Hormones, Metabolism & the Fasting Myth with Lauren Papanos

22:32And T3 really tells us how much, how hot's the thermostat essentially, right? So if your T3 is low, your thermostat's really cold and that's like your body's thermostat. And so when your body's thermostat is cool, right? Metabolically, you can think of it as like your metabolism is not working efficiently. Your body is conserving energy. That's really what low T3 tells us. So ideally we want to see that someone has, they're converting T4 over to T3 really well. And then there's another hormone we look alongside that called reverse T3. We want to make sure the body's not deactivating that. I would say in about like 85 % of women that we work with, they have low T3 levels.

23:10And how do you fix that? We've got to figure out why the body's conserving energy. So, right. And that's where it gets down to like, what's the inflammation? What's the nutrient deficiencies? Are we overexercising? Why is the body feeling like it's in a stressed position? And when we can address those things, we pull the stressors off. Are there general suggestions that you could give women where you're like, least make sure like before you work out that you have this or like you know are there moments in the day where women can make good decisions to like help with their t3 without having to like you know because a lot of i'm sure financially for whatever reason anybody that's like out of range for you but like our listeners right now is there anything that they could do on a daily basis to support t3 yeah totally so the first thing is that thyroid is very mineral dependent the thyroid is you just gave me your mineral yeah i just gave you mineral magic which is a really great starting place.

23:58Listen, talk about it. So thyroid hormones are literally made from iodine, which is a mineral that combines with tyrosine, which is an amino acid. And then we use other minerals like zinc and selenium and magnesium and iron to then convert that T4 over to its active form T3. Cool. I have never seen, we run mineral panels on patients every single day, and I've never seen someone come into my practice that has adequate levels of all those minerals. I just have never seen it. Even especially women that are postpartum, because you have to think of how much your body is depleting of that during pregnancy, because those minerals get put towards the baby because that's the priority, right?

24:37And they get taken away from mom. And so women come in postpartum and they've even been on prenatals that are supplying some of these, and they're still depleted in these minerals. And if we don't have enough of those minerals, the body literally cannot make those hormones. You take this when you're pregnant? Yeah, I did. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, Mineral Magic is a really great starting place. Doing a mineral panel. When am I taking this? You can take it at any meal. I take mine at breakfast. And like when I was pregnant, I just was like getting super bad, you know, aversions to certain supplements.

25:06So I would just break them open and like put them in a smoothie. You can do that or you can swallow them as capsules. OK, cool. Amazing. So this is a baseline thing that someone can do every day. Yeah, definitely. So minerals is the most important thing you think to support T3? I think it's a really great starting place. Yeah. Yeah. And then, I mean, when we talk about like the stress response, right, like that's like a more complicated picture because for everyone that looks so different, you know, for some people, it's like they're working out too much or some people they're like not eating regularly enough.

25:30They're not sleeping enough. So that's where it starts to get a little bit more of the minutia of individualization. But that would be kind of the second thing is like we've got to look at is like, why does your body feel stressed? What what is telling it that it needs to be in a stress position? And then again, going back to the original question of the, you know, fat loss in 20s and 30s. So outside of making sure that, you know, our hormone and the T3 levels are good, I'd love to know, especially like nutritionally, because I think like sometimes I'm like so scared to eat a carb. You know, I'm not scared to eat a sweet potato.

26:01And I just started feeling like really calm. Like in the last two years, I'm like, potatoes are good for me. You know, I like roast potatoes and bone broth. And I'm like, these are like little powerhouses. I buy them from the farmer's market. And I'm like, they're grown in the soil. And like, it's a great, you know, but are there certain ways that we need to be eating to help? I mean, obviously with like actual real fat loss. Yeah. So one of the most powerful things I see is taking your carbs. So I do think most women are not eating enough carbohydrates. That's the first thing. I think I'm scared of them.

26:28Yeah. Most women are because of the messaging. And I had sour toast this morning, but I made sure that I ate it with a bunch of protein. And I had to be like, this panic sets over me to be like, did I just fuck up? Yeah. You know, and I don't feel that way if I go eat, you know, a delicious meal with my husband and I eat pasta or whatever. But, you know, in I eat 80 percent, I eat really, really well. Right. So in my bucket of like this is the meal that I'm eating that is like in my like me eating well and good for me and what what serves my body. Like does something like sourdough, does it like serve my body?

27:02It depends. Right. In terms of like, does your body do you have a leaky gut? Because if you do, then like even that small amount of gluten may be inflammatory for you. Right. So that's kind of where there is more minutia with it. But I think that most women, what I see, are eating too much fat and a moderate amount of carbohydrate alongside that. So here's the thing, right, is that you've got three macronutrients. You have protein, you have carbs, and you have fat. Your body does not store protein very efficiently for energy. So from like a cycle perspective, eating just protein, it's not going to get you very far in terms of telling your brain, hey, this is safe for reproduction.

27:34we need enough protein, but that doesn't need that shouldn't be the core, you know, focus when we're talking about reproduction. That is a full fucking like core focus for me with most of my meals. Yeah. And it is important. So I'm not saying it's not important. It's just that if we're talking about the, you know, macronutrients that our body is going to get this safety signal from, it's going to be carbs and fat.

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31:37I have been eating a lot of beans. Okay, I love beans. I'm a huge bean advocate. I've been like fiber. Yeah. Complex carb. but like let's break down even like so what should breakfast be and i work out in the morning and i don't want to be like super full when i work out so like what's like a great i take my aminos before i work out i'll have like one shot of coffee but i eat something before i just started doing like half a banana maybe just like a couple spoonfuls of of uh yogurt but like what's a good like pre-workout meal yeah yeah so kind of what i was saying is like you want to make sure that we we need to be mindful of how much carbohydrate someone's consuming because if you are consuming too much at the wrong times, then we are going to get that insulin resistance, right?

32:14And that is going to make it harder for fat loss. So one of the ways that is really effective is to time your carbohydrates around exercise. Use the exercise benefits that you have to your advantage. Because when you exercise, particularly when you do resistance training, your muscle is like a sponge to carbohydrates. They're not stored very effectively. Those carbohydrates are getting stored into your muscle. They're not getting stored as fat as they would be in a meal outside of exercise. So and carbohydrates are really great around exercise because they're our primary fuel. So they're going to make you be able to push harder in your workout.

32:48You work out harder, right? You're going to be able to build stronger muscles, get fitter, faster. They also help blunt cortisol after workouts. How many women are not losing fat because they are in a chronic cortisol, high cortisol position? There have been so many times in my life where I'm working out and not losing weight. And I'm like, I look like I'm training for the big game. I'm all full. And my dad was an offensive lineman. I'm like, I'm just my dad right now. You know, because the fat's not going away, but I was just getting like bigger and bigger. Yeah. So am I having the carbs before I work out?

33:18Before and after. And after. So those are my carb times. Those should be your carb heavy meals. And then your meals furthest away from exercise should be where we're focusing on more fat and fiber. Okay. So that would be like, you know, an idea could be, you asked about pre-workout. pre-workout I would even recommend switching your banana over for a starch source okay it's going to be a little bit I just started eating bananas because I had like a little blender recently I felt really sick and I did a blood test and the doctor was like I had to go to fucking urgent care but the doctor was like you have the lowest potassium I've like ever they like wouldn't let me leave until I took these like potassium pills and drank this stuff so just the last couple weeks I've been like I'm just gonna like throw in a banana really quick because I'm just like I know that I need some, but like ideally what kind of, what other starch should I be having before I work out?

34:04Yeah. So you could do like a good granola and oats. Yeah. Like a glyphosate free oat would be a really high quality option. Not if you have it with protein. And if you're doing it before your workout, we actually want some of that blood sugar. Great. Yeah. And your muscles are going to be using that carbohydrate really effectively. So just making sure that like you're having it within 30 to 60 minutes of starting your workout. It shouldn't be a crazy large serving, you know, it could be like a quarter to a third of a cup of oats. Sometimes I even have clients where they're like, I really can't stomach anything before I work out.

34:34It's hard for me because I feel sick when I use it and then I work out. Or they're like having to work out at like 5 a.m. because they're trying to like mom work and like all the things, you know. So I'll have them do like a really high quality oat milk with their coffee and some collagen. And, you know, everyone's like... Yeah. It's like super simple. I could make oat milk myself, right? So I'm not having... Because oat milk is not... You know, people say it's not good for you, right? Yeah, it wouldn't be the best option if you were having like a coffee outside of your workout because it is higher in carbs.

35:00They typically like some of the lower quality ones have like seed oils and things in them. But we're talking about like a, you know, good quality oat milk. We're using this as like your oat. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it's just in the liquid form. And then you have a little bit of caffeine, which does help with like perceived work exertion. So you're going to be able to work out a little bit harder. And then there is some research to also show that especially when women are in high estrogen states. So whether that's like around ovulation or a lot of times happens in like perimenopause, PCOS, where there's more of this estrogen dominance.

35:28I have a lot of estrogen dominance. Yeah. So collagen before exercise can actually help blunt some of the like soft tissue related issues that can happen when you're in a high estrogen state. What about bone broth? Yeah, you could do that as well. You could do like a cup of bone broth or like a scoop of bone broth protein as well. Amazing. Wow, I'm obsessed. And now I'm going to romanticize this collagen coffee with like a yummy oat milk that I want to make for myself. Yeah, you should do it. That's so great. Yeah. I've been taking aminos before I work out. Do we love aminos before I work out?

35:59So the thing with aminos is that they compete with absorption of the protein that you're going to consume. Shut the fuck up. Yeah. So you want to do aminos on an empty stomach. And then if I, so if I do aminos first thing, how long do I wait before I consume something? Like, I don't even know if I'll have enough time before I work out. I would just do your don't do the aminos when you wake up. Do the pre-workout snack workout because you're working out really early and then do the aminos either like during your workout. If you like the taste of them, you want something to sip on or you could do them like between lunch and dinner.

36:27Wow, really? Yeah. I thought that I needed them like before my workout. No, because you're going to get all those aminos in the protein source that you're going to have in your pre-workout. And you're aiming for about 15 grams of protein for it to be sufficient pre-workout. And what about creatine? Yeah, creatine's great. I like creatine better post-workout. Yeah, I do it after workout. But you can add it into your post-workout meal or your breakfast. And what's my post-workout meal? Yeah, so carbs would be the priority. Protein as well. I'm not eating enough carbs. I had that toast this morning, but usually I'll scoop cottage cheese with turkey bacon and an egg.

37:02It's very protein-y. Well, you need protein for sure, but your body is going to use those carbs effectively. You might as well do it. Totally. Just go. you're like, just have them, you know, have them there, like enjoy it, right? Have them at that meal. So I would even try to like have that as your base, make sure that there's not like too much fat in some of those protein sources. Cause sometimes I find people are doing a lot of like sausage with egg, with avocado. We start to get into a situation where it's like now all three things are fatty, high fat and high carb. And that's what we want to prevent is like, we want to tell the body, we want to send a very clear message when it comes to fat loss.

37:36Is the body burning carbs at this meal or is it burning fat? So we don't want to have like a high fat and high carb meal together. So how do we tell the body we're burning fat? That's carbs and protein. Yeah. So after a workout, I would do carbs with protein. You can have a little bit of fat, but it's just the carbs are the priority. And what kind of carbs should we have? Yeah. So you could do the sourdough if your body tolerates that fine. If you are going to do fruit as some of your carbs, you just want to make sure that there's fruit and starch. You don't want to do fruit by itself because fruit preferentially restores your liver glycogen.

38:06And after a workout, you've burned mostly your muscle glycogen and starch refills muscle glycogen. Okay. So what are our starch options? Yeah. So the beans you mentioned, like I love beans. Those are great. You could do them there. You could do the oats. You could do sourdough. I mean, I typically do sourdough or I'll have a smoothie and I'll do like a berry smoothie. And then I put a bunch of granola on top of it. God, to me, granola is like such like a bad girl thing to eat. It feels like a candy bar. Yeah. But post-workout, you're going to get like... This is going to make me burn fat? Yes.

38:34Yes. It's going to make that way more effective for you. It's fucking mind-blowing to me that I could eat granola to get a summer blood. It's crazy. And then you just need to be mindful about the meals outside of exercises. Like those meals, we're thinking like blood sugar support, like more fiber, more fat, right? More protein, more veggies. You know what I did recently that was really yummy? I made soup. I did bone broth and white beans. And then I sauteed in some chicken, Italian sausage and collard greens. Perfect. And the next day I had it for breakfast and I put it on in a pan and I cracked two eggs open in it and I had breakfast soup.

39:13Nice. And I was like, this feels right. Yeah. I was like, this feels like so nourishing. And I felt like good having the beans in the morning. And it was so wild because I finished the meal and I felt so satiated and my body responded so well to it that I was in like an elated state mood wise for hours. I was like, huh, that was crazy. Like my body just got the exact fuel it needed. I felt really good. I'm so used to it. I mean, I just spent so much of my life feeling like shit that it felt really nice. Right. I'll tell you that like I've seen so many blood sugar data, just different reports of people over the years.

39:45And beans are the number one thing that everyone does amazing with. TikTok taught me this. But doesn't it make people, some people so bloated? Yeah. So that's the kind of the thing is like if you have gut dysbiosis where there's like stuff going on in your gut microbiome, then we do have to be careful with them. But like, that's also another reason why we need to address what's going on in the environment, right? Because like you should be able to tolerate beans and feel great with them. And then what's a great like dinner option? What do you like for snacks for people? Snacks should be more protein forward.

40:10So I would definitely try to do something like, you know, if you're on the go, it could be like a protein shake, some jerky, some turkey slices. That's in my bag right now. These sticks are great. Yeah. Those are always good. Protein RTDs. I always love to have on hand if you can eat a quick thing. They're like the protein shakes that are already pre-mixed that you get like in the fridge section, you know, there's some good brands out there for those. So yeah, those are great for a snack. But I do, I will say that that's one thing we need to be really mindful of is I do think that that does hamstring people's fat loss is that they're snacking too much.

40:39Like they're not getting satiated enough for meals. Can I tell you, I'm doing this with my kids. Yeah. I feel like kids, I feel like I notice kids just like snack all day long and they don't sit down for meals. Yeah. And I obviously my kids have snacks, but like we treat it like where they've like sit down and it's like a thing. They can't just be like eating and walking around. And I find that because they're not snacking all day long, like when they do sit down to eat, they're like really eating what's on their plate. Good, yeah. It's so hard with kids though because it's like sometimes we use food to almost like appease them, you know?

41:07It's like - I don't do that. I'm not going to do it. Yeah, you have to get out of the - There's no, they don't eat in my car unless it's like, because it's like, then they're mindlessly eating. Yeah, exactly. They eat a lot. My kids eat like so much food, especially with a daughter with autism. I don't want people to be like, she's not feeding her kids. But I do think that you get in this bad habit of just like mindlessly eating and you're not like really, I want to teach them about food and that it's good and it's nourishing and we eat it as a family together. I try to do that myself. I just like don't want myself to like, I mindlessly snacked for so long.

41:37And you don't get the same hunger hormone response when you do that, you know? And that's what I always think of with like my son is I'm like, I want him to be really conscious of this meal because I know that that's going to tell his brain I'm satiated. when you're not aware of what you're eating. You're not sending that message. I try to not look at my phone when I eat things too because I know you don't send that message really when you're like mindlessly scrolling. It does get blunted. I want to talk about like actual training. So if someone, what's like an ideal setup between, you know, strike training, Pilates, like hot yoga, walking.

42:09And we'll say, you know, for someone who's in their 20s and 30s, like what's like an ideal kind of like weekly schedule? Yeah. Yeah. So I think that all women should be strength training to some extent. If that's new to you, you don't know where to start and something like Pilates feels more of a like entry point, then fine. But, you know, at some point we need to also like ask the question of like, are we challenging ourselves enough? Because I think that that's one of the issues I see is that when women are resistance training, we're very much like taught this, you know, this message or sent this message that if you push yourself that you're going to get bulky, right?

42:41But by pushing yourself is actually how you build muscle. And if my sister's with my trainer, she's been teaching me this over the last like year. You really have to challenge yourself when you are resistance training. Like you should be working at an RPE of like eight or so. RPE stands for rate of perceived exertion. So like on a scale of one to 10, it should be like exhausted around like rep like eight to 12. Yeah. Like there should feel like there's only one to two reps left in the tank of whatever exercise you're doing. Right. Exactly what like literally my last rep this morning, I was like, my sister was like, that's it.

43:11Yeah. Like when you feel like your body is failing at rep 12 is when you're in a good spot. Can I tell you what's so funny is like, I have four of my closest girlfriends training with my sister right now. And everyone is so scared of getting bulky. And it's been so funny to watch us all not get bulky, doing all these. And it's been like, we've all been working out with her now for like a year. Yeah. And it's been the most fun thing, like watching all of us, like, you know, right before 40 or into our 40s, like getting these bodies that like we are so proud of from doing these like this strength training workout.

43:45It's been like a really beautiful experience, but it has been something that we've all been so scared of. It's yeah. I mean, it is scary for women to definitely enter it. But then once you like start doing it, you notice that it's only like internally to what it's doing to your hormonal health and metabolic health is like nothing can can match it. But I think the big issue is like once women do start strength training is sometimes they get into a position where there's just too much volume. So that's one thing that we have to be very careful. That's what they've all been saying that now they're all starving.

44:14Yeah, yeah, yeah. You have to be very careful. It's like, are you doing too much? Because when you start to do too much, you get inflamed. And then that's when women are like, how come whenever I take a week off my workouts, I like lose four pounds or I like my face doesn't look puffy anymore. And I'm like, because what you are doing is you're doing too much. Right. And I was once a culprit of that where like I was just doing too much because I'm like, oh, more is more. Right. Like that's what we're always told. So what I find is that the more we can consolidate stressors, typically the better the body responds.

44:42Of course, everyone's situation looks different, but especially for people that are in more of like a high stress position, generally speaking, like two to three full body resistance training days lands the best. We want to be careful that we're not doing them back to back, that we have enough recovery in between because if you don't then your nervous system doesn't have enough recovery time let me ask you how i handle this because i'm now addicted to working out and it mentally it makes me feel really good and the fact that i'm able i've you know i do pilates too and so like now like literally what was it yesterday the day before day before yesterday i did a pilates class and the strength training is helping me in pilates so much and the pilates is helping me in the strength training so much.

45:26And so when I feel so strong in these classes, I obviously now I'm addicted to doing more. So if I do like, so legs I do on Monday, right? So if it's a leg day that where I'm not, you know, you can tell by the end of the day if you're going to be sore, right? If it's a leg day that was great, but it didn't, it's not like, it didn't kill me. Can I do Pilates the next day? Or should I really take that day off if Wednesday is an arm day? You're probably okay to do Pilates the next day. Pilates is like generally more restorative than it is like detrimental. I mean, it gets really hard, but I also feel like it's working really specific different areas on my body.

46:04Yeah, there's not the same. Like a squat and like a Pilates move on my butt are like two different groups. Yeah, yeah. It's a very different way that it's affecting the neuromuscular system. The one thing, though, that you may look at is just depending on like how many days per week are you hitting your legs? i'll do pilates once or twice a week and then i do one leg day okay so we get i walk a lot yeah walking's another amazing form of movement for sure for hormones your legs because they're the largest muscle group you get they really affect your body right they really affect your metabolic rate so when you do a workout that engages your legs you're going to get a greater growth hormone response and then because of that you're going to get a greater metabolism response so one way that you can work with that is try to do some leg movement every time you resistance train so instead of doing like a leg day you would be like doing legs each time you resistance train okay so each time you're resistance training say like i said like it's two or three days per week it's a full body full body workout so it's like maybe it's monday you do like a squat you do some lunges usually there should be a push a pull a hinge and a squat movement oh wow cool in each workout and then you do that again say on wednesday it's just a different type of exercise So like Monday, the focus is squat and Wednesday you're doing, you know, the focus is a hinge.

47:20It's a deadlift, but you're still doing the upper body as well alongside of that. That will actually give you a better metabolic response. The only caveat to that is like if you're really trying to hypertrophy, like say you're really trying to grow your glutes, you do want to have frequency with that. So in a situation like that, then it might be better to break up your lower body and upper body training. But that's a little bit more specific to someone that's like training for like bodybuilding or something. versus someone that's like, I'm just a girl because I like want to have good hormones.

47:52Totally. Yeah.

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51:38I'd love for you to like emphasize the importance of walking. Walking is like when I'm good about my walking, my life is different. So different. Yeah. I anytime I like personally, I ever feel like, oh, like I just feeling a little bit, you know, kind of just like my clothes are fitting tighter or anything. I'm like, you're not walking enough. Like you're walking has slipped. Right. So it's such an important tool that we have. And it's so low effort. It's so low impact. Like it does not feel like it takes up more time. Like I have this mental block where I'm like, oh, I got to go on this like long walk.

52:10I had to like romanticize walking for me. I also like had to realize that I have to also walk on days that I'm working out. Like it's not just like walking is my form of workout. Yeah. So now what I've been doing and obviously this isn't possible for many people. But like my my husband, I do drop off together every morning and then he'll leave me at school and I walk home with the dog. Nice. And that's like and I can take a meeting while I'm, you know, I try to like habit stack it. So I don't feel like shit. I'm like taking up an hour of my morning where I need to be working. But like as soon as like I started, it's been the last like three months.

52:46I've just been like walking more. I mean, I just feel like my digestion is so good. Yeah, it's so good for so many things. And I will say like, that's been one of the hardest things for me since becoming a mom is just like, I have guilt when I walk because I'm like, I could be, I need to be doing so many other things right now. That's how I feel. I'm like, this is so, and it just feels like you're not doing anything. And you're like, this is a fucking hour. You could be doing so much. I know. But does your son love going on walks with you? No, because he doesn't like the stroller. He doesn't like the stroller.

53:14So I have to carry him. And like, now he's getting so heavy. No fucking way. We're getting a little better with the stroller. but like only if I bring him a book or he has snacks. So then it's like we're in that situation where then he's like snacking in the stroller, right? Yeah, but that's fine if he gets him outside because he needs to also be outside. I know, yeah. And sometimes I'm like, I need like the mental break, you know, and I need to walk. But I have a walking pad too. Do you have one of those? You know what I do? And it's so funny. It's like under my bed. I never use it. I find it to be so helpful now.

53:43I know, but do you type on it or something? I do it when I like have kind of tasks that don't require a lot of brain power. So yeah, like in the morning, I usually will work for a little bit in like answering emails and messages. I just don't have the thing where I can be on a computer while I'm walking. So I got rid of mine. I used to have one of those. And I literally got this like organizer from Target that is not meant for it. It's like meant for putting socks in. OK. But I just like stack it up on its side and then put my computer on top of it on my desk. And it works perfectly. If I set that up, then I would be fucking cruising.

54:12Yeah. I would look at it. Because yeah, some days like it's the only way that I can make it work. Yeah, of course, especially by people who live on the East Coast. Like we're California girls over here. It's been like 30 degrees, two degrees. Like people haven't seen the sun in months over. And I think about it all the time because I always want to move to the East Coast. And everyone's like, it's so cold. Like, how are you going to go do your walks? It's so cold. I'm like, we have walking pads, right? You make like a little cave with like your red lights, your walking pad. Let's talk about red light because I just talked about it in my podcast a couple of weeks ago.

54:44I obviously have, you know, I love higher dose. and I, you know, we've had the founder on the podcast. And so they're really generous. I've bought some things and they've sent me some things. And I've always, I've read like, and I see what they say about how good it is for you. But for me, it was like, this is like an aesthetic kind of like hot girl thing. But my daughter's functional medicine doctor who specializes in children with autism did a post on her Instagram talking about, and I love this doctor because with every claim she makes, she puts the number of the study next to it. So people can't fucking fight her on these things.

55:17But she said that all of her patients, and I need to know, I just started doing it with Carmela, who all of our moms of kids with autism have said that almost out of all the supplements that she puts them on, that red light therapy has been one of the biggest changes it's made in her autism children, which makes me so emotional. So I was like, God, this is actually doing so much more for me than just getting rid of the wrinkles on my face. Yeah. Well, it's because mitochondrial health is a key piece of autism. Yes. And that's one of the ways that red light... She has zero mitochondrial function.

55:50Yeah. I can see it in her lab work. Yeah. And red light is amazing for improving mitochondrial function. So that's... Mitochondrial function is not just... I mean, there's so many ways that it impacts the body, like in terms of fertility. There's even research to show like using the red light on your pelvic area. There's been research to show like back and improve. That's what it said on her thing that there was a study with so many autistic children and all of us have such microbiome issues that putting the red light on their stomach helps with the microbiome. Yeah. Yeah. I did that when I was like trying to conceive.

56:22I would use it on my pelvis area. Yeah. So smart. Yeah. But you can also have patients use it on their thyroid because there are a lot of thyroid disorders. Yeah, of course. And thyroid, there's a lot of oxidative stress. And that essentially is like this mitochondrial health issue at play. You know what? Everyone should invest in that, in the higher dose face mask because it's like wobbly, you know? Like it rolls up. And so you can literally attach it to any part of your body, which is so great. And it's nice because you don't have to hold it. Because I have one that you have to hold and it's just like your arm starts to get tired.

56:52Yeah, of course. Especially if you need to put that thing on for like 20 minutes. What are other ways that you can increase mitochondrial function? Yeah. So a lot of those antioxidants that we talked about, Clutathione, glutathione, N-acetylcysteine, carnitine, selenium. Yeah, like all of those are super critical. Some people, depending on where they are in their healing journey, can be sensitive to some of them. So there's always like a kind of a timeline in terms of how we introduce them. But as a whole, those are one of the most powerful things. Just like toxin avoidance too, and anything that supports our detox pathways is really good for mitochondrial health.

57:25So when we think of detoxification, there's three phases to it. the third phase happens in our gut. So just getting your body going to the bathroom regularly, like it's one of the reasons why I love beans is because like they're so good for providing that soluble fiber that helps keep bowel movements regular. And then like phase one and phase two are very amino acid and antioxidant driven. So polyphenols, like foods that, you know, green tea, oh my gosh, my favorite. Antioxidants from berries. You've got your amino acids from protein sources, getting a wide variety of protein sources. Like all of those are such a key piece to improve.

58:00Have you taken fatty 15? Yeah, I have. It's the I'm not even like allowed to say the studies that they've done already on it because obviously there's legal and whatever. But, you know, I work with them and they will call me when they're like, this thing just came out and you can't tell anybody yet. But like the science behind C15 and fatty 15 is some of the most beautiful, incredible science I've ever seen. And since I started taking it years ago, I just feel like I got this internal glow up because it helps so much with your mitochondrial function. I sleep really well. That's why I'm dying to get Carmela to take it because I'm just like, I know this would change your life.

58:39Yeah. It almost like needed a liquid, huh? Maybe I could just take a pill and put it in something and shoot it in her mouth because I can give her some herbs and stuff. And she's been really good about taking the, I get the L-carnitine and her lucovorin compounded. I give her B12 injections every third day, too. I'm like really biohacking. I love it. This girl, because, you know, when you do the labs and you look at it, you're like, these are your like outward symptoms of autism are a function of your, they're, they are. Like deficiencies. Oh my God, what's the word I'm fucking blanking? It's like a symptom of her deficiencies.

59:17Yeah. They're all the same way that like my heavy period or my exhaustion or my brain fog is like a symptom of something happening in my body. So if we're so good about treating it this way, like I'm always just like autism has to be approached the same way. Of course. Because you can see that there's a baseline of like so many things with these kids. Yeah. And it affects us the same way. Like if our mitochondrial function is down, like we are not. So imagine being like a little kid and like trying to get your synapses to form and then you're up against like low mitochondrial function. It's like it's exhausting.

59:43I know. And kids are so developmentally sensitive to like I do lab work on some. kids sometimes. And I'm always just so surprised at, you know, like six, eight year olds, like parasitic infections, like crazy stuff going on in their gut microbiome. And they don't really know any different, you know, but their guts are just so they're still developing. So like, they don't have the gut immune system to protect them from these types of things. And it just makes you think that we need to be, you know, people always think of kids as being so robust as like, oh, we all just ate packaged foods. And like, we didn't need anything when we were kids.

1:00:12I'm like, no, kids actually need more support because their body is fragile. Like they don't have the same, you know, resources that we do. I know there are times where I'll see kids that are just like constantly upset or like really frustrated. And I'm always like, I don't, I think like, sure, part of this is personality and development. It's really hard having big feelings or whatever. But if you see it like chronically in your friend's kids or something, I'm just like, there's a fucking deficiency happening here. You know what I mean? Let's do some blood work. No, like this kid wants to be happy.

1:00:38He can't help it. You know what I mean? But I think that like chronic stuff. And I've learned a lot from Carmela's function talk, but it's the same thing with us, right? Yeah, totally. There's always a message. what supplements and you mentioned bunch but I would love to just be concise about it what supplements are actually worth the investment for women you know I mean there's a lot of like marketing around supplements right so let's name let's name a few supplements that you're like baseline you know I you feel safe to say most women should be taking yeah and maybe if you want to name a few that you're like these are being like heavily marketed and like you really don't need it yeah okay so baseline that I would say most of my patients which I typically don't start people on a lot of supplements until we get any blood work back, right?

1:01:15But I would say baseline once we get blood work back that most people are on is a vitamin D with K2 and K1. You know, there's so many genetics involved in this, but so many people are deficient in vitamin D. It's involved. It works like a hormone. It's involved in so many different inflammatory processes in the body. So I would say across the board, most people need that. We want to make sure it's always paired with K2 because when you take vitamin D, it increases calcium absorption and K2 is what directs the calcium into your bone. Oh, cool. Yeah. So most of them nowadays have that in there, but just making sure.

1:01:43Yeah, that would be one thing. A second, I really love cod liver oil. Cod liver oil has omega-3 fatty acids, which again, most people need because - My omegas were really low on my blood test. And when I take those pills, I burp fish all day. And so I haven't been taking them, but I need to. Thank you for the reminder. Yes, you need to. And it might be the type you're taking too, because there are different types. There's like ethyl-easter, ethyl-easter, there's triglyceride form. So you could look at - Which one should I get? I would do the triglyceride form. Okay. Yeah. So yeah, I would look at that.

1:02:10But I really love cod liver oil because it has retinol, which is the active form of vitamin A in it. Plus it has a little bit of D and E and K. That'll make your skin so nice. Skin as well as like so many women are iron deficient or they have issues. Totally just had iron infusion. Or issues with iron transport. So this would be really helpful for you right now is after the iron transfusion, you want the retinol because that's what actually directs the iron and tells the iron what to do. It's like the K2 for vitamin D. Got it. So I've never seen anyone that has high enough vitamin A levels. Like no one is eating enough vitamin A in their diet.

1:02:42Is there a brand of cod liver oil that you like? I like Carlson's, but most people don't like the taste of it. I don't care about taste. I'll do it. Even Nordic Naturals. Rosita's is one that's also very concentrated, but Nordic Naturals is probably like the easiest one to get down because it has a lemon flavor that's added to it. Yeah, I know. I don't mind that one at all. Yeah, it's my son takes it every day. And I don't burp that up like I do with the pills. Yeah, the liquid can sometimes be better tolerated. Yeah, definitely. Okay, what else? The minerals. You know, whether it's my mineral magic or it's some other type of mineral complex, I just think that a lot of times when people think minerals, they're taking a trace mineral supplement.

1:03:16Totally. And although trace minerals are important, we're looking for macro minerals as well, which would be things like selenium, magnesium, zinc. I don't recommend taking iron with those minerals because iron and calcium block each other's absorption. Oh, well. And, you know, if you aren't iron deficient, then taking iron can be a pro-oxidant. so it can be damaging to our mitochondria. So we want to make sure it's like, if you're iron deficient, yes, we're taking iron. We're just taking it at a separate time of day. Okay. If we're not iron deficient, we're not taking iron and we're getting all the other minerals.

1:03:46Okay. That's really important. The other one I gave you is energy nutrients, which that's like my mitochondrial support. So it has a lot of the like CoQ10, curcumin, like some of the mitochondrial support in there. But if not that, then just something, especially for women. So they take those separately. So that's nice that that's in love. Yeah. It's like all combined. But for women that are also trying to conceive that are 35 plus, I would definitely make sure like something you're taking has lots of CoQ10, has some carnitine, alpha lipoic acid, N-acetylcysteine. Like these are just really great antioxidants to protect your egg quality.

1:04:16So I would say those are probably the core ones that I have most of my patients on based off their blood work. And then like we'll use herbs and other like B vitamins and things, but those are really more so just based off what I'm seeing in their labs. What about magnesium? Oh, magnesium is in the mineral. Yeah. And some people need extra. But honestly, I find, you know, there's a lot of discussion about like everyone being magnesium deficient. I actually don't find that to be the case. And maybe it's because I work with a lot of people that are already eating really healthy diets. So they're like getting a pretty decent load of magnesium from their food.

1:04:47But I actually find things like zinc and copper and selenium to typically be lower than something like magnesium. Do you work with peptides at all with any of your clients? I don't do any peptides, no, but I have a lot of patients that are on them or using them. Wow. Amazing. Yeah. I know it was anything. I know so many people are like peptide stacking. I had a really bad reaction to the glow peptide, like really bad. Okay. Which is like, like I had like emergency rooms. I had like a extreme histamine response. Oh yeah. It was like really scary. I had like a cramp in my intestine that was like worse than like a contraction.

1:05:22Wow. And my hands, my whole thing I got, wow. It was really scary. Yeah. So I'm always like peptides but I'm like definitely make sure that your doctor does it with you yeah you know what you're working with I was I got bit by a dog and so I was doing the glow to like help with the healing process and I was taking it every day and it was fine and then like all of a sudden I had this like horrible histamine response yeah interesting I know yeah I think some people I was talking with a patient about this yesterday I was like she's on a lot of peptides I was telling her I'm like once we get your blood work back we probably can remove quite a bit of those that you're taking like I don't think you need that many I mean I think peptides can be helpful but I just think sometimes people are like overusing them because they're like being used as a bandaid because there's like underlying imbalance.

1:06:01But you're able to like get people on track where you're like, you don't need to be doing this. Yeah. I'm like, let's all work toward minimalism wellness, right? Where it's like, we should be able to like go on vacation and like not have to take 25 things with us and like be able to survive just fine. You're the first person I've ever heard fucking say that. It's like really refreshing. Yeah. And that's the goal, right? That's my goal is like, I don't want to be dependent off these things. Like I want to use them to help my body heal and support it in ways that I need to. But like, ultimately, like, I want to be able to go to Europe and just like eat bread and olive oil and like feel great.

1:06:30Okay. To round out the podcast, are there besides the supplements that you just said, are there any like, you know, daily practices that you think that like every woman listening to this podcast needs to implement into their like day to day life? Well, we talked about like strength training and walking, right? I think those are key. Red light also, of course. I think outside of that, the biggest thing I see across the board is just like nervous system issues, you know, just like so many people just feeling like dysregulated, like in fight or flight. And I find for a lot of women that are kind of more like anxious prone, that working that energy through their body is really effective.

1:07:05So I think a lot of times we think of like meditation, right, as being the only tool we have for supporting our nervous system. And it just doesn't work for a lot of people, especially ones that are more anxious prone, but something like somatic based meditation or yoga that's like really moving that energy through our body. I find to just like really, really be supportive for the nervous system. So I think ultimately we just have to find what works for us and everyone knows their body differently, but trying on different things that are for your nervous system for size and seeing what makes you feel more regulated because ultimately the place where, you know, not every day are you going to feel regulated, right?

1:07:39Like our world is difficult. cold, there's a lot of stress in life, but ultimately finding what keeps you out of that constant fight or flight is going to be one of the most supportive things that you can do for your overall hormone health. My little group of girlfriends all just did a bunch of testing with a functional medicine doctor. And one of them, you know, it came back that she was like was waking up with these like really high cortisol spikes. And so one of our other really good friends is a life coach my friend Whitney she comes on the podcast a lot and and I overheard her telling her it was like the sweetest thing she like gave her this practice to say when she wakes up in the morning where she was like feel you know acknowledge like your head on your body acknowledge your body like feel your feet on the ground say like I am safe I am happy today's gonna be okay she like just worked her through this like little thing to say in the morning and it was so cute and beautiful and I was like what a great way to because that can shift your entire nervous system rather than just like grabbing your phone and looking at the news or something.

1:08:36I was like, what a cute, sweet, like girlhood moment. Girls being supportive of one another. We love that. It was really nice. Thank you so much for coming. I'm like really dying to work with you. Yes, we'd love to. I'm like, it's so funny because I obviously listen to a couple of podcasts that you're on. And like, at some points I'm like, you're so intelligent. I have no fucking clue what you're talking about. I try to keep it as like applicable as possible. but like, you know, sometimes it can be challenging. But it's crazy that someone like me who has had so many doctors on this podcast has like spent the last 10 years, like really trying to be her best self, has invested a lot of money in functional medicine doctors, has never heard of T-fucking-3.

1:09:16I'm almost 40. So like, think about it. Like you really are here doing God's work. So thank you so much. I appreciate that. Of course. Thank you.

1:09:26And that, ladies and gentlemen, concludes this week's episode of Everything is the Best. I hope you enjoyed it. Please rate, review, subscribe, all that stuff. Maybe leave a comment. Go ahead and follow me on Instagram at Pia Barancini. And I hope you have a fabulous, fabulous rest of your day. Love you. Ciao.

1:09:52Please note that this episode may contain paid endorsements and advertisements for products and services. Individuals on the show may have a direct or indirect financial interest in products or services referred to in this episode.