2 (55:17):
How do you feel?

Speaker 3 (55:18):
How do you fix it?

Speaker 4 (55:19):
Like yeah, like what am I doing wrong? Or what's
wrong with me?

Speaker 2 (55:22):
And I really want funny, I don't ask that.

Speaker 4 (55:26):
Yeah, I really want us.

Speaker 1 (55:27):
To stop thinking that way when we have a hormone imbalance,
when we have a fertility challenge, to remember that a
lot of these things are bigger than just us, and
there's nothing wrong with you. You're not broken, You're not a lemon.
And then from there like, Okay, what can I do
to support myself to be as optimally healthy as possible

(55:49):
so that I can try to do this through my
own steam, you know. But then there's also like there's
no shame in the game if you need to use
fertility treatments. There are still all these things are still important,
like all the fertility diet, the healthful eating. I love
the word diet, but all the healthful way of eating
for fertility.

Speaker 4 (56:07):
You still need that.

Speaker 1 (56:08):
If you're going to do IVF, you're still going to
need that to be pregnant and have a healthy baby.
So it's just a simple low hanging fruit that we
can all turn to.

Speaker 2 (56:17):
Yes, and put our health first. Put our health first,
our happiness comes with it, and we just be answered
a beautiful question.

Speaker 3 (56:24):
Well, we can't thank you enough. This has been fantastic.
You've given our listeners so much great, great advice, and
it was so fantastic to meet you.

Speaker 2 (56:33):
So everybody to do, let's activate the non judgment of ourselves.
Look at our bodies, look at our mental health, our
physical health, and our friendship and our love health, and say,
I'm done with judgment and I'm going to continue forward
being better and reminding my friends and complimenting my friends.
I love that.

Speaker 3 (56:48):
I love that. I know. Now now you've written seven books,
and let us let our listeners know. I'm sure they're
going to want more from you. Where can they find.

Speaker 1 (56:56):
You Aviva ram dot com, just set my website or
over at doctor Aviva on Instagram. I hang out there
quite a bit too.

Speaker 2 (57:05):
All ristic, prediful healer, you are. Thank you so much
for being bettering us.

Speaker 4 (57:11):
Thank you, thank you for chatting with me today. We're
a better day.

Speaker 3 (57:16):
Good listen, and wow, I was impressed by that she was,
by the way, fifteen and going off to college.

Speaker 2 (57:25):
I believe you're just such a brain I didn't even
talk about now, I mean, and your kids whatever and
going to Yale, right, But I think what she did
is is break it down. To be able to break
it down and understand the things that you can go
to to get that much help. All of the different
the education on.

Speaker 3 (57:39):
The urbs AT's appointment, we were able to me. Neither
did y'all.

Speaker 2 (57:44):
I started to feel very lucky that I'm better together.
We can have all these that's exactly what we're doings for.
I mean, I can we can hardly see all the
college that she gave us. You just I was like, oh,
I'm gonna have to listen to this myself, and I
hope everybody did.

Speaker 3 (57:57):
Bring a pen in a paper, right, get all the
get all the good scoop on and you know, we're
just gonna get We're gonna get so healthy.

Speaker 2 (58:03):
We're gonna get so healthy and happy. It's in, but
nobody's gonna be and our libidos are going to be
served by hopefully our self esteem and everything else that
we have going on and complimenting our friends. I love
how you activated that if we give positive energy to
our friends, make that your activation this week.

Speaker 3 (58:18):
Say something nice to somebody.

Speaker 2 (58:19):
Thank you doctor for being on our show and for
everybody who was listening. That was so much.

Speaker 3 (58:23):
Oh my god, I didn't just get better together. I
think all right. And a big big thanks to our
better Together team, Ryan Tillotson, Silvana Alcola, Daniel Ferreira and
of course and in Heather.

Speaker 4 (58:37):
If you haven't already, please subscribe on whatever device or
platform you're listening to this on and as always, see
you next week