When to Exercise, Gut Health Clues & The Cost of “Perfect”

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0:56welcome to the wellness scoop your weekly dose of health and wellness inspiration and as always we're both here as your hosts i'm ella mills and i'm riannon lambert and after a decade in the wellness industry we know how overwhelming and confusing health advice can be that's why we're here with this podcast to cut through the noise and make healthier living simple fun and personal

1:24we're back in person this morning which is so nice over the easter holidays we had a bit of a higgledy piggledy schedule but we're back i mean it feels like the first time recording the podcast again we were both so excited when we got in today yeah and also it's like a perfect day it's like so beautiful blue sky outside as well walked from the station got a coffee energies in the room i even saw ella munching on popcorn this morning i was like there's something in the air today. I have never seen you do that. I didn't like popcorn. I always used to think popcorn was the world's most overrated snack.

1:56And I was just, yeah. Welcome to our world, Ella. Oh my gosh. I was just eating the wrong popcorn. I know. It was the prep popcorn. I was eating this one in the sweet and salty. It's absolutely 10 out of 10. That's my airport snack every time. Oh my, it's become my train station snack on the way home. But I've been making it as well with um may at home and it's so fun i know it's a great little thing to do and so ella what have we got coming up in today's show we have got so much good stuff we have got a listener message that we want to talk about in a second we have got a lot about what's changing within the uk school food system and why that matters whether we're exercising at the right or wrong time of the day for us which is interesting from an individual approach what our gut might already know about our future health that's some amazing new research which I'm excited to talk about the hidden risk behind the perfect body trend that's a bit more on looks maxing which is incredibly alarming why everyone's suddenly showering in the dark maybe a weird one let's see how that goes and then we had the snack tin trend which I'm kind of obsessed with it's aesthetic but it's making food feel joyful again but Rhi shall we start with this feedback that we had from a listener.

3:09Yeah, it's absolutely lovely. So the feedback says, you know, this isn't a question, but I wanted to let you guys know, I'm a fit and thin 28 year old, but due to the societal pressures, I felt the need to experiment with GLP-1s. So those are the weight loss injections. Your podcast helped me realise that that's not necessary. And I cancelled my follow up appointment and told the provider I've chosen against it. I can't believe I went down that route but I'm so thankful to you guys for reminding us that bodies come in all shapes and sizes and that there is so much toxicity behind these shrinking trends.

3:47I mean so much to say on that and the reflection on kind of culture and society and the oddness in so many ways the health and wellness industry but it's also I think for both of us we as Ree said a second ago we just love making the show we love our monday mornings together but also you know because we do this and we obviously can't see you guys as we make each episode and we love your feedback and we read your messages all of them and then we get messages like this and it's this amazing tangible example of a positive impact that the wellness scoop is having and it just honestly it's so humbling to know it's like a hug and a mug a hug and a mug yeah i love it it really is how it feels like But you just want, if we'd seen you in person and you said that, I'd just give you a big cuddle if you're a cuddle person.

4:35But I just don't think that you're alone in that feeling. And I think that's the bit that's so odd, isn't it? This sense of, yeah, this kind of. Pressure and access to medication. Perfectionism and the idea of trying to look a certain way because that's what we see around us and what we see online. and I obviously totally understand and appreciate and respect that these medications 100 % have a time and a place absolutely but it's this idea of the kind of cultural norm of shrinking that we're referring to and then people feeling the pressure it being forever because the problem with the medications is you know people are struggling coming off them staying on them how do you adapt your life without any support and there's a lot of things that are coming up now with the meds, the side effects.

5:23The other thing that I'm seeing everywhere is stuff on peptides again. I know, but I'm seeing debunking, which is great. Maybe in my algorithm, I've got all of these doctors saying, no, this is the biggest waste of money ever, which I'm really happy to see. But you're right, peptides are in all the big mags. Vogue, I saw it in as well. Everywhere. I saw it in The Guardian last night. Yeah, people talking about peptide, peptide stacking, the fact that some of it's going to be regulated potentially and more available. but I have to say just completely honestly I have times where I'm like oh well shall I be taking them like am I getting it wrong when all these people are saying oh this will change your life but it's the same as collagen do you remember the hype like in a year or two that might go down again I mean and I obviously then sense check myself yeah but when you see these things everywhere and you see people saying the best thing I've ever done for my health my energy is completely different people showing like this is completely like anti-age to me 10 years it's quite tempting.

6:20Very tempting and you're right we do we do question ourselves I do it too I'll see it but I'll always go and look it up because I even have to go and look it up to be sure that it's not a thing and my common sense is saying well you can't just consume a peptide that's broken down and amino acids and expect it to go to your face or your muscles directly you don't know where it's going to go. Well that's exactly what we're saying isn't it about collagen which is then what the most recent research showed that we talked about a month or so ago which is I I always said it to people. It's like, it's not that collagen's irrelevant.

6:48It's just that you can't tell it to go to your 11 lines as opposed to your baby toe. This is Ella's analogy. Does it go to your baby toe? You just don't know. Or is it going to those like 11 lines or that, you know, lines around your eyes, the ones that matter, whatever it is to you most. And basically the research shows, yeah, it could go to your baby toe. It's better to wear sun cream, which we'll probably have to touch on again this summer. Because again, I'm seeing a lot of anti-sun cream posts again at ReservSing. But there's so many things. But thank you so much. if you ever want to share anything with us, you are not alone.

7:19And I think it helps to do so. Yeah, exactly. And I think that was the key thing from that message is that that pressure is so real. And if you feel it, I think it's just which is why we both saying like we read these things too and think, oh, gosh, are we getting this wrong? Should we be doing it? Like it's completely normal. There's so much noise. There's so much pressure. It's a very human instinct. So you guys aren't alone in that. You're not alone. Well, Ella, before we get into our pickups today, how have you've in because you just got back from the beautiful sicily i have i'm a hermit it's my first time in london in a month i mean for ella who lived here worked here breathed here that is a big deal oh my gosh i've like honestly become such a hermit like we spent our whole weekend in and out the garden center weeding oh my gosh it's just so fun talking of weeding on tiktok what i'm being served right now because i don't spend any time on that platform apart from to upload is those sticks that you stick in the ground and then it gets to the bottom of the root you know the dandelion root and it pulls it up and I so nearly brought my first ever TikTok shop purchase oh I want to see what that is because we bought one at the garden center but I don't feel like it gets under the root guys we're like 98 well do you know what I don't know if I trust it I know TikTok shop's huge and everyone's like you should be a TikTok shop with your books but I I am a bit apprehensive about shopping on that platform so I'll send you a link anyway you've been gardening which is fantastic oh my god I'm just obsessed we've and I planted all my like like veggie seeds and dahlias as well.

8:46I keep checking them, like signs of life. None yet, but let's see. But my seeds are coming also. I've got like eight different types of tomatoes, three different cucumbers, all these squashes. Because you've got an actual greenhouse. Yeah, we have a little greenhouse. You can do proper tomato growing. Oh my gosh, it's so fun. Yeah, it's very exciting. And I don't know, it's just really grounding. I feel like this is my new hobby in life. You can see why people have this entire life ahead of them of a gardening adventure. Oh my gosh, me too. and we were both like right we'll never leave home ever again because we've just got to be here for our garden there's actually so you know there's so much science and knowledge behind it we were staying at woolly grange in wiltshire and for me that's back home it's somewhere i've always seen growing up just special and my boys went they kind of ran away from me as kids do you know they run through the gardens and they found the gardener and they started asking the gardener questions about this glorious garden and i learned that um the reason they keep the weeds until the end of May or mid-May, it's because the bees really need that before all the flowers come into bloom and different types, because bees don't love tulips, apparently.

9:47And there were so many tulips in this garden. I didn't know. You know, there's so much knowledge in a garden that I know nothing about. And the boys were fascinated. Like, oh, what's that bee? What's that type of bee? You know, and it's amazing, but we need the bees. So thank you for gardening, because every new species is a food for the bees. Well, I'm loving it. How are you? Good. I am inspired. It was the London Marathon this weekend. Yes. Every year I tell myself, maybe I'll run it. Now I've got, I feel like I've gotten old enough to now be like, stop, stop telling yourself that. We've all got callings in life and we have to embrace what we're good and what we're not good at.

10:24I'm good at crying and watching and donating. So that is. Not the running. Not the running. Congrats to anyone who did it. Everybody, you are remarkable. But some of the stories, I just, I end up just stuck in a scrolling algorithm marathon, crying my eyes out. Like, it's amazing what people run for us. I know that you've been there with Matt in the past. Yeah, I signed him up for it, basically. Because I've always said, I was like, I should run the marathon. I don't know why I had it in this, like, bucket list thing. I don't know why it's your bucket list. And by the way, I hate running. So I feel like it's not really very big.

10:56We have that in common, Ella and I. We are not runners. We are walkers. But anyway, my mother-in-law died of brain cancer. and after she died we were talking to the brain tumor charity and you know we both said look we've got a profile at the moment we'd love to use it how can we help you how can we support we were really kind of shocked to learn that basically no progress had been made in brain cancer research in over 20 years or and you know it's the leading cause of cancer in under 40s anyways and i said well what can we do and they said well you know marathons are like the best way to raise awareness right we'll run both of us will run and Matt looked at me like really and then didn't you get pregnant yeah yeah having so then didn't never even bought a pair of shoes because two weeks later I found out I was pregnant but I had to announce we were doing it said we were doing it committed doing it so he had to run it I think I remember you riding a bike next to him yeah I was when he was training I was like yeah I felt so guilty I was like I'll do anything I'll cook Oh yeah, cheerlead you, whatever.

11:55Honestly, yeah, everybody, anyone that runs a marathon, you are absolutely remarkable and inspiring. So a humongous pat on the back because you've done something wonderful and also, wow, the recovery afterwards. I mean, that is intense recovery. And we are launching Retrition Plus any week now. And - How's all the prep been? It's a lot. It's a lot of prep to build a space or a platform because this isn't an app, everybody. It's not something that's been done before because you get exclusive content from the clinic. So it's like a nutrition journey. You can go on different journeys. We're going to start with menopause.

12:30Then for the next marathon, we can lead a group of people for marathon nutrition workshops. We've had so many marathon nutrition questions. Yeah, we have loads. And you get access in an affordable way. It's less than like an expensive cup of coffee a month for a lunch on the go. and you get access to the amazing clinicians in my clinic or brands we trust, discount codes, all sorts of things and it's all there. And you can ask your question directly and everything you need is in one safe space. So that's Retrition Plus. The link I'll pop in the bio for you. But Ella - Is it coming any day now or is that too much pressure to say that?

13:03I think it is any day now. I should be getting sign off tomorrow. I'm very nervous to put a date on it because I know from speaking to Ella, launching many businesses, there's always something that crops up last minute and I get nervous to put a date in it. But we've got a really big sign up list, a waiting list and you'll all get first dibs. Amazing. We'll just say soon. Yeah, soon, coming soon. Ella, I'm really bad at talking about things about myself, as you know, but I did see this incredible campaign. Now, Ella was in Sicily and I'm really sorry that I sent this over while you were on holiday.

13:32No, I had wrecked myself out of social media as well. So she sent me a link and I was like, I had to like video screen grab it, didn't I? Video screen grab the link from the page. I was like, I cannot believe this campaign in 2026 is happening. and I got really excited about the Slingshot campaign. Yeah, have you guys seen it? It's, I think, as I said, I'm a hermit, so I haven't really been out recently. She's not in our world right now. She's in the garden, which is a beautiful thing to be. I'm in the garden. But we were saying there's over 750 ads in over 200 London Underground stations, which I think has got to be pretty much every station.

14:09Over 2 ,000 ads inside two cabbages' carriages. and it's all over social media as well. Yeah, and the goal is to end factory farming by 2040. Now that still seems a long way away to me, but when you look at when you set goals. I think it's a really ambitious goal. It is ambitious still when you think about it, but the campaign is led by Project Slingshot. So it's a new activist group with lots of names you recognise on TV, actresses and actors that you'll recognise. Dr Amir is leading it as well. And the core message is called Don't Buy It. they're finally addressing the quality of the produce wheat in terms of meat and how unfair it is for any animal to be raised in the conditions that they are raised in just to be food essentially I mean let's give them a life before that happens yeah I think it's this interesting conversation we obviously talk a lot particularly when we've talked about UPFs about the lack of transparency in our food industry and I think when you sent this to me that was what was really interesting to me about it is that I think across the board, we saw it with the kind of panorama documentary that came out about baby food recently and the pouches and the fact that actually they're nothing that what people think they are.

15:20And unfortunately, and I'm not trying to be like a conspiracy theorist here, the reality I've worked in the food industry for almost 15 years. The reality is it is such a con. The vast majority of the food industry is one enormous con and it is all about marketing messages and it hides a lot of things. And I think the Slingshot campaign is very much speaking to that, which is that you'll see like a picture of a happy chicken or something. On the packet, yeah, happy eggs. Exactly. But actually, and I'm not saying it's those ones in particular, but then you see the reality of factory farming and it's so not what we think of as farming.

15:56When I was writing the plant-based book, it was looking at the amount of space hens have and what free range actually equates to. and they're not actually free range. Yeah. And so I think it's a really interesting conversation. And we talked about this as well. Like we both obviously, you know, really passionate about getting people eating more plants and more broccoli and excited about carrots and lentils and all the rest of it. I don't think either of us have ever had a message of everyone must be veggie, not at all. Oh no, you've got to do you. But equally, I think just like with UPFs or just like with baby food, with all of it, I think it's just having more transparency so that when you're in shops and when you're spending your money, you have more clarity on what you're buying.

16:34And I think this is a really interesting campaign, again, for just kind of shifting the dial on what people tell you versus reality. Because I think, as I said, after almost 15 years in the food industry, the gulf between the two really is, like, it's really concerningly enormous. The reality is, even though we have a cost of living crisis and zero nutritional education in the curriculum, let's be honest, the reality is if you're not spending a lot on animal produce you're not getting happy quality meat and I think if you're going to eat meat and you're informed those are decisions that we have to be responsible for and so does the food industry and essentially that's what don't buy it is saying you know let's question this yeah it's calling for clarity and I think we need that across all facets of the food industry so yeah it's really interesting well done slingshot campaign We're loving that.

17:27And then we have a second pick up following on from the health benefits of optimism. Ella, good news. I love a good news headline. A positive attitude may reduce risk of dementia. Yeah, I saw this and I thought, yeah, obviously we talked a few weeks ago about the health benefits of optimism and that actually a positive attitude and trying to find the glass half full or the sunny side up or whatever you want to call it. actually is not just, you know, nice to have. It's actually genuinely move style on your health. And there's so much research on that. But there was a new piece of research that came out.

18:00And this was from researchers in the US and in Finland, included the Harvard School of Public Health. They were analyzing just over 9 ,000 cognitively healthy adults in the US, an average age of 73, following them up over 14 years. And what they saw was that the people in that cohort with the most optimistic outlook had the lower risk of developing dementia. And each increase that those people had on the optimism scale, how good is an optimism scale, was linked to about a 15 % reduction in risk. I mean, the findings held even after adjusting for the age, the health, the education and depression, and they weren't explained by early undiagnosed dementia.

18:39So researchers obviously are suggesting this might be potentially driven by the fact that when you're more optimistic, you may experience lower stress because you just handle different situations in a different way. Stronger social connections potentially can reduce stress. We know the more we talk and we speak and we're open, we're not bottling it up. Higher physical activity levels. Again, apart from if you have that specific gene, which I know one of those marathon runners was running with the fridge on his back and he's made headlines everywhere because he knows he's going to get dementia under the age of 40 because he's got that gene.

19:11most of us let's really try and embrace our half cup our full cup our everything cup i know our just like overflowing cup yeah absolutely it's so much easier though when the sun is shining my husband's like yeah well we should just move abroad then i'm like the grass is not greener darling the grass is not greener and also i feel like i'm so appreciating spring because it was winter can i just say for anybody that is living or able to escape london for the day blue bell woods this time of year oh they are just magical like actual fairy gardens i just love them i love them i totally agree we have another pickup ella oh yeah i guess we've gone from really positive to which is going to take a quick deep dive at least we had one in there everyone because we do want to give it out but this is important and this is a kind of relatively niche but it's really shocking we obviously were talking a second ago about um glp1s and the pressure around that that obviously affects everybody as in like all different genders and sexes whereas we've been talking about the manosphere and looks maxing which is a little bit more kind of male dominated as a conversation and there was this interview and piece in the sunday times and the interview was with a doctor from the university of edinburgh and it was honestly so shocking and basically what it was saying is their anabolic steroid use among young men which is often driven by this kind of hyper-mascular looks maxing-esque manosphere.

20:40It used to be and still is predominantly used in the body composition competitions you know the how lean can you get and how bulked up can you get. Exactly and so it's obviously it's solely an aesthetic decision in this case to use this And doctors are now starting to see, as I said, rare. This isn't kind of mass, but still incredibly serious consequences, which is these aggressive forms of liver cancers. And they're seeing them in these men in their 20s to 40s, which is extremely unusual in otherwise healthy people. But it's because of these steroids. And our liver is our detoxification system.

21:16It must be completely and utterly devastating to have an overload of that. And this is what this surgeon from the University of Edinburgh was saying. He was talking about these like, yes, it's kind of small scale because this obviously isn't a huge population wide issue, but these real terminal cases of cancer linked to steroid use. And he was calling it a silent killer, which was in the headlines. But he was saying how basically what they're seeing is these patients becoming so obsessed with their image that they were then even reluctant to stop taking the steroids after their cancer diagnosis and after the cause of the cancer, the steroid use being identified.

21:50He was talking about this one case. He had a man in his early 30s. He had two tumours the size of grapefruit they described removed in a very complicated operation. Luckily, he survived. The doctor said his long-term outcomes could be very positive if he could stay off steroids. But he didn't believe it was certain this man would be able to do that. This is when psychology and body image is such a humongous topic. And I am so glad that they are now banning mobile phones at schools for under 16s and all these sorts of things. it's all interlinked everything is interlinked it's the pressure the societal pressure but it's so psychologically damaging it's nuts isn't it anyway he noted there was this kind of irony of taking drugs to make yourself more beautiful but ultimately shortening your life and just how insane that is and i was also quite shocked that there's up to a million people in the uk between half million and a million people in the uk using steroids often without medical supervision so this is obviously totally different to what we were just saying about like otherwise healthy you know slimmer people using glp1s but i think it's all the same same with peptides it's all of these drugs that we don't need and taking them because of this societal pressure to look a certain way and i read this book yesteryear over the last week which is essentially this kind of black mirror take on ballerina farm you know that instagram account and it's this pitfall of what goes wrong with the kind of influencer culture and performing for an audience extremes oh my gosh anyway it's just all of this has just so got me i've got kind of obsessed with it at the moment i wrote very long sub stack about it about this like obsession that we have with performing a life for other people and this all links not real unless you get a like or unless yeah but do you know i do think you know with age comes wisdom is what people used to say does it and you know i I don't feel wiser.

23:44I think we do because look how we're discussing things. Like, would we have been having these discussions in the same depth? I mean, yes, we were always on this bandwidth, but it's very rare. Most people don't have a mature brain until 25. And that's a fact that our brain has not matured until 25 years old. And we're being exposed to these trends in social media and access to these drugs and medications from teenage years up in those early 20s. And then we're talking about that cosmetorexia. Yeah, exactly. you know then you've got eight-year-olds wanting like retinol from sephorides 100 % because people are being exposed to it in such a bombarding way that I am not surprised that that many people are on on the steroids if I'm being honest it all links into eating disorders or body image disorders and all sorts of dysmorphic way a way of viewing oneself but 100 % I think when you're that age you're not thinking about longevity in the same way as a 30, 40 year olds thinking about longevity.

24:42No. Anyway, what were the single observations in the 30s, 40s? Anyways, it's just this. To me, the interesting part is all these different facets of the same conversation. You know, it's like, call it cosmetorexia or the GLP-1 conversations and kind of celebrities shrinking or steroid use and looks maxing and all the rest of it. It's all facets of the same thing, which is just this insurmountable pressure to be quote unquote perfect. it's very very very sad and worrying um but i think if we move forwards and we just watch this space and we just try and break people out of the the maze the maze yeah thank you for sharing that one i think it's really important we discuss things like that

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27:17Find more with Les in store and at REI.com. It leads us on to our first headline today, Ella. Right. Rhea is going to lead on this one because she's been doing lots of interviews on it. This is so her remit. And I can't wait to learn a bit more from her. But this is about the school food standards shake up. What does it mean? So there were loads of headlines over the last couple of weeks because there's been some big new policy changes and announcements about school food in the UK. Most of the headlines talking about banning fried food and desserts. But what's actually happened? Well, we know things are bad.

27:53I don't think we can brush over the fact that nutrition in this country has kind of peaked at an all-time low. At the moment, we know just 19 % of children aged 5 to 15, so we're talking primary school all the way up until teenage years, are meeting the five-a-day fruit and veg recommendation. It drops even further. Teenagers aged 11 to 18, only about two to three portions on average, which is just 9 % of them hit the target, Ella. So we have to look at inequalities. Obviously, there's so many issues here, but one place where children should be able to go to be safe, to have a healthy meal every day at school.

28:28And I think that's undeniable. For some children, very sadly, we know that it's the only meal they'll get a day that could be balanced. And what's so absurd is that there's been no changes to this guidance for well over two decades, really, when you think about updated school food. every school's different depends on the catering company depends on the chef in the school depends on anybody's willingness to do something about it within each school of course i talk i wax lyrical about fiber all the time only eight percent of children over the age of two meet their recommendations it's just so tragic it drops to three percent in the lowest income households this is predisposing children as we know in adulthood to bowel cancer to poor heart health to poor gut health, which links to poor mental health and the vicious cycle, being overweight, more hyperpalatable ultra processed foods.

29:20The dominance of ultra processed foods in schools is unbelievable with 61 % of calories in primary school lunches coming from UPFs. That rises to 70 % in secondary schools. Now, I remember at secondary school, Ella, I went to a school that was now, it's so bad, it's been knocked out. It was a very bad state school. But there were some nice teachers there that always are gems that pull people through. I remember when the ultra processed pasties came in. Every lunch I would go and buy in this like paper bag. It was so greasy. I remember the most delicious cheese and onion ultra processed pasty. And then I'd get the huge golden syrup leaking out the bottom, you know, flapjack from the campaign.

29:56And then the vending machines came in. Everyone wanted something from the vending machine. I'd have Skittles every day, Yolkabar every day. And how is that a food environment that anybody should aspire to put their children in to enable their learning at school. So the new guidance is that they aim and I'm talking guidance. It's not even mandatory yet. And is it going to be mandatory or no, it's just guidance? Currently just guidance. Okay. I mean, how they're consulting, but it's positive. I want to say it's a positive thing because they want to get rid of deep fried food. I mean, hallelujah, there shouldn't be any deep fried food at school.