Q&A with Naturopath Susie - Yes, Your Food Intolerances Might Be Caused by Perimenopause!

Can hormonal changes during perimenopause and menopause actually trigger food intolerances? Discover the surprising connection as I unpack the intricate relationship between your gut health and hormonal shifts. You'll learn why symptoms like brain fog, itchy skin, and even joint pain might be signalling a food intolerance that’s easily overlooked. From gastrointestinal motility to microbiome changes, I explain the underlying mechanisms and provide actionable advice to help you identify these intolerances.

Join me as I guide you through simple yet effective elimination tests for common culprits like gluten, dairy, and eggs. I'll also emphasise the importance of consulting with healthcare professionals to rule out serious conditions such as celiac disease before making any dietary changes. This episode is your go-to resource for understanding and managing food intolerances during this transformative phase of life. Subscribe now and let's embark on this journey to maintaining your health and well-being, agelessly and awesomely!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Susie Garden and this is the Ageless and
Awesome podcast.
I'm an age-defying naturopathand clinical nutritionist and
I'm here to bust myths aroundwomen's health and aging so that
you can be ageless and awesomein your 40s, 50s and beyond.
The Ageless and Awesome podcastis dedicated to helping women

(00:24):
through perimenopause andmenopause with great health, a
positive mindset and outrageousconfidence.
Hit, subscribe or follow nowand let's get started.
Hello, gorgeous one, andwelcome to Q&A Thursday with me,
susie.
And today's question actuallycropped up in a presentation

(00:46):
that I gave yesterday.
I gave a presentation to agroup of psychologists at the
All About Her Center, and one ofthe questions that came up was
regarding food intolerances, andI thought, well, if it's coming
up in this forum, it might besomething that you guys are
interested in as well.

(01:06):
So is there a link betweenperimenopause or menopause and
food intolerances?
And in fact there is.
There can absolutely be anincrease in food intolerances at
this time in a woman's life,and there's a couple of
mechanisms through which thishappens.

(01:27):
One of the main ones is thatthe hormonal changes that go on
have an impact on what we callour gastrointestinal motility,
so what that means is just thespeed at which the food goes
through the gut, the intestines,et cetera.

(01:50):
So what happens is that andthis is probably they believe,
because, again, there's not alot of research on this, but
it's believed that the menopauseassociated or perimenopause
associated, food intolerance hasmultiple causes and it might be
probably, they think, mostlogically, it's related to

(02:13):
changes to the microbiome, whichwe know happen plus diet, any
dietary changes that might begoing on, changes to activity
levels, sleep, which we know canbe very, very disrupted in
women in their 40s and 50s andbeyond, and other factors, and
also stress is another one thatcame up in the in some of the

(02:36):
research that I was reading.
And the thing is that whenpeople think about food
intolerances, they tend to thinkabout diarrhea and bloating,
right, but there are so manysymptoms of food intolerance and
I think it's really good to beaware of this that it can be
things like brain fog, it can beitchy skin, it can be rashes,

(03:00):
it can be gosh so many differentthings, weird symptoms,
symptoms.
So if you're getting kind ofweird symptoms joint pain,
actually it's the other one Iwas trying to think of uh, that
can come up.
So if you're getting symptomslike that and you haven't had
them before.
It's really worth kind oflooking into it and thinking
what could this be?

(03:21):
Could this be a foodintolerance?
And the top three foods thatpeople can be intolerant to tend
to be gluten, dairy and eggs.
So, as I was explaining to thegroup yesterday, something very
simple you can do, that costsnothing, is to do a little test

(03:41):
elimination for yourself.
So you could eliminate glutenfor two weeks and, if you feel
better, what I recommend thatyou do is go and talk to your
healthcare professional aboutgetting some testing done to
make sure that you're not celiac, because if you go off gluten
and you haven't had the testingdone, it's very difficult to get

(04:03):
a positive test because theinflammation in your body will
be gone.
So if you want to get diagnosedand I strongly recommend that
you do get a diagnosis andeither get it ruled out or
tested, and then you know youhave it and then you know you
know can get um information onwhat to do about it Then I think

(04:23):
that's really important.
So gluten is one, and then,yeah, if you're finding you're
feeling no different, theneliminate dairy and I would not
bring gluten back in.
Just keep off gluten for thisperiod of time that we're doing
the testing.
So when I say sorry, thetesting, I mean the elimination.
So then, yeah, you do a coupleof weeks without dairy, which I

(04:44):
know sounds hard.
There's plenty of substitutesyou can use, and when I say no
dairy, I mean no dairy, andthat's including things like
lactose-free dairy.
We want to go off it completelybecause it may not be the
lactose component, it might bethe casein component, which is
the protein element in dairy.
So if you go off dairy for twoweeks and you don't feel any

(05:08):
different, try eggs and thenslowly start to bring things in,
because when you reintroducethe gluten or reintroduce the
dairy, that's when you mightactually go.
Oh, I do feel worse on this.
And if you tried those threeand you're not getting anywhere,
then I suggest maybe againchatting to your healthcare
practitioner, looking at perhapsgetting some testing done so

(05:30):
that you can identify what thefood intolerance is and avoid it
for a good six to eight weekswhile undergoing some good gut
healing protocols.
Now, as a practitioner, I tendto use supplementation because I
can get a result quickly andbecause I know what the dosage
is.
Otherwise, if you want to DIYit, I recommend getting some

(05:54):
good quality, organic must beorganic bone broth and using
that you can use collagensupplements that will help with
gut healing as well.
But also looking at what theunderlying cause is.
So, if you have a lot of stressin your life, working on your

(06:14):
stress management, becauseotherwise the problem is just
going to come back, so you wantto work on your stress
management.
You want to look at what's mylifestyle like.
Am I moving enough?
Am I eating a good qualitywhole food diet or am I eating a
lot of processed foods?
And a good way of looking atthis.

(06:35):
I heard this on a podcast theother day and I thought, oh gosh
, I forgot about framing it likethis.
If you're doing the majority ofyour shopping on the outside
part of the supermarket, that'swhere all the good stuff is,
that you won't find a lot ofprocessed food on the outside
walls.
Oh, when I say outside, youknow what I'm talking about,

(06:56):
right?
If you're going into the centeraisles, that's where all the
ultra processed foods are, youwant to avoid that as much as
you can.
Are you want to avoid that asmuch as you can?
All right.
You're wanting to get lots offresh fruits, veggies, good
quality breads, ideally 100% ryebread because it's an

(07:16):
anti-inflammatory grain.
Obviously, if you have glutenissues, that's not going to be
suitable.
But yeah, all of the goodquality whole foods tend to be
on the outside of thesupermarket I don't know how to
say it without saying like it'soutside the supermarket.
You know what I'm talking about?
On the outer perimeter of theinside of the supermarket, yeah,

(07:38):
and so if you're spending moreof, if you look at your shopping
trolley and the majority ofit's from the internal kind of
aisles, then you're probablyhaving too much processed food
and that is absolutely going tocontribute to issues with food
intolerances because it promotesincreased intestinal
permeability, aka leaky gut, andleaky gut is generally what the

(08:00):
issue is when we have foodintolerances.
So I hope that's been helpful.
I feel like I've rambled on alittle bit today, but I hope
that's been helpful.
If you want me to do a moreproper kind of longer podcast on
this, please do let me know.
You can email me at hello atsuzygardencom, or you can

(08:23):
message me on Instagram atsuzygardenwollas.
Enjoy the rest of your week,have a fantastic weekend and I
will be back on Tuesday withsome more fresh content.
Thanks so much for joining metoday on the Ageless and Awesome
podcast.
If you liked today's episode,please make sure you click the
little plus button if you're onApple Podcasts, or the follow

(08:46):
button if you're on Spotify, sothat you get each new episode
delivered to you every week.
If you like free stuff, thenhead to the show notes and click
the link to receive my freeRadiant Reset Hormone Detox
Guide for Perimenopausal Women.
Or if you'd like to continuethe discussion, head over to
Instagram and DM me atSusieGardenWellness.

(09:06):
I'd love to connect with you.