F*ck, Let’s Talk Inflammation! with Amelia Phillips

Episode Transcript
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Dominique Hind (00:00):
Hi, I'm Dom Hind and F*ck, I'm nearly 50.
Actually, I'm 47 and fivemonths, and I have started the
countdown. It's weird, isn't it,you hit your mid 40s, and
suddenly your body startsbehaving like it's got a mind of
its own. One minute, you'repowering through life, back to
back, meetings, workouts,parenting, chaos and the

(00:23):
occasional glass of wine, andthe next you're crashing at 3pm
your guts are unpredictable,your sleep's patchy, and your
genes feel personally offended.
And the worst part, you're doingall the right things. You're
eating the kale, you're movingyour body. You're meditating
when you remember, you've got adrawer full of magnesium and a

(00:44):
fridge, fridge full of goodintentions, and still, something
feels off, slower, heavier,foggier, inflammed. And here's
the kicker. We're told that thisis just what 45 plus feels like,
that it's hormones or stress orjust getting older, but what if
that's not the whole story? Whatif chronic inflammation is

(01:06):
quietly hijacking our energy,our mood, our metabolism and
even our ability to feel likeourselves? This episode dives
straight into that question, andwhat can we actually do about
it. So whether you're flat,foggy, fired up, or just
curious, this one's for you.
Let's get into it. Because fuck,I'm nearly 50, and isn't it

(01:30):
amazing?
Amelia Phillips is one of thosewomen who just gets it. She's a
clinical nutritionist, exercisescientist and a mum of four, and

(01:51):
she's been in the wellness gamelong enough to spot the
difference between a trend andwhat actually works. You might
know her as one of the originalpioneers behind the 12 WBT
programme, which transformed1000s of Aussie women's women
and how they approach fitnessand food. But what she's doing

(02:14):
now, it's different. Her innervitality programme is built for
real women in midlife who aretired of feeling burnt out,
bloated and wondering why theystill feel exhausted despite
doing everything right. Today,we're going to dive into what
information really is and howit's running the show, why

(02:37):
strength training is our midlifesuperpower, how to rethink our
approach to food movementrecovery and a few cheeky
extras, some midlife MythBusters, hot or hype, and her
real vitality toolkit. Sowhether you're thriving,
surviving or somewhere inbetween, Amelia is here to help

(02:57):
us stop pushing, start resettingand get back to feeling like
ourselves again. Be cool.

Amelia Philips (03:05):
Big promise.
Well, my work cut out for metoday. Jeepers, done. What are
you doing?

Well, Amelia, welcome to fuck. I'm nearly 50.

I just love the title. You had me at the title.

I just couldn't just the play on the apps. It's
too Bruno, how would youdescribe what you do in the
least wellness expert waypossible. God,

such a hard question, because I'm such a
wellnessy kind of person, aren'tI? But honestly, when, when you
really boil it down, I helpwomen understand their bodies
better, because I have seen overmy 26 years in this industry,
that when you understand yourunique body, you understand what

(03:52):
works, why that works, whatdoesn't work, why It doesn't
work. It unlocks behaviourchange. It unlocks clarity. And
that's how you can separate thewheat from the chaff. That's how
you can scroll through Instagramand go, I'm not Fauci that fad
that's not gonna sit well withme, but it really it comes back

(04:17):
to understanding our own uniquebodies, and that is a journey.
Oh, yeah, it's a journey for allof us, but it's one that I feel
like as a collective community,us women are taking on in full
charge, because we're sick ofbeing gaslit. We're sick of
being told by, you know, men whohave used research that was 90%

(04:41):
on male rodents, and then onmale athletes often. And so
we've kind of gone, you know,fuck this. We're going to take
matters into our own hands. Andso what I've really how, how
I've kind of honed and created.

(05:03):
Crafted my career, and mymessage is in line with my age
as well, because I'm fuck almost50 Well, 46 so heading there as
well. And so it's great that Ifeel like I've got this unique
perspective where I've got thetraining and the education and
the qualifications. I then gotthis experience working with
hundreds and 1000s of women overmy career. So actually being on

(05:26):
the front line and seeing changehappening on a large scale, and
then I'm going through itpersonally as well. So I just
feel like I offer a uniqueperspective, and I have never
been more passionate and morehopeful for this next phase of
our life. So I want to try toget that message out that this
is, this is a this is acomeback, this is a reckoning.

(05:52):
It's such a wonderful time forus women,

yeah, and it's, it's so interesting in all of
the conversations that I've hadwith everyone, not only on the
podcast and in general, with myfriends, yes, so much of it is
about understanding ourself,yes. And so often we just don't
put the time in. We look foreverything else, rather than
actually looking at ourselvesand going, what do I actually

(06:15):
want, or what do I actuallyneed?

And, well, it's also confusing, because where do
you begin? Yeah, like, you know,when Amelia says, I gotta
understand my body better. Well,what the hell does that mean?
Like, my height, my weight, youknow, my skin, you know, where
do we begin? And I think that'swhere the overwhelm comes in,
because we haven't been given ablueprint or a roadmap, per se,

(06:41):
but that's what I like to do.
That's what my business is,that's what in a vitality is.
That's why I partnered with anamazing integrative GP so that
we can together take our memberson this journey with a clear
roadmap. But we're not justtelling them what to do. We're
empowering them to understandtheir bodies better. We're
showing you these are themarkers that really matter if

(07:03):
you want to set up thisbeautiful second stage of your
life, yeah?

And I think that is the thing, like, it's having,
like, I just love the idea ofhaving baselines. And I think
it's like having a baseline or astarting point, yeah, it's such
a good way, yeah, to start thejourney, because you've got
something to come back to. Is itworking? Is not working? Yeah?
And I think that, yeah, we justneed to be pushing

that more, yeah?
And start tracking now, beforethe shit hits the fan,

before you fall down the other side.

No, you want, I 100%

agree with you, yeah. So let's start with the
foundation, because it's oneword that keeps coming up and
keeps coming up and keeps comingup about how women feel when
they're flat, they're foggy orjust not themselves. It's
inflammation.

Yeah, it absolutely can be it can be lots
of things, but silent, simmeringinflammation is is a real issue
for women approaching 50 andpost menopause, and it's not
spoken about enough, and I feellike there's a lot of confusion
around it, so it's a fantastictopic to talk about. And so what

(08:16):
is it? Okay? What isinflammation? All right? Well,
in a nutshell, we all, we allunderstand acute inflammation.
So you walk out in your fabulousheels, and you slip on a crack,
and you roll your ankle, andwithin 10 minutes, your ankle
blows up like a balloon. That'sacute inflammation. So your body
is doing a wonderful thing whereit's sending a lot of fluid and

(08:39):
blood to an injured site, andthen it is repairing it. Or,
let's say you get gastro, or youget ill and pathogens have
entered your body. Well, thenthere's a really fast acute
inflammatory response, which isall your fighter cells, just,
you know, arming up and fightingwonderful. We love acute
inflammation. It keeps us alive,yeah. But then we've got chronic

(09:01):
inflammation, and that's reallyone of what I want to focus on
today. And so this is this lowgrade simmering inflammation
that happens in some of ourbodies when certain triggers are
repeatedly given to our body.
And so what happens is theseinflammatory markers are
simmering, they're elevated, notenough that you notice it. So

(09:22):
you may have no symptomsinitially, but then what might
start to happen is you noticelittle things, like when I have
that glass of wine, I'm nowgetting very sinusy. Within 20
minutes of having the wine atdinner, I can feel my nose is
very blocked. Or you might wakeup in the morning and go to take
you put your rings on or takethem off, and you realise that
your joints are really puffy.

(09:44):
You can feel it in your fingers.
Or you might go to the doctorand realise that you've been
diagnosed with an autoimmunecondition, celiac disease,
rheumatoid arthritis,Hashimotos. Or you might find
that just food intolerances,foods that you used to be able
to to. Tolerate. You can'ttolerate these are all signs
that you have silent, chronicinflammation, but there you can

(10:07):
test for it, yes. So this iswhat I think is so, so
important. And so in in avitality which is our flagship
programme, our business iscalled vitality 360 it's a
membership platform where we runa whole bunch of amazing
functional health programmesusing testing. So in a vitality
which is our flagship programme,measures 55 key blood

(10:27):
biomarkers, which I call thesleep well at night markers.
They give you an overallsnapshot of your health. So we
measure a bunch of inflammatorymarkers, and the resounding
feedback we've had, and we'vehad 1000s of women through this
now is, oh my goodness, I've gotelevated inflammation. I had no

(10:49):
idea I did

well, even when you just said about the because
I don't drink, yeah? But even,like, just the rubbing of the
nose on the wine, I just it wastoo annoying, and I stopped
doing it. I know I

started happening to me too. Yeah, yeah,
I know another reason not to Istopped drinking when I started
tracking my sleep, and I sawwhat it was doing to my sleep,
and I decided it

wasn't worth it.
Yeah, it's hard, but, yeah,interesting. Okay, so, yeah,

so there's a couple so, so there are a couple
of the kind of signs andsymptoms, and then those more
starting to get diagnosed withsome of those conditions are
kind of, I guess, the red flags,but yes, I would like, even if
our ladies listening today, justgo and ask their doctor for a
high sensitivity CRP, which isthe kind of gold standard

(11:35):
inflammation marker. Now justknow one blood test, it doesn't
tell you if that's chronic oracute inflammation. So if you're
going and having a blood test,we and you're fighting an
illness, and you come back withhigh inflammation, you don't
know. So that's why sometimes,number one, don't get the blood
test when you've just rolledyour ankle, when you've got a
big graze up your arm, forexample, or you've been ill. And

(11:58):
that's why having a few testskind of over a period of time.
You go, Oh, wow. Okay, I'vetested it now two or three times
this year, and it's alwayselevated. Yeah. And also, Dr
Yasmeen is optimal ranges are alot tighter than the reference
ranges as well. So

which is, which is, that's a good point to know,
because even with those ranges,I know, because I've had a
couple of issues with my liver,not from alcohol, but just from
stress related things. And evenit's never within the normal
range. But normal, who's

normal? Yeah, the reference range is
essentially 90% of thepopulation, yes, so it's not
actually the healthy range thatyou should be in. So when you
get that blood test, andhopefully everyone here is, when
they do get any kind of test,they keep a copy. That's where
you can start. So a lot ofpeople still don't do that. Make
sure the doctor writes patienton the referral, so that you get

(12:51):
your own copy. And then thereference ranges you see on
there are literally justsocietal norms. So you sometimes
either ask your doctor or ifthey've got an optimal range,
or, you know, Dr Yasmina has,and look some of them, are you
they're exactly what thereference ranges are, and that's
fine, but, yeah, that's just alittle tip. Yeah. Okay, good,

(13:11):
yeah.

Why does this matter? And understanding
information in mid midlifematter more now,

yeah, such a great question. I think the best
way to answer it is that thefour biggest killers of
Australians and people in theWestern world, the four diseases
that kill the most people, allstem from a body that is
inflamed. Wow. So in a simplestform, if you can keep your

(13:43):
inflammatory markers, and if youcan keep your body in a state of
low inflammation, you're kind ofwarding off what Peter Attia and
I borrow this. He calls them thefour horsemen, the four biggest
killers of the Western world,which is cardiovascular disease.
So heart attacks, strokes,things you know, obesity

(14:04):
related, heart disease, cancer,yes, which a lot of people don't
think of, associate with, asbeing inflammatory. But many
cancers, or all cancers, stemfrom a state of inflammation,
metabolic disease, which is thefastest growing of the four
horsemen, and that's essentiallytype two diabetes is the is the

(14:25):
big one there, andneurodegenerative diseases,
Alzheimer's, dementia, andthere's a bit more talk in the
media about inflammationrelating to those
neurodegenerative diseases. Sobasically, if you want to keep
the Four Horsemen at bay, yougotta kind of fall think about
following a low inflammatoryapproach and just keeping an eye

(14:47):
on those markets through theyears.

And what are the signs that some women may be
living, living in that low gradeor that the inflammation state,
obviously, the rubbing of thenose after one are they. Any
other

if you are carrying extra body fat, yes,
particularly around the middle,yes, that type of visceral fat
is pro inflammatory, right? Soyou're probably at a higher risk
of of having that simmering. Wecall it metaflammation, so
inflammation caused by metabolicimbalances. So if you're, if

(15:25):
you're metabolically not copingvery well. So for example,
you're, you're carrying extrabody fat for whatever reason,
insulin resistance, prediabetes, type two diabetes,
you're in a state of what ourmarkers will show if you're in a
state of being overfed. I knowit's a strange term, but we can
see, we can look at someone'smarkers and say, your body is in

(15:47):
a state of being overfed and andit's struggling, and that is
actually driving up yourinflammatory markers. We need
to, we need to make somelifestyle changes to bring that
down. So apart from the othersymptoms I mentioned earlier
that body fat one is, is anotherone, but just know it's silent.
Yes, you can, yeah. I mean, ifI'm looking at you, Dom and I'm

(16:10):
you are not in my bucket of highrisk. Okay, we don't know what,
yeah, beneath the surface,that's why I don't like to stab
in the dark. No,

I think it is.
The markers are as the baseline.
You've just got to get tounderstand what they what they
all mean, and where you are,yeah, because I think the acute
inflammation is always in mybody. Oh, really, because I do
too much exercise or try orwhatever, but it's yeah. It's
that underlying yeahinflammation, yeah, that yeah,

(16:39):
you know, you just never know,no,

and it's just one of those sleep well at
night. Why wouldn't youbasically,

I guess, yeah, okay, I like that. So, is it
just food, or is it overtraining? Is it stress, poor
sleep? What's joylessness? Whatis causing it? I

like to put it into four key buckets, yes,
which is diet, exercise, stressand environmental toxins, or
toxic people.

So does that mean we can get rid of all those
toxic people?

Let's put them all in the same bucket, shall
we? I just threw that toxicpeople in there because it
contributes to stress. I'llelaborate on those a little bit.
So probably, of all of those forthe diet is the biggest lever
that you can either, you know,can either drive up inflammation
or drive it down. Yeah. Okay,so, and I know we're going to

(17:42):
talk lots about strategies,which we can later on, but just
knowing that you know, a dietthat's very high in pro
inflammatory foods is reallygoing to make a difference. And
on the flip side, if you'resomeone that follows a diet
that's very high in antiinflammatory foods, that's
really going to make adifference, exercise is kind of
similar. So under train, undertraining and over training are

(18:05):
both pro inflammatory. Soimagine a bell curve. Imagine a
chart, and you've got the bellcurve kind of shaped like a
mountain, yeah. So if you thinkof, like, the sweet spot for,
like, you know, managinginflammation, it's, you know,
the worst is no exercise, andthen the bell curve rises up.
You're in the sweet spot forjust healthy exercise. We can

(18:25):
talk about what that is, 50minutes a week. And then the
bell curve falls back down againon the over training side. So
elite athletes, endurancerunners, et cetera, they can
sometimes be carrying that lowgrade, simmering, chronic
inflammation, although I wouldargue that that sort of
inflammation is not asdangerous, yes, as some of the

(18:46):
others. And that's certainly inmy cohort. That's a very, very
small percent. I wish I had morepeople that over training was an
issue. Yeah, I'm definitely mostof my members are the opposite
end of the spectrum. So then wehad environmental toxins. I
think everyone understands, yep,from, from what we put on our
skin, what we ingest, what weinhale, all of those, all of

(19:08):
those factors and and thenstress. Yes is a big one,
chronic stress, and we've runsome incredible tests on our
members, measuring stress andcortisol through a special test
called a car test. And I wasblown away by how many of our
members were highly stressed. Wekind of put it into three

(19:31):
buckets of chronic, chronicstress, what we call a blunted
car. So basically adrenalfatigue and burnout,
dysregulated where it was justall over the shop. So oh my
goodness, the stress thing isreal. Yes, it's real, and it has
a physiological impact, whichnot many of us, I think, really

(19:52):
land with, but it really

does. So when I was going through my liver,
like, up and down, or justtrying to investigate what was
actually going on. On, I startedto meditate, because I was just
like, I need to do something totry and get the stress levels
down. And it was interesting howit did have an impact on my
liver, just by taking stock.

(20:15):
Isn't that a time?

Yeah. And then you didn't even, kind of, in the
beginning, believe it was gonnaI did

not also, oh, this is such a crowd like as if
it's gonna have an impact, butit did have an impact, and I
have fallen back out of thehabit of it, and I can feel my
stress levels go back up.

It's breath work, even. And I'm a failed
meditator, although meditatorstell me that there's no such
thing as a failed meditator, butI'm like, well, then describe me
because I don't know what otherword to use, but breath. That's
why I like breath work. Breathwork is, yeah, breath work is a
good one, but it's remarkablewhat an impact that makes. And

(20:53):
you touch on a beautiful pointthat I really want to I want to
give all your wonderfullisteners so much hope is that
inflammation is one of myfavourite markers and one of my
favourite health metrics tomanage, because it's so
sensitive and so unlike others,like you know, the scales, for
example, or some of these, youknow, cholesterol, which can

(21:15):
really feel like an effort tochange, inflammation, markers
will come down before many othermarkers change. So it's in such
our power to make a differencewith this one, and that's why we
get all these good news storieswhere members come back, go, Oh
my goodness. It's now about outof the red. It's in the green.
All I did was, you know, addsome blueberries, and I stopped

(21:37):
having that fried food on aFriday night. And yeah, so it's,
it's really encouraging to seehow, how much our body wants to
repair itself, yeah, body wantsto be well.

But I think even in that, that because we're so
addicted to instantgratification, yeah, so having
the ability to see the changes,yes, quickly, or quicker than
what it would take for somethingelse, yeah, it's an amazing
thing, yeah,

yeah. And then what you what you find people
experience is these side effectsthat only in hindsight they go,
Oh, my brain fogs. Yeah, here,that was a symptom. I didn't
mention, brain fog, moodinflammation, particularly
around that meta formation andinflammation in the brain
affects things like mood, brainfog, anxiety, so people then

(22:25):
say, oh, and so interesting.
Also, I've noticed theseimprovements. I'm concentrating
better. I'm not having thosedown moods like I used to. So,
so interesting.

Yeah, that's encouraging. It is. Can we just
before we move on the the foodand the the foods like, even
just the adjustments in what youwere talking about with the
blueberries, yeah, what, whatare your go to like, if you had,
like, three go to foods,

yeah, that's easy, good, yes, I like that one
well, well, before I get to thego to foods. I want to emphasise
that what you don't put in yourmouth is just as important you
put in your yes, becauseremember, I mentioned all these
pro inflammatory foods, so youreally need to clear those out.
And for some people, they don'teven focus on what they're

(23:17):
putting in their mouth.
Actually, the biggest benefitcomes from they're removing so
those really high, ultraprocessed foods, yes, big
culprits for inflammation,particularly inflammation
through the gut, because whathappens, particularly as we age,
is our gut lining and our gutintegrity already degrades.

(23:39):
Think of your gut lining like athink of it like a swimming pool
that has mosaic tiles, yes, aswimming pool that has mosaic
tiles on it. And over time, thegrouting in those mosaic tiles
starts to crack, yeah, and sowater starts to seep through.
Okay? That's kind of like yourgut lining. So when you're
young, you've got these greatmosaic tiles. It doesn't matter
if you've got crappy watercoming in the swimming pool, you

(24:02):
know, crappy food comingthrough. You've got the mosaic
tiles are keeping everything,you know, out, but as we age and
those cracks start to develop inour gut lining, and then we're
bringing in these strangelooking molecules that are ultra
processed, you know, highlyrefined. And those molecules are

(24:23):
now allowing and being able topass through those cracks. And
then what happens is these proinflammatory cytokines, which
are sitting on the other side,and they're like the Guardians,
and they're sitting there, andsuddenly these weird molecules
are coming through, and they go,Whoa, pro inflammatory Danger,
danger. And they trigger thesepro inflammatory cytokines,
yeah, so we want to reduce that,yeah, by Yeah, eliminating so

(24:44):
hot, so Ultra processed, sosimple carbohydrates, yeah, all
of those really hot, highlyprocessed, white wheat fried
food, cakes, biscuits. It'sfunny, because when you talk
about fried food, a lot ofpeople are like. Oh no, no,
that's not me. Like I don't eatHungry Jacks or Maccas or
anything like that. But youthink about the, you know, the

(25:05):
Asian meal you had, and

the area for

the saturated fat is very pro inflammatory. So
if you're someone, you know, Ilove full cream, milk, and I
love dairy. And I'm definitelytelling you, stick, keep having
your butter. Don't switch tomargarine. But if you're having
a lot of those saturated fatfoods, particularly deli meats,
sausages, ham, salami,prosciutto, they're all pro

(25:40):
inflammatory, yeah. So get ridof those. Yeah. And then you're
dialling up your antiinflammatory. So three foods, so
anything dark purple, red. Soberries, beetroot. Beetroot is a
massive hero. If you're a big ifyou're someone that does a lot
of exercise, particularlyendurance style exercise, you
should be trying to have threebeetroot three times a week.
It's okay. I don't like singlingit, yeah, single foods is a

(26:03):
nutritionist, but I have to saythat it is, it is a real
superfood. So those dark theseare all foods that are very high
polyphenols, yes, okay, so thesehave what anti inflammatory
properties in them. They reallybring it down. Dark green leafy
veggies as well. Extra Extravirgin cold press, extra virgin
olive oil. Okay, is another oneas well. I'm sorry you probably

(26:25):
were wanting something reallycool and innovative and new, but
I think

the like, even the beetroot, like, that's,
yeah, what about as a cheat forthe beetroot? What about like a
beetroot juice? Yeah,absolutely. I

look, I love it when you are blending instead of
juicing so that, okay, yeah,yes, the great thing, woollies
and Coles now do these. What arethey called? Not zip locked, but
air tight, pre peeled and cookedsea troops. And I did some
research, because I was like, Isthis as good as the real thing

(27:00):
and a tiny little bit of nitrategets lost, but it's just as
good, really, apart from that,and for me, if I had to peel it,
cook it, yeah, roast it or grateit, or do whatever it takes
forever. So I now just havethose. And I sometimes I'm so
uninventive, I literally justeat it all. I just, but no,

(27:22):
you're so right. I trust thosein my Yes, my kids are very
athletic, so it's like a I

wouldn't have expected that.

I'm always, you know, throwing what I can in
their smoothies, trying to, youknow, keep them as healthy.
That's

actually because I think they're called Love
baits, like I have seen them aswell, yeah, and they are
amazing, and they come like in apre pack four. But that's a
great

I think, because they are airtight, they must be
locking in the nutrients, thissmall amount of nitric oxide
that gets lost in the research.
I did quite a big deep dive intoit, because I love beetroot so
much. So there you go. That's mylittle high tip that should be
in your shopping everywhere.
Okay, and just, you know, chopit up in your salad, throw it in
a smoothie, have it on the side.
Yeah, yep. So they're really theheavy hitters. Dark chocolate,

(28:06):
yes, yes, yeah, good nuts aswell. Look just always eat a mix
of them, walnuts in particular,Selenium. Brazil nuts can Yes.
Five of them contain your RDIfor selenium, and if you've got
some metabolic issues or thyroidissues, a lot of us are quite
insufficient in selenium. So I'malways like, have your Brazil

nuts? Yeah, I think, yeah. Okay, good. Brazil
nuts are a good one. Okay, solet's bust some myths. These are
the things that we've been toldfor years, but, you know, I
don't know whether they'reactually true. So true, false or
complicated. Okay, cardio is thebest way to lose midlife belly

(28:49):
fat. It's complicated.

It's definitely complicated, because
physiologically, the exercisethat dials up lipolysis, which
is fat burning. So the exercisethat will have you in a state of
fat burning is zone two cardio.
Yes, okay. Zone two is meaning60 to 70% of your max heart
rate. It's basically cardioactivity where you are able to

(29:15):
hold a conversation, but onlyjust okay. So physiologically,
it's true, cardio is a great fatburner, particularly if you're
glycogen depleted, so if you'vegot no blood glucose so in your
blood so for example, you wakeup fasted, and you train fasted
cardio. Physiologically, thatwill get you into a fat burning

(29:38):
state fastest, and you'll burnfat, okay? But we all know that
that's not the complete story.
Yeah, because for fat burning,we need to have one of the one
of the biggest metabolic enginesthat we have on our bodies, our
beautiful muscle, our leanmuscle, so if you're if you're

(29:58):
addicted to car. And you're astring bean, and you've got very
low muscle mass, thenmetabolically, that's actually
not that healthy. So that's why,unfortunately, there's no one
winning. Or this is what youhave to do when it comes to
exercise and managing bodycomposition, which is really
important as we age. It needs tobe there's kind of four key

(30:21):
domains of exercise, and we needto do all four. All four domains
of exercise have their place.
Yeah, do you want me to gothrough? Yes, I would love to.
Okay, all right. Am I doingthem? Yeah, let's say hey. Well,
yeah, let's find out. So thefirst two are cardio related. So
zone two and VO two, Max, yes.
Okay, so zone two, I justexplained that your steady state
cardio, great for mental healthas well. Great for connecting

(30:43):
with nature. If you're able toget outside and somewhere
through a park or down by thebeach. The second one are you
doing this? Dom, VO, two, Max.
These are short, sharp, hard,maximal outputs of cardio. So
these are your sprints. Theseare your on the assault bike at
the gym, 20 seconds on, 10seconds off, repeated five
times, sprinting to the the last200 metres of your run. Are you

(31:07):
doing any

Well, I'm doing spin. And in SPIN we do a lot of
like, yep, there are a lot ofhardcore like, okay, we're now
going for a sprint.

Great. Well, then yeah, I it basically is at
a point where you need to,you're at a point where you have
to stop, oh, your body,literally, I will fall off the
bike and look for any of ourbeginner exercises that are
listening to this going, I donot like what this chick saying
right now. I'm gonna give yousix months leeway. So for my

(31:37):
people that are just coming backinto fitness, yes, you don't
need to do your VO two Max workfor six but well, six months
time, you have to promise me,yeah, you're gonna start doing
it doesn't have to be a lot,like I said, 20 seconds on, 10
seconds off. It could beburpees. I always call it a fast
finish. Yeah, you're just doingthat. Yes, you know it should
only vo two Max, should only be10% of your total load. So some

(31:58):
people listening might be going,Oh, actually, I'm probably doing
too much Bucha. I

am. But okay, yeah, based on my Apple Watch
afterwards, I'm like, yeah, oh,my heart rate was a bit too high

for all that. So it's, yeah, it's, it's important
to be doing that gentler zonetoo, especially if you're
someone that is more on thatstressed type, which is very
hard. You're in probably an Atype personality. I just
stabbing in the dark here. Dom,I love it takes one to no one.

(32:30):
Don't worry, don't worry, lotsof our ladies are so that's, you
know, giving you permission thatactually, that just city state
is really, actually, it'ssetting you up to the thing
that's going to have you livingto 100 is, is that zone two
cardio? Okay, so they're thefirst two, then the third one is
strength, yeah. So lifting heavyshit, yeah. I could talk days
about this, and it's a journey.

(32:54):
So for those of you listeningwho have never done strength
training, you might you knowpeople, people say is Pilates
strength training. And I guessfor I'm never black or white
about these things, but ifyou've never done any strength
training, I feel like Pilates isa lovely reformer Pilates is a
lovely stepping stone. But ifyou've been doing reformer
Pilates as your strength now fora while, you need to step into

(33:15):
the weights room. You need tolift. You know, my goal with a
lot of my ladies, is to say youneed to lift your body weight 10
times in a deadlift. So youthink about how much you weigh a
deadlift. You know, the bar withthe weights, don't go and try it
this afternoon. Build up to it.
But that's a great goal to have.
You need to be able to dead hangbetween 60 to 120 seconds. So

(33:38):
that's just hanging off. Go tothe park with your kids, find a
find a bar, and just see howtime, how long you can dead hang
for. There's lots of differentmoves, but strength is so, so
important, and I feel likethere's a lot out in in the
zeitgeist at the moment aboutthe power of strength training,

like it's interesting. So I was doing so
much spin and Pilates, and now Ihave swapped it, so I do
strength training three times aweek, okay? Pilates three times,
two times a week, and spin twicea week. So do

you know that's a tick tock trend? What is I was
on channel nine two days ago,talking about exactly what you
just called the 321, method. Oh,really, yep, three days of
strength training, two days ofPilates and one day of cardio,
and it's a trending tick tock.
Did you start that? No, I

doubt I did. I doubt I do. You're doing it
without even realising how coolyou are, yeah? Except I do two
spins, yeah, oh, yeah. Okay.
Well, there you go. But Three,two, yeah, but it's, it's hard,
because, when you're used topush, like, because I train
hard, and I'm used to pushing mybody hard, but going back to
strength training, and it'sreally, like, I find it boring.

(34:55):
Like, I really find it boring.
And the great thing is, is I'mnow in a room with six other
people, and. We all do it at thesame time. Australia, is it in
class? It's a class where it ishow they finding that much
better, better if it was justmyself and a trainer or myself
doing it myself. It's just, Ijust find there's no challenge.
And yeah, I

100% agree with you. And for any of the
entrepreneurs listening to this,there is a huge opportunity and
a gap in the market for a newstrength training. You know,
business trend, there is such amissing middle of women in their
40s and 50s who have never grownup in the weights room and and

(35:40):
they don't want to do curves,no, because that's and there's
an amazing programme forosteoporosis and strength
training, very evidence based,is called onero, but that's also
for people that have low bonedensity. Yeah, that doesn't, I'm
looking, there's nothing in themiddle. There's nothing in the
middle. Yeah, look, I think pumpclass is a great place to start.

(36:00):
Okay, right? Yeah, CrossFit,interestingly, and F 45 I would
not recommend people go toCrossFit without having being
sort of an intermediate. Yeah,you could do cross, yeah, that's
why I love CrossFit, becauseit's got that group based
component to

it. And there's a bit of a challenge too,
because I like compete, like Ilike competing with that person
next to me, and if it's a man,it's even better, because if I
can annihilate, yeah,

absolutely. And there's a skill involved,
because a lot of the moves instrength training, once you
start doing Olympic lifting,it's there's a lot of skill and
gymnastics involved, which Ipersonally like, I never thought
at my age I'd be doing handstandpush ups, and here I am going
upside down and then havingcompetitions with my kids at
home and losing terribly tothem, but I think that you're so

(36:47):
right. We have to. And thiscomes back to what I said at the
very start, where the onus comeson the woman to find her own.
Yeah, and it kind of sucks,yeah, but it's just where we're
at. And so do if you find itboring, then you need surviving.
Mix it up, try somethingdifferent. And I think group
based, and that's why thosepersonal challenges of, like,
can you deadlift your bodyweight? Yes, 10 times. There's

(37:10):
some great period, eyes,programmes, yeah. So that's the
third one. Sorry,

yes, I love the exercise. One's always been
like, I'm fascinated. Yeah, it

is, oh, and it makes such a big difference. And
the last one is mobility,stability. So this is the, this
is all the flexibility work, butalso the balance and stability
work. So for example, we'lloften have some challenges about
members standing on one leg,yes, with their eyes closed,

(37:38):
yeah, and seeing if you can makeit past 30 seconds.

Yeah, and what, what is the is, what is there a
marker or an indicator?

So I've actually got a chart, and don't make me
memorise this. I won't be ableto tell you. I'll get it wrong.
I can send you the link to popin the show notes. But I was on
the TV show, do you want to liveforever? And we did all this
longevity testing. And sobasically, if it shows, if
you're, you know, 40 to 50 yearsold, you're meant to be able to

(38:06):
stand on one leg for x seconds.
And I'm not going to say becauseI don't want to get it wrong,
but I will put it in a shownotes in there. So it's
hilarious, because we would thensay to our participants, you
know, you've got the balance ofa 70 year old. And there's
nothing like that to set achallenge.

Yeah, exactly.
And that is it's a challenge. Iknow, yeah, it sounds
ridiculous, but in the shower,when I'm washing my body, I will
stand on one leg, yeah, and shutmy eyes, yes. And

do that, and unlock your knee slightly. So
when you're standing on that oneleg, just slightly bend that
knee, and you'll feel your anklestabilisers start to really
light up. So, yeah, just, that'sa great little tip when you're
brushing your teeth, yeah, oneleg, okay. And the leg that you
stand on first is your, usuallyyour much better leg. So I
always say you'll stand on thatone leg and then go, Oh no, I'm

(38:56):
going to switch sides. Alwayswork on the poor leg. Yeah,
okay, that is, that's a goodone. So they're the four vo two,
Max zone two, cardio, strength,flexibility, mobility, all of
them are equally important.

Yes, and it's just in again, coming back to
you and making sure what worksfor you as a person 100%

and if you've only got three days a week,
well, you just got to work outhow you can slot those in. Or
what I like to do is I like toreally focus on one for, for, I
do use the school term becausethat's my whole life is in
school terms. So for term fourlast year, was all about
strength. I really wanted to beable to deadlift double my body
weight, and I wanted to be ableto squat my full body weight 10

(39:35):
times. So, so all of term fourwas a strength, great idea. And
then term one, I'm really cardiofocused at the moment. I'm
trying to because you can trackyour VO two max on your
wearable. If you've got awearable that's actually
reasonably accurate, you can seeparticularly Apple Watch, and
I'm not sure about all theothers, but so I want to get, I

(39:56):
want to dial up my vo two max bytwo points so that I'm really
focused on. I'm doingeverything, but that's the one
thing I'm focused

I think it's really interesting with your VO
two Max, the only way you canactually track it is when you've
gone for a walk, which I think,because I was looking at that
with Justin, and we were going,oh, what? My vo two Max, it
hasn't gone up, it hasn't gonedown. It's just been steady. And
then we went for a walk, and Icould actually see that it has
gone when you do an outdoorwalk. Apparently, that's when it

(40:25):
resets to see how you

is that, right?
I did not know that from Ithought it was, oh, there you
go. I learned something newtoday. Um,

you spoke before 150 minutes, yeah, what? What is

look that's just the national recommended
guidelines. So 30 minutes, fivetimes a week. You can slice and
dice it any way you want, butit's just the national
recommended guidelines.
Honestly, they can't evenjustify, I mean, they would like
it to be a lot higher. Theythink it should be a lot higher,
but then it's no one would everachieve it. We're not even
achieving it as a nation anyway.

(40:58):
But it's it is the nationalrecommended guidelines is 150
minutes a week, and they don'tcare how you do it. You can do
150 minutes in one go. If youcould do 10 minutes three times
a day, just do it. Yeah, justand if you're not an exercise of
the 10,000 steps is a great oneas well. Very hard to do, yeah,
but a great one. If you hate thegym and you just, but you still
want to be really healthy, justtrack your track your steps.

What about this one? You can't build muscle
after 45

false, yeah, definitely false. I won't say
it's easy, but you can 100%build muscle after 45 I send so
many of my ladies on DEXA scans.
I like all my ladies to comeback with at least 40 kilos of
lean, fat, free mass. And I seethat number going up all the
time. But I do have ladies cometo me saying, Oh, I'm scared I'm

(41:47):
going to get too muscly. And I'mlike, you wish,

honey,

I wish you know I could make you more muscly.
It's there's no doubt if youwere to take 47

year old Yes,

and somehow miraculously, get 25 year old
Dom, yes, doing the exact samestrength training programme,
she's gonna blitz you. Oh, yeah,of course. Well,

yeah, how annoying I am. Yeah,

competing with your 25 year old self. I
wouldn't put it past you, myfriend, I would not put it past
you. But it is much, much harderas we age to lay down lean
muscle, and it's much mucheasier to lose it. Yes, so it
has to be taken seriously.

(42:40):
That's why protein intake is soimportant. That's why we put a
lot of our ladies, they need tohave a protein supplement in a
protein shake, because they'rejust not able to get it in the
in the quantity of their dailycalories.

It is. It's so much protein that we have to be
eating, yeah, like it's, it's alot like, I start my day, every
day, with two hard boiled eggs,just to

try and get 20 to 30 grammes in in every meal,
and then not get reallyconstipated. Just I've got a
little tip for you that works atreat. There's a great fibre,
prebiotic so you've got yourregular fibre, like psyllium
husks. But this is a, it's abrand called designs for health,
and it's called paleo fibre,yes, and we, we we recommend

(43:22):
this to a lot of our ladies, andyou just put it in with your
protein if you get constipated,because having protein, yeah,
this fibre. So it's fibre, whichis great, but it's a prebiotic
as well. Whereas psyllium husks,you just go here, just going
through you, yeah, this one'sactually really going to help
with that integrity of your gutlining and and just help
fertilise those healthy gutbugs. So, yeah, that's a great

(43:44):
one. Even love that fertiliseyour healthy gut bug. Yeah, it's
like fertiliser, prebiotics. Youknow, he's a fertiliser,
exactly.

Intermittent fasting is a miracle for women.

It's complicated, okay, so I can tell
you who should not intermittentfast, yeah, and then we'll talk
about who could work for. And Iknow Dr Stacy Sims, who I love
and I follow, and I think she'samazing. She's very anti
intermittent fasting, but I geta bit frustrated because she

(44:16):
will often caveat what she saysvery quickly at the start of a
conversation with, with theexception of overweight or obese
people. So no, you shouldn'tfast, and it's blah, blah, blah,
or with the exception ofoverweight or obese people. So
let me explain. Okay, you shouldnot intermittent fast, and I'm
talking about, you know, longerthan 12 hours. Yeah, pretty much

(44:40):
anyone can fast for 12 hours,pretty so 8pm till 8am yeah,
that's that's just yourovernight, prolonged overnight
fast, but those much longer,fast, prolonged overnight fast,
like up to 1618, hours, etc, ifyou are have a low body fat, a
very healthy body fatcomposition. I. Yeah, and you

(45:01):
tend to be more of that stressedand type A personality type,
intermittent fasting oftendoesn't work in a very what we
call an exaggerated cortisol sothat higher stress person, those
people generally don't respondwell to intermittent fasting.
Then on the flip side, if youhave some metabolic issues, so

(45:24):
you might be insulin resistant,or pre diabetic or type two
diabetes. This is why it'scomplicated for some people,
intermittent fasting is a gamechanger, and it works really
well. But if you're one of thosepeople that's unable to control
your blood sugar levels, if youfast for a long period of time,
you are actually at a reallyhigh risk of a hypoglycemic

(45:45):
episode, which is where you canfaint and your body can organs
can start to shut down. Soalthough intermittent fasting
can be a brilliant weight losstool, if you know you have
insulin resistance or prediabetes, you need to fast under
supervision. Yeah, that's whereCGM can be really a continuous
glucose monitor, because you cansee if you're having a low blood
sugar episode. But for everyoneelse, which is probably 90% of

(46:10):
your listeners, there is a placefor it, because for the majority
of us, we live in what's calledan obesogenic environment. We
live in an environment that isworking so hard to make us
overeat, it's working so hard tomake us eat more and move less.
Yes, that for many of us tryingto manage our caloric intake to

(46:31):
meet our energy requirements andnot overload, it is a really
hard thing to do. So having twomeals a day with a little snack
in the middle. Works so wellhaving a big brunch and a
beautiful family dinner at 6pm abig brunch at, you know, 10am
family dinner at 6pm and maybe alittle snack or protein shake or

(46:52):
something like that in theafternoon. And those people are
sitting, you know, wherevertheir calorie needs are, go for
it, yeah, don't worry about whatStacey's saying? Yeah,

I do. And this comes back to, you know, it's
all about you and what works foryou and understand your body
better. Understand your bodybetter, and understanding what
works and what doesn't. Yeah,and it is true. Like even at
lunch today, I had the biggestbowl of rice, and I'm like, I
don't need all this rice. Like,you could cut it in half, and
that would be absolutely fine.

(47:25):
And then I was asked, what waswrong? Why didn't you eat it
all? Because you are literallyfeeding me for four

feeding me like I'm a lump Jack. And I always
say, particularly if you'retrying to manage your weight and
you're, you know, trying to keepthat body composition in check,
it's really healthy to feelhungry, yes, below the neck.
Yeah, twice a day for 15minutes, right? Okay, so think
about and I often have memberssay I never feel hungry ever.

(47:51):
Yeah? And I'm like, that's a redflag, yeah. So have a little
experiment tomorrow morning,when you wake up, don't eat
until you feel hungry, but ithas to be below the neck,
because that is true hunger.
That is when your hormonegrilling. So what happens is
your your tummy comes online,like your digestive engine has
to wind up. It's a bit likebooting up your computer. And

(48:12):
for some people, it takes a lotlonger in the morning for their
digestion to come online. And ifthey're trying to eat, when you
know, shut down. That's notgood, that's

not healthy. And he's like, is the noise in your
tummy? Is that a good indicator?

Absolutely. But you often will feel it before
you hear it, although, you know,some people have noisy guts, but
feeling hungry below the neckand then sitting with that
hunger, this is, if weightmanagement is, yeah, for you
feel sitting in that hunger for15 minutes, because what you're
doing then is you're improvingyour insulin flexibility, so
your body is basically sayingblood glucose is declining. So

(48:49):
we need to now dial uplipolysis. We need to dip into
our fat stores and start turningsome of that amazing body fat
into energy. And that's a realthat's that metabolic
flexibility. That's really,really important. But if you
feel hungry above them, say, inthe afternoon, yeah, yeah, you
are hungry, you go, hang on. Isthis below the neck or above?
Oh, it's a craving. It's like ataste in my mouth, a feeling.

(49:11):
That's when you have to go,Okay, that's a craving. And we
need to, you know, there's lotsof strategies to managing
through those cravings.

I love that in that yeah, low or above, like
and if

you're worried about energy, of really fun fact
is that we have enough body faton our bodies to fuel us to walk
from Sydney to Melbourne. Okay,great.

So there's fuel in the tech, honey. There's time
you go without. Yes, thatcraving, you can actually think
about something else.

Yeah, it's not that you generally and it's
funny, because we're exhausted,it's just the worst because
we're we're exhausted, we'refrustrated, we've got brain fog,
we've got all these things thatare just causing us to crave
the, you know, salty, sugary orfatty foods. But actually, the
best thing we can do is not steponto the road. Coaster and not

(50:01):
have those, those sugar spikingfoods, or those foods that put a
lot of pressure on our digestivesystem. But yes, easier said
than

done. Yeah, it is easier than but at least if
you can identify it, yeah, Ithink that's a good thing. Yeah,

I was telling you off air. One of my hot tips
is the collagen hot chocolate.
Yes, I got a sweet tooth, and soI use chief collagen. They have
a really delicious darkchocolate collagen powder that I
just have in the afternoon whenI'm craving something sweet and
I want to pick me up. I havethat with a splash of milk, and
it's just delicious in honourall afternoon. And that gets me

through the and I liked it. You actually put
omega Yes, like Jaffa,

yes, I've got my Omega oil, which is, I don't
like the taste of it on its own,but it's got a citrusy trying to
mask the, you know, fishy taste.
But if I tip it in my hotchocolate, it just makes it
taste like a Jaffa.

Yeah, which I Yeah. How good is it? Yes, that
in the afternoon, I know. See, Ijust have my collagen matcha.

Much love matcha, although it has got a
bit of caffeine in it. Yeah,

that's probably why I like it. But I don't drink
coffee, so I usually sleep well,yeah, so I don't have a problem
with sleep, then go for it, butI do have magnesium before bed.

She's got it all worked out.

I don't know about that, but there's always
things you can learn with a lotof women are still training, as
they did in their 30s, highintensity, full throttle, which
is what we spoke about justbefore, and it's burning them
out, yeah, and their joints andtheir shoulders and their knees,
Yeah. How can movement make youfeel supported rather than just

(51:43):
feeling burnt out. Yeah,

such a great question. And again, it's very
personalised and individualised,but know that as we transition
through Peri and then menopauseand then post menopause, our
joints change quitedramatically. So in the in the
five years post menopause, bythe time we get to five years

(52:07):
post menopause, we will havelost 30% of our body's collagen.
So annoying, isn't it? And youdon't do men do the same. Well,
they don't go through menopause,yeah. Okay, so it's for us, it's
the transition of the hormones.
It's the we lose the beautifulprotective element of oestrogen,

(52:29):
which is very nourishing, andprogesterone as well, and so we
recognise it in skin, right?
Yeah. You know, everyone's veryconscious of wrinkles, but what
we don't realise is thatcollagen is connective tissue.
So our joints, when they losethat collagen, it really impacts
our joints. That's why we hear alot more tennis elbow and frozen
shoulder. Yes. So you've gotthese ladies that may have had a

(52:51):
break from exercise, rememberthat they could, you know, punch
out 50 push ups in their 30s,and then they jump back into the
gym and and, you know, theydon't warm up. They don't do the
extended warm up that our ageingjoints need, and that's when
those joint base injuries flareup. And then, of course, you
lose confidence. And exerciseisn't fun, and yeah, and it has

(53:12):
that, and it does that exactly.
It has that whole knock oneffect. So that's why the good
news story is that four domainsof exercise and having that
balanced approach, because itgives you permission to do the
gentler exercise, know that thatzone two cardio is setting your

(53:33):
heart, your cardiovascularsystem, up for living to 100
Yeah, so it's actually you'reyou're doing the best thing you
possibly can by dialling thatback a bit. And if you're doing
a lot of hard cardio becauseyou're trying to out train a
poor or outrun a poor diet, justknow that it's not going to
work, and there's going to comea point where you need to

(53:53):
address your diet, becausethat's not what exercise is, is
well,

and it is, isn't it 70% of what you put in your
mouth and 30. Well, you know,yeah, everyone's different, I
know, but what you put in, yeah,

you just, you won't be able to out train a
poor diet. And also the poordiet, you know, we were talking
about inflammation in this wholeepisode has a real inflammatory
men to it. So you shouldn't beputting those pro inflammatory
foods in your mouth. You shouldbe working to dial them down.
Yes, anyway, so yeah, it's, youshouldn't be training to outrun

(54:25):
that diet. Yeah.

And it's, it's interesting, even just in that
mindset of changing from thesweat to the strength is it's a
big change. Well, for

you, I mean, you're having a bit of an
identity crisis around like,it's slower, it's a bit more
boring. I'm not coming outbeetroot red. I'm having to sit
and rest for two minutes whilemy, you know, muscle glycogen
replenishes my creatingphosphate in my, you know, it's
a different type of training. Ifyou're used to just thrashing it
out in cardio. It's a real it'sa bit of an identity shift.

But it's like coming from that high like. Do
get the runners high, or, youknow, the the cardio high, and
changing it to, yeah, it's notthere,

yeah. But you know what I found, I get a
strength high, like, when you'reokay, when you've lived, so when
I lift heavy, and I'm, like,really heavy, and there's
grunting, and there's, you know,it's not pretty. I'm not one of
those. I'm a very I'm a messycry or ugly crier, and I'm ugly
strength trainer. I could neverbe like a fitness influencer,

(55:26):
thank goodness. I think youshould be, no, just you'd see
all those. There'd be memesabout, like the Kim Kardashian
memes. So no, but there you do,you'll, I reckon you'll get to a
point where it'll click in Yeah,I do see that happen

at it? Dom I'm trying. I'm trying. For someone
who's never touched a weight,how do you convince them that
this is the best gift that theycan give their future self?

I would start by following an Instagram page
called train with Joan. Okay,have you know is what colour
hair like? She's a lady in her70s. Yes, I do that, yeah, yes.
But a million followers, yes,she looks like, or she did look
like anyone's Granny, gorgeous,lovable, and she discovered

(56:16):
exercise in her early 60s. Andshe's aged backwards. You should
see her now. Unbelievable Thatto me is, I think, start to
establish what I like to callsome worthy idols. So think
about maybe someone in yourcurrent decade, maybe someone in
the next decade, you know, for alot of people, could be Jane

(56:39):
Fonda. It could be MichelleObama's arms. You know, it could
be, hopefully there's someone inyour life, yes, that you look to
as inspiration. Because I cantell you one thing, we are all
going to be old for a longperiod of time, which is great
news, yeah, rather that than theopposite. But we are an ageing

(57:00):
population. And really a coupleof really interesting stats on
that is that centenarians inAustralia are ageing at a rate
or growing. So the number ofpeople over 100 years old is
growing in Australia at a rateof 6% per year, which is
massive. But here's acontradictory stat, the life
expectancy in Australia has justgone backwards for the first

(57:23):
time in 20 years. Wow. So Ican't remember the exact. Is it
84 for women and 81 for men? Ican't remember the exact, but
the recent report came out aboutthree months ago, and you're
like, Well, how do those twomarry up? So here's how it
marries up. The reason why ourageing, our average lifespan in
Australia, has gone backwards ischronic disease. Okay, yes, yep.

(57:46):
But if you manage to avoid thosefour horsemen, which you will,
yeah, yeah. And I'm planning onhopefully, and all our beautiful
listeners are, if you can avoidthose chronic diseases, then
you're going to be old for along period of time. Yes. And
therefore this body of oursneeds to be able to carry us
independently for a long period.

(58:10):
And you think about pre frailtyand frailty, and you only have
to think of a couple ofrelatives that you know. Think
of some people you know in your80s, and they my mum and dad,
are chalk and cheese. Yeah, mymum could sit on the couch
you're on right now, which isquite a low couch, and she could
just pop up without eventouching my dad, I would need to
pull him up. He can be he's soimmobile, he's so weak.

Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it? And
that's strength, yeah, okay.
Party is not going to do that.
And I always like, I keeptelling myself, with everything.
What does your 80 year old bodywant? Like, I know you need to
actually go, yeah, ask yourfuture self like, all the time,
which is why I stopped running,because I was like, my I won't
be able to walk. And it's also,whenever I look at something

(58:54):
that I go, that looks sodelicious, I then go, what would
my 80 year old self say? And,yeah, it's just a nice way of
reframing it. It

totally is because we don't want to lose
our independence. And we we wanthealth span, not Yeah, we want
to be independent. And you know,if you want to be able to go up
and down those stairs at 95 youwant to be able to carry three
kilos in each arm at 95 which isthe equivalent of the shopping,
you know the around the corneryou want to be able to carry

(59:23):
three kilos for five minuteseach. In your 90s, well, that
means in your 80s, you got to becarrying six kilos. So in your
70s, you got to be carrying 12kilos. So in your 60s, by the
time you get to your 50s, canyou pick up 220 kilo dumbbells
and do a farmer's carry for fiveminutes? Because that's what
you've got to be able to do

Yeah, which is Yeah, and that in itself is
like, it's a good motivator.
Don't you think that'smotivated? I absolutely do. Yes.
Good one person's motivated,yeah, which is why I'm sticking
out the boring wipes I

know. Ask your future self, she goes, Oh, we
want you to have a party. Wewant you to have a cocktail and.
Relax, put the weights down,shut up, put yourself.

Dominique Hind (01:00:05):
Food is one of the most confusing wellness
topics out there, and when itcomes to information, everyone's
got their own opinion. We didtalk about the three things to
bring in, but what we did talkabout the fried foods. Is there
anything else that when it comesto inflammation in the women in

(01:00:27):
their 40s, over the 40s, weshould be looking for,

Amelia Philips (01:00:29):
I think for inflammation and diet, they are
the biggest levers. I feel likewe covered it pretty well.
There's a couple of, I'm justgoing to throw some kind of more
context around there aresupplements you can take as
well. There's one called SBMactive, which is a good one.
Omega threes is a great one aswell. These are just kind of to

(01:00:50):
dial it up even more. But what Iwill say is, instead of thinking
about just completelyoverhauling your diet and going,
okay, table flip moment. I'velistened to meals and Dom
starting tomorrow. I'm only antiinflammatory all the way. And
then, you know, you know how the

story plays out, right? Yeah,

let's, let's approach it a different way,
which is, let's pick one part ofyour day. Yes, you can, because
the great thing about us iswe're creatures of habit, so we
get many attempts at thesethings, because most of us live
pretty, you know, consistent.
I'm going to say boring for me,but I know everyone else far
more exciting, but I eatrelatively similarly each day.

(01:01:32):
So pick one part of your day andyour and your eating pattern
that you'd really like to focuson. So for me, personally, I've
got the world's biggest sweettooth. And up until two years
ago, I was having dessert sevennights a week. Wow. And that
dessert was getting and what wasit? A guy and bigger and bigger.

(01:01:58):
Okay, so my Monday to Thursdaydessert was, you know, those
cobs, popcorn? Oh, yes, a wholebag and but that's not enough. I
would get chocolate, like someform of whether it was
favourites or, you know, if Iwas being healthier, lean, dark
chocolate. I feel like I'm in aconfessional. Now, I would put
the chocolate at the bottom ofthe bowl. I call it the bomb. So

(01:02:20):
just when you think you'regetting to the bottom of the
bottom of the bowl of popcorn,you get the bomb, which is the
chocolate anyway. So yes, and Iwanted to stop this, yeah. And I
tried and failed and tried andfailed. I would go down
tonight's the night I'm not andTim, I could just kill my
husband. He would sit there withan apple and just be satisfied.
And I would look at that. And soI'd sit there, and I'd get

(01:02:42):
myself an apple and be watchingmy show, going like this,
starting to feel really antsy,and then like, like, halfway
through the show, I just run tothe kitchen and get it all over.
So for me, and it was actuallymy beautiful podcast, and it was
a tiny habits method, Iinterviewed BJ Fogg Phillips,
and he I interviewed his sister,who has this method called the

(01:03:05):
tiny habits. And I did it, andit worked, yeah. And one of the
things they talk about is likemaking the goal and the habit
change so small, so I juststarted to do it, yeah, Monday,
Tuesday, Wednesday, yes. And Icould not enter the lounge room,
so I completely changed mynighttime routine, where, after
I put the kids to bed, insteadof going down to lounge room
watching Netflix, I go straightto my bedroom, and I did a whole

(01:03:31):
self care ritual bath. I boughtbeautiful aromatherapy, I got
the magnesium bath salts, and Ialways had a good book, and it
was hard, like maybe for two orthree weeks, but this the
replacement of this amazing selfcare. I was going to better now,
why? And just Monday toWednesday, and then Thursday to
Sunday, I went nuts with mydessert. But now here I am, two
years later, I don't needdessert at

all. Isn't that interesting? And I was even
thinking, how you've you focus?
Or you said, before focus aterm, yeah, for each of your
exercise fitness goals, youcould also do

it with the food as well, 100% which

because, if you've got something that you
can couple up, yep, and it'sonly a short term, yeah? Because
that's, I think the biggestthing is, we all get stuck on
these big, lofty, even yeargoals, yeah, but they don't
stick No.

And even the Monday to Friday thing, I think
is fantastic. And, well, anothergreat one is sleep. For a lot of
people, sleep is something thatthey really want to improve. And
so I say, just be fanaticalabout it. Yeah, on a Tuesday,
Wednesday, that's where you'renot going to watch your show.
You're going to set an alarm.
Yeah, no. Like, I wake up superearly, so I have to work
backwards if I want to be in bedfor eight hours. It's

(01:04:42):
embarrassing at what time I haveto actually get in climbing to
bed. But it works. So circlingback to nutrition, pick one part
of your your diet. It could bealcohol. Yes, it could be that
after dinner, sweet treat. Itcould be pick one area. It could

(01:05:02):
just be your breakfast. Like agreat tip is to switch to a
savoury breakfast. So no moregetting on the sugar roller
coaster. Our blood sugar is sosensitive first thing in the
morning on an empty stomach,that if we have that extremely
healthy smoothie that's got allthe goodies in it, but it's got
a lot of sugar in it, we'regoing to get on that glucose
roller coaster, and we're goingto crash down later on. So pick
one part of your diet and dialup the anti inflammatory

(01:05:26):
properties and and then justfocus on that, the term, yes, I
love that for weeks or whatever.
Yes, once that, because once itswitches from an effort into
habitual, then it's effortless.
Yes. And that's where you lookback and you I cannot believe I
used to eat that much dessert.
It's, it's effortless for me tonot have, deserve now, and my

(01:05:47):
past self, I that wasinconceivable,

yeah, well, you know, and that's, that's an
amazing thing, like just beingable to look back and go, I've
done it.

I've come a long way. A lot of us have, have come
a long way. And we don't giveourselves, you know, pat on the
back. Think about how you werein your 20s, oh my gosh, you
know, on a diet of ciggies andcocktails and, you know, place
size was walking home in heelsat 5am from the club. Like, Hey,
girls, we've come a long way.

What's one underrated tip for supporting
your gut health that we shouldconsider probiotics, yeah, okay,

we need to come back to them. They had a moment.
I would, I would say thatwhenever you go through a gut
disturbance, get back on theprobiotics.

And what is a gut disturbance like a flu, a
cold,

anything, anything where you get where you
have gut dysbiosis. Soconstipation, diarrhoea, you had
a really bad trigger. You maybewent out one night, and then for
two days afterwards, you noticedthat you were constipated, and
then you had diarrhoea. So whenyou've had something that you
know is your gut hasn't liked,maybe you've been sick with the

(01:07:02):
flu or, of course, antibioticswe need to reseed those really
healthy gut bugs. And the threemost researched, actually, I'll
talk about four of them, so youwant to have a supplement that
includes these. Islactobacillus, Bifidobacterium,
yes. And then bacillus. I knowthat everyone's like we've heard

(01:07:25):
of those, but they're the onesthat will that have got the most
clinical research. And then theother real superstar coming up
the ranks is akkermansia Akron,yes, particularly if you've got
metabolic issues. So strugglingwith weight, it's an insulin
sensitizer. The bad news isthere's only one really good
brand called pendulum, andthey're expensive and possibly

(01:07:48):
100 bucks, sort of, if you'retaking them for a month, but if
you've got the funds, that wouldbe worth trying. But then the
other ones, I like probysport.
Yeah, that's a really good oranyone can just DM me on
instagram if they want to knowbut, but even in a Health Plus,
yeah, they've got a lot ofclinical trials behind them.

(01:08:09):
Don't take probioticsconsistently. Yes, you had a
disturbance, jumped on them fora few weeks, and then use that
food first approach. So whileyou're having in your and you're
re inoculating with those youknow, you want to have some
food, fermented foods as well,if your tummy can handle it,
pouring kefir is a great one.
Yeah, the shot glass full inyour smoothie. You know, pickled

(01:08:32):
veggies are great. That wouldprobably be,

yeah, that's, they're good ones. Okay, okay,
trends, so, can you tell me ifthese ones are hot, high or
helpful, but overdone? Coldplunges?

I'm not a fan.
I've never been a fan. I

hate the cold.
Me too. I hate it. I

just I'm not a fan. And there's more and more
research coming out saying it'snot ideal for ladies anyway. The
other thing I've just found iswe're also time poor. Yeah, what
are you displacing me? You know,if, are you switching out a
workout or shortening yourworkout, or are you not now

(01:09:18):
shopping? If, if. But it comesto getting to know your body
better, if you feel amazingdoing it and you've got the time
and it's not displacing someother healthy activity, knock
yourself out. I swim once aweek, just in motion. I smile,
yeah, I wouldn't do it, exceptmy friend Zoe makes me do it,
and I always blame her, but Ialways feel fabulous when I come
out. So look, if it floats yourboat, you feel great. But I'm

(01:09:41):
definitely not tellingencouraging people to go out and
yeah, I much prefer, prefer asauna. Yeah, me too. And
actually, sauna to sauna, so hotto cold has a lot more evidence
and efficacy behind it than justYeah, particularly good for
circulation and for skin healthas well. Okay? Good collagen

powders. Yeah, love, love.

In fact, I interviewed a really great
nutrition scientist, Dr TimCrowe, on my podcast healthy
her. And he's very conservative.
And, you know, a little bit he'sjust very conservative. So
usually, everything he turns hisnose up to he's very he was even
very fizzy about collagen. Andinterestingly, again, we always
love food first. But what theresearch is telling us with

(01:10:28):
collagen is that hydrolyzedcollagen, the supplement,
actually seems to have betteruptake in connective tissue than
the food first. And I canexplain why. So imagine collagen
is is made up of amino acids.
Yes. Think of a Lego structure,yes, okay. It's got lots of

(01:10:49):
little pieces of Lego that arestuck together when you eat
chicken skin or your bone brothand you digest it, those
collagen, the collagen that's inthat skin and that bone broth,
those Lego structures have toget pulled apart by your
digestion. Okay, so all thosethat structure gets pulled
apart, lots of little Legopieces get digested, you know,

(01:11:10):
get absorbed through the gut,and then in the connective
tissue, they have to then buildthose Lego structures back into
collagen. Hydrolyzed collagen islike a Lego structure that's
been super glued together. Sowhen it's hydrolyzed, it sticks
together, so it goes throughdigestion, and the digestive
process, this is the theory.
Doesn't pull the Lego piecesapart, so the collagen peptide
stays intact, and it's uptakenby the skin, connected tissue,

(01:11:34):
gut lining a lot moreefficiently. Yeah, so it's okay,
yeah, so I'm I'm very proCollagen For Peri meno and post
minnow.

Okay, amazing, good. I'll keep taking mine
there. Yes, gut cleansers.

What do you mean by gut cleanse,

like, actually, a detox, like, or

so, so not a fan of colonics at all. Yes, okay,
okay, so and yeah, I know I'mgonna make some enemies by
saying that, but,

but, you know, this is where everyone's like,
yeah,

absolutely. But I have just seen too many horror
stories. Like, years later, notjust I have seen some acute
horror stories, but I just thatour microbiome and in our
digestive tract is so precious,yes, and it isn't. It is not
designed to have a flush, aflush, yeah, just but horses for

(01:12:35):
courses, Dr Yasmina, my businesspartner is who's a functional
medicine GPS, and a lot oftraining in functional medicine
is also, you know, cautionsagainst it, but detoxes not a
juice cleanse. I'm not, Iparticularly for over 40s, but a
whole food detox, I am a fan of.

(01:12:59):
So this is maybe 14 days reallyfocused on those anti
inflammatory foods. I feel likefor some people, you know, a
short period of time whereyou're really pulling out any of
those pro inflammatory triggers,you're really dialling up all
those healthy nutrient densefoods, the fibre, and you're
really focusing on putting lotsof, you know, key anti
inflammatory properties, liketurmeric, ginger, a bunch of

(01:13:20):
herbs and spices, go for

it. Okay, great.
What about apple cider vinegar?
Yeah, so

in our gut health, as we age and again, I'm
talking, you know, Peri meno andpost, we have kind of four key
drivers of optimal gut health.
This is probably a wholepodcast, Good talk, so I'm, I'm
not going to go into detail,but, you know, you think of gut
health as a whole blob, a wholething, but there's actually four
key drivers of gut health, andone of the drivers is what we
call digestive function. Anddigestive function is everything

(01:14:01):
from chewing to salivaproduction, to digestive
enzymes. And as we age,digestive enzymes, like amylase,
they degrade in our body. Ourability to produce our own
digestive enzymes goes down,yeah, and so it makes it harder
to digest food. Those largerchunks go through. We've got
those mosaic tiles cracking sonow we've got bits of food
either putrefying in the gut orbeing passed through the gut

(01:14:23):
lining, leaky gut syndrome, etc,and now we're having those
inflammatory responses. So applecider vinegar, you know, a
little shot glass, or a coupleof a tablespoon or 215 minutes
before a meal, can be reallyhelpful to help produce to help
your digestive enzymes you havea kick along. Taking a digestive

(01:14:47):
enzyme supplement like multiJess can be a game changer for
people. Bioceuticals, multi Jessor pairing your meals with foods
containing digestive enzymes. Sopineapple, isn't it funny? How
poor. Pork is often served withpineapple, and yet, pineapple
contains these amazing digestiveenzymes. How did we know? Isn't
that great? You know what can behard to digest? Papaya, coconut,

(01:15:13):
because you just have to Googleit. There's lots of foods
containing digestive enzymes. Soyeah, I if you if you feel like
your digestive capabilitiesdeclining then, but just if
you're having it, rinse yourmouth out afterwards. Can impact
the enamel, same with that lemonwater I want to don't want that
acidic residue in your mouth.

Okay, yeah, as I said that, I just licked my
teeth. Just

I might take a sip of water,

okay, nearly getting to the end. So for some
fun, a quick fire round of reallife go tos and things that you
actually really like to do.
What's your favourite breakfast?

Smash Davo baby.
I'm broke all the way.

What about with a poached egg? Or, yeah, no, the

poached egg. And my mum always makes me a bag of
she toasts Pepita seeds, and sheputs them in a container when
she comes to visit. So I'vealways got these amazing toasted
Pepita seeds. So I will do, Iwill do, I'm gluten free. So
gluten free, toast, smashed avowith some feta, mix through a
little bit of feta, poached egg.
Pepitas, or he if Mum hasn't gother delivery, hind arm reminder,

(01:16:24):
then hemp seeds as well. Yeah,

what's your best $20 health buy?

Oh, that's a great question. Ah. Dr, TEALS,
yes. Mineral, magnesium, bath,soap, salt. What's that?
Bergamot and Himalayan rocksalt. Okay, yeah. And there's
lots of beautiful flavours, butI love the bergamot one. Okay,

(01:16:48):
good. Not that the magnesium youabsorb from a bath is nowhere
near the same as what youabsorb. I just love the smell,
and it's cheap. Dr, TEALS. I'llbuy like, six bags. Okay, all
right, good. So so luxurious.
And it's only, yeah, I'm sureit's under 20 bucks,

um, most underrated form of movement.

Oh, well, running is not underrated.
Downward Dog. I love a goodDownward Dog.

Can you actually get your heels to the ground?
No, yeah, I can't either. I'mlike,

you're talking to an ex marathon runner here.
Just what I love about adownward dog is you do six or
eight. Say sun salutations,where you just do that simple
flow, where you know up to thesky, hands on the ground, jump,
step back. Do your downward dog.
You do six or eight of thosedoing the deep breaths and
flows, you can roll out of bedand do them. You know, set one,

(01:17:43):
you're, it's like, you've gothigh heels on you. You totally
there's, like, what, 1015,centimetres between your heel
and the ground, and by the timeyou get to set eight, you're
only May, I'm maybe three orfour centimetres off the ground.
So I just, and I feel so

wonderful. Yeah, okay, I think that's that is
actually a great one, onewellness thing you've completely
ditched,

probably for me, intermittent fasting, because I
realised that I was that more atight, stressed, I don't have a
body fat issue, and I waspushing, I was pushing that fast
out and then kind of feelingjittery. And the other thing I
didn't mention, one of themarkers we test is Billy Rubin.

(01:18:30):
And when this is a great one,for those that are questioning
whether they shouldintermittent, fast or not, my
Billy Rubin was climbing, andthat's Gilbert syndrome. And if
you are looking like you've gotGilbert's, it's very benign, but
it just is a sign that fastingisn't for you. So test your
bilirubin, you'll be able totell if fasting is for you or

(01:18:51):
not. Yeah, I see so many greatbenefits with my fat loss,
ladies, but it definitely isn'tfor me. Yep. Okay, great.

What makes you feel most like yourself?

Shout out to my three besties, Sam, Lou and Zoe,
who, with Sam and I, were bestfriends from preschool, and then
the rest of us in year five atschool, we'll catch up probably
every six to eight weeks for adinner, and we laugh so hard.
And I just that, honestly,there's no drug, no therapy, no

(01:19:27):
nothing that could give me thethe halo effect and the feeling
of being my authentic self, thenthose besties, those people in
your life that you can just sitin your own skin with Yeah,

i Yes, I definitely agree with that.
Okay, so Amelia, yeah, real,this has been amazing because
it's made me go, okay, yeah,I've got some things to do, but
I've loved thinking aboutfocusing on Exercise. Food in
terms, because I think busy mumsbeing a term and the holidays in

(01:20:06):
between, it gives you the appgives you that block of time to
actually think about what youcan change and making it small.
Because I think when we focus onmaking two bigger changes, we
just don't do them. Setourselves up. We do or we do
them for a little bit, and thenthat's it. That's done great.
Last question, if I could do onething before I hit 50, something

(01:20:30):
that will push me, make me alittle bit uncomfortable. What
do you think I should do? Why

does it have to make you uncomfortable and push
you? Okay, well, okay, what'ssomething that I should do, I
think you should start trackingyour markers. Yeah, because, and
it might make you uncomfortable,because it might uncover some
things that maybe you know don'tsit well with you. But if, if
you know the premise of yourshow is, is around getting to 50

(01:20:59):
and setting yourself up for thiswonderful next chapter of life.
I think understanding your bodybetter and having those key
markers that you can beunderstanding and tracking is
one of the best things you cando to help navigate the
menopause period so that you cancome out the other side feeling
amazing, reclaiming your lifeand feeling like you're setting

(01:21:22):
up that next chapter in thehealthiest way possible, and it
just means that you will be lessconfused, you will have clarity,
and you'll know where your blindspots might be or your
weaknesses might be, and so youcan take a much more targeted
approach to your health. Yeah,and relax a little, then you
can, you know, you can relax,and you don't have to feel like

(01:21:43):
you've got to be doing all thethings out

there. And I think that's, it's amazing. So
even with, like, my blood testnow, yeah, I do put them into
chat GDP and say, Can you pleaseexplain this to me, as I am
don't know anything about myhealth, so that it is easy to
understand, but it is yeah,understanding the markers, yeah.
That's when we do, yeah. I thinkit's that is a great thing,

(01:22:07):
yeah. And

not just being told that this is what you
should be doing, theunderstanding the why, the why.
I think, you know, functionalmedicine is a root cause
approach. It's not, oh, you havehigh cholesterol, and therefore
you need to go on statinstatins. It's like, oh, you have
high cholesterol. Let'sunderstand why. Yes, you have
high cholesterol. And then let'stry to take a root cause
approach. And a lot of the timethat's all you need. Yeah,

(01:22:29):
there's little tweaks. So yeah,I love that term based and just
picking one area, focusing onthat, and then before you know
it, you'll add more and more.
Yeah, you'll be,

by the end of the year, fabulous, four extra
things that you've embedded intoyour life, for food, for
exercise, and you'll be amazing.
Yep, feel great. Okay, that wasit. Thank you very much for
sharing your energy and youryour wisdom, particularly with
so much war warmth and just realtalk, because you definitely do

(01:23:00):
that, and you've taken somethingthat films feels so overwhelming
like information. It's justthere's so much talk out there
about what it is, what it does,how it can impact you, and you
just don't know where to startor what to do. So thank you for
explaining us, explaining that,and you've reminded us that

(01:23:22):
midlife isn't the end point,that it is actually the platform
to move forward, which I love. Ilove that, and we need to
reconnect with ourself. And Ithink that's what I've taken out
of so much of the conversationsI'm having, is it's all about
making sure you know, you knowyou, who you are, what you want,
what your body needs, and how itdoes actually respond. So

true. No one's coming to save us. No one is
coming to

save us. No one's coming around.

Influencer, the onus is on us. See it again?
Yeah,

it is 100% on us. It is worth it. Yes, it is.
You know what? It is worth it,is worth it, particularly if you
feel like you know you better,yeah, and you know what your
body's going to respond to. It'sempowering. It is very
empowering. So if this episoderesonated with you, like it did
me, and you want to go and checkout Emilio's programme in

(01:24:21):
vitality. Please do so it willall be in the show notes. And
it's not about becoming someonenew. It's about coming back to
yourself, which I think is a bigthing 100%

Yeah.

And if you are sitting in the something's not
right, and you need to be doingsomething different, then it is
a perfect thing to go andexplore and

even following me on Instagram, because I do
put a lot on you do tips andtricks on Insta, so yeah, maybe
pop my handle in, and I'm prettyactive on DM, so I'm always
happy to chat over DM. If you'relike, what's this?

What do I do?
Way too kind. Anyway. Um. Ifyou've loved this episode,
please subscribe. Send to yourfriends. Subscribe to Amelia,
Instagram and all the thingsthat she's got available. I'll
put them in the show notes. Youdon't have to do everything, but
you can start with one thing,and if you loved anything in
here, they'll be in the shownotes. Try something new that

(01:25:18):
shift your energy, try the termchallenge, and look at your food
or your exercise, because f*ck,I'm nearly 50, and isn't it
amazing?

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