Speaker 1: Personally the old Man.
Speaker 2: We are officially in season three. How I have done
Speaker 2: already fifty one episodes.
Speaker 3: Is wild and amazing.
Speaker 2: I'm just really happy that this podcast exists. It's been
Speaker 2: a fun last few weeks with the employees and residents
Speaker 2: of Apes Garden talking all about their life story and advice.
Speaker 2: If you love that episode or any other episode in particular,
Speaker 2: let me know as I start planning this new season
Speaker 2: this weekend. Next we're getting into some health and wellness
Speaker 2: but root cause style. Stephanie Adler joins me this week.
Speaker 2: She is a hormone, gut health and fertility practitioner. She
Speaker 2: helps people get to the root cause of issues, and
Speaker 2: I think that's what we're all looking for these days.
Speaker 1: So let's go.
Speaker 2: I'm here right now with Stephanie Adler. She's a functional
Speaker 2: health practitioner and really focus on helping people find the
Speaker 2: root cause of so many things. And we're going to
Speaker 2: get into a lot of topics. But Stephanie, I'm really
Speaker 2: happy to have you here.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Morgan, I'm so excited to be
Speaker 1: here with you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is going to be fun.
Speaker 2: Okay, We're going to start like bottom kind of out
Speaker 2: of the barrel, because gosh, with so.
Speaker 3: Much content and things to consume, we.
Speaker 2: Are getting constantly so many different understandings of what it
Speaker 2: means to be healthy and to eat healthy. But in
Speaker 2: your expertise, what does that actually mean and what does
Speaker 2: it look like?
Speaker 1: Totally? And I just want to have a lot of
Speaker 1: sympathy and compassion for anyone who's about to hear what
Speaker 1: I'm about to say and be like, so everything I've
Speaker 1: been doing my whole life has been wrong, because that's
Speaker 1: definitely how I felt. And so a little bit of background.
Speaker 1: I was like so into health and wellness and like
Speaker 1: thought that I was doing all the things and reading
Speaker 1: all the BuzzFeed lists and all this and all the
Speaker 1: Instagram posts. And then I went to school nutrition, but
Speaker 1: holistic nutrition. I chose not to go the way of
Speaker 1: the registered dietitian. Here's the FDA's food pyramid recommendations, and
Speaker 1: it blew my mind because it was so different from
Speaker 1: what I thought was healthy. I had been like a
Speaker 1: pseudo vegetarian who was a pescatarian, and I was like,
Speaker 1: up on my high core, some of this is the
Speaker 1: healthiest thing, like Butter's the devil, And now I recommend
Speaker 1: to my clients animal fats and more animal fats. It
Speaker 1: is so important for every single cell in our body
Speaker 1: that we have a really healthy cell membrane which is
Speaker 1: made up of fats, and these animal fats are the
Speaker 1: best possible kinds. So when we're thinking about what is
Speaker 1: really healthy, the thing that I actually ask people to
Speaker 1: do is think back to what your great grandparents were eating.
Speaker 1: Go back to a time before the industrialization of food.
Speaker 1: Go back to the time before the food lobbies and
Speaker 1: all of these interests that are driven by money had
Speaker 1: a say over what was healthy for us. And look
Speaker 1: towards not even just our great grandparents, but indigenous cultures
Speaker 1: around the world who had so much much health and
Speaker 1: so much vitality before we brought in Western food and
Speaker 1: modern food. And when we look to that, we really
Speaker 1: see what is so deeply nourishing, What it makes us
Speaker 1: most fertile, what helps us have the most energy, and
Speaker 1: what is overall just like for better vitality.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, And it's funny you say that, because I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna lie I am vegetarian.
Speaker 3: I'm not vegan. I do eat eggs, and I like cheese,
Speaker 3: and I like Greek yogurt.
Speaker 2: And all of that stuff, But mine's an ethical thing.
Speaker 2: I was eight years old when I decided this. I
Speaker 2: was never like I'm going vegetarian to be healthy. It
Speaker 2: was I love the animals, and then it just stuck.
Speaker 2: But I'm a very unusual case because I've been doing
Speaker 2: that since I was eight years old. My body's so
Speaker 2: accustomed to that lifestyle now. But I could never do
Speaker 2: the full vegan. I can never go in that route.
Speaker 2: So I am probably on your other spectrum of people
Speaker 2: who are like, wait, what what did you just say?
Speaker 1: And I think that it's an important distinction there. Like again,
Speaker 1: when we look at these different intigenerous cultures around the world,
Speaker 1: none of them were fully plant based, but a lot
Speaker 1: of them weren't eating very much meat or hardly any
Speaker 1: meat at all, And so we can as long as
Speaker 1: you're eating dairy and eggs and like getting those again,
Speaker 1: those are really important animal fats, which is what exactly
Speaker 1: I was talking about that could totally work for your
Speaker 1: body and really thrive. I have a group program that
Speaker 1: I run, and it was super funny because for a
Speaker 1: long time I was attracting all these vegetarians who were
Speaker 1: having a lot of health problems, and it became like
Speaker 1: an inside joke inside the program. It was like where
Speaker 1: vegetarians come to get happy because they would start eating
Speaker 1: more animal foods. So I get where you're coming from.
Speaker 1: I used to be there, and I think that can
Speaker 1: still work for people as long as they're doing it
Speaker 1: super intentionally and eating some animal products.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure, I never thought going to begin was
Speaker 2: ever going to be my options And I was like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I just got to find the right way to do this,
Speaker 2: and it's transitioning and it's understanding because it's also just
Speaker 2: such a heavy battle to fight because to your point,
Speaker 2: what we're thinking of with our grandparents and back in
Speaker 2: the day and indigenous cultures eating meat then wasn't this
Speaker 2: entire experience of what it is now, and so they
Speaker 2: don't have this like ethical battle. There was truly, like
Speaker 2: I don't know the best way to describe it, but
Speaker 2: there wasn't what there is now with industrialized meat, which
Speaker 2: is why so many people have an ethical problem with it.
Speaker 1: For sure, And I came to it a lot from
Speaker 1: that perspective as well. I won't say like when I
Speaker 1: was initially aveditarian that it was holy that, but for
Speaker 1: a lot of my clients, like I do think I
Speaker 1: will say to them that, like, if your option is
Speaker 1: Tyson chicken or no chicken, we maybe should choose no chicken.
Speaker 1: The beautiful thing is there are so many amazing options.
Speaker 1: Like where we get all of our meat is a
Speaker 1: farm fifteen minutes from our house, and we go, we
Speaker 1: see the animals. My son pets them, he chases the
Speaker 1: little ducks around, Like it's very much the environment that
Speaker 1: they were supposed to be living in and the best
Speaker 1: life that they had until the day their life is over.
Speaker 1: And like we witness that transition of life, were able
Speaker 1: to see and be part of that. And for some
Speaker 1: people that's a lot. But I really think that if
Speaker 1: we're going to be eating meat, it should we should
Speaker 1: be able to have that relationship with our food and
Speaker 1: like really understand where it comes from and have a
Speaker 1: lot of respect for that animal.
Speaker 2: Yes, which is also why so many people love farmers'
Speaker 2: markets and have those I am a huge activist for
Speaker 2: farmers market. I go and I spend my Saturday mornings
Speaker 2: there and I even not eating meat, I'm like, this
Speaker 2: is awesome.
Speaker 3: This is good food. I know where it's coming from,
Speaker 3: and it just makes me feel really good. So all
Speaker 3: that to say, I totally understand that experience.
Speaker 2: I couldn't do it because I in my brain of
Speaker 2: the animal lover would be like no chance.
Speaker 3: But on the way with other things, So I totally
Speaker 3: see where you're coming from.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: There are a lot of people too who feel like
Speaker 2: they're doing all the right things right. They feel like
Speaker 2: they're eating healthy, they're working out, they're moving their body,
Speaker 2: they're doing the things that they have been told they
Speaker 2: have to do, but they can't lose weight. Like what
Speaker 2: is happening with your body when you feel like you're
Speaker 2: making the right steps? But maybe there's some things that
Speaker 2: we're missing totally.
Speaker 1: And this is a really common thing that I see
Speaker 1: in my practice, and it's like the most frustrating thing
Speaker 1: in the world, right, I Oh, And usually there's a
Speaker 1: couple of different factors. So the first one is stress.
Speaker 1: And when I say stress, it doesn't just mean oh,
Speaker 1: I'm stressed out about my job or my boyfriend or
Speaker 1: my finances or whatever. It is. The body has sources
Speaker 1: of internal stress, and then we also have external stress. Right,
Speaker 1: So at the core of all of these different things
Speaker 1: that I'm going to say, it could be We really
Speaker 1: just need to think about the fact that if the
Speaker 1: body is in a state of stress, it does not
Speaker 1: think that losing weight is safe. Is it famine? Is
Speaker 1: there a reason why you are so stressed out that
Speaker 1: the body is all I must preserve all resources by
Speaker 1: any means possible, And a lot of times with exercise,
Speaker 1: this is something I see all the time. I tell
Speaker 1: my clients, I want you to stop exercising, go for walks,
Speaker 1: go for a nice bike ride with a friend, but
Speaker 1: the beach, whatever, like, don't be bedridden, but stop doing
Speaker 1: especially intense workouts. But typically any sort of like real exercise,
Speaker 1: and that plus some of these nutrition changes, is when
Speaker 1: we start to see the weight fly off. And it
Speaker 1: is so counterintuitive to what everyone has always been taught.
Speaker 1: But when we're thinking about specifically female bodies, we need
Speaker 1: to understand that they're super primal and everything we do
Speaker 1: is based around reproduction, and the body, when it feels stressed,
Speaker 1: will see exercise as additional stress and thinks that it
Speaker 1: has to hold on to protect us for any means possible,
Speaker 1: especially if we were to get pregnant, which is probably
Speaker 1: also not prioritizing hormones or reproduction. If you're that stressed out.
Speaker 1: But a lot of times it's that extra exercise that
Speaker 1: tips the scale into too stress to lose weight. Historically,
Speaker 1: if we think back again to like our ancestors, this
Speaker 1: is probably more than our great grandparents go a few
Speaker 1: more generations back. If you are running, what did that mean?
Speaker 3: You were like in survival mode?
Speaker 1: Yeah, you were in danger. So like maybe you feel
Speaker 1: a little bit of an adrenaline high after going for
Speaker 1: a run, but your body is in a state of
Speaker 1: a lot of active stress while you're doing that. It
Speaker 1: thinks you are running from a tiger and things, you're
Speaker 1: running for your life. Similarly, like those experiences of like
Speaker 1: heavy intensity, our body views it as stress. And so
Speaker 1: that's the first thing, is like a lot of times
Speaker 1: people are just putting too much stress on an already
Speaker 1: stressed out body in a stressed out world.
Speaker 2: Okay, and before I want you to go on to
Speaker 2: these other parts, but I would love to know because
Speaker 2: nobody's ever everybody always says, are you stressed, and nobody's
Speaker 2: ever detailed it in that way to be like, no,
Speaker 2: this is actionly what that means.
Speaker 3: Like how if you're obviously you.
Speaker 2: Have external factors and you know how to handle that
Speaker 2: stress and try and maneuver it. But when your body
Speaker 2: is stressed, how do you get your body out of
Speaker 2: stressed state?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's a great question. It's really the million
Speaker 1: dollar question. And there's a few different things that I'll
Speaker 1: typically recommend for people. A first one, it sounds wu
Speaker 1: but talking to your body and telling your body that
Speaker 1: you're safe is important. And a big one like truly
Speaker 1: just taking three deep breaths, which can shift you from
Speaker 1: a sympathetic active stress state to a parasympathetic, relaxed state,
Speaker 1: free deep breaths and saying to your body, you are safe,
Speaker 1: you are loved, bring it down and doing that a
Speaker 1: few times a day is like one way to really
Speaker 1: just on a cellular level, tell your body, okay, it's okay,
Speaker 1: to calm down, and like we don't have to be
Speaker 1: hyper alert and just slowing down. The second one is
Speaker 1: figuring out hidden blocks to wellness, and so some of
Speaker 1: these things might be toxins that we've come into contact with,
Speaker 1: either in our homes or on our bodies or in
Speaker 1: the greater world. And doing practices that help us detalks
Speaker 1: regularly and support our drainage pathways, so our body isn't
Speaker 1: fighting that intense toxic load all the time, which puts
Speaker 1: a lot of stress on our bodies. So that's like
Speaker 1: an easy thing that people can start doing at home
Speaker 1: and paying more attention to. And then another one is
Speaker 1: figuring out other potential stressors in the body. And this
Speaker 1: one is a little bit less DIY and would be
Speaker 1: like engaging the help of a practitioner where we're looking
Speaker 1: for things like potentially gut infections or an imbalance of
Speaker 1: good and bad bacteria in the gut, which you're influencing
Speaker 1: everything from our brains to our metabolism to our immune system.
Speaker 1: We're potentially looking for things like heavy metals, et cetera.
Speaker 1: So at minimum, some deep breast telling yourself that you're safe,
Speaker 1: and then at maximum, maybe diving a little bit deeper
Speaker 1: and seeing, okay, like why is my individual body so
Speaker 1: stress if the rest of my life is cool.
Speaker 2: Yes, Okay, I'm glad you detailed that some more, because
Speaker 2: I do feel like there's a lot of people out there,
Speaker 2: especially I'm also someone who does hit workouts, and I
Speaker 2: do feel stressed from that, and I've had my fluctuations
Speaker 2: where I'm.
Speaker 3: Like, okay, I'm only going to do yoga for a while.
Speaker 2: Let's just calm a body doubt and it's moments you
Speaker 2: go through the rollercoaster of life.
Speaker 3: But I'm so glad you detailed that, because I do think.
Speaker 2: A lot of people probably have internal stress happening and
Speaker 2: they just have no idea what's happening and why.
Speaker 3: Sorry, I made us go on a detour.
Speaker 1: Oh and there's just one actually one other thing I
Speaker 1: want to add to that, because look, we could also
Speaker 1: go this could be an entire podcast episode of all
Speaker 1: the stressors. But sometimes also I find like I'll have
Speaker 1: there's like different archetypes of people that I see, and
Speaker 1: so there's also oftentimes and so if someone's listening to
Speaker 1: this who feels like they're stressed out by like everyday
Speaker 1: things that really shouldn't be that stressful, just like the
Speaker 1: person who's like, like, if I have one more thing,
Speaker 1: it's just like at a lot of times that will
Speaker 1: also be mineral imbalances. And sometimes people who are taking
Speaker 1: like pre needles or multivitamins are those like generic let's
Speaker 1: throw a lot of things in here at once. I
Speaker 1: find are some of the worst with that because it's
Speaker 1: causing what we call either calcium or copper toxicity or
Speaker 1: some of these mineral profiles. So if you're someone who
Speaker 1: you're just like, I really feel like I shouldn't be
Speaker 1: as stressed as I am, like when I really look
Speaker 1: at my life, that's actually something to really start to
Speaker 1: pay attention to.
Speaker 2: Okay, and what exactly is mineral amounts because I did
Speaker 2: have this to talk about. Anyway, we're just going into
Speaker 2: a different way, which is perfect, But what is that
Speaker 2: because I've never heard of that, but for.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and a lot of women have it, and it's
Speaker 1: such a shame to me because it is, in my opinion,
Speaker 1: the number one hack to thriving in the modern world
Speaker 1: as a woman. Seriously. So, just like any nutrients, like
Speaker 1: we all have maybe a basic understanding of we need
Speaker 1: our be vitamins so our hair grows long, and we
Speaker 1: need to see so we don't get scurvy, like we
Speaker 1: have their like essential nutrients that we should all be
Speaker 1: getting all the time, and unfortunately, our modern food system
Speaker 1: is very deficient in these nutrients. Hence why a lot
Speaker 1: of people take a lot of supplements. But the problem
Speaker 1: is when you start taking supplements blindly, right like, without
Speaker 1: really an understanding of what your baseline is we can
Speaker 1: start to create imbalances in the body. Now every mineral,
Speaker 1: really every vitamin but for the sake of this conversation too,
Speaker 1: but for the sake of this conversation, we're mostly going
Speaker 1: to be focused on minerals. Every minerals has a cofactor.
Speaker 1: They almost have a best friend that's another mineral, and
Speaker 1: their ability to do what they're supposed to do in
Speaker 1: the body is dependent on this other mineral ability to
Speaker 1: do what it's supposed to do in the body. So,
Speaker 1: for example, if you have too much copper, you therefore
Speaker 1: probably aren't going to have enough sinc. They balance each other.
Speaker 1: Same with vitamin A in calcium, or vitamin D and calcium.
Speaker 1: This is why I see a lot of times people
Speaker 1: who are taking vitamin D supplements. It really messes up
Speaker 1: their mineral balance because they're not doing it with the
Speaker 1: other cofactors. And so it's a little bit like a dance.
Speaker 1: And when these minerals are in balance and we have
Speaker 1: them in the appropriate amounts, we feel calm Our metabolism
Speaker 1: works really well. Our adrenals, which are our stress system,
Speaker 1: is able to show up when we need it to
Speaker 1: and calm down when we need it to, which is
Speaker 1: super important. Our fertility is much more vital. Our ability
Speaker 1: to come back to life postpartum and really feel like
Speaker 1: we have capacity and patience and all of the qualities
Speaker 1: we want to be in a mom. All of this
Speaker 1: is really dependent in what we're seeing in the minerals,
Speaker 1: and most of the time people are just not eating
Speaker 1: mineral rich foods and or are taking supplements that are
Speaker 1: making them out of whack.
Speaker 2: Wow, I had no idea how do you find out
Speaker 2: that you do have a mineral imbalance, because if I
Speaker 2: had to guess, the typical blood panel that you do
Speaker 2: at a doctor's office is not going to tell you
Speaker 2: those things.
Speaker 1: No, and that unfortunately it's not, because it would be
Speaker 1: great if it did. But what the blood is, it's
Speaker 1: the highway system. So if you go to the doctor
Speaker 1: and you say, hey, can you test my zinc and
Speaker 1: my magnesium? Sure, And now if you're like really deficient
Speaker 1: or really high in something like a super super intense
Speaker 1: end to the extremes, it might show up in the blood,
Speaker 1: but a lot of times it'll be dependent on what
Speaker 1: you ate for dinner last night and what like. It's
Speaker 1: the highway system and how it's how it travels. So
Speaker 1: the testing that I do inside my practice is a
Speaker 1: hair mineral test. So what we do is we take
Speaker 1: a sample of hair. You can do it at home
Speaker 1: and you just take a little sample of hair from
Speaker 1: the nape of your neck almost and you send it
Speaker 1: into a lab and they analyze it. And what we're
Speaker 1: able to see is by excretion, so how much your
Speaker 1: body is letting out of tissue minerals as opposed to
Speaker 1: blood minerals. Now, I know that sounds a little I'm
Speaker 1: getting into the like scientific elements of it, but bear
Speaker 1: with me for just a second. Why this is so
Speaker 1: valuable is because not only are we able to see
Speaker 1: approximately a three month snapshot compared to approximately a thirty
Speaker 1: six hour snapshot. Right, So I'm able to see over
Speaker 1: the course of the past three months what your nutrient
Speaker 1: status looks like. But I'm also able to see how
Speaker 1: your body is dealing with stress because we're able to
Speaker 1: see how much you're pushing out, how much you're utilizing
Speaker 1: so much. So like a lot of times I'll see
Speaker 1: people who come to me and they're like, yeah, my
Speaker 1: doctor says I'm anemic because on their blood work they
Speaker 1: don't have enough iron in their blood, but I'll look
Speaker 1: and in their minerals they have so in their tissue.
Speaker 1: They have so much iron in the tissue, which then
Speaker 1: is telling me it's actually not that you're low in iron,
Speaker 1: you're just not able to move it and utilize it properly.
Speaker 1: So it's so much more of an actionable data in
Speaker 1: terms of what we're going Wow.
Speaker 3: This is so interesting.
Speaker 2: Okay, I feel like we could keep I know, I
Speaker 2: feel like we could keep going down that path, but
Speaker 2: I'm like, I have so many other things to talk
Speaker 2: talk to you about too, So make sure you go
Speaker 2: check out Stephanie's stuff if you're like really even more
Speaker 2: curious to.
Speaker 3: Go down that path.
Speaker 2: But I also wanted to talk about cause I saw
Speaker 2: you do an episode of your podcast about this, the
Speaker 2: Candida infection and how it could be the cause behind
Speaker 2: like brain fog and sugar crabans and yeast infections.
Speaker 1: What is this like?
Speaker 2: There's just so many things I've found. I'm like, I've
Speaker 2: never even heard of this before.
Speaker 3: What's going on?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Totally? Candida. Oh gosh, I have a client she's
Speaker 1: I just thought of her because she's been calling her
Speaker 1: Candida overgrowth. Candace and like she and her husband like
Speaker 1: blame everything on Candace. They're like, oh Candace, Like why
Speaker 1: are you doing this, sus So now I just want
Speaker 1: to call it canvas.
Speaker 3: We can call her Candace.
Speaker 1: I like it, So you have Candace come with it now.
Speaker 1: But basically, candida is a yeast and now Candida, like
Speaker 1: everyone has candida. It is abundant on our skin, like
Speaker 1: it is like it's normal to have some levels of candida.
Speaker 1: But what happens in our modern world even more so
Speaker 1: because and I'm not going to get into this so much,
Speaker 1: but like we just a crazy thing to think about
Speaker 1: is we are not only inheriting like genetics from our
Speaker 1: parents and from our grandparents, we're inheriting their microbiome. We
Speaker 1: inherit the makeup of their gut. We start swallowing amniotic
Speaker 1: fluid when we're in the womb and absorbing our mom's microbiome.
Speaker 1: And then if we're birth vaginally, we get the exposure
Speaker 1: there of your birth vac section. You're getting whatever's on
Speaker 1: those people's hands. So anyways, we're like seeing more and
Speaker 1: more over time, as people have had more and more antibiotics,
Speaker 1: it kills off a section of the gut and the
Speaker 1: gut works as a big ecosystem, okay, And when that
Speaker 1: ecosystem is in balance, everything has its place. So you
Speaker 1: have some Candida there, but it's kept in check by
Speaker 1: all these other good microbes that are balancing it out.
Speaker 1: So what happens is, over time, either in our own
Speaker 1: bodies or inherited, we're taking more and more antibiotics. We're
Speaker 1: eating more food that has pesticides on it, which is
Speaker 1: intended to kill small micro organisms, which is basically what
Speaker 1: our entire microbiome is. And so we're slowly having a
Speaker 1: more and more depleted and out of balance ecosystem and
Speaker 1: the gut, which then you bring in things like sugar
Speaker 1: and really like refined grain products that feed those opportunistic
Speaker 1: yeats like candida, and you end up with this imbalance.
Speaker 1: And when you have this imbalance, So Candida is one
Speaker 1: yeast that is well known in research and we can
Speaker 1: test for, and so that's why I focus on her,
Speaker 1: But it could be other yeasts that are not Candida too.
Speaker 1: Ye have a mind of their own and they have
Speaker 1: their own priorities, and so they will literally take over
Speaker 1: our system and make you crave sugar, make you crave
Speaker 1: things that make you have brain fog or fatigue so
Speaker 1: that you want more sugar, crave the things that are
Speaker 1: going to feed them. So candida is not a fun
Speaker 1: thing to have an overgrowth, But it's all about how
Speaker 1: do we find the balance? Right. It's not bad in
Speaker 1: and of itself, it's how it relates to everything else
Speaker 1: in the body.
Speaker 3: Okay, and before because you did talk about.
Speaker 2: The womb, and I want to get into the mother conversation.
Speaker 2: But I'm thinking of all of these things that you
Speaker 2: can potentially have, right, and I'm sure you s helt
Speaker 2: it when you were studying this, You're like, this is overwhelming.
Speaker 3: There's so many things. Do I have all of it?
Speaker 3: What's going on with my body?
Speaker 2: When somebody comes into you, what are some things they
Speaker 2: should be evaluating about themselves and their lifestyle to even
Speaker 2: head down one of these paths, to be like this
Speaker 2: is a possibility. Like what is happening when somebody new
Speaker 2: comes to you and they're getting diagnosed for lack of
Speaker 2: a better.
Speaker 3: Term, or they're understanding their root causes? Is it an onion?
Speaker 3: Your peeling back? What does the process look like?
Speaker 1: Yeah, to answer the first part of the question before
Speaker 1: I answer the second part, the only requirement is to
Speaker 1: have an open mindset and to want to play the
Speaker 1: game of show me how good this can get. If
Speaker 1: you were going to play the game of show me
Speaker 1: how good I can feel in my body, show me
Speaker 1: how good I could feel in my life, and how
Speaker 1: that's going to transform my relationships, my work, my partnership,
Speaker 1: whatever it is. That's the only thing, because the rest
Speaker 1: we can always figure out. I think can feel overwhelming
Speaker 1: when you're hearing it in some of these capacities, but
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, it's all one thing.
Speaker 1: Whether it's a gut imbalance, whether it's a mineral imbalance.
Speaker 1: We've been taught to think about the body as completely
Speaker 1: separate symptoms. If you go to your general practitioner and say, hey,
Speaker 1: I have brain fog and my period it really hurts
Speaker 1: and I feel loaded all the time after meals, they're
Speaker 1: going to send you to a neurologist and to a
Speaker 1: gastro entrologist and to and what was the other thing
Speaker 1: I said, undercrinologist, and they're going to all try and
Speaker 1: fix you separately by giving you a band aid solution.
Speaker 1: Everything in the body is connected, so the mineral imbalances
Speaker 1: are related to the gut imbalances, and so we're really
Speaker 1: healing them with one way. And so what I'm doing
Speaker 1: is actually I don't diagnose anything, and what I do
Speaker 1: is actually radically different than a doctor in the sense
Speaker 1: that while I'm uncovering root causes, we're not actually treating
Speaker 1: any one thing. We're giving your body the proper tools,
Speaker 1: environment and ingredients that it needs to heal itself to
Speaker 1: come back to balance itself, so that you can become
Speaker 1: your own self healer. And that is I think what
Speaker 1: is the most empowering thing in today's day and age,
Speaker 1: where we like so often look to authority for everything else.
Speaker 1: It's like, no, you are the expert of your body,
Speaker 1: and I'm just helping you uncover roadblocks that have gotten
Speaker 1: in the way.
Speaker 2: See, And I wanted you to describe it in your
Speaker 2: way because it is it's hard sometimes for us to
Speaker 2: understand because we have been taught this very basic understanding
Speaker 2: of you go to a doctor, you get a diagnosis,
Speaker 2: you bandid it, or to your point, you go to
Speaker 2: all these different varieties of doctors.
Speaker 3: But there's so much.
Speaker 2: More to our body and understanding our body of how
Speaker 2: it all works together and That's why I wanted you
Speaker 2: to share a little piece of that in case nobody's
Speaker 2: heard about it. I want to get into the mom's
Speaker 2: side of this, because you became a mom in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty three, which had I imagine a big impact on
Speaker 2: your life. But I want to know something you say
Speaker 2: is that you have a positive postpartum experience, when very
Speaker 2: often we hear about a lot of postpartum moms that don't.
Speaker 2: So what are you doing differently that maybe we could
Speaker 2: give out to the moms out there to have them help.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I could almost cry talking about this because
Speaker 1: it's something I feel so deeply passionate about. I used
Speaker 1: to go to these like new moms. I joined a
Speaker 1: new mom's group in my community where for twelve weeks
Speaker 1: we like sat together and shared things and whatever, and
Speaker 1: we would go around the room and share how things
Speaker 1: were going. And it was just like, it hurt so
Speaker 1: much to hear these swomen talking about just how much
Speaker 1: they were struggling. I almost felt like a little uncomfortable
Speaker 1: being like I'm doing awesome, because it was like, okay,
Speaker 1: was not what we had just been hearing. But it's
Speaker 1: also important to point that as like a beacon of light,
Speaker 1: a lighthouse that this is possible. And so what was
Speaker 1: I doing. The first thing I was doing is I
Speaker 1: was doing what was biologically appropriate and normal for me
Speaker 1: and my baby. And I could teach you all the
Speaker 1: right nutrition things. I could teach you all of the
Speaker 1: things to do for mineral balancing and for postpartum like
Speaker 1: healing of the teachers and all that stuff, and I will.
Speaker 1: But the biggest thing that I was doing is going
Speaker 1: back again to what my great great grandparents were doing
Speaker 1: of what is normal for me and my baby and
Speaker 1: my midwife. So I actually gave birth to my son
Speaker 1: at home. That was something I knew that I wanted
Speaker 1: to do since I was like a kid like. I
Speaker 1: went to visit a woman who had a baby in
Speaker 1: our community with my mom, and when we left, I said,
Speaker 1: I think I'm gonna have my babies at home, and
Speaker 1: she laughed at me and I was like, yeah, right,
Speaker 1: you're gonna want the epidrol and I was like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, I just think I want my babies at home.
Speaker 1: So my midwife was telling me this story about how
Speaker 1: she went over to one of her client's houses once
Speaker 1: and they had the baby in one of those electric rockers.
Speaker 1: This's new was what it's called the basinet, three thousand
Speaker 1: dollars to rock your baby. And her client, who had
Speaker 1: had a baby a few weeks prior, was like so sad,
Speaker 1: so depressed, and she said, I don't know what's wrong.
Speaker 1: He sleeps all day in this thing. He's great, he's easy.
Speaker 1: But I'm just like over here and I'm an absolute mess.
Speaker 1: And my midwife went and she picked the baby up
Speaker 1: out of this new and she put the baby in
Speaker 1: her client's arms, and she said, stop using this thing.
Speaker 1: Hold your baby for the next two weeks and call
Speaker 1: me and let me know how you're doing. Gone. Postpart
Speaker 1: and depression gone. We're supposed to be close to our
Speaker 1: babies and holding them constantly, if you're breastfeeding as much
Speaker 1: as possible, like sleeping with them, being with them. And
Speaker 1: when we are apart from our babies, even for short
Speaker 1: periods of time, our body gets anxious and our body
Speaker 1: gets suppressed, because that's not what's supposed to be normal
Speaker 1: for us. And so that was like one of the
Speaker 1: things that I really prioritized was we kept the first
Speaker 1: forty days, I stayed like in my little cocoon with
Speaker 1: my baby. My husband was super supportive and I was
Speaker 1: touching him constantly, and I think that makes a really
Speaker 1: big difference. So that's the first thing, and then the
Speaker 1: other one is minerals. I know we talked about that already,
Speaker 1: but to paint the picture for moms even more, there
Speaker 1: is a massive mineral transfer that happens during pregnancy. So
Speaker 1: you have spent, if this is your first baby, your
Speaker 1: entire life storing like a little squirrel, storing acorns away,
Speaker 1: storing away these minerals for the big event of getting
Speaker 1: pregnant and passing those minerals onto your baby. And if
Speaker 1: we are not deeply replenishing when that mineral transfer happens
Speaker 1: at birth or before birth. During pregnancy and then at birth,
Speaker 1: we put out so many resources, right, there's so much
Speaker 1: adrenaline and so much adrenal output that happens. And then
Speaker 1: postpartum you're not sleeping as much. If you're breastfeeding, your
Speaker 1: body is creating more nutrition for the baby. You will
Speaker 1: end up so depleted. And that depletion can translate into
Speaker 1: anything from anxiety, brain fog, insecurities around me, am I
Speaker 1: doing the right thing. It can translate to not feeling
Speaker 1: like your body comes back to the way it should,
Speaker 1: whether that's with weight or like actual healing of tissue,
Speaker 1: all of which impacts our mental and physical and emotional health.
Speaker 1: So really focusing on nutrient dense foods, and a lot
Speaker 1: of people nowadays they just order takeout and it's like
Speaker 1: the absolute worst thing that they could be doing, and
Speaker 1: I get why they do it. It's hard. But if
Speaker 1: you really intentionally plan for how to have really nourishing meals,
Speaker 1: really mineral rich drinks, and how to really support your body,
Speaker 1: it will totally change your postpartum experience.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 2: Those are really important things to have and things that
Speaker 2: I don't think we ever think about because we're so
Speaker 2: focused on just you get pregnant and you're so excited,
Speaker 2: and then you're not really focused on what's to come after.
Speaker 2: We are never focused as human beings, Like we get
Speaker 2: to the really exciting moment and then after we're like, Okay,
Speaker 2: whatever happens happens. So these are huge tools to have
Speaker 2: that I'm so glad you mentioned, So thank you for those.
Speaker 1: Now it's never last thing, Like, it's never too late.
Speaker 1: If you didn't prioritize that during pregnancy, you're an early postpartum.
Speaker 1: You're a year and a half, two years postpartum, and
Speaker 1: you feel like you're tanked. It's never too late to
Speaker 1: get started on these things.
Speaker 2: Oh I'm glad you said that, because there will be
Speaker 2: I'm sure moms out there who are feeling similar to
Speaker 2: what you're talking about, and to know that they can
Speaker 2: start doing this even.
Speaker 3: A little bit, will be a big change.
Speaker 2: Also, on this other side, I know we talk postpartum,
Speaker 2: but on the flip side of having a baby in
Speaker 2: the postpartum is the biological clock that we hear about
Speaker 2: and fertility declining as.
Speaker 1: You get older.
Speaker 2: What's your experience with those two things, because it's such
Speaker 2: a big topic, especially for someone like me who's entered
Speaker 2: her thirties and gosh, if I have to hear somebody
Speaker 2: tell me one more time, when are you gonna have
Speaker 2: kids like you're getting older, I'm probably gonna punch somebody
Speaker 2: in the face.
Speaker 1: Yes, I have a lot of thoughts on this. I'll
Speaker 1: narrow them down into two really important ones that I
Speaker 1: think will also really hopefully reassure you as well on
Speaker 1: a personal level. The first one is, so, yes, people
Speaker 1: are waiting longer to have kids, like the average age
Speaker 1: of a woman having babies in the Western world is
Speaker 1: going up significantly. However, is that a reason for the
Speaker 1: declining fertility rate and for people struggling to get pregnant.
Speaker 1: I don't think it's actually as big of a reason
Speaker 1: as most doctors and modern even media just makes it
Speaker 1: out to be. And this is why because historically, even
Speaker 1: going back thirty years, like not that long, women were
Speaker 1: starting to have babies earlier, but they also had a
Speaker 1: lot more kids, including into their late thirties and early forties. Yes,
Speaker 1: like to some extent, we do see fertility change as
Speaker 1: we get older, but it shouldn't. It doesn't explain the
Speaker 1: declining fertility rates in the way that we are seeing
Speaker 1: them manifest. So it's actually something else happening. And here's
Speaker 1: my hypothesis that is rooted in some research, but it's
Speaker 1: hopefully something that we're going to be doing a lot
Speaker 1: more research in the coming years because I think it's
Speaker 1: such a big reason. So again, we talked about our
Speaker 1: modern world being a pretty toxic relatively placed to how
Speaker 1: it's been in years past. Now the body does another
Speaker 1: weird thing. When it's we talked about that mineral transfer,
Speaker 1: the body also uses pregnancy as an opportunity to detox
Speaker 1: things that it can't typically detox very well. So what
Speaker 1: we'll see if a twenty one year old, for example,
Speaker 1: gets pregnant, she's had approximately twenty one years of accumulating
Speaker 1: toxins in her body, so she can go on get
Speaker 1: pregnant easier because she doesn't have all these toxins interfering
Speaker 1: with her reproductive system, and she's less likely to have
Speaker 1: a miscarriage because again, one of the things the body
Speaker 1: will do is it will pass those toxins onto the baby,
Speaker 1: and if those toxins are enough to kill the fetus,
Speaker 1: it will, and if it's not, then it's probably just
Speaker 1: going to churn into things like allergies, ezema, asthma, etc.
Speaker 1: When her baby's born. But if we have a thirty
Speaker 1: five year old who's getting pregnant for the first time,
Speaker 1: that's an additional fourteen years. That's more than fifty percent
Speaker 1: more time of accumulating toxins, and so what we're actually
Speaker 1: seeing is not necessarily a crisis of age, but more
Speaker 1: crisis of environment and the way that's influencing fertility. So
Speaker 1: on the positive side of that is likeers so much
Speaker 1: we can do to reduce our toxic exposure and also
Speaker 1: detox our bodies. I love nothing more than when women
Speaker 1: come to me and they're like, I want to get
Speaker 1: pregnant in a year, let's prep for it now. That
Speaker 1: is like the move because you are able to not
Speaker 1: only set yourself up for an easier time conceiving when
Speaker 1: you are ready, but also a healthier pregnancy, a healthier baby,
Speaker 1: et cetera. So if you're listening to this and you're
Speaker 1: on the preconception side, or if you've been struggling with fertility,
Speaker 1: my questions to you are really to get curious about
Speaker 1: what you're not seeing, because really, no fertility is actually unexplained.
Speaker 1: It's just do the people who are helping you have
Speaker 1: the right tools and tests to help you figure out
Speaker 1: what is causing it.
Speaker 2: Oh, I really hope this can help some people out
Speaker 2: there who have been struggling with that, because that is
Speaker 2: such a common thing, especially these days where you just
Speaker 2: hear people that it's taking people longer and longer to
Speaker 2: have children, And I totally see it, even someone who
Speaker 2: isn't even in the realm of having kids yet. But
Speaker 2: I've started change, you know, over my household to healthier
Speaker 2: things and utilizing glassware and stainless steel, and just because
Speaker 2: it was for me right, this was like I transition
Speaker 2: now and then it means things happening later to hopefully
Speaker 2: be easier.
Speaker 3: And I know.
Speaker 2: That's difficult to do though, because we've been so accustomed
Speaker 2: to this world of cheap things and plastics, the overarching
Speaker 2: everything that's so environmentally difficult for us. But I do
Speaker 2: hope some people hear that and have some hope that
Speaker 2: there's still a possibility if they can make some necessary changes.
Speaker 1: Totally, if you're listening to this and you have been
Speaker 1: feeling frustrated or even hopeless, my statistics are better than
Speaker 1: the fertility clinics for helping my clients get pregnant. And
Speaker 1: so many clients have come and been like my doctor said,
Speaker 1: I'll never get pregnant without IBF, or they've gone and
Speaker 1: done four or five rounds of IBF with no success,
Speaker 1: and then they get pregnant naturally three months later, beautiful,
Speaker 1: healthy baby pregnancy Like it is one hundred percent. If
Speaker 1: only doing the conventional things is what you've been doing,
Speaker 1: there's always something else to explore. And the other thing, too,
Speaker 1: is a lot like this is somewhat related, but is
Speaker 1: the eg quality conversation is as we get older, like
Speaker 1: people talk about equality quite a bit, but just in
Speaker 1: the same way that like you could be seventy and
Speaker 1: have two you could have two seventy year olds sitting
Speaker 1: next to each other, one who didn't smoke cigarettes and
Speaker 1: two took care of her skin was like treating her
Speaker 1: body well, and then one who wasn't. And one woman
Speaker 1: looks eighty and one woman looks fifty, right like ours,
Speaker 1: we can have a different way of aging, and so
Speaker 1: your fertility can have an age that's different than you.
Speaker 1: So there are so many things you can do with
Speaker 1: antioxidants and like putting taking away oxidative stress in the
Speaker 1: body and adding in more pro like res vitrol, for example,
Speaker 1: is an amazing antioxidant that we see improve equality directly
Speaker 1: because of the way that it reverses aging. So there's
Speaker 1: so much that you can do and just like really
Speaker 1: encouraging people to dive a little.
Speaker 2: Deeper, yes, which is so much of what I feel
Speaker 2: functional health is. And when you talk root causes, it's
Speaker 2: to your point genuinely being open minded and willing to
Speaker 2: try a new path that is probably not one that
Speaker 2: you've heard a lot about, or one that you've been
Speaker 2: deterred from taking, And so I really do appreciate that
Speaker 2: side of things. I hope it give some hope out
Speaker 2: there just to try something new. I know trying new
Speaker 2: things is hard, and doing things that are so vastly
Speaker 2: different is also hard, but it's helpful and you're a
Speaker 2: testament to that in so many ways, not just for you,
Speaker 2: but also with clients you've worked with. I also want
Speaker 2: to know, speaking of this realm of things, because hormones
Speaker 2: also often get looped into this page, are there any
Speaker 2: habits that we're doing that are often influencing our hormones
Speaker 2: or like our hormone behavior or the balance and what's
Speaker 2: happening in there that we don't realize are impacting that.
Speaker 2: Because I have a feeling based on a lot of
Speaker 2: things you've told me, there are.
Speaker 1: Definitely Some people probably have heard a lot about the
Speaker 1: circadian rhythm, So this is one that I think is
Speaker 1: so understated, Like people just don't realize how much it
Speaker 1: impacts our hormones. When I started talking about big hormonal
Speaker 1: impacts in the twentieth century that came on it was
Speaker 1: birth control and modern lights like seriously like light bult
Speaker 1: or like the biggest thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, as I'm sitting here in front of very bright lights, like.
Speaker 1: We're all doing it. And it's one of those things
Speaker 1: where there's like a couple little easy things that you
Speaker 1: can do that really go a long way. The first
Speaker 1: one is getting light early in the morning, like real
Speaker 1: natural sunlight, going and opening your window and stating your
Speaker 1: head out the window for two or three minutes, or
Speaker 1: going and sitting and having your cup of tea or
Speaker 1: cup of coffee on your front porch, or like prioritizing
Speaker 1: getting the dog out earlier. Getting sunshine, which is that
Speaker 1: blue light but specifically from the sun on our eyeballs,
Speaker 1: starts to set up our circadian rhythm for the day,
Speaker 1: which is so connected to our hormone system. So really
Speaker 1: easy thing that you can do. So if you're someone
Speaker 1: who just like stays inside for the first couple hours
Speaker 1: of the day, no one's thinking about that, but that
Speaker 1: is really potentially impacting your hormones. This is another actual,
Speaker 1: just like little thing that I learned recently at a conference.
Speaker 1: This woman was describing it in such a beautiful way,
Speaker 1: thinking again back to like ancestral times. If we were inside,
Speaker 1: we were hiding. So even though you think that it's
Speaker 1: like cozy and nice and whatever in your house, like
Speaker 1: our bodies thrive on being outside. And so just like
Speaker 1: the cord is all the stress hormone impacts all of
Speaker 1: our other hormones. So spending more time outside in general
Speaker 1: throughout the day as much as you can is awesome.
Speaker 1: So if it's easy enough to like take your tea
Speaker 1: and drink it outside instead of inside, do it.
Speaker 2: And that's also why I feel like we when I
Speaker 2: go and spend out time outside in the sunshine, I
Speaker 2: come back and I'm.
Speaker 3: Just a happy person.
Speaker 2: Like your body feels that way when you're outside and
Speaker 2: connected with nature.
Speaker 1: It is so important. And yeah, and we're getting like
Speaker 1: you're breathing, like your outdoor era is much cleaner than
Speaker 1: you're in, and there's just so much. And then on
Speaker 1: the circadian rhythm side, in the evenings, blue light in
Speaker 1: the evening, and like we all think of like blue
Speaker 1: light from our computers, Like I feel like that's not
Speaker 1: like a new thing. People are like, oh, yeah, I
Speaker 1: know I shouldn't be like all my device at night,
Speaker 1: But it's more than that. It's like your light bulbs,
Speaker 1: and so switching your light bulbs out to the Edison
Speaker 1: style bulbs, which was like the original light bulb where
Speaker 1: it's more yellow and light and less of the led
Speaker 1: and white makes a huge difference. They also have all
Speaker 1: these like smart light bulbs now that you can switch
Speaker 1: them to be red in the evening, like just on
Speaker 1: your phone, which is cool because the red light is amazing.
Speaker 1: Or you can just be super dorky like me and
Speaker 1: I have these like actual blue light blocking glasses, but
Speaker 1: they're not the clear ones that are cool. Mine are
Speaker 1: like orange. They look like I look like I'm just
Speaker 1: like parting these like dorky orange glasses. My husband makes
Speaker 1: so much fun of me, and I'm like, I don't care.
Speaker 1: My norm worlds are better for it, and I sleep
Speaker 1: so much better. I noticed that there was a couple
Speaker 1: days last week where my son had misplaced them and
Speaker 1: I couldn't find them, and I did not sleep nearly
Speaker 1: as well. So the biggest habit, I would say, is
Speaker 1: like your lighting, and there's a couple really easy fixes,
Speaker 1: and then you don't worry about it if you're at
Speaker 1: someone else's house having a good time at night, Like
Speaker 1: who cares You're enjoying your life. But if eighty percent
Speaker 1: of the time just normal days in and days out,
Speaker 1: you're getting sunshine in the morning and red light at night,
Speaker 1: it'll be really helpful.
Speaker 2: And you can also be like me because she did say,
Speaker 2: make the lights not be led, And I put little
Speaker 2: Christmas lights on one of my trees, and it's the
Speaker 2: warm lighting and that's all I ever have on at
Speaker 2: night and makes it cozy. That's all I leave on
Speaker 2: and it's always like perfect, And I do feel like
Speaker 2: I sleep better when I utilize that.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. I'm so happy to do that. And also
Speaker 1: like candle lighting. I actually have a friend who has
Speaker 1: three kids, and she did this experiment where once it
Speaker 1: became dark outside, especially in the winter when it was earlier,
Speaker 1: they only used candles at night, which is like a
Speaker 1: commitment to just set that up. She said they noticed
Speaker 1: that their kids weren't hyper at night anymore. That like
Speaker 1: they enjoyed dinner so much more. Everything was so much calmer.
Speaker 1: And it's that same idea. So get your vibes on
Speaker 1: and be cozy with it. For sure. This is perfect.
Speaker 3: You can go red light, you can go glasses, you
Speaker 3: can go Christmas lights.
Speaker 2: Candles.
Speaker 3: It can still be fun even though you're helping and
Speaker 3: changing your body.
Speaker 2: Okay, Stephanie, I feel like I could talk to you
Speaker 2: all day about all of these things in your knowledge.
Speaker 2: I love to end on whether it be just a
Speaker 2: very big piece of advice, maybe something we didn't touch on,
Speaker 2: or something motivational you want to leave us on.
Speaker 3: I like to end our episodes on something fun.
Speaker 2: And informational, motivational, inspirational, whatever you want.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, this is so fun and it's so
Speaker 1: open ended that I'm like, where could I go? Let's see.
Speaker 1: I think what I want to share is that you,
Speaker 1: like every person listening to this, Yes, your body is
Speaker 1: super unique, but it is not rocket science to get
Speaker 1: it to function optimally. And so often I think that
Speaker 1: we've been just like fed this story that things are normal,
Speaker 1: painful periods, not having energy, acting whatever, the things are right,
Speaker 1: the things that make us not feel perfect in our bodies,
Speaker 1: when we need to recognize that common is not normal
Speaker 1: just because it's common. It's not normal, and you don't
Speaker 1: have to settle for common, like you don't have to
Speaker 1: be common, you get to be special, and so like, really,
Speaker 1: if you are stuck and feeling like, Oh, I have
Speaker 1: all of these common things and I know they're not normal.
Speaker 1: Follow that calling, because so much waits for you on
Speaker 1: the other side.
Speaker 3: Oh see, this is a perfect thing to end on.
Speaker 2: This is an inspirational, motivational, and informative.
Speaker 3: This is important. Thank you, Stephanie for being here. I
Speaker 3: really appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Thanks for having me Morgan. This was super fun.
Speaker 2: If you love this episode and want to connect with Stephanie,
Speaker 2: you can go to at Stephanie Adler Wellness with an
Speaker 2: f in Stephanie on Instagram or Stephanieadler dot com again
Speaker 2: with that f in, Stephanie, thanks for being here. Happy
Speaker 2: to share fun new people with you guys and expose
Speaker 2: us all to some good life lessons and information. So
Speaker 2: I will talk with you guys next week.
Speaker 3: Love you bye,