December 3, 2024 • 40 mins
In this episode of the Love Your Gut podcast, I sit down with Lindsey Lusson, RD, an expert in hypothalamic amenorrhea (HA) to talk about the overlap between HA and gut health. Together, we explore the overlap between HA and GI issues, including how restrictive eating, overexercise, and chronic stress can impact both your gut and reproductive health.
Lindsey shares her own journey with HA and provides valuable insights into how healing your relationship with food and supporting your body’s nutritional needs can restore menstrual cycles and improve digestion. We also discuss common misconceptions about HA, the role of stress and energy availability, and why gut health often needs to be addressed alongside hormone recovery.
Whether you’re navigating HA, GI symptoms, or both, this episode offers hope, practical advice, and a better understanding of how everything in the body is interconnected.
Connect with Dr. Heather
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- Learn about Dr. Heather & team's life-changing programs
Connect with Lindsey:
Lindsey Lusson is Registered Dietitian who specializes in disordered eating and infertility. She has both personal and professional experience with Hypothalamic Amenorrhea (HA) or period loss related to over exercise and under eating. Her experience led her to become passionate about educating and empowering others to advocate for their health and take charge of their fertility through proper nutrition. She has helped hundreds of women recover from HA and over 160 get pregnant and take home healthy babies.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Dr. Heather Finley (00:03):
Welcome to the Love Your Gut Podcast.
I'm your host, Dr.
Heather Finley, registereddietitian and gut health
specialist.
I understand the frustration ofdealing with GI issues because
I've been there and I spent overtwo decades searching for
answers for my own gut issues ofconstipation, bloating, and
stomach pain.
I've dedicated my life tounderstanding and solving my own
(00:24):
gut issues.
And now I'm here to guide you.
On this podcast, I'll help youidentify the true root causes of
your discomfort.
So you can finally ditch yoursymptoms for good.
My goal is to empower you withthe knowledge and tools you need
so that you can love your gutand it will love you right back.
So if you're ready to learn alot, gain a deeper understanding
(00:46):
of your gut and find lastingrelief.
You are in the right place.
Welcome to the love your gutpodcast..............
Welcome back to the next episodeof the love your gut podcast.
I am so excited today because Ihave my good friend, Lindsey
Lusson here with me, and we aregoing to talk all things period
loss, GI issues, hypothalamicamenorrhea, primary amenorrhea,
(01:11):
and everything in between.
So Lindsey, welcome to the show.
Thanks so much for having me.
There's a lot
Lindsey Lusson (01:17):
of Overlap and things that we can unpack here.
And I think that this is goingto be so valuable for anybody
who has ever struggled withperiod loss and digestive issues
or currently struggling.
Dr. Heather Finley (01:28):
Totally.
And I think we've had a lot ofkind of shared clients over the
years or referrals back andforth.
So I think it'll be helpful tohave a discussion around like,
when is it appropriate to workon your GI issues first?
When is it appropriate to workon period recovery first?
What are some of the kind ofoverlaps and gaps in between?
So why don't we start out byjust defining some terms and
(01:52):
kind of getting everybody on thesame page.
So Tell us a little bit aboutwhat you do, why you do it and
give us a little background onwhat is hypothalamic amenorrhea?
What is primary amenorrhea?
So we kind of know thedifference and then we can go
from there.
Lindsey Lusson (02:07):
Yeah, sure.
I'm a period recovery andfertility dietitian, been a
registered dietitian for 14years.
Went through kind of my ownjourney with losing my period
and experiencing infertility asa result when I lost my period
back in gosh, like senior yearof high school is very much a
swept under the rug.
Just take the pill.
This is no big deal, but I feellike women just have this really
(02:29):
amazing, innate intuition.
You just always kind of knowsomething is not right.
And so I was always trying toget down to the bottom of why I
wasn't getting my period.
Fast forward to when I was readyto get pregnant, I was basically
told that I needed to startpretty high level intervention
for fertility treatment.
And that just didn't sit verywell with me.
Around the same time,interestingly enough, people
(02:51):
started talking about this term,hypokalemic amenorrhea.
I went through four years ofundergrad, three years of grad
school.
never came across the term kindof identified with this idea of
having female athlete triad,which is disordered eating bone
loss and loss of period.
But I didn't really fit theathlete mold.
And so when I came across thisterm, it was kind of like a
light bulb moment that this iswhat.
(03:12):
What's going on with me.
Fast forward was able to get mycycle back.
Ovulate on my own, get pregnantnaturally three times.
And so now today I help womenall over the world do the same
thing.
Be able to get down to thebottom of their missing period.
Be able to ovulate naturally ontheir own and take home healthy
babies.
Dr. Heather Finley (03:29):
So interesting.
And I also agree.
I think we probably had onelesson on the female athlete
triad in all of undergrad.
And it was Oh, and by the way,here's this thing.
Okay.
Moving on.
Kind of same with GI issues alittle bit too, where it's like,
Okay.
And there's this thing calledthe low FODMAP diet and moving
on, so why do you think it isthat we're not taught about this
(03:52):
or why do you think it's, it'sbecoming a lot more common that
people are actually talkingabout this, but I know you and I
have had many conversationsoffline about like how a lot of
physicians don't even know whathypothalamic amenorrhea is.
Why do you think that is?
Or what do you think some of thedrivers of that are?
Lindsey Lusson (04:10):
Yeah.
I think at the root, at leastwhen you and I were going
through school, a decade or twoago, I think lack of information
was a big problem back then.
Cause like I said if you lookback to the earliest research
paper on hypothalamicamenorrhea, it was written in
like the seventies maybe.
So that's like relatively new inthe research world.
And so we all know that it takesa decade plus for like research
(04:33):
to get caught up to be actuallybe put into like policy and
protocols and things like that,like in a health, a traditional
healthcare setting.
So I think that lack ofinformation is part of the
problem too.
I also feel like for both GI andlike hormone issues I've got
another one too, that I'll getinto in a second.
I feel like we, at least for me,it was very presented as this is
(04:55):
super rare.
Like you're never going to comeacross I don't feel like anyone
has this.
Unless you like work for the IOCand you're working with.
Gymnasts and figure skaters allday.
So I feel like it was kind ofposed as this is super rare.
This doesn't happen very often.
And then finally, I knowspecifically for like period
problems.
Women's health and hormones.
It's just so understudied.
(05:16):
Like women's health is sounderstudied, even today in
2024.
We're like very much in theinfancy of the research and
understanding everything.
And I think maybe we can say thesame thing too, for gut health.
Dr. Heather Finley (05:29):
Totally.
Yeah.
And it's you said it's, Oh, thisis a rare thing, but it's
actually not.
I think I was a swimmer my wholelife and I ran cross country in
high school and there was a lotof times In high school where
I'd have cross country practiceand swim practice in the same
day.
And so it's very easy.
If you take a scenario like thatmyself and, millions of other
(05:49):
high schoolers that probablyhave a similar routine when
sports is like such a huge partof your life, it's And it's very
easy to like, even just go toyour pediatrician for your
yearly checkup and then be like,Oh you're just a late bloomer or
like you, you're just superactive.
So this is quote, unquote,normal.
And it's easy to kind of brushlike under fueling under the rug
(06:11):
and not pay attention to agrowth chart or anything.
And, perhaps maybe catch some ofthese things before they start
affecting fertility orAffecting, all the other things
that can come along with it downthe road.
So yeah, same thing with GIissues.
It's Oh, this is actually notthat common, but I think some of
the research now shows like 70percent of people in the U S
(06:31):
have GI issues.
I'm like, that's a lot of peoplethat have some level of GI
issues.
Lindsey Lusson (06:38):
Yeah.
A hundred percent.
And something that you said,because I know we were talking
about like a defining what isAJ?
What is primary amenorrhea?
Something that I think reallydeserves more attention is early
intervention for when womenaren't starting their period.
So we work with a lot of clientswho are like, I was a late
bloomer, or, I didn't start myperiod until I was 16, 17, 18,
(06:59):
or until I went to college, etcetera.
And that alone is kind of a redflag because anytime somebody
isn't starting their period byage 15, that is like the
clinical definition of primaryamenorrhea, meaning that
something is misfiring in theirreproductive system.
Signaling usually like with thehypothalamus that is not
allowing the body to turn onthat hormonal system at the
(07:20):
appropriate time that it'ssupposed to.
Dr. Heather Finley (07:23):
So break down for us then what the
difference between primaryamenorrhea and hypothalamic
amenorrhea and where the overlapis because.
There can be overlap as well.
Lindsey Lusson (07:33):
Yeah, definitely.
I am probably a little bitbiased because usually the
people that we're working withwho have primary amenorrhea,
also it is more hypothalamicamenorrhea in nature.
But there are incidences wherethere can be other reasons why
somebody wouldn't start theirperiod where it isn't kind of
the frankender feeling.
So I guess let's first by startby defining a little bit more
hypothalamic amenorrhea.
(07:53):
In the most like simplisticterms, it is caused by kind of
three main things, stress.
So that can be likepsychological stress.
It could be physiological stressfrom trauma or eating disorder,
et cetera.
There is also typically a underfueling component of it, whether
it's a, Heather, back in highschool, multi sport athlete,
very limited time.
(08:14):
Maybe so also some GI issuesgoing on kind of a frank under
feeling like, Oh my gosh, I hadno idea.
I needed to be eating this much.
So it could be an unintentionalunder feeling.
It could also be an intentionalunder fueling with more of a
disordered eating, eatingdisorder, part of it.
And then also typically.
High energy expenditure, whetherthat is intentional as part of
an eating disorder orunintentional.
(08:36):
Usually what we see more oftenis like athlete put past
division one athlete kind ofcontinued their training into
young adulthood, middleadulthood.
So yeah, so the three maintriggers stress under fueling
and over exercise.
Usually it's not one of thosealone probably could be a
trigger, but usually it's somesort of combination of all three
(08:57):
of those.
And it happens in somebody whostarted their period at a normal
age and then kind ofmysteriously loses their period
at some point.
Whereas primary amenorrhea isthey don't actually ever start
their period at kind of thatnormal around age 15, 16
designated age.
Dr. Heather Finley (09:15):
And so you work with clients primarily that
have hypothalamic amenorrhea,but you do get a handful that
have primary amenorrhea.
But like you said, many timesit's actually driven by the same
things as the hypothalamicamenorrhea.
Lindsey Lusson (09:29):
Yeah.
It kind of depends upon thetrigger, right?
So if we're working with aclient who Is 30 and has never
had a period.
It's been covered up by hormonalbirth control.
And then we start having aconversation.
And this is a piece that I feelis just so often missed in a
traditional clinical healthcaresituation is we start actually
having a conversation aboutbull, what went on in high
(09:52):
school?
What was the environment withfood?
What were the pressures that youwere put?
putting yourself under in termsof training.
Was there ever a change in theway that you chose to, approach
food or restrict food?
And usually at least the clientsthat we're working with that
maybe never have ever had aperiod kind of roots in
(10:13):
restriction, disordered eatingdisorder from a really young
age.
Dr. Heather Finley (10:16):
I want to bring light to something that
you've said a couple times isthat it was covered up by
hormonal birth control.
So just to kind of put it outthere, if somebody has had a
period, but it's induced byhormonal birth control, that's
not the type of period thatwe're talking about.
We're talking about likesomeone's body menstruating on
(10:37):
its own without the use of likebirth control or something just
to clear the air a little bit sosomeone's not I'm on birth
control and I've had a period.
But we're talking about have youever had one without anything
inducing it?
Natural
Lindsey Lusson (10:53):
ovulatory cycle versus.
Birth control is really morewhat we would consider to be a
withdrawal bleed from thesynthetic hormones that are in
your system.
Dr. Heather Finley (11:01):
Yeah.
Okay.
Just wanted to make sure thatlike the listeners were on the
same page as us and weren'tbeing like, Oh, this doesn't
apply to me because I've had aperiod for 15 years cause I've
been on birth control for 15years.
Okay, so the reason for thisconversation is because of the
overlap of GI issues with allsorts of period issues.
(11:22):
So we, like I said at thebeginning, tend to see quite an
overlap in some of our clients.
It's pretty common when someoneis missing a period or even on
birth control to have GI issues.
So let's talk about some of thecommon GI issues that you might
experience and why that is.
And then we can have aconversation about do you
(11:44):
address the GI issues?
Do they go away?
What kind of some typicalscenarios can look like?
So in the clients that you workwith, let's say it's somebody
who's been missing a period forseveral years.
You identify that they havehypothalamic amenorrhea.
What would kind of be expectedfrom like a GI standpoint, or
what are some of the commonthings that you see?
(12:05):
I
Lindsey Lusson (12:06):
see a lot of slow motility.
So people not having bowelmovements every single day, or
if they are going, they feellike they are having incomplete
bowel movements.
A lot of bloating a lot offeeling like they.
Can't digest food well, whichusually puts, sends people kind
of down this rabbit hole ofelimination diets and food
(12:28):
sensitivity testing.
And so I would say that thoseare the biggies are like bloat,
constipation, slow motility.
And just kind of like their GIissues, just like it feeling
very like taking over theirlives.
Dr. Heather Finley (12:44):
So from an energy standpoint, like why
would that actually be?
normal, like why do we expectthat would be the case and
expect that somebody who comesto your program might have some
of those symptoms?
Lindsey Lusson (12:57):
So I think that way, I think that kind of the
way that we're taught to thinkabout the human body is that
There's the separate systems.
There's the reproductive system.
There's the gastrointestinalsystem.
There's the muscular skeletalsystem.
The fact of the matter is thatthey're all very closely
interrelated and can be impactedby a variety of different
things.
So if we think about what iscausing your body to shut down
(13:21):
ovulation and your body to saymayday, this is not a safe place
to make a baby.
shut down the system, we have toconserve energy.
It makes sense that there wouldbe other systems in the body
that would be impacted fromremaining in a low energy state.
So we see this with bone loss.
So people lose the ability tomaintain regular bone mass
(13:43):
whenever they aren't cyclingregularly.
We see it in heart issues and wealso see it in digestive issues.
So if the body.
Simply doesn't have enoughenergy to move food and waste to
the digestive track.
That's going to contribute tofood sitting in the stomach
longer and some of those bloatconstipation and kind of trickle
down effective, even kind ofeven more severe than I'm sure
in your practice GI issues.
Dr. Heather Finley (14:05):
Yeah.
So at the end of the day, it'sreally all about what does your
body have the energy to do?
And a GI.
Or having a bowel movement iskind of a non essential
function.
It's way more important for yourheart to beat and your lungs to
breathe and your brain to thinkthan it is for you to have a
bowel movement each day.
(14:25):
So it's like your body isactually just really doing what
it was designed to do, which forbetter or for worse, that's kind
of the reality.
Lindsey Lusson (14:34):
And same thing with reproduction.
Like we, that's not an essentialfor life function.
It's a nice to have, but notnecessary for you to survive.
The next 24 hours function.
Dr. Heather Finley (14:45):
Totally.
Totally.
So what do you kind of see aslike the progression, you have
clients that come to yourprogram, probably have
constipation, bloating gas,whatever else add to the list of
the GI symptoms, they'veprobably gone down the food
sensitivity rabbit hole,probably all that has done is
(15:06):
restricted them more, added morestress and potentially made the
issues worse.
What do you typically see as faras.
When GI issues get better.
And like what percentage ofpeople just estimate wise, I
don't know that we have likespecific research on this, but
just in your opinion and yourexperience, people start working
through your program.
(15:26):
They start eating more fuelingthemselves.
Potentially exercising less, etcetera, like addressing all the
pieces.
Do the GI issues get better andkind of what's the timeline for
that?
Lindsey Lusson (15:38):
Yeah.
So what I usually tell myclients to expect, and this is
really just based off of the 300plus clients we've served and
patterns that I've observed withthem is there is a little bit of
a learning curve, right?
So if your body is.
It's only used to handling Xamount of energy in terms of
digestion and metabolism andutilizing all of those
nutrients.
(15:59):
There is going to be a learningcurve because part of the
process of being able to getyour cycle back and to signal to
the body that, Hey, this is asafe place to ovulate and make a
baby and therefore have a periodis getting your body in an
energy surplus.
This is one of the mostchallenging parts for.
literally everyone during AHArecovery is that it's
uncomfortable.
(16:19):
Like it's uncomfortable to eatmore food, especially when your
digestion has slowed, especiallywhen your metabolism isn't
working adequately.
And so there is this, I alwaystell people kind of a two to
three week learning period,learning curve when the body is
having to relearn how toproperly digest all of this
food.
Get it out.
There is also sometimes aclearing out of the digestive
(16:42):
tract.
So for people who are havinginfrequent bowel movements or
incomplete bowel movements,sometimes they'll actually have
a lot more bowel movementsduring this adjustment period
because they're kind of clearingout their bowels for the first
time in months, maybe years.
But usually after about two tofour weeks of correcting the
energy deficit, our clientsreport like a complete 180 on
(17:04):
most of their gut issues.
This is not the case for everysingle person, but I will
confidently say that at least 90up to 95 percent of our clients
are able to get, I don't want tosay instant relief, but within
about a month or so, like a hugedifference.
Dr. Heather Finley (17:22):
Which really in the grand scheme of it all is
not that long.
It probably does at the timefeel like the longest month of
your life while you're doingthat.
But if you think about it in thegrand scheme of everything,
that's actually a pretty quickturnaround.
Like the body really can healitself pretty quickly, given the
proper inputs.
(17:43):
Are there things that yourecommend that your clients do
in the meantime to help withlike comfort and symptom relief,
et cetera?
What are some of the things thatyou found that have been
helpful?
Lindsey Lusson (17:54):
Yeah, definitely.
So it feels really backwards fora lot of our clients because
they feel like the pathway intoHA, not for everybody, but for a
lot of people is almost likevery clean eating, very healthy
eating, borderline orthorexiaeating.
So it can feel verycounterproductive.
But one of the things that we'lltell our clients to do is
actually start cutting down ontheir fiber intake and to lower
the amount of fruits andvegetables that consuming,
(18:15):
especially like raw uncookedvegetables.
And that Can help to not overtaxthe GI system as it's kind of
adapting and relearning how tomove all that food and process
it and move it through thedigestive tract.
The other thing is to kind ofthink about decreasing volume
and focusing on nutrient densefoods.
So things like nuts, seeds,avocados, higher fat foods,
(18:38):
liquid calories can also bereally helpful here too, because
we kind of have this short termmust correct the energy deficit.
But while battling these GIissues.
And so the idea is how can weget you the most energy possible
without over, withoutoverfilling your stomach with a
lot of volume.
So that's kind of where we areusually talking to people like,
(19:00):
Hey, veggies are great time anda place.
Let's talk about decreasing theportion, making sure that
they're cooked, kind of thinkingthem more of more of a sprinkle
or an add to the meal, not likethe entire base of the meal.
Dr. Heather Finley (19:12):
That's something we tell our clients
too.
Like one of the biggest, mostpowerful shifts you can make is
stop eating raw salads for everysingle meal.
If you're bloated and you'reconstipated, a raw salad is
actually extremely hard todigest.
And can be really triggeringfrom a symptom perspective and
prevent you from actually eatingenough too.
(19:33):
Switching from raw to cookedlike that alone can make a huge
difference.
Anything else that you see iseither nutritional or something
else thing that really helpslike a shift that somebody could
make.
Lindsey Lusson (19:45):
We really try to get our clients off of sugar
alcohols or any sort of fakeartificial sweeteners.
A lot of our clients are veryathletic and they're into
fitness.
And so they're typicallyconsuming all the protein bars,
all the protein powders, allthe, halo top ice cream or high
protein, low sugar version of aregular type of food or a
dessert food.
(20:06):
And unfortunately, most peopledon't do well with sugar
alcohols, whether they're crazybloated or they're pooping their
pants.
Like most people just don'ttolerate them well.
Trying to eliminate those asmuch as possible.
And then also, this isn't aproblem for every single person,
but cutting down on carbonatedbeverages, like if somebody's
drinking diet sodas, or ifsomebody's drinking just a lot
(20:26):
of sparkling water through allthroughout the day, that alone
is definitely going to make youa little more bloated.
Dr. Heather Finley (20:30):
Yeah, totally.
It's like a trade off, okay,enjoy that, but know that with
that can come like some of theseother things.
Okay.
So you said 95 percent of peoplecan resolve their, or you've
seen 95 percent about resolvetheir GI issues once they are
eating more.
Exercising less resolving theperiod.
What about like the 5%?
So we were talking about thisoffline the one in 200 where
(20:54):
it's okay, you've kind offollowed the program.
You've been eating more, you'vedecreased your activity.
You've been at this, you'rebeing really diligent and honest
with yourself about resting, etcetera.
And yet your GI issues are.
So horrible.
Or you're just not getting yourperiod back.
(21:14):
So let's look at it like kind offrom the reverse, what are some
scenarios that you've seen that,would be in that kind of 5
percent that we're talkingabout?
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show notes.
Now back to the episode.
Lindsey Lusson (22:21):
Yeah, definitely.
I've definitely come acrosschronic unresolved constipation
and I say and unresolved mightsound extreme because I do feel
like there's always a solutionfor it.
But Usually I'm seeing this inour more severe eating disorder
clients.
So kind of coming back to atopic I'm sure you've covered on
this podcast several times aboutthe gut being a muscle and the
(22:43):
gut being out of shape.
And so step one to getting thatworking again is getting food
and waste to regularly move.
Through the digestive track.
What if you can't do that?
What if for reason X, Y, or Z,whether it's stress related,
whether it's something morecomplex medically, what if you
can't do that?
And that's where I've learned alot through you and looking a
(23:03):
little bit further into mineralbalance and thinking about
different supplements that wecan aid in helping them to be
kind of clearing out andemptying their bowels.
And.
That's a little more persondependent because I think you
have to kind of start thinkingabout their symptoms.
But looking at minerals inparticular, I know minerals do a
world of a lot difference for myregularity.
(23:24):
And kind of thinking about thethree major ones that are what
we'll see most often depleted insomebody that's coming from a
disordered eating or just a highenergy expenditure, high stress
background, or sodium,magnesium, and potassium.
Dr. Heather Finley (23:37):
Yeah, which all are needed.
It's a common scenario that wesee and maybe you do too, is we
have clients coming to us taking1500 milligrams of magnesium
citrate and they're like, I'mstill constipated.
Like, why is this magnesium issupposed to be loosening my
bowels and it's not doinganything.
And the reality is because theyare coming kind of from what you
were talking about earlier, likethis really clean kind of
(23:59):
orthorexic eating background.
They're actually pretty sodiumdepleted.
They're not getting enough saltin their diet.
Cause they're eating prettyminimal processed foods,
probably not adding enough saltto their foods.
I think the nineties were reallybad from a salt standpoint.
Like we all became fearful andwe all still haven't recovered
from that.
(24:19):
But salt is so helpful foractual magnesium absorption.
And then from like a musclecontraction standpoint,
potassium is so essential.
I think we always think ofbananas and we think of
potassium, but you can'tcontract a muscle without
adequate potassium.
And I think the latest researchshowed like 99 percent of
Americans don't meet their dailypotassium needs.
(24:42):
So if you're consistently overtime, not meeting that, like you
can become very depleted, youhave a huge like ditch of
deficiency that you've got tofill in over time.
So
Lindsey Lusson (24:52):
Definitely.
And I think in this pattern ofcombination, like a double
whammy of past restrictiveeating past excessive
expenditure, you're just reallythat far in the hole.
And then another thing thatyou've brought up when we've had
some conversations about clientstoo, is the idea of man, maybe
somebody is a rock star withtheir intake.
But maybe they haven't addressedthe stress component and they're
(25:15):
just constantly in fight orflight state.
And so they're just burningthrough all of their minerals so
fast.
Like the intake can never meetbecause we're already starting
in such a far depletion andthere's still just a lot of high
stress stuff going on.
Dr. Heather Finley (25:30):
Yes.
Yeah.
And your stress will rapidlydeplete the three minerals that
you just talked about.
And then probably a conversationfor another time, but then you
kind of take into accountperhaps somebody who's been on
hormonal birth control for fiveto 15 years, however long.
And we know that hormonal birthcontrol depletes a lot of the
vitamins and minerals that arereally essential for.
(25:52):
gut function.
And we know that it can disruptthe balance of bacteria in the
gut.
So like that can be, potentiallysomething to look at as well.
If there's a long standinghistory there of hormonal birth
control use.
Lindsey Lusson (26:05):
Yeah, definitely.
And, talking more about the 5percent of people where the gut
issues are like impacting theirability to actually fuel, to be
able to recover.
Just looking further down theline.
That's usually the people I'mreferring to you, but doing like
additional testing is there aninfection?
Is there SIBO?
Is there something that needs tobe treated to get this person
the relief that they need tothen start addressing the energy
(26:27):
deficit part of it?
Dr. Heather Finley (26:30):
I think the third scenario would be like,
what about the client whothey've done a lot of functional
stuff and we definitely seeclients like this.
I think you do too, but thetypical client who's gone to the
functional medicine doctor, thenaturopath, they've done stool
testing, perhaps they've donemineral testing.
They've done a lot of fancyexpensive testing.
(26:51):
And I'm a fan of testing.
Within the right context, ofcourse, but the scenario that
you see is they go, they getthese results, they're horrified
with their results, and thenthey're put on like hundreds of
dollars worth of supplements,but they never actually address
the true root of the problem,which is actually a nutrition
(27:13):
problem.
Not necessarily.
And that's contributingobviously to the fact that they,
maybe they do have candida, ormaybe they do have.
SIBO like you mentioned, butthey don't get any better.
So let's talk about thatscenario because I think we both
see that a lot.
Lindsey Lusson (27:31):
Yeah, definitely.
And I think that's so importantbecause I feel like that you
could be treating the same SIBOover and over again.
But if you're chronicallyconstipated because you're not
eating enough.
I'm kind of pulling out onespecific scenario, then you're
going to kind of like round andround we go.
Testing is something and I workwith clients that kind of walk
(27:52):
this fine line between Eatingdisorder and disordered eating.
A lot of our clients were neverformally diagnosed, but they're
like, Oh yeah, that one time incollege, or I got way too
obsessed with stuff before mywedding.
And even when we kind of correctthings from a habit behavior
standpoint, so the psychologicalstuff can really stick with you.
And also to just knowing kind oflike the personality type of a
(28:14):
lot of the people who work withthat develop HA.
I do think sometimes testing cancause you to focus on the wrong
things or to become hyperfocused on, oh my gosh, like I
need to I need to get mysecretary IGA up And they're
kind of missing the whole boaton yes.
And one of the reasons why it'sout of whack is because there's
(28:35):
this chronic underfeeling orbecause you're still running
seven miles every single day.
Though I do feel like sometimesfor a certain type of client,
testing can almost give you toomuch information.
And so we really like in ourprogram to kind of start with
the basics of Hey, how's yoursleep?
How's your stress?
How's your fueling?
How's your nutrient timing?
(28:55):
How's your macronutrientbalance?
Let's get this foundation downfirst.
Cause we got a good chance thatwe can resolve a lot of these
gut issues and then we canalways do further testing
looking into other things atsome point.
So yeah, I do find that a lot ofour clients are coming to us
with Yeah, on a ton ofsupplements.
And not all bad, right?
(29:16):
Like these things can worktogether.
And I know we kind of wanted togo here too.
These things can work together,but unfortunately, depending
upon the practitioner that theywere working with before they
work with us, kind of miss thewhole boat on getting the
foundation down first.
Dr. Heather Finley (29:30):
No, I'm 100 percent with you.
And like I said, I'm a huge fanof testing, but within the right
context, I think it's incrediblywasteful to do testing and just
treat with supplements becauselike you said, you're not
addressing the root of theissue.
If your Secretary IGA being lowor your SIBO not going away is
(29:53):
actually like an underfuelingstress issue.
You can take all theimmunoglobulins, all the
antibiotics, all the whateveranything.
It's not going to actuallyresolve the issue.
So you have to use likenutrition, lifestyle, and then
supplements can be supplementaryto actually addressing the whole
(30:15):
picture.
And I think honestly, probablyanother conversation for another
time, but that's wherefunctional medicine goes wrong
is it's.
It's like people kind of havethis idea that functional
medicine is you go in, you takea test, you take supplements,
but like true functionalmedicine is not that.
It's you go in, you assess thewhole picture.
(30:35):
You identify all of theunderlying things.
And address those and then youcan use supplementary things as
kind of a stop gap, but it's notthe whole treatment, but that's
unfortunately kind of what it'sbecome.
And I'm like, that's nodifferent than the conventional
healthcare model thateverybody's frustrated with.
Like you go in and you get amedication or you go in and you
(30:56):
get supplements.
Both of those things aren'thelpful.
Lindsey Lusson (30:59):
Right, right.
Yeah.
And it's hard to say to exactlywhere the gap is because I'm
thinking about like some of myclients to like, maybe there
were conversations around, Hey,you also need to make sure
you're eating enough or Hey, youalso need to make sure that
you're managing your stress.
And those things were like inone ear out the other.
And they were like, I'm going totake care of you.
this cool little supplement andall my problems are solved and
(31:20):
I'm going to go on my merrylittle way with, doing orange
theory seven days a week, likeit's hard to identify exactly
where the gap is, whether theinstruction wasn't given or if
the, that in particular personlatched onto the wrong parts of
the treatment or
Dr. Heather Finley (31:32):
just lack of accountability, where it's okay,
maybe that provider didn't havethe bandwidth to be like, Hey,
I'm going to keep youaccountable to actually
addressing these things.
So yeah, there's, there candefinitely be a lot of pieces to
the puzzle.
Okay.
So we've covered like threepretty standard scenarios that
(31:56):
we see.
So anything else that you feellike we should address when it
comes to lack of period, missingperiods, period issues, and kind
of the overlap of GI issues,anything that we missed?
Lindsey Lusson (32:08):
I think the thing that we've, we haven't
gotten into yet, and I thinkit's appropriate that we kind of
save this for last because it ismore of a, this truly is a rare
scenario, but where the issueslike ongoing issues with kind of
more severe gut issues areactually impacting the
absorption of nutrient andcalories.
(32:32):
To support hormone balance wherelike the gap is actually that
like they are fueling enough.
They are weight restored We haveslowed way down on exercise.
We are addressing the stresscomponent, but we're stuck and
That very that scenario.
Dr. Heather Finley (32:46):
Yeah, and we've both had clients Like that
where it's okay, what else isgoing on here?
And, some typical scenarios thatwe could see is perhaps there's
a gallbladder issue and, there'snot good fat soluble vitamin
absorption because of thegallbladder issue or lack of
gallbladder could also be ascenario or.
From like a mineral perspective,there's not good mineral
(33:09):
absorption because there's lowstomach acid.
And then that's kind of a catch22 cause you need minerals to
make stomach acid.
It's like kind of, where do youstart there?
Or just overall, something thatwe see, which this is kind of
niche as well as with disorderedeating and orthorexia.
type eating.
A common scenario that peoplewill go towards is becoming more
(33:31):
like vegetarian, vegan.
And something that we see ontesting is as someone follows a
vegan or vegetarian diet, we'llsee a last taste, which is a
marker of pancreatic enzymeoutput decrease.
And over time, The pancreaticfunction can decrease, which
truly then can become kind of adigestion absorption issue.
(33:53):
And that's not to say that everyvegetarian or vegan is going to
struggle with that.
It can be, you can very muchexecute that well if you're
paying attention, but if you'renot, then that could cause some
issues.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think you're right.
There definitely can be adigestion, absorption, et
cetera, piece that if kind ofall of these things are in place
(34:13):
and nothing's shifting, it'sworth looking into that.
Okay, what is your body notabsorbing or what is it lacking?
Lindsey Lusson (34:21):
It's interesting too, that you bring in like the
vegetarian or vegan thing.
Cause I do get a lot ofquestions from people of, can
you get your period backfollowing a vegetarian diet or a
vegan diet?
And in my experience, yes.
It does typically take a littlebit longer and from a hormone
fertility perspective ifsomebody is very strict vegan
(34:41):
and they're not consuming enoughdietary cholesterol, that can
have a major impact on yourbody's ability or rather
inability to make proper sexhormones.
Dr. Heather Finley (34:52):
Yeah.
And that's going to affect thegallbladder as well too.
So then it's just, yeah, it'saffect multiple systems.
So what would your advice be tosomebody then that maybe kind of
fits in that bucket of okay,perhaps there is an absorption
digestion actual issue going on.
That's kind of the big bulk ofthis piece here.
Lindsey Lusson (35:12):
Yeah.
I think that's where you reallydo have to get specific with a
little bit of testing because Ithink that a lot of.
People, the people that I'veworked with in that scenario,
they feel really lost becausethey've, they feel like they've
turned over almost every singlestone.
They're that, I think that isactually the best place to start
bringing in functional testingis to see what else is going on
(35:33):
under the surface.
That's kind of impacting theirsystem.
And those aren't tests thatthey're going to get with their
regular doctor.
And just somebody kind of afresh set of eyes to look at
things from a differentperspective.
Dr. Heather Finley (35:43):
Totally.
And I think you're right.
Kind of that lost feeling of amI broken?
Is there something wrong?
I'm like following all the boxesand something.
So just to encourage thatperson, there's always more that
can be done and looked at, ifyou've addressed the basics and
you're doing all those thingsand nothing's shifting, there's
always another stone that can beturned over to look at.
Okay.
(36:03):
Yeah.
Or the onion layer, however youwant to, whatever analogy you
want to use let's really kind ofget to the core of what's
actually going on so that youcan feel better.
Lindsey Lusson (36:13):
Yeah, definitely.
Dr. Heather Finley (36:15):
Okay.
Any last minute thoughts for ourlisteners?
And if not, where can peoplefind you, learn about you, your
programs, et cetera?
Lindsey Lusson (36:23):
Yeah, I guess in terms of last minute thoughts,
I, if anybody is feeling lostwith period issues, I would
highly recommend, of course,thinking about a lot of the we
talked about here in thisepisode, because I do think that
like when we talk about Oh, Ihave a gut infection or, this is
I'm eating enough, but likethings aren't allowing my body
to like properly digest andabsorb the nutrients.
(36:45):
If you're still doing that andyou're running seven miles a day
and eating 1700 calories likethat's probably not your issue.
So I would say that, but I wouldalso encourage people who do
fall in that more niche scenariothat we described Testing is can
be so transformational like inthe clients that I've referred
to you Heather.
We've seen people actually beable to get cycles for the first
time ever.
So never give up on testing orjust, don't give up on just like
(37:09):
conventional healthcare tellingme like, Oh, this is the end.
It looks like your own hormonereplacement therapy at age 25
for the rest of your life, likethere's more that can be done.
Dr. Heather Finley (37:16):
And feel free to reach out to, I'm, I
will.
And I know Lindsay will do thesame.
We'll honestly tell you if wethink that we can help you or if
you're missing a step, it'spretty common that I've told
people like, Hey, I'd love tohelp you.
However, I think the first stepfor you is actually getting your
period back.
Tell me a little bit more aboutwhat's going on.
Yeah.
It's it doesn't make sense rightnow, maybe for us to go down the
(37:40):
testing rabbit hole, but let'sdo this first.
If you're still experiencingthese issues, then come back,
and vice versa.
So we can always explore likewhat would be the next best
option for you.
Lindsey Lusson (37:50):
Yeah.
Yeah.
If anybody is interested inlearning more about me and what
I do everything is food,freedom, fertility.
So I'm on Instagram food.
freedom.
fertility.
Website isfoodfreedomandfertility.
com.
And I'm usually most activehanging out on Instagram.
So just like Heather said, ifyou ever have a question, you
can always reach out over DM andI will let you know pretty
quickly if I think that our teamcan help, or if not, how to get
(38:11):
you in front of the right personwho can.
Dr. Heather Finley (38:13):
Awesome.
Thanks for joining us, Lindsay.
Last question actually is whatis your favorite way to love
your gut?
Because this is called the loveyour gut podcast.
Lindsey Lusson (38:22):
Oh man.
I did HTMA with you over thesummer with your team and I kind
of went into it a little bitlike, Oh, I don't really feel
that bad.
But.
minerals have been reallyhelpful for me.
And I know I kind of feel evencrazy sometimes that I'll even
travel with like my like mineralpowder, but I'm like, you know
what travel disrupts mydigestion.
These are such a game changerfor me.
(38:43):
I'm just going to be that weirdperson that like travels with
her supplements.
So yeah, minerals have been agame changer, especially when I
think about just my Okay.
There are things about mylifestyle that I will manage as
best as I can, but I do havethree young children and I am a
business owner and the stress isjust there.
So yeah, minerals are, have beena game changer for me.
Dr. Heather Finley (39:03):
Welcome to your mid thirties.
This mid thirties guys.
We travel with our mineralpowder so we can feel our best.
I love it.
Thanks for joining and everyonego check out Lindsay and she has
a podcast as well.
So you can tune in there.
Thanks.
I'm giving your gut a thumbs upbecause you just finished
(39:23):
another episode of the love yourgut podcast.
You know that in order to live alife free from uncomfortable
bloating, you need to figure outwhy you're actually bloated,
right?
The best way to do that is bytaking my free quiz.
Take the next steps towardsdetermining your root causes by
visiting drheatherfinley.
co backslash quiz and learn whatit is that's causing your
(39:46):
bloating.
Soon enough, you'll betransforming your gut issues and
I can't wait to help you.
Be sure to tune in next week forthe next episode of the Love
Your Gut podcast.
Welcome to the Love Your Gut Podcast.
I'm your host, Dr.
Heather Finley, registereddietitian and gut health
specialist.
I understand the frustration ofdealing with GI issues because
I've been there and I spent overtwo decades searching for
answers for my own gut issues ofconstipation, bloating, and
stomach pain.
I've dedicated my life tounderstanding and solving my own
(00:24):
gut issues.
And now I'm here to guide you.
On this podcast, I'll help youidentify the true root causes of
your discomfort.
So you can finally ditch yoursymptoms for good.
My goal is to empower you withthe knowledge and tools you need
so that you can love your gutand it will love you right back.
So if you're ready to learn alot, gain a deeper understanding
(00:46):
of your gut and find lastingrelief.
You are in the right place.
Welcome to the love your gutpodcast..............
Welcome back to the next episodeof the love your gut podcast.
I am so excited today because Ihave my good friend, Lindsey
Lusson here with me, and we aregoing to talk all things period
loss, GI issues, hypothalamicamenorrhea, primary amenorrhea,
(01:11):
and everything in between.
So Lindsey, welcome to the show.
Thanks so much for having me.
There's a lot
Lindsey Lusson (01:17):
of Overlap and things that we can unpack here.
And I think that this is goingto be so valuable for anybody
who has ever struggled withperiod loss and digestive issues
or currently struggling.
Dr. Heather Finley (01:28):
Totally.
And I think we've had a lot ofkind of shared clients over the
years or referrals back andforth.
So I think it'll be helpful tohave a discussion around like,
when is it appropriate to workon your GI issues first?
When is it appropriate to workon period recovery first?
What are some of the kind ofoverlaps and gaps in between?
So why don't we start out byjust defining some terms and
(01:52):
kind of getting everybody on thesame page.
So Tell us a little bit aboutwhat you do, why you do it and
give us a little background onwhat is hypothalamic amenorrhea?
What is primary amenorrhea?
So we kind of know thedifference and then we can go
from there.
Lindsey Lusson (02:07):
Yeah, sure.
I'm a period recovery andfertility dietitian, been a
registered dietitian for 14years.
Went through kind of my ownjourney with losing my period
and experiencing infertility asa result when I lost my period
back in gosh, like senior yearof high school is very much a
swept under the rug.
Just take the pill.
This is no big deal, but I feellike women just have this really
(02:29):
amazing, innate intuition.
You just always kind of knowsomething is not right.
And so I was always trying toget down to the bottom of why I
wasn't getting my period.
Fast forward to when I was readyto get pregnant, I was basically
told that I needed to startpretty high level intervention
for fertility treatment.
And that just didn't sit verywell with me.
Around the same time,interestingly enough, people
(02:51):
started talking about this term,hypokalemic amenorrhea.
I went through four years ofundergrad, three years of grad
school.
never came across the term kindof identified with this idea of
having female athlete triad,which is disordered eating bone
loss and loss of period.
But I didn't really fit theathlete mold.
And so when I came across thisterm, it was kind of like a
light bulb moment that this iswhat.
(03:12):
What's going on with me.
Fast forward was able to get mycycle back.
Ovulate on my own, get pregnantnaturally three times.
And so now today I help womenall over the world do the same
thing.
Be able to get down to thebottom of their missing period.
Be able to ovulate naturally ontheir own and take home healthy
babies.
Dr. Heather Finley (03:29):
So interesting.
And I also agree.
I think we probably had onelesson on the female athlete
triad in all of undergrad.
And it was Oh, and by the way,here's this thing.
Okay.
Moving on.
Kind of same with GI issues alittle bit too, where it's like,
Okay.
And there's this thing calledthe low FODMAP diet and moving
on, so why do you think it isthat we're not taught about this
(03:52):
or why do you think it's, it'sbecoming a lot more common that
people are actually talkingabout this, but I know you and I
have had many conversationsoffline about like how a lot of
physicians don't even know whathypothalamic amenorrhea is.
Why do you think that is?
Or what do you think some of thedrivers of that are?
Lindsey Lusson (04:10):
Yeah.
I think at the root, at leastwhen you and I were going
through school, a decade or twoago, I think lack of information
was a big problem back then.
Cause like I said if you lookback to the earliest research
paper on hypothalamicamenorrhea, it was written in
like the seventies maybe.
So that's like relatively new inthe research world.
And so we all know that it takesa decade plus for like research
(04:33):
to get caught up to be actuallybe put into like policy and
protocols and things like that,like in a health, a traditional
healthcare setting.
So I think that lack ofinformation is part of the
problem too.
I also feel like for both GI andlike hormone issues I've got
another one too, that I'll getinto in a second.
I feel like we, at least for me,it was very presented as this is
(04:55):
super rare.
Like you're never going to comeacross I don't feel like anyone
has this.
Unless you like work for the IOCand you're working with.
Gymnasts and figure skaters allday.
So I feel like it was kind ofposed as this is super rare.
This doesn't happen very often.
And then finally, I knowspecifically for like period
problems.
Women's health and hormones.
It's just so understudied.
(05:16):
Like women's health is sounderstudied, even today in
2024.
We're like very much in theinfancy of the research and
understanding everything.
And I think maybe we can say thesame thing too, for gut health.
Dr. Heather Finley (05:29):
Totally.
Yeah.
And it's you said it's, Oh, thisis a rare thing, but it's
actually not.
I think I was a swimmer my wholelife and I ran cross country in
high school and there was a lotof times In high school where
I'd have cross country practiceand swim practice in the same
day.
And so it's very easy.
If you take a scenario like thatmyself and, millions of other
(05:49):
high schoolers that probablyhave a similar routine when
sports is like such a huge partof your life, it's And it's very
easy to like, even just go toyour pediatrician for your
yearly checkup and then be like,Oh you're just a late bloomer or
like you, you're just superactive.
So this is quote, unquote,normal.
And it's easy to kind of brushlike under fueling under the rug
(06:11):
and not pay attention to agrowth chart or anything.
And, perhaps maybe catch some ofthese things before they start
affecting fertility orAffecting, all the other things
that can come along with it downthe road.
So yeah, same thing with GIissues.
It's Oh, this is actually notthat common, but I think some of
the research now shows like 70percent of people in the U S
(06:31):
have GI issues.
I'm like, that's a lot of peoplethat have some level of GI
issues.
Lindsey Lusson (06:38):
Yeah.
A hundred percent.
And something that you said,because I know we were talking
about like a defining what isAJ?
What is primary amenorrhea?
Something that I think reallydeserves more attention is early
intervention for when womenaren't starting their period.
So we work with a lot of clientswho are like, I was a late
bloomer, or, I didn't start myperiod until I was 16, 17, 18,
(06:59):
or until I went to college, etcetera.
And that alone is kind of a redflag because anytime somebody
isn't starting their period byage 15, that is like the
clinical definition of primaryamenorrhea, meaning that
something is misfiring in theirreproductive system.
Signaling usually like with thehypothalamus that is not
allowing the body to turn onthat hormonal system at the
(07:20):
appropriate time that it'ssupposed to.
Dr. Heather Finley (07:23):
So break down for us then what the
difference between primaryamenorrhea and hypothalamic
amenorrhea and where the overlapis because.
There can be overlap as well.
Lindsey Lusson (07:33):
Yeah, definitely.
I am probably a little bitbiased because usually the
people that we're working withwho have primary amenorrhea,
also it is more hypothalamicamenorrhea in nature.
But there are incidences wherethere can be other reasons why
somebody wouldn't start theirperiod where it isn't kind of
the frankender feeling.
So I guess let's first by startby defining a little bit more
hypothalamic amenorrhea.
(07:53):
In the most like simplisticterms, it is caused by kind of
three main things, stress.
So that can be likepsychological stress.
It could be physiological stressfrom trauma or eating disorder,
et cetera.
There is also typically a underfueling component of it, whether
it's a, Heather, back in highschool, multi sport athlete,
very limited time.
(08:14):
Maybe so also some GI issuesgoing on kind of a frank under
feeling like, Oh my gosh, I hadno idea.
I needed to be eating this much.
So it could be an unintentionalunder feeling.
It could also be an intentionalunder fueling with more of a
disordered eating, eatingdisorder, part of it.
And then also typically.
High energy expenditure, whetherthat is intentional as part of
an eating disorder orunintentional.
(08:36):
Usually what we see more oftenis like athlete put past
division one athlete kind ofcontinued their training into
young adulthood, middleadulthood.
So yeah, so the three maintriggers stress under fueling
and over exercise.
Usually it's not one of thosealone probably could be a
trigger, but usually it's somesort of combination of all three
(08:57):
of those.
And it happens in somebody whostarted their period at a normal
age and then kind ofmysteriously loses their period
at some point.
Whereas primary amenorrhea isthey don't actually ever start
their period at kind of thatnormal around age 15, 16
designated age.
Dr. Heather Finley (09:15):
And so you work with clients primarily that
have hypothalamic amenorrhea,but you do get a handful that
have primary amenorrhea.
But like you said, many timesit's actually driven by the same
things as the hypothalamicamenorrhea.
Lindsey Lusson (09:29):
Yeah.
It kind of depends upon thetrigger, right?
So if we're working with aclient who Is 30 and has never
had a period.
It's been covered up by hormonalbirth control.
And then we start having aconversation.
And this is a piece that I feelis just so often missed in a
traditional clinical healthcaresituation is we start actually
having a conversation aboutbull, what went on in high
(09:52):
school?
What was the environment withfood?
What were the pressures that youwere put?
putting yourself under in termsof training.
Was there ever a change in theway that you chose to, approach
food or restrict food?
And usually at least the clientsthat we're working with that
maybe never have ever had aperiod kind of roots in
(10:13):
restriction, disordered eatingdisorder from a really young
age.
Dr. Heather Finley (10:16):
I want to bring light to something that
you've said a couple times isthat it was covered up by
hormonal birth control.
So just to kind of put it outthere, if somebody has had a
period, but it's induced byhormonal birth control, that's
not the type of period thatwe're talking about.
We're talking about likesomeone's body menstruating on
(10:37):
its own without the use of likebirth control or something just
to clear the air a little bit sosomeone's not I'm on birth
control and I've had a period.
But we're talking about have youever had one without anything
inducing it?
Natural
Lindsey Lusson (10:53):
ovulatory cycle versus.
Birth control is really morewhat we would consider to be a
withdrawal bleed from thesynthetic hormones that are in
your system.
Dr. Heather Finley (11:01):
Yeah.
Okay.
Just wanted to make sure thatlike the listeners were on the
same page as us and weren'tbeing like, Oh, this doesn't
apply to me because I've had aperiod for 15 years cause I've
been on birth control for 15years.
Okay, so the reason for thisconversation is because of the
overlap of GI issues with allsorts of period issues.
(11:22):
So we, like I said at thebeginning, tend to see quite an
overlap in some of our clients.
It's pretty common when someoneis missing a period or even on
birth control to have GI issues.
So let's talk about some of thecommon GI issues that you might
experience and why that is.
And then we can have aconversation about do you
(11:44):
address the GI issues?
Do they go away?
What kind of some typicalscenarios can look like?
So in the clients that you workwith, let's say it's somebody
who's been missing a period forseveral years.
You identify that they havehypothalamic amenorrhea.
What would kind of be expectedfrom like a GI standpoint, or
what are some of the commonthings that you see?
(12:05):
I
Lindsey Lusson (12:06):
see a lot of slow motility.
So people not having bowelmovements every single day, or
if they are going, they feellike they are having incomplete
bowel movements.
A lot of bloating a lot offeeling like they.
Can't digest food well, whichusually puts, sends people kind
of down this rabbit hole ofelimination diets and food
(12:28):
sensitivity testing.
And so I would say that thoseare the biggies are like bloat,
constipation, slow motility.
And just kind of like their GIissues, just like it feeling
very like taking over theirlives.
Dr. Heather Finley (12:44):
So from an energy standpoint, like why
would that actually be?
normal, like why do we expectthat would be the case and
expect that somebody who comesto your program might have some
of those symptoms?
Lindsey Lusson (12:57):
So I think that way, I think that kind of the
way that we're taught to thinkabout the human body is that
There's the separate systems.
There's the reproductive system.
There's the gastrointestinalsystem.
There's the muscular skeletalsystem.
The fact of the matter is thatthey're all very closely
interrelated and can be impactedby a variety of different
things.
So if we think about what iscausing your body to shut down
(13:21):
ovulation and your body to saymayday, this is not a safe place
to make a baby.
shut down the system, we have toconserve energy.
It makes sense that there wouldbe other systems in the body
that would be impacted fromremaining in a low energy state.
So we see this with bone loss.
So people lose the ability tomaintain regular bone mass
(13:43):
whenever they aren't cyclingregularly.
We see it in heart issues and wealso see it in digestive issues.
So if the body.
Simply doesn't have enoughenergy to move food and waste to
the digestive track.
That's going to contribute tofood sitting in the stomach
longer and some of those bloatconstipation and kind of trickle
down effective, even kind ofeven more severe than I'm sure
in your practice GI issues.
Dr. Heather Finley (14:05):
Yeah.
So at the end of the day, it'sreally all about what does your
body have the energy to do?
And a GI.
Or having a bowel movement iskind of a non essential
function.
It's way more important for yourheart to beat and your lungs to
breathe and your brain to thinkthan it is for you to have a
bowel movement each day.
(14:25):
So it's like your body isactually just really doing what
it was designed to do, which forbetter or for worse, that's kind
of the reality.
Lindsey Lusson (14:34):
And same thing with reproduction.
Like we, that's not an essentialfor life function.
It's a nice to have, but notnecessary for you to survive.
The next 24 hours function.
Dr. Heather Finley (14:45):
Totally.
Totally.
So what do you kind of see aslike the progression, you have
clients that come to yourprogram, probably have
constipation, bloating gas,whatever else add to the list of
the GI symptoms, they'veprobably gone down the food
sensitivity rabbit hole,probably all that has done is
(15:06):
restricted them more, added morestress and potentially made the
issues worse.
What do you typically see as faras.
When GI issues get better.
And like what percentage ofpeople just estimate wise, I
don't know that we have likespecific research on this, but
just in your opinion and yourexperience, people start working
through your program.
(15:26):
They start eating more fuelingthemselves.
Potentially exercising less, etcetera, like addressing all the
pieces.
Do the GI issues get better andkind of what's the timeline for
that?
Lindsey Lusson (15:38):
Yeah.
So what I usually tell myclients to expect, and this is
really just based off of the 300plus clients we've served and
patterns that I've observed withthem is there is a little bit of
a learning curve, right?
So if your body is.
It's only used to handling Xamount of energy in terms of
digestion and metabolism andutilizing all of those
nutrients.
(15:59):
There is going to be a learningcurve because part of the
process of being able to getyour cycle back and to signal to
the body that, Hey, this is asafe place to ovulate and make a
baby and therefore have a periodis getting your body in an
energy surplus.
This is one of the mostchallenging parts for.
literally everyone during AHArecovery is that it's
uncomfortable.
(16:19):
Like it's uncomfortable to eatmore food, especially when your
digestion has slowed, especiallywhen your metabolism isn't
working adequately.
And so there is this, I alwaystell people kind of a two to
three week learning period,learning curve when the body is
having to relearn how toproperly digest all of this
food.
Get it out.
There is also sometimes aclearing out of the digestive
(16:42):
tract.
So for people who are havinginfrequent bowel movements or
incomplete bowel movements,sometimes they'll actually have
a lot more bowel movementsduring this adjustment period
because they're kind of clearingout their bowels for the first
time in months, maybe years.
But usually after about two tofour weeks of correcting the
energy deficit, our clientsreport like a complete 180 on
(17:04):
most of their gut issues.
This is not the case for everysingle person, but I will
confidently say that at least 90up to 95 percent of our clients
are able to get, I don't want tosay instant relief, but within
about a month or so, like a hugedifference.
Dr. Heather Finley (17:22):
Which really in the grand scheme of it all is
not that long.
It probably does at the timefeel like the longest month of
your life while you're doingthat.
But if you think about it in thegrand scheme of everything,
that's actually a pretty quickturnaround.
Like the body really can healitself pretty quickly, given the
proper inputs.
(17:43):
Are there things that yourecommend that your clients do
in the meantime to help withlike comfort and symptom relief,
et cetera?
What are some of the things thatyou found that have been
helpful?
Lindsey Lusson (17:54):
Yeah, definitely.
So it feels really backwards fora lot of our clients because
they feel like the pathway intoHA, not for everybody, but for a
lot of people is almost likevery clean eating, very healthy
eating, borderline orthorexiaeating.
So it can feel verycounterproductive.
But one of the things that we'lltell our clients to do is
actually start cutting down ontheir fiber intake and to lower
the amount of fruits andvegetables that consuming,
(18:15):
especially like raw uncookedvegetables.
And that Can help to not overtaxthe GI system as it's kind of
adapting and relearning how tomove all that food and process
it and move it through thedigestive tract.
The other thing is to kind ofthink about decreasing volume
and focusing on nutrient densefoods.
So things like nuts, seeds,avocados, higher fat foods,
(18:38):
liquid calories can also bereally helpful here too, because
we kind of have this short termmust correct the energy deficit.
But while battling these GIissues.
And so the idea is how can weget you the most energy possible
without over, withoutoverfilling your stomach with a
lot of volume.
So that's kind of where we areusually talking to people like,
(19:00):
Hey, veggies are great time anda place.
Let's talk about decreasing theportion, making sure that
they're cooked, kind of thinkingthem more of more of a sprinkle
or an add to the meal, not likethe entire base of the meal.
Dr. Heather Finley (19:12):
That's something we tell our clients
too.
Like one of the biggest, mostpowerful shifts you can make is
stop eating raw salads for everysingle meal.
If you're bloated and you'reconstipated, a raw salad is
actually extremely hard todigest.
And can be really triggeringfrom a symptom perspective and
prevent you from actually eatingenough too.
(19:33):
Switching from raw to cookedlike that alone can make a huge
difference.
Anything else that you see iseither nutritional or something
else thing that really helpslike a shift that somebody could
make.
Lindsey Lusson (19:45):
We really try to get our clients off of sugar
alcohols or any sort of fakeartificial sweeteners.
A lot of our clients are veryathletic and they're into
fitness.
And so they're typicallyconsuming all the protein bars,
all the protein powders, allthe, halo top ice cream or high
protein, low sugar version of aregular type of food or a
dessert food.
(20:06):
And unfortunately, most peopledon't do well with sugar
alcohols, whether they're crazybloated or they're pooping their
pants.
Like most people just don'ttolerate them well.
Trying to eliminate those asmuch as possible.
And then also, this isn't aproblem for every single person,
but cutting down on carbonatedbeverages, like if somebody's
drinking diet sodas, or ifsomebody's drinking just a lot
(20:26):
of sparkling water through allthroughout the day, that alone
is definitely going to make youa little more bloated.
Dr. Heather Finley (20:30):
Yeah, totally.
It's like a trade off, okay,enjoy that, but know that with
that can come like some of theseother things.
Okay.
So you said 95 percent of peoplecan resolve their, or you've
seen 95 percent about resolvetheir GI issues once they are
eating more.
Exercising less resolving theperiod.
What about like the 5%?
So we were talking about thisoffline the one in 200 where
(20:54):
it's okay, you've kind offollowed the program.
You've been eating more, you'vedecreased your activity.
You've been at this, you'rebeing really diligent and honest
with yourself about resting, etcetera.
And yet your GI issues are.
So horrible.
Or you're just not getting yourperiod back.
(21:14):
So let's look at it like kind offrom the reverse, what are some
scenarios that you've seen that,would be in that kind of 5
percent that we're talkingabout?
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show notes.
Now back to the episode.
Lindsey Lusson (22:21):
Yeah, definitely.
I've definitely come acrosschronic unresolved constipation
and I say and unresolved mightsound extreme because I do feel
like there's always a solutionfor it.
But Usually I'm seeing this inour more severe eating disorder
clients.
So kind of coming back to atopic I'm sure you've covered on
this podcast several times aboutthe gut being a muscle and the
(22:43):
gut being out of shape.
And so step one to getting thatworking again is getting food
and waste to regularly move.
Through the digestive track.
What if you can't do that?
What if for reason X, Y, or Z,whether it's stress related,
whether it's something morecomplex medically, what if you
can't do that?
And that's where I've learned alot through you and looking a
(23:03):
little bit further into mineralbalance and thinking about
different supplements that wecan aid in helping them to be
kind of clearing out andemptying their bowels.
And.
That's a little more persondependent because I think you
have to kind of start thinkingabout their symptoms.
But looking at minerals inparticular, I know minerals do a
world of a lot difference for myregularity.
(23:24):
And kind of thinking about thethree major ones that are what
we'll see most often depleted insomebody that's coming from a
disordered eating or just a highenergy expenditure, high stress
background, or sodium,magnesium, and potassium.
Dr. Heather Finley (23:37):
Yeah, which all are needed.
It's a common scenario that wesee and maybe you do too, is we
have clients coming to us taking1500 milligrams of magnesium
citrate and they're like, I'mstill constipated.
Like, why is this magnesium issupposed to be loosening my
bowels and it's not doinganything.
And the reality is because theyare coming kind of from what you
were talking about earlier, likethis really clean kind of
(23:59):
orthorexic eating background.
They're actually pretty sodiumdepleted.
They're not getting enough saltin their diet.
Cause they're eating prettyminimal processed foods,
probably not adding enough saltto their foods.
I think the nineties were reallybad from a salt standpoint.
Like we all became fearful andwe all still haven't recovered
from that.
(24:19):
But salt is so helpful foractual magnesium absorption.
And then from like a musclecontraction standpoint,
potassium is so essential.
I think we always think ofbananas and we think of
potassium, but you can'tcontract a muscle without
adequate potassium.
And I think the latest researchshowed like 99 percent of
Americans don't meet their dailypotassium needs.
(24:42):
So if you're consistently overtime, not meeting that, like you
can become very depleted, youhave a huge like ditch of
deficiency that you've got tofill in over time.
So
Lindsey Lusson (24:52):
Definitely.
And I think in this pattern ofcombination, like a double
whammy of past restrictiveeating past excessive
expenditure, you're just reallythat far in the hole.
And then another thing thatyou've brought up when we've had
some conversations about clientstoo, is the idea of man, maybe
somebody is a rock star withtheir intake.
But maybe they haven't addressedthe stress component and they're
(25:15):
just constantly in fight orflight state.
And so they're just burningthrough all of their minerals so
fast.
Like the intake can never meetbecause we're already starting
in such a far depletion andthere's still just a lot of high
stress stuff going on.
Dr. Heather Finley (25:30):
Yes.
Yeah.
And your stress will rapidlydeplete the three minerals that
you just talked about.
And then probably a conversationfor another time, but then you
kind of take into accountperhaps somebody who's been on
hormonal birth control for fiveto 15 years, however long.
And we know that hormonal birthcontrol depletes a lot of the
vitamins and minerals that arereally essential for.
(25:52):
gut function.
And we know that it can disruptthe balance of bacteria in the
gut.
So like that can be, potentiallysomething to look at as well.
If there's a long standinghistory there of hormonal birth
control use.
Lindsey Lusson (26:05):
Yeah, definitely.
And, talking more about the 5percent of people where the gut
issues are like impacting theirability to actually fuel, to be
able to recover.
Just looking further down theline.
That's usually the people I'mreferring to you, but doing like
additional testing is there aninfection?
Is there SIBO?
Is there something that needs tobe treated to get this person
the relief that they need tothen start addressing the energy
(26:27):
deficit part of it?
Dr. Heather Finley (26:30):
I think the third scenario would be like,
what about the client whothey've done a lot of functional
stuff and we definitely seeclients like this.
I think you do too, but thetypical client who's gone to the
functional medicine doctor, thenaturopath, they've done stool
testing, perhaps they've donemineral testing.
They've done a lot of fancyexpensive testing.
(26:51):
And I'm a fan of testing.
Within the right context, ofcourse, but the scenario that
you see is they go, they getthese results, they're horrified
with their results, and thenthey're put on like hundreds of
dollars worth of supplements,but they never actually address
the true root of the problem,which is actually a nutrition
(27:13):
problem.
Not necessarily.
And that's contributingobviously to the fact that they,
maybe they do have candida, ormaybe they do have.
SIBO like you mentioned, butthey don't get any better.
So let's talk about thatscenario because I think we both
see that a lot.
Lindsey Lusson (27:31):
Yeah, definitely.
And I think that's so importantbecause I feel like that you
could be treating the same SIBOover and over again.
But if you're chronicallyconstipated because you're not
eating enough.
I'm kind of pulling out onespecific scenario, then you're
going to kind of like round andround we go.
Testing is something and I workwith clients that kind of walk
(27:52):
this fine line between Eatingdisorder and disordered eating.
A lot of our clients were neverformally diagnosed, but they're
like, Oh yeah, that one time incollege, or I got way too
obsessed with stuff before mywedding.
And even when we kind of correctthings from a habit behavior
standpoint, so the psychologicalstuff can really stick with you.
And also to just knowing kind oflike the personality type of a
(28:14):
lot of the people who work withthat develop HA.
I do think sometimes testing cancause you to focus on the wrong
things or to become hyperfocused on, oh my gosh, like I
need to I need to get mysecretary IGA up And they're
kind of missing the whole boaton yes.
And one of the reasons why it'sout of whack is because there's
(28:35):
this chronic underfeeling orbecause you're still running
seven miles every single day.
Though I do feel like sometimesfor a certain type of client,
testing can almost give you toomuch information.
And so we really like in ourprogram to kind of start with
the basics of Hey, how's yoursleep?
How's your stress?
How's your fueling?
How's your nutrient timing?
(28:55):
How's your macronutrientbalance?
Let's get this foundation downfirst.
Cause we got a good chance thatwe can resolve a lot of these
gut issues and then we canalways do further testing
looking into other things atsome point.
So yeah, I do find that a lot ofour clients are coming to us
with Yeah, on a ton ofsupplements.
And not all bad, right?
(29:16):
Like these things can worktogether.
And I know we kind of wanted togo here too.
These things can work together,but unfortunately, depending
upon the practitioner that theywere working with before they
work with us, kind of miss thewhole boat on getting the
foundation down first.
Dr. Heather Finley (29:30):
No, I'm 100 percent with you.
And like I said, I'm a huge fanof testing, but within the right
context, I think it's incrediblywasteful to do testing and just
treat with supplements becauselike you said, you're not
addressing the root of theissue.
If your Secretary IGA being lowor your SIBO not going away is
(29:53):
actually like an underfuelingstress issue.
You can take all theimmunoglobulins, all the
antibiotics, all the whateveranything.
It's not going to actuallyresolve the issue.
So you have to use likenutrition, lifestyle, and then
supplements can be supplementaryto actually addressing the whole
(30:15):
picture.
And I think honestly, probablyanother conversation for another
time, but that's wherefunctional medicine goes wrong
is it's.
It's like people kind of havethis idea that functional
medicine is you go in, you takea test, you take supplements,
but like true functionalmedicine is not that.
It's you go in, you assess thewhole picture.
(30:35):
You identify all of theunderlying things.
And address those and then youcan use supplementary things as
kind of a stop gap, but it's notthe whole treatment, but that's
unfortunately kind of what it'sbecome.
And I'm like, that's nodifferent than the conventional
healthcare model thateverybody's frustrated with.
Like you go in and you get amedication or you go in and you
(30:56):
get supplements.
Both of those things aren'thelpful.
Lindsey Lusson (30:59):
Right, right.
Yeah.
And it's hard to say to exactlywhere the gap is because I'm
thinking about like some of myclients to like, maybe there
were conversations around, Hey,you also need to make sure
you're eating enough or Hey, youalso need to make sure that
you're managing your stress.
And those things were like inone ear out the other.
And they were like, I'm going totake care of you.
this cool little supplement andall my problems are solved and
(31:20):
I'm going to go on my merrylittle way with, doing orange
theory seven days a week, likeit's hard to identify exactly
where the gap is, whether theinstruction wasn't given or if
the, that in particular personlatched onto the wrong parts of
the treatment or
Dr. Heather Finley (31:32):
just lack of accountability, where it's okay,
maybe that provider didn't havethe bandwidth to be like, Hey,
I'm going to keep youaccountable to actually
addressing these things.
So yeah, there's, there candefinitely be a lot of pieces to
the puzzle.
Okay.
So we've covered like threepretty standard scenarios that
(31:56):
we see.
So anything else that you feellike we should address when it
comes to lack of period, missingperiods, period issues, and kind
of the overlap of GI issues,anything that we missed?
Lindsey Lusson (32:08):
I think the thing that we've, we haven't
gotten into yet, and I thinkit's appropriate that we kind of
save this for last because it ismore of a, this truly is a rare
scenario, but where the issueslike ongoing issues with kind of
more severe gut issues areactually impacting the
absorption of nutrient andcalories.
(32:32):
To support hormone balance wherelike the gap is actually that
like they are fueling enough.
They are weight restored We haveslowed way down on exercise.
We are addressing the stresscomponent, but we're stuck and
That very that scenario.
Dr. Heather Finley (32:46):
Yeah, and we've both had clients Like that
where it's okay, what else isgoing on here?
And, some typical scenarios thatwe could see is perhaps there's
a gallbladder issue and, there'snot good fat soluble vitamin
absorption because of thegallbladder issue or lack of
gallbladder could also be ascenario or.
From like a mineral perspective,there's not good mineral
(33:09):
absorption because there's lowstomach acid.
And then that's kind of a catch22 cause you need minerals to
make stomach acid.
It's like kind of, where do youstart there?
Or just overall, something thatwe see, which this is kind of
niche as well as with disorderedeating and orthorexia.
type eating.
A common scenario that peoplewill go towards is becoming more
(33:31):
like vegetarian, vegan.
And something that we see ontesting is as someone follows a
vegan or vegetarian diet, we'llsee a last taste, which is a
marker of pancreatic enzymeoutput decrease.
And over time, The pancreaticfunction can decrease, which
truly then can become kind of adigestion absorption issue.
(33:53):
And that's not to say that everyvegetarian or vegan is going to
struggle with that.
It can be, you can very muchexecute that well if you're
paying attention, but if you'renot, then that could cause some
issues.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think you're right.
There definitely can be adigestion, absorption, et
cetera, piece that if kind ofall of these things are in place
(34:13):
and nothing's shifting, it'sworth looking into that.
Okay, what is your body notabsorbing or what is it lacking?
Lindsey Lusson (34:21):
It's interesting too, that you bring in like the
vegetarian or vegan thing.
Cause I do get a lot ofquestions from people of, can
you get your period backfollowing a vegetarian diet or a
vegan diet?
And in my experience, yes.
It does typically take a littlebit longer and from a hormone
fertility perspective ifsomebody is very strict vegan
(34:41):
and they're not consuming enoughdietary cholesterol, that can
have a major impact on yourbody's ability or rather
inability to make proper sexhormones.
Dr. Heather Finley (34:52):
Yeah.
And that's going to affect thegallbladder as well too.
So then it's just, yeah, it'saffect multiple systems.
So what would your advice be tosomebody then that maybe kind of
fits in that bucket of okay,perhaps there is an absorption
digestion actual issue going on.
That's kind of the big bulk ofthis piece here.
Lindsey Lusson (35:12):
Yeah.
I think that's where you reallydo have to get specific with a
little bit of testing because Ithink that a lot of.
People, the people that I'veworked with in that scenario,
they feel really lost becausethey've, they feel like they've
turned over almost every singlestone.
They're that, I think that isactually the best place to start
bringing in functional testingis to see what else is going on
(35:33):
under the surface.
That's kind of impacting theirsystem.
And those aren't tests thatthey're going to get with their
regular doctor.
And just somebody kind of afresh set of eyes to look at
things from a differentperspective.
Dr. Heather Finley (35:43):
Totally.
And I think you're right.
Kind of that lost feeling of amI broken?
Is there something wrong?
I'm like following all the boxesand something.
So just to encourage thatperson, there's always more that
can be done and looked at, ifyou've addressed the basics and
you're doing all those thingsand nothing's shifting, there's
always another stone that can beturned over to look at.
Okay.
(36:03):
Yeah.
Or the onion layer, however youwant to, whatever analogy you
want to use let's really kind ofget to the core of what's
actually going on so that youcan feel better.
Lindsey Lusson (36:13):
Yeah, definitely.
Dr. Heather Finley (36:15):
Okay.
Any last minute thoughts for ourlisteners?
And if not, where can peoplefind you, learn about you, your
programs, et cetera?
Lindsey Lusson (36:23):
Yeah, I guess in terms of last minute thoughts,
I, if anybody is feeling lostwith period issues, I would
highly recommend, of course,thinking about a lot of the we
talked about here in thisepisode, because I do think that
like when we talk about Oh, Ihave a gut infection or, this is
I'm eating enough, but likethings aren't allowing my body
to like properly digest andabsorb the nutrients.
(36:45):
If you're still doing that andyou're running seven miles a day
and eating 1700 calories likethat's probably not your issue.
So I would say that, but I wouldalso encourage people who do
fall in that more niche scenariothat we described Testing is can
be so transformational like inthe clients that I've referred
to you Heather.
We've seen people actually beable to get cycles for the first
time ever.
So never give up on testing orjust, don't give up on just like
(37:09):
conventional healthcare tellingme like, Oh, this is the end.
It looks like your own hormonereplacement therapy at age 25
for the rest of your life, likethere's more that can be done.
Dr. Heather Finley (37:16):
And feel free to reach out to, I'm, I
will.
And I know Lindsay will do thesame.
We'll honestly tell you if wethink that we can help you or if
you're missing a step, it'spretty common that I've told
people like, Hey, I'd love tohelp you.
However, I think the first stepfor you is actually getting your
period back.
Tell me a little bit more aboutwhat's going on.
Yeah.
It's it doesn't make sense rightnow, maybe for us to go down the
(37:40):
testing rabbit hole, but let'sdo this first.
If you're still experiencingthese issues, then come back,
and vice versa.
So we can always explore likewhat would be the next best
option for you.
Lindsey Lusson (37:50):
Yeah.
Yeah.
If anybody is interested inlearning more about me and what
I do everything is food,freedom, fertility.
So I'm on Instagram food.
freedom.
fertility.
Website isfoodfreedomandfertility.
com.
And I'm usually most activehanging out on Instagram.
So just like Heather said, ifyou ever have a question, you
can always reach out over DM andI will let you know pretty
quickly if I think that our teamcan help, or if not, how to get
(38:11):
you in front of the right personwho can.
Dr. Heather Finley (38:13):
Awesome.
Thanks for joining us, Lindsay.
Last question actually is whatis your favorite way to love
your gut?
Because this is called the loveyour gut podcast.
Lindsey Lusson (38:22):
Oh man.
I did HTMA with you over thesummer with your team and I kind
of went into it a little bitlike, Oh, I don't really feel
that bad.
But.
minerals have been reallyhelpful for me.
And I know I kind of feel evencrazy sometimes that I'll even
travel with like my like mineralpowder, but I'm like, you know
what travel disrupts mydigestion.
These are such a game changerfor me.
(38:43):
I'm just going to be that weirdperson that like travels with
her supplements.
So yeah, minerals have been agame changer, especially when I
think about just my Okay.
There are things about mylifestyle that I will manage as
best as I can, but I do havethree young children and I am a
business owner and the stress isjust there.
So yeah, minerals are, have beena game changer for me.
Dr. Heather Finley (39:03):
Welcome to your mid thirties.
This mid thirties guys.
We travel with our mineralpowder so we can feel our best.
I love it.
Thanks for joining and everyonego check out Lindsay and she has
a podcast as well.
So you can tune in there.
Thanks.
I'm giving your gut a thumbs upbecause you just finished
(39:23):
another episode of the love yourgut podcast.
You know that in order to live alife free from uncomfortable
bloating, you need to figure outwhy you're actually bloated,
right?
The best way to do that is bytaking my free quiz.
Take the next steps towardsdetermining your root causes by
visiting drheatherfinley.
co backslash quiz and learn whatit is that's causing your
(39:46):
bloating.
Soon enough, you'll betransforming your gut issues and
I can't wait to help you.
Be sure to tune in next week forthe next episode of the Love
Your Gut podcast.
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