Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, it's Jackie Goldschneider and Ensler and we are
Speaker 1: two Jersey Jays.
Speaker 2: Hi, guys, how's everyone? We haven't even seen each other.
Speaker 3: I know Jackie has come back to us from Italy.
Speaker 1: I was only there for six days, but it was magical. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I haven't been well. I keep saying I haven't been
Speaker 1: to Europe. I went to Dublin on the show last year,
Speaker 1: and I keep forgetting because you know that was like show, but.
Speaker 2: You mean ever you've never been. I haven't been since
Speaker 2: my honeymoon in Italy. It was amazing.
Speaker 1: I said to Evan, as soon as the kids are
Speaker 1: all in college, I want to go for like eight weeks,
Speaker 1: get a in a villa in Tuscany, right and kind
Speaker 1: of know in Rome, love with people.
Speaker 3: Yes, I think it's the only place in Italy that
Speaker 3: actually haven't been mm hm, because we've spent a lot
Speaker 3: of time there with them without the kids. It was
Speaker 3: I know, I always hear that you were aware Vietnam, Right,
Speaker 3: I went to Vietnam. That's insane, which was over the top,
Speaker 3: you know. Jeff suggested it for our anniversary we hit
Speaker 3: twenty five years.
Speaker 2: Oh congrat thank you God.
Speaker 3: So he had suggested it, and I had heard people
Speaker 3: like saying how beautiful it was. And obviously there's so
Speaker 3: much history. I'm not really a history buff, but I
Speaker 3: just heard that it was so unreal and different. And
Speaker 3: the truth is, it felt like I was, you know,
Speaker 3: on a different planet, and that was part of what
Speaker 3: was so great about it. It's just, you know, it's
Speaker 3: like it was like sensory overload, and it was so beautiful,
Speaker 3: and there's.
Speaker 2: So much history. You know.
Speaker 3: I was like stepping in tunnels where the Vietcong had,
Speaker 3: you know, conducted there the whole war. And the people,
Speaker 3: the Vietnamese to these people are the nicest, really kindest people.
Speaker 3: I mean, there's so much poverty in the country, and
Speaker 3: but our guide was telling us there's really not a
Speaker 3: lot of depression.
Speaker 2: There's very little crime. It's a communist country.
Speaker 3: They don't you know, if you get caught dealing drugs,
Speaker 3: you're executed. It's also there's just so much history and
Speaker 3: there's so much beauty. We went we cruised Hawong Bay,
Speaker 3: which is like one of the Seven Wonders of the World,
Speaker 3: and we went to Saigon, which is like going to
Speaker 3: New York City, and we ate like our body weight
Speaker 3: in fu, which is like yeah, yeah, like the noodles,
Speaker 3: and it was just I don't know, it was just
Speaker 3: really amazing and it was nice to get just out
Speaker 3: of town and get some perspective.
Speaker 2: Yeah, do you feel like that that.
Speaker 1: I agree with that. I'm so interested when you just
Speaker 1: said there's no depression. I know, like mental health I
Speaker 1: don't know about in the United States. I think mental
Speaker 1: health is so much better. And you know, I've been
Speaker 1: listening to all these other podcasts lately about because I
Speaker 1: want to understand food. I really do, Like I never
Speaker 1: understood food. I always just stayed away from it. The
Speaker 1: first like quarter of my life. I just ate, like
Speaker 1: not knowing anything, just ate and ate and eat, and
Speaker 1: then I stopped eating. So I'm at this point now
Speaker 1: where I want to understand what food to you because
Speaker 1: I really want to get to a place where like
Speaker 1: full enjoyment, full recovery, full everything. And a lot of
Speaker 1: what I'm listening to is talking about what the like
Speaker 1: the gut and how the gut impacts everything and like
Speaker 1: well process foods due to your hormones and your gut
Speaker 1: and your brain and all those connections. So I'm kind
Speaker 1: of into that right now.
Speaker 3: So well, when we travel, Jeff and I are foodies.
Speaker 3: And when I say foodies, I don't mean that we
Speaker 3: only want to go to Michelin Star restaurants. I mean
Speaker 3: we love to eat, like we can base whole vacations
Speaker 3: around that. The three meals a day. But that was
Speaker 3: part of what was so amazing is that the food
Speaker 3: is so different in terms of the depression. That was
Speaker 3: what one guide said to us, and we had three
Speaker 3: different guides. So when we woke up one morning, we
Speaker 3: literally went outside it I don't know, seven thirty because
Speaker 3: weet a pack day, and everyone was out and about
Speaker 3: in the square in I think we were in Hanoi, Hanoi.
Speaker 3: I'm still not pronouncing it correctly, probably, but anyway, and
Speaker 3: exercising and old people, young people, music playing, but not
Speaker 3: exercising in like a frenetic way. Like it didn't seem
Speaker 3: like anybody was exercising to burn calories. People were either
Speaker 3: playing paddleball or they were doing tai chi, or they
Speaker 3: were doing sort of like a line dance, you know,
Speaker 3: and just with each other and laughing, and it was
Speaker 3: really really cool to see. Like I don't I personally
Speaker 3: because I always hated exercise. I don't think of exercise
Speaker 3: like that, but that's how exercise sort of is there
Speaker 3: outside of.
Speaker 2: The United States. Sh It's really different. And just a
Speaker 2: quick question if you don't mind, not at all.
Speaker 1: So, being on ozembic, did you find that you could
Speaker 1: eat all the things that you wanted to eat?
Speaker 2: Or did you get like full and sick?
Speaker 3: No, truth be told. I stopped taking it. Well, I
Speaker 3: wasn't I was going to be there longer, so I
Speaker 3: didn't want to take it with me. Oh so because
Speaker 3: someone wanted I didn't need to travel with it and
Speaker 3: travel with needles and whatever else. But and I'd stopped
Speaker 3: taking taking it the week before just because because of
Speaker 3: that reason, Like I wanted to have.
Speaker 2: I wanted my entire appetite. I still do.
Speaker 1: I still eat and enjoy, but like, but it doesn't
Speaker 1: want any like it stays in you.
Speaker 3: I ate a lot and I loved every minute of it.
Speaker 3: It was amazing. And by the way, speaking of eating,
Speaker 3: I do want to know about the pizza.
Speaker 2: Oh, the pizza. I don't know if you guys know,
Speaker 2: it was really good. So the backstory of the pizza.
Speaker 1: So you know that I've recovered from anorexia I was
Speaker 1: anorexic for eighteen years, and even though I recovered, I
Speaker 1: still had a lot of disordered eating, So not an
Speaker 1: eating disorder, but disordered eating where I was afraid of
Speaker 1: a lot of foods And so I was eating enough,
Speaker 1: I was eating enough calories, and I was eating real
Speaker 1: foods now, but I I was still scared of a
Speaker 1: lot of foods. And right at the very tip top
Speaker 1: of that list was pizza. I have not had pizza
Speaker 1: since nineteen ninety eight.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I figured, let me have my first piece
Speaker 1: in Well. I was going to do it in Naples,
Speaker 1: but then that didn't end up working out, so I
Speaker 1: had it in Rome.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: And the kids were really like supportive, except for Hudson.
Speaker 1: Love Hudson Dearly so cute. But the whole time he
Speaker 1: was like, why are you recording this? Who gives a
Speaker 1: shit if pizza? Why don't you just eat the pizza?
Speaker 1: If you want the pizza, just eat the pizza. Why
Speaker 1: don't we have to record it? Like he was touch
Speaker 1: a little old.
Speaker 2: How old is he gets? Thirteen?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 4: And he was such a little jerk about it. Oh
Speaker 4: but he was so cute, he was cute. Oh but anyway. Yeah,
Speaker 4: the kids, except for Hudson, were very supportive. And because
Speaker 4: I've never seen me eat pizza before and I've taken
Speaker 4: a number pizza a million times and never had it
Speaker 4: with them.
Speaker 2: Have they think that they internalized it? Like they they
Speaker 2: know that.
Speaker 1: You have think my older ones understood what was going on.
Speaker 1: And Jonas and I shared one and it was great.
Speaker 1: I really ate out of my comfort zone in Italy
Speaker 1: and it was great. A little scary for me. I
Speaker 1: do have this fear. Listen, I have a fear regularly
Speaker 1: of gaining weight. But with every everyone around me so
Speaker 1: thin right now, it's compounded, right, so, but it didn't
Speaker 1: hold me back.
Speaker 2: And I really I ate very freely. And let me
Speaker 2: ask you, that was the pizza? Did it live up to?
Speaker 3: You know, you have this, I'm sure, this crazy image
Speaker 3: of it and how amazing it is and yet how
Speaker 3: restricted you have to be around it, And did it
Speaker 3: live up to?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 5: It was.
Speaker 2: It was pretty damn good. It wasn't like my favorite thing. Ever.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't think that I'm going to be like
Speaker 1: a pizza fishing auto, but maybe I haven't had like
Speaker 1: enough pizza. I'll tell you the best thing that I
Speaker 1: had there was I also haven't drank orange juice in
Speaker 1: about thirty years.
Speaker 2: I had.
Speaker 1: A blood orange juice and it was like it wasn't
Speaker 1: even it was like a red It was so unbelievable.
Speaker 2: It was like eating candy. It was. I had a
Speaker 2: lot of things there that were just outstanding. If you're
Speaker 2: going to go somewhere to eat, it's certainly going to
Speaker 2: be Italy. Yeah. Yeah, but it was great.
Speaker 5: It was fabulous.
Speaker 1: And now I'm back in New Jersey, then most place
Speaker 1: on earth.
Speaker 3: Let's not be silly. And that gets your buslers, all right,
Speaker 3: you guys. So, uh, today, of all things, we are
Speaker 3: talking about something that I've gone through.
Speaker 2: Jackie is probably going getting through it. I I'm not sure.
Speaker 3: Well, this is a really sexy, sexy topic today. We
Speaker 3: are talking menopause. Menopause, and I'll tell you how it
Speaker 3: ties in. I was with some friends last weekend and
Speaker 3: one of them just finished menopause and she said, I
Speaker 3: used to know how to lose weight when I wanted to,
Speaker 3: and now my body holds onto everything.
Speaker 1: Yeah that's menopause. Yeah, And that scared the shit out
Speaker 1: of me. And I will say I don't know that
Speaker 1: much about menopause because I haven't entered it yet, I
Speaker 1: don't think, and I am scared shitless because of all
Speaker 1: the things that I have heard. Well, i'll tell you
Speaker 1: you as somebody who's now postmenopausal, I don't know where exactly,
Speaker 1: and our guests can maybe talk us through that where
Speaker 1: you change from being in menopause to post menopause. But
Speaker 1: I at fifty one, I had my last period, like
Speaker 1: exactly at fifty, like my birthday, like in August of
Speaker 1: my fiftieth year, and I didn't have it for another year.
Speaker 1: So I've been in menopause and now postmenopausal for quite
Speaker 1: some time. I don't know that it's the weight gain
Speaker 1: is as dramatic or has been as scary to me.
Speaker 1: I always had issues with my weight anyway, So but
Speaker 1: there's so much about it that's difficult.
Speaker 2: There's also I have.
Speaker 3: I was talking about it actually during the past oversay
Speaker 3: or with my cousins because they always want to know
Speaker 3: what we're going to talk about on our next podcast,
Speaker 3: And my cousin Debbie was like, the menopause is the greatest,
Speaker 3: Like I love not getting my period, and I kind
Speaker 3: of feel like I think at one point I felt
Speaker 3: a little.
Speaker 2: About not getting my period anymore, just.
Speaker 3: In the sense that, like, I'm really getting older and I,
Speaker 3: even if I wanted to have a baby, which I
Speaker 3: didn't to was always my number, I couldn't and like
Speaker 3: that felt a little sad to me, you know, and
Speaker 3: sort of what goes along with this, right, there is
Speaker 3: certainly a deterioration and not what do you mean a
Speaker 3: deterioration physically, Yes, of your body. And so I guess
Speaker 3: maybe our guest will enlighten us a little bit on that.
Speaker 3: But things start to happen, and especially in this day
Speaker 3: and age, when you can do so much about your
Speaker 3: outward physical appearance, right, and you can have like, as
Speaker 3: I know very well, surgeries and lasers and you know,
Speaker 3: you can exercise and you can do all of this
Speaker 3: stuff to look young, but you can't stop the clock. Yes,
Speaker 3: So it's like you know, and I'm we could talk
Speaker 3: about this also with our expert. But at the beginning
Speaker 3: of it, the joint pain was really bad.
Speaker 2: Oh, I didn't even know about that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm scared of all the other shit that I've
Speaker 1: heard about her, you know, about like the that you
Speaker 1: don't sleep well.
Speaker 2: I always sleep well. Oh, okay, and it's different for everyone.
Speaker 3: So oh yeah, I could sleep anywhere any time period,
Speaker 3: Like Jeff's like there's twenty four hours in the day,
Speaker 3: you sleep twenty five. But the sweats and you remember
Speaker 3: Jack on the.
Speaker 1: Show, Oh my god, so can I tell everybody sweet.
Speaker 1: One of the very first times that Jen filmed with
Speaker 1: me for the show, it was at Margaret's house. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we were playing like a game night and it was
Speaker 1: and Chen shows up and she is just sweating room.
Speaker 2: It was horbying, horb Margaret was just drying. Yes, the
Speaker 2: whole season. Oh my god.
Speaker 3: Remember the one when we did at Dolores's house and
Speaker 3: when she told me we were going to go to
Speaker 3: Ireland and that you just saw me just fanning myself
Speaker 3: with like a paper plate. Yeah, and that's a lot people,
Speaker 3: at least my friends and family and people that have
Speaker 3: gone through it and are going through it. That's the
Speaker 3: biggest complaint usually is not just night sweats, but hot flashes.
Speaker 2: So that's really hard to deal with.
Speaker 3: Although now I've now I'm on estrogen and so I'm
Speaker 3: in a different place or hormone replacement. But also, I
Speaker 3: mean it's not just listen, I can bring that perspective
Speaker 3: to it. But also I think our our hosts may
Speaker 3: tell you that you're in peri menopause, like whether or
Speaker 3: not you know it.
Speaker 1: Maybe I don't know because I haven't gotten my period
Speaker 1: in twenty years. So I write my period with anorexia,
Speaker 1: and I never got it back right, So I don't
Speaker 1: know if I'm if I'm in Perry pre I don't
Speaker 1: know the difference between any of them. I have so
Speaker 1: many questions. Our expert is quite an expert.
Speaker 2: Yes, by the way, she is.
Speaker 1: Her knee is doctor Wendy Chorney. She's a doctor of
Speaker 1: physical therapy who's been taking care of women for over
Speaker 1: twenty years. She specializes in the treatment of pelvic pain,
Speaker 1: pre and post surgery, pregnancy related pain issues, EDS, sexual dysfunction,
Speaker 1: and orthopedics.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 1: She's a practicing clinician, educator, and author, and she is
Speaker 1: the menopause expert.
Speaker 2: We did you watch the TikTok? She has a TikTok
Speaker 2: episode what do you call a TikTok? I don't know.
Speaker 3: Thing that got like one over one million views, and
Speaker 3: it's like it's about menopause, but it's about Perry and
Speaker 3: then post and so just watching it for me, I
Speaker 3: because I've just recently heard about doctor Wendy, and I
Speaker 3: was like all in as soon as I started listening
Speaker 3: to it. It's just so interesting how women it's not,
Speaker 3: you know, a one year thing, it's it is. It
Speaker 3: goes on for quite some time. It starts probably before
Speaker 3: you would think, and doesn't kind of stop. Really, I
Speaker 3: mean postmenopause, I guess goes on forever. But and there's
Speaker 3: so many changes, and I think it's now becoming this
Speaker 3: multimillion dollar industry like it hasn't. I don't think menopause
Speaker 3: has been talked about in the past like it's being
Speaker 3: talked about now.
Speaker 2: Oh no, for sure.
Speaker 1: I mean you google menopause and like a million things
Speaker 1: come up, right, There's there's quite a few experts, but
Speaker 1: no one like doctor Wendy. So I'm very excited. I'm
Speaker 1: going to pepper her with questions. All right, so are
Speaker 1: you ready for doctor Wendy. We're ready for doctor Wendy.
Speaker 2: Let's talk there.
Speaker 3: Hey, Hi Wendy, Hi Wendy Wendy. We are absolutely so
Speaker 3: happy to have you. I don't think I've ever spoken
Speaker 3: to a menopause expert. You, I mean, you are you're
Speaker 3: a menopause expert.
Speaker 5: Yes, well, so by default what happened was, I'm you know,
Speaker 5: a doctor, Wendy Turney. I'm a physical therapist. I specialize
Speaker 5: the women's health. I specialize in all the things that
Speaker 5: happen to women postpartum, your sie, joint, your joints, muscle pain, whatever.
Speaker 5: But I started to notice my population aging and then
Speaker 5: oh my gosh, joint pain, frozen shoulder, planar fresh itis.
Speaker 5: Their hair was thinning, their skin, and like, I take
Speaker 5: care of women for net pain. And I was holding
Speaker 5: the heads of all these women as they're crying, and
Speaker 5: I'm like, okay, can a fiscal therapist be a menopause specialist?
Speaker 5: And the answer is yes. I don't prescribe hormones, but
Speaker 5: I can help you in your lifestyle modifications, point you
Speaker 5: in the direction of the doctor that will prescribe you hormones,
Speaker 5: answer all the questions. So it sounds like I'm basically, yeah,
Speaker 5: best friend with all the answers, and I'll just point
Speaker 5: you where you need to go.
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1: Well, let me just preface by saying that Jen and
Speaker 1: I are in two very interesting positions in life. So
Speaker 1: I have not yet entered menopause as far as I know,
Speaker 1: and Jen.
Speaker 5: Is on other side, Harry menopause.
Speaker 2: I don't really know what that means. Can you clear
Speaker 2: it all up?
Speaker 1: What is pre menopause, perimenopause, postmenopause, like, what is all
Speaker 1: of it?
Speaker 5: Well, so here's the thing I think if we talk
Speaker 5: about it like as a general definition. First, so menopause
Speaker 5: by technical medical definition is three hundred and sixty five
Speaker 5: days since your last period. That is when you have
Speaker 5: reached menopause. But here's the joke bee kind of part
Speaker 5: that nobody knows. Perimenopause is seven to ten years prior,
Speaker 5: and perimenopause is like seven to ten and it has
Speaker 5: two different brackets, So there's early and then there's late
Speaker 5: and late perimenopause is when you have those period changes
Speaker 5: in vasomotor symptoms, and that's when people think, oh, that
Speaker 5: must be menopause, but it is even earlier. There are
Speaker 5: many other symptoms. So then you reach menopause like the
Speaker 5: one day, and then there's post menopause, and even postmenopause
Speaker 5: has early and late, and early postmenopause can have the
Speaker 5: bvasomotor symptoms like those hots like burning within the inside
Speaker 5: for a few seconds to a few minutes to not
Speaker 5: being able to sleep, frozen shoulder joint pain. So like
Speaker 5: it's a it's a transition.
Speaker 3: What is I'm sorry why I don't I don't mean
Speaker 3: to cut up, but I just want to make sure
Speaker 3: I ask this because I'm confused. So menopause as opposed
Speaker 3: to perry or post does it only last that day?
Speaker 3: Like when I reached the year, I was in menopause
Speaker 3: that day and then I was postmenopause. Yes, kind of
Speaker 3: only menopause for a day. News, everybody menopause last day.
Speaker 5: It's like the menopause. You should celevate that. It's like
Speaker 5: the menopause transition though, is what people don't realize. And
Speaker 5: then like perimenopause is early and late. There's like two
Speaker 5: separate sections, and then postmenopause is two separate sections. And
Speaker 5: the ten years like in the middle. So the five
Speaker 5: years before menopause and the five years after menopause is
Speaker 5: when all the worst changes happen. Interesting, well, like it's
Speaker 5: a bigger spectrum. And so once you're five, let's say
Speaker 5: three to five years post menopause, I'm five, your hormones
Speaker 5: are yeah, so your hormones are much more stable. So
Speaker 5: mentally you are better. You are clear, you know who
Speaker 5: you are. You will fight the war and have zero
Speaker 5: problems doing it. Speak your mind. Your bone density might
Speaker 5: have shifted, it might not be the best. So this
Speaker 5: is where we like lean into your lifestyle modifications of
Speaker 5: we need to lift to keep that bone mass, we
Speaker 5: need to walk to keep our heart healthy. You need
Speaker 5: to moisturize everything under the sun. You know, like it
Speaker 5: is kind of a different game, and we fight hard.
Speaker 6: So let me absolutely in late Pree is pre pre
Speaker 6: is Perry.
Speaker 2: Parry in late is in late Perry and early.
Speaker 1: Posts is when you're gonna have most of the symptoms correct.
Speaker 5: The ones that are most commonly known. Yeah, so like
Speaker 5: early perimenopause could be things like heart palpitations, anxiety. You've
Speaker 5: noticed your body is shifting shapes and you're like, why
Speaker 5: does my arm look like a hit? What is this?
Speaker 5: Like I've been working out, I'm meaning the same, why
Speaker 5: do I have this fat and less muscle? And so
Speaker 5: it's a whole shift in everything because people don't realize
Speaker 5: estrogen effects every system in your body, So your skin,
Speaker 5: your hair, it's it's wild. So you might start to
Speaker 5: notice your skin is a little thinner, your skin's a
Speaker 5: little drier, the wrinkles by your eyes, your hair is
Speaker 5: getting a little more thin, and it's all these subtle changes.
Speaker 5: But people don't know. And if you don't know, how
Speaker 5: can you help yourself?
Speaker 2: And that's because of estrogen.
Speaker 5: And that's yeah, So estrogen is not just for breast
Speaker 5: and vaginal health, but every system of the body. And
Speaker 5: what happens in menopause to estrogen, So estrogen as we
Speaker 5: know it from the ovaries basically goes bye bye, like
Speaker 5: you have like one percent of the estrogen you would
Speaker 5: have had when you were twenty five. Like it's just bad.
Speaker 5: And then there are other hormones that kick up, like
Speaker 5: you might have more testosterone, you might have the weaker
Speaker 5: estrogen estrone. But this is why hormone replacement therapy is
Speaker 5: kind of like liquid gold for a majority of people.
Speaker 2: Yeah, most people don't feld.
Speaker 5: Yeah it is. But like people think, I feel like
Speaker 5: there's a stigma even with the word estrogen, that estrogen
Speaker 5: causes cancer.
Speaker 2: Breast cancer. I remember my mom.
Speaker 3: Yeah, back in the day, there were so many there
Speaker 3: were studies. I don't know what happened to those studies,
Speaker 3: but I think there have been now more study is
Speaker 3: health initiative.
Speaker 5: Okay, it was a bad research study that came out
Speaker 5: mass blasted to the public. So this is before social
Speaker 5: media and they couldn't like tell people, oh no, we
Speaker 5: messed up, we misinterpreted it, we did things wrong. And
Speaker 5: so now that belief system that menopauses old people and
Speaker 5: estrogens causes cancer, like, I feel like people think that
Speaker 5: and it's none of those are true.
Speaker 3: When I went on estrogen replacement, I was worried about
Speaker 3: that because I had remembered from when my mom had
Speaker 3: gone on estrogen and then she went off of it
Speaker 3: because she was very worried about breast cancer. So I asked, well,
Speaker 3: I have a gynecologist, and I also have somebody who
Speaker 3: was in charge of all of my HRT and hormone
Speaker 3: stuff and papside anyway, but I said, okay, so it
Speaker 3: doesn't cause cancer, right, hormone replacement, But can it in
Speaker 3: fact like almost bring it to the surface. Let's say
Speaker 3: that you have cancer cells that are brewing. By putting
Speaker 3: estrogen into your body, are you then activating you know,
Speaker 3: you're becoming almost getting things up and moving again, And
Speaker 3: so can so.
Speaker 5: Well, still, what you're saying like makes perfect sense, right,
Speaker 5: So if it was sitting there brewing, would estrogen possibly
Speaker 5: feed that estrogen positive cancer?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 5: Yes, But this is why we get our mammograms every
Speaker 5: year because we can catch it when it's like zero
Speaker 5: stage zero, you know, we can catch it. But our
Speaker 5: estrogen affects so many other systems, like, for instance, it
Speaker 5: affects our heart, so estrogen helps keep the arteries of
Speaker 5: our heart flexible, so we're less likely to have a
Speaker 5: heart attack. And the number one killer of women is
Speaker 5: heart attacks, not breast cancer. Now, one in eight women
Speaker 5: will get breast cancer, which is exceptionally sad, and our
Speaker 5: friends will, but I think the majority of us feels
Speaker 5: so much better on estrogen When it happens and you
Speaker 5: get that and you're like, I feel like me again,
Speaker 5: it's kind.
Speaker 2: Of just like I have to tell you.
Speaker 3: Well, so I've been on it for I guess a
Speaker 3: year and a half going on maybe almost two years.
Speaker 3: But I had had a surgery that I get the
Speaker 3: pellets put into my body, so it's like a little
Speaker 3: mini I guess almost like a little mini surgery. They're
Speaker 3: all different kinds right, ways to get chestrogen so, and
Speaker 3: that it also has testosterone in the pellet, and then
Speaker 3: I take progesterone and I get my blood drawn all
Speaker 3: the time to make sure the levels are right. Anyway,
Speaker 3: so I had a surgery and I think it actually
Speaker 3: removed the pellet, and it was all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: like within a couple of weeks, I was having crazy
Speaker 3: hot flashes again.
Speaker 2: I was waking up. It came right back hot flashes.
Speaker 3: I started like waking up in the morning, and I
Speaker 3: used to do before I did. Is still called HRT
Speaker 3: or is that an old fashioned way of saying it?
Speaker 5: Well, they just recently started to change it to menopause
Speaker 5: hormonal therapy, but I still say HRT because I kind
Speaker 5: of want people to understand that. I say, if we
Speaker 5: say m HT, people choke.
Speaker 2: HRT is hormon place.
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, Well I used to wake up before it
Speaker 3: like on a right angle like I was. I would
Speaker 3: literally wake up and I would have to like walk
Speaker 3: a little bit around my room to straighten my body up.
Speaker 3: And I mean what I was, I was, you know,
Speaker 3: early early fifties or getting down the stairs. I mean
Speaker 3: as literally was like I had a hold onto the
Speaker 3: banister like an old woman before estrogen. This is before estrogen.
Speaker 3: It was crazy.
Speaker 5: Yes, yes, but this is why me and the phiscal
Speaker 5: therapists started educating on this because I take care of
Speaker 5: all these women and I have taken I run a
Speaker 5: concierge practice, so I take care of women. And I
Speaker 5: jokingly say I'm a hairdresser for the body. And these
Speaker 5: women have been doing their same exercises, they're same walking,
Speaker 5: and they started to feel more broken, and we would
Speaker 5: do the joint mobility and maybe I would try needle
Speaker 5: them and they would just feel so bad, and then
Speaker 5: they would go on estrogen and then all of a sudden,
Speaker 5: their skins glowing, their hairs glowing. They feel like them
Speaker 5: and they're like, Wendy, it has to be and like
Speaker 5: you're right. And then I read this book called Estrogen Matters,
Speaker 5: and everything we kind of thought about that study that
Speaker 5: told us that estrogen gives us cancer. It pretty much
Speaker 5: shows you in the marks of the whole lovely language. Yes,
Speaker 5: so Estrogen Matters is a book. I highly recommend that
Speaker 5: or is it just Estrogen Matters? So that would be
Speaker 5: number one in my required reading if I do like
Speaker 5: a women's health class, because women need to know that
Speaker 5: estrogen doesn't cause cancer. But if instead have an estrogen
Speaker 5: pop you're saying yeah, yeah, yes, and so that it
Speaker 5: even if you go back in time, right, twenty years ago,
Speaker 5: the hormones are mothers and grandmothers were taking. We're not
Speaker 5: what we have right now.
Speaker 3: We have a whole a bio identical or they were
Speaker 3: bioidon't right, what's the bioidentical the ones we take now?
Speaker 5: So yes, so back in the day, historically speaking, the
Speaker 5: hormones were from pregnant horse urine and it's a whole
Speaker 5: different thing. And we can even get estrogen patches which
Speaker 5: remove the clotting issue that people worry about.
Speaker 2: For fourteen years. Did you not know?
Speaker 1: Yeah, well I had anorexia, so I lost my period
Speaker 1: twenty years ago and my doctors were concerned I had
Speaker 1: zero estrogen level.
Speaker 2: I mean all my kids, yes, saving but yeah, it
Speaker 2: could be a saving grace for you.
Speaker 5: Right, So, like you can all this.
Speaker 2: As anything doctor could certainly tell you.
Speaker 3: I mean, there's very it's a very easy thing to know, right,
Speaker 3: I don't know, is there a blood tests?
Speaker 5: Well, so here's the thing, So you guys are in
Speaker 5: two different stages and so Perimenopause comes in like a whisper,
Speaker 5: and you can't exactly hear it if you're not listening
Speaker 5: for it, and it won't show when your blood tests.
Speaker 5: It shows up in your symptoms. But when you're close
Speaker 5: to reaching menopause, like so, say you're in that last
Speaker 5: three years of perimenopause, you can have two different things
Speaker 5: show up in your blood work AMH and f s
Speaker 5: H these two markers, and your blood work will show
Speaker 5: how much do your ovaries have left? Right, so your
Speaker 5: ovaries are putting out little eggs, and eventually, as you're
Speaker 5: getting close to the end, it's like, okay, I'm going
Speaker 5: to send you a message I'm almost done, and you
Speaker 5: can find that in blood work. Okay, but your normal
Speaker 5: doctor may or may not even know that. And this
Speaker 5: is why a majority of women who come to see
Speaker 5: me and they're I'm screening women for perimenopause as a
Speaker 5: physical therapist. I'm screening them because I think I know them.
Speaker 5: And then they're emotionally laybile and they're crying and they're
Speaker 5: so tough, and I'm like, why are you crying? This
Speaker 5: is not you?
Speaker 2: Did you say?
Speaker 5: I'm sorry?
Speaker 3: I have to interrupt you do you say emotionally laybile?
Speaker 3: I like new words.
Speaker 4: What is that?
Speaker 2: What is that?
Speaker 5: Laybile?
Speaker 2: Basically I never that word before.
Speaker 5: Usually, well, usually your friends would that would keep it together,
Speaker 5: that they're unhinged, and you're.
Speaker 3: Like, what is Oh I'm never I was always unhinged
Speaker 3: to you, I never had well.
Speaker 5: So you know your friends when they're postpartum and those
Speaker 5: hormones are like hard, maybe like perimenopause, those hormonal shifts
Speaker 5: are that violent, and so they're just.
Speaker 2: Labile crying all right, So what do you do to then?
Speaker 2: For women short of estrogen?
Speaker 1: Like, so, if you're not prescribing them estrogen, what can
Speaker 1: you do for them?
Speaker 6: Oh?
Speaker 5: Massive amounts of things. So I am the friend that
Speaker 5: comes alongside you and drags you too. You feel better,
Speaker 5: So I am lovingly prodding them on. Okay, let's let's
Speaker 5: get our lifestyle modifications down. Are you lifting because you're
Speaker 5: going to have to lift three times a week for
Speaker 5: at least twenty minutes to turn on your human growth hormone.
Speaker 5: Because our estrogen's leaving, everything's kind of like melting down.
Speaker 5: Our muscles are going away, our bone density is going away.
Speaker 5: So I'm going to kind of prod you to be like, listen,
Speaker 5: your arm's going to turn into squish, squish. You're going
Speaker 5: to have to lift if you want to be strong,
Speaker 5: because you're losing one percent of muscle mass in essence
Speaker 5: after forty.
Speaker 2: So my goal is lift.
Speaker 3: So I have been, but I will tell you that
Speaker 3: it's interesting to exercise for those reasons as opposed to
Speaker 3: my whole life using exercise as a weight management tool.
Speaker 2: But now that does not work now, yeah.
Speaker 3: But the difference also is at at least I have
Speaker 3: found this this kind of exercise, lifting is so much
Speaker 3: more enjoyable, right, like as opposed to running on a
Speaker 3: treadmill or you know whatever.
Speaker 2: Some people love that.
Speaker 3: I'm just really talking about me, you know, being able
Speaker 3: like lifting weights. It's such a different thing, and knowing
Speaker 3: also that I really am doing it to be stronger,
Speaker 3: not just to be thinner. And there's like a pressure
Speaker 3: that it goes away. Yes, yeah, it's a sing and
Speaker 3: it feels really empowering. And for me also after being
Speaker 3: on semi glue tide, like you lose muscle from that
Speaker 3: as well, and so I was warned about that, but
Speaker 3: knowing of course that as I get older, they say
Speaker 3: you want to lift your grandkids, you better start, you know,
Speaker 3: lifting now. And I would like to lift a grand kid,
Speaker 3: so anyway, but that type of exercise. And I don't
Speaker 3: go to the gym and do heavy you know, machines,
Speaker 3: but I lift weights.
Speaker 2: That's it.
Speaker 3: I you know, I actually have somebody now that comes
Speaker 3: so that I can stay on my game.
Speaker 1: So, doctor Wendi, can I ask you about some of
Speaker 1: the emotional aspects because that really scares me.
Speaker 5: That's well, that's because that is the early kind of
Speaker 5: symptoms of perimenopause. And that's what gets you because you
Speaker 5: didn't know that that was tied in. And that's kind
Speaker 5: of one of those early secret things. Like you could
Speaker 5: feel more anxious, you could feel kind of like nervous,
Speaker 5: you could feel like panic detects well, estrogen, remember, is protective.
Speaker 5: That's what I kind of try to tell my patients.
Speaker 5: I'm like, I want you to know that estrogen is protective,
Speaker 5: and it's protective across the board, right, So it's protective
Speaker 5: of your breast health, your vaginal health. We know your skin,
Speaker 5: we know your hair, but also your brain. And so
Speaker 5: when you feel like, oh my gosh, I feel a
Speaker 5: little crazy, that's that volatile hormones shifting, and as you
Speaker 5: get further along in life, I mean all of us,
Speaker 5: as we age, we're losing our eggs. We're putting them out,
Speaker 5: they're going away, We're putting them out. But as we
Speaker 5: get closer to the end, it's so much harder for
Speaker 5: that ovary to put out that little egg, and your
Speaker 5: hormones are just all over, and so your emotions are
Speaker 5: all over. Now she's postmenopause, so she doesn't have that fluctuation,
Speaker 5: so she kind of feels like a rock star. She's
Speaker 5: like solid, she knows who she is.
Speaker 3: We talked about about like the beauty of getting older.
Speaker 3: One of the many things that's good.
Speaker 1: About it has been this attitude that I have that
Speaker 1: is so different.
Speaker 5: You're stable hormonally, and we have to appreciate that we
Speaker 5: are cyclical beings. But when you are in that moment
Speaker 5: and you feel all those feelings, you know, the research
Speaker 5: does show that women going through perimenopause do not get
Speaker 5: more diagnoses of depression. They just feel those depressive symptoms
Speaker 5: come back again. They feel them very intensely. Because estrogen
Speaker 5: is neuroprotective, it's protective of our brain and now our
Speaker 5: old problems could be coming back to bother us. So
Speaker 5: I only figured out I was perimenopause because I'm writing
Speaker 5: a book on the science of women's health and wellness,
Speaker 5: and I was like typing all these symptoms, I'm like, yes, yes, yes, right,
Speaker 5: and then the other part that kind of struck me.
Speaker 5: There's two things, and see if it speaks to you.
Speaker 5: It reminded me of my postpartum blues, because my brain
Speaker 5: the two days before my period was no longer me.
Speaker 5: I felt horrible, I felt anxious, and I felt worried,
Speaker 5: and it reminded me of how I felt postpartum.
Speaker 2: Do you ever feel that I wasn't an experience.
Speaker 3: I don't remember experiencing too much what post partum?
Speaker 1: I had very bad postpartum anxiety, not depression. I had anxiety, like.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I mean I know a lot, a lot
Speaker 3: a lot of women do experience that. One thing that
Speaker 3: I managed to escape. Doctor Wendy, let me ask you this. So,
Speaker 3: in terms of depression tied into menopause, one of the
Speaker 3: things that I have heard and that some of my
Speaker 3: friends have tried, especially with hot flashes, is a very
Speaker 3: low dose of let's say prozac. I think I think
Speaker 3: maybe it's just prozac helps hot flashes. I mean, I'm
Speaker 3: you know, I'm a prozac baby. I've been on prozac
Speaker 3: for as long as I can remember. But I think
Speaker 3: it's interesting that you know, it doesn't it's not only
Speaker 3: for the mind, but also physically can help you with
Speaker 3: some of these menopausal and I don't know, maybe perimenopausal symptoms.
Speaker 3: And there's such a stigma around antidepressants, they can also
Speaker 3: maybe help you physically.
Speaker 2: Is that true?
Speaker 5: Yes, So, so when you look at who is in
Speaker 5: control of prescribing prescriptions and doing the regulations. The North
Speaker 5: American Menopause Society, which is rebranded to the Menopause Society,
Speaker 5: every year puts out recommendations and they do recommend SSRIs,
Speaker 5: which is the select of serotonin reuptake they are. They
Speaker 5: do recommend that.
Speaker 2: However, I recommend them too.
Speaker 5: By the way, the gold standard though is hormones is estrogen.
Speaker 5: So like technically speaking, if they were to pick, they'd
Speaker 5: pick replacing your hormones if you can. And sometimes people
Speaker 5: get estrogen or they get their menopause hormone therapy and
Speaker 5: it's still like they still don't feel right, and then
Speaker 5: they will add in that SSRI so, but some people
Speaker 5: are so opposed to both and so menopause, that transition
Speaker 5: is a very unique experience based on you, your chemicals, your genetics,
Speaker 5: and so yeah, I am personally for both of those
Speaker 5: because I am on both of those too. I feel
Speaker 5: the same way you do. But it changed my life.
Speaker 5: But I had an epiphany because I couldn't recognize perimenopause
Speaker 5: and myself. At first, it was my facialist when I
Speaker 5: was getting like laser electrolysis for like, what the heck
Speaker 5: is his face here? And then I'm crying to my
Speaker 5: facialists like I don't know what's row with me. I'm happy,
Speaker 5: I have a good job, I love my partner well.
Speaker 5: And she's like, Wendy, do you feel like there's a blue.
Speaker 2: Cloud that publish you? And I'm like not black.
Speaker 5: She like pats my arm, She's like, you need to
Speaker 5: go on your hormones and go back on your antidepressants.
Speaker 5: Liked oh, and then it went away. Okay, So can
Speaker 5: I ask you a question.
Speaker 1: Let's say you have somebody who really doesn't want to
Speaker 1: use hormones. Are there holistic ways that people can improve
Speaker 1: their well being during before and after?
Speaker 5: Yes, what well. So menopause is a unique experience. Every
Speaker 5: person's experience is unique, and how you treat your menopause
Speaker 5: is also unique based on your beliefs. There are some
Speaker 5: of my patients that don't want to see a menopause specialist.
Speaker 5: There are some of my patients that say me up,
Speaker 5: tell me when can I see him next week? And
Speaker 5: so there are so many options. But I do believe
Speaker 5: whether you want to do hormones or not, this is
Speaker 5: where I come in the lifestyle modifications. So I am
Speaker 5: about to do a study this fall for the use
Speaker 5: of yoga for perimenopause and menopause because it will help
Speaker 5: you have as a tool, calm your mind, help you breathe,
Speaker 5: help keep your joints flexible. An example is that yoga
Speaker 5: doesn't actually change your basomotor symptoms according to the Menopause Society,
Speaker 5: but it does make you feel better. In that moment.
Speaker 5: Your joints feel looser. You've had a moment to stop
Speaker 5: and be you. You've had maybe twenty minutes where somebody's
Speaker 5: not touching you, and that helps you regulate your nervous system,
Speaker 5: which that menopause transition is. Everything's justsregulated. Your nervous systems
Speaker 5: just regulated. Your hormones are just regulated. So moving keeps
Speaker 5: you flexible and helps quite your mind. And those are
Speaker 5: the things I kind of lean into because it's free.
Speaker 5: Everyone can do it, but it's hard because you have
Speaker 5: to change your lifestyle, and we try to do it
Speaker 5: in a little bit. Now. Some people believe in certain supplements.
Speaker 5: The Menopause Society doesn't necessarily recommend anything in replacement, like
Speaker 5: a non hormone, non hormonal kind of drug, but they
Speaker 5: do suggest that you nourish yourself. Right, So what I
Speaker 5: tell my patients are are you living your best life?
Speaker 5: Are you getting twenty five grams of fiber a day
Speaker 5: because you need to have fiber to get that estrogen
Speaker 5: and all those hormones as you metabolize them through you.
Speaker 5: Are you consuming enough protein because we know your muscle
Speaker 5: mass is leaving during this transition, things like that. So
Speaker 5: taking omega threes because estrogen helps you with inflammation, and taking.
Speaker 3: I take the mega omega threes, I take what do
Speaker 3: they I bet you know them, those big yellow ones?
Speaker 3: Oh my god, and they like have brought my cholesterol
Speaker 3: down and Jeff, my husband's cholesterol down. What do they
Speaker 3: call Oh it's They're amazing and they tate. They have
Speaker 3: like a lemon scent. They don't smell like I know,
Speaker 3: I have to run a stair, I know, right, But Monday,
Speaker 3: I thought maybe you would know. They're expensive, they're on
Speaker 3: the they're on the pricey side.
Speaker 5: I don't. Well, so I use the brand Nordic Naturals. Yes,
Speaker 5: I also have. I think yes, Okay, I think yeah,
Speaker 5: probably it is so probably, but like, notice how you
Speaker 5: said and I didn't even say this, but notice how
Speaker 5: you said. You know what, It brought my cholesterol down
Speaker 5: because when your hormones left the party, when estrogen said
Speaker 5: bye bye, and estrogen is protective of everything, your court
Speaker 5: is all slowly creeped up. Your cholesterol slowly creeped up.
Speaker 5: Then you started taking Omega threes to take your inflammation down,
Speaker 5: and then your cholesterol came down. And I asked you, like,
Speaker 5: can I start taking you can take Omega threes?
Speaker 2: Now they get kids for brain function.
Speaker 5: Right, yes, brain function?
Speaker 2: Yeah, my numbers are all yeah, so all the time.
Speaker 5: Some of my patients don't even want to take Omega
Speaker 5: three is because they eat salmon three times a week,
Speaker 5: so they're getting their omega threes from oily fish and
Speaker 5: I'm like, okay, great, so we're checking off the boxes.
Speaker 5: Are you doing your fiber now, you're doing your omega threes?
Speaker 5: You know, next we got to do are you eating protein?
Speaker 5: Because we have to nourish you. We have to help
Speaker 5: you make muscle. Because the weird thing is estrogen is
Speaker 5: tied to your muscle. And that's the crazy part, right,
Speaker 5: That's something that I learned recently. Because we know that
Speaker 5: testoster is important for men's muscle. Why did we never
Speaker 5: think that estrogen was important for our muscle? Why did
Speaker 5: we never think that? The research just now shows that.
Speaker 3: So and you're and you also your testosterone does go
Speaker 3: down as well. Right, so even in women, it is
Speaker 3: related to muscle testosterone. Right, I'm making this up, certainly,
Speaker 3: no more than I do. Nope, it's fair raising both, right,
Speaker 3: and I don't even know. And then throw progesterone in.
Speaker 3: Don't ask me. I have no idea what that does.
Speaker 3: But I think you're supposed to have it, right if.
Speaker 5: Your text it's the lining of your it protects your uterus.
Speaker 5: So if you have a uterus, you if you take estrogen,
Speaker 5: you're going to take progesterone. But if you see a
Speaker 5: menopause specialist, they will know those things. So that's the
Speaker 5: joy of seeing a specialist that you're like, listen, here
Speaker 5: are my symptoms. Help me. But as a fiscal therapist,
Speaker 5: I screen people for perimenopause and then I say, please
Speaker 5: go talk to your doctor step one, talk to your OBGYN,
Speaker 5: talk to your family medicine, whoever you can talk to,
Speaker 5: and if they deny you a conversation, we go to
Speaker 5: someone else. And I can't tell you how many of
Speaker 5: my patients, how many doctor visits, how many specialists they
Speaker 5: had to see to find somebody to give them the conversation. Yes,
Speaker 5: because apparently menopause is not taught in med school, and
Speaker 5: unless you have a specialty, many people feel uncomfortable prescribing
Speaker 5: hormones or even having the conversation.
Speaker 2: Yes, I know that's true.
Speaker 3: I know that my mic onecologist was willing to give me,
Speaker 3: I guess, some cream for vaginal dryness and for all
Speaker 3: the other treats that come along with menopause. But the
Speaker 3: pellets were a different thing, and so we had discussions
Speaker 3: about them. He's not necessarily all for them for different reasons,
Speaker 3: not because of cancer because he actually thinks that they
Speaker 3: could affect your heart.
Speaker 2: I've read so much now.
Speaker 5: And there's so many different things, right, So it's so
Speaker 5: many different camps. So you make your menopause plan that
Speaker 5: is unique for you, for how you feel, for your symptoms.
Speaker 5: But it's not easy to find a healthcare provider. So
Speaker 5: I always tell my patients to go to menopause dot org,
Speaker 5: type in new zip code and find a practitioner near you.
Speaker 5: And people really have to fight to be seen if
Speaker 5: there is no one near you. There are telehealth options
Speaker 5: thanks to covid. For instance. I work closely with a
Speaker 5: company called Alloy a l o y dot com and
Speaker 5: they are leading the charge on women's health. They are
Speaker 5: doing things in Washington. They have the best in the
Speaker 5: country working for them, and they're really like top notch.
Speaker 1: Do insurance companies tend to hover the hormone replacement for
Speaker 1: women in menopause mind mind doesn't really.
Speaker 5: They can it's not compounded. If you take a pill,
Speaker 5: if a progesterone pill, I think when I say.
Speaker 3: Maybe, but now what I'm doing with this I don't know,
Speaker 3: and we're all going to run out of time. But
Speaker 3: I also would love to know what you think about
Speaker 3: the pellets versus the creams and the patches.
Speaker 5: But you know, oh, that's it's fascinating. I can tell
Speaker 5: you that a little bit. But I'm low in testosterone.
Speaker 5: There is no FDA approved testosterone for females. So I
Speaker 5: pay fifty plus bucks a month to have compounded testosterone
Speaker 5: with progesterone to help me. And it's a shame that
Speaker 5: we don't even have FDA of approval, but men do,
Speaker 5: so men can get a prescription for testosterone, but I can't,
Speaker 5: so I have to pay a compounding pharmacy to do it.
Speaker 5: But the thing is, it's interesting is I started to
Speaker 5: notice that because my muscle bulk was going away and
Speaker 5: I'm lifting and I'm working now, and where are my
Speaker 5: muscles well? Because my testosterone was low, because my hormones
Speaker 5: were shifting and my body was changing shapes. And that's
Speaker 5: that part of me as a physical therapist. I'm listening
Speaker 5: to these women like cry on my table, like I'm sad,
Speaker 5: i feel fat, I'm gaining weight. I haven't changed my diet,
Speaker 5: and I'm like, I know what to do.
Speaker 4: I know what to do?
Speaker 5: You know, going to find you a menopause specialist.
Speaker 3: Because we try to be an all inclusive podcast as
Speaker 3: much as possible men. And it's funny because I was
Speaker 3: discussing this with my husband when he was asking me
Speaker 3: about what our next episode is going to be whatever,
Speaker 3: But there are at I think similar ages. There are
Speaker 3: things going on with men as well. I don't know
Speaker 3: if there's something I.
Speaker 5: Call it menopause, right, thank you, thank you Paul.
Speaker 3: And what's involved in MANIF And I want to I
Speaker 3: just want all of our listeners. I'm hoping that we
Speaker 3: have all different sexes, so to know that you're not alone.
Speaker 2: We're not alone. Right, Something does happen to men as well?
Speaker 2: What happens to men? They don't lose their pair, also.
Speaker 5: Get low testosterone manifact. I actually talked to the well
Speaker 5: so they will have kind of similar symptoms to women,
Speaker 5: like how we do with menopause. They might feel fatigued,
Speaker 5: they might feel kind of blue, and they can't make muscle.
Speaker 5: And one of the things that you can do to
Speaker 5: help your testosterone is lift, like move your body a lift,
Speaker 5: But men have to work harder and they have to
Speaker 5: lift longer to turn on their human growth hormone and
Speaker 5: get that testosterone boost. Thean women. Women only have to
Speaker 5: technically lift twenty minutes to turn on our human growth
Speaker 5: hormone and get things going. Men have to do like
Speaker 5: forty forty five minutes.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 6: Finally, Yes, I know, because I don't feel bad for
Speaker 6: men on a gender Wow.
Speaker 1: So if a woman who's going through menopause, I know.
Speaker 1: Jen was saying that one of the things that affected
Speaker 1: her was she was very sad about not being able
Speaker 1: to have children anymore, whether or not you want it.
Speaker 3: No, I didn't want I didn't want more children. It's
Speaker 3: just this idea that my body couldn't, that.
Speaker 1: You can't, And that's sort of like one of the
Speaker 1: things that being a woman is is being able to
Speaker 1: bear a child.
Speaker 2: So when that's over, you can.
Speaker 5: So there are some people that feel that very deeply.
Speaker 5: You're right. So as the person who is, I'm to say,
Speaker 5: I'm your BFF, your friend that's going to drag you
Speaker 5: through this. You know, I will say, well, what are
Speaker 5: you planning on having more kids? And they're like no, no,
Speaker 5: and I'm like okay, but we were always meant to
Speaker 5: have this transition, right, we don't want to have children
Speaker 5: forever and always. Now I will say I have learned
Speaker 5: from TikTok that it is very sad for some because
Speaker 5: some women desperately wanted children and they tried and they tried,
Speaker 5: and menopause is heartbreaking for them because they didn't get
Speaker 5: that chance. And and that that is just that is
Speaker 5: I don't want to that is that is that is
Speaker 5: supreme sadness. That's a different sadness.
Speaker 3: That's different, and I don't I don't want to compare that.
Speaker 3: And I again, very I don't know that it was
Speaker 3: about the fact that I couldn't have children. It was
Speaker 3: about the fact that my body is definitely getting older,
Speaker 3: and there's no denying it, no matter how many.
Speaker 2: Faceless I have. Doesn't if you're j Low, yes.
Speaker 3: Yes, there's not botox that could make me fertile again.
Speaker 3: And so I think it's just there's this realization about
Speaker 3: the fact that maybe even mortality right like it's happening.
Speaker 3: I am, I am getting old, and yet.
Speaker 1: Jen Fessler, I will say, you look better than I
Speaker 1: have ever seen you look ever, and I've only.
Speaker 2: Known I like this. I like this episode.
Speaker 5: This was this was your glow up.
Speaker 2: You look young.
Speaker 3: Listen, That's not just although I will say I feel
Speaker 3: like the hormone replacement absolutely makes me glow. I don't
Speaker 3: my jointstone, all of what doctor Wendy has been discussing
Speaker 3: with us, hair all of that. But I've also yes,
Speaker 3: but I've also spent plenty of money in uh plastics.
Speaker 5: Let's get yeah my final que let me say something
Speaker 5: about that sadness. Yes. So here's the thing. So there
Speaker 5: is sadness in our culture with menopause because I think
Speaker 5: there's like a hush hush, we've normalized women's suffering. In
Speaker 5: other countries, it is not seen the same way it
Speaker 5: is here. It is seen as, let's say, in Asia,
Speaker 5: it is seen as Wow, what a release. I don't
Speaker 5: have to worry about fertility anymore. My body's my own,
Speaker 5: I have wisdom, I'm the top of my family. I
Speaker 5: am the leader I like. So it has a whole
Speaker 5: different view.
Speaker 3: And I can't believe you're saying this and that's where
Speaker 3: that is self, because I was just saying to Jackie,
Speaker 3: I was in Vietnam for almost two weeks and I
Speaker 3: just got back. But in terms of like the the
Speaker 3: older generations, there's such it feels so different, like there's
Speaker 3: not First of all, there's not bota and there's not
Speaker 3: even dyeing your hair, right, there's this acceptance. A lot
Speaker 3: of times the grandparents are taking care of the children
Speaker 3: because they stop working and they and then their kids
Speaker 3: are working, and so they're still vital and they're still
Speaker 3: living their lives, but they're also out on the streets.
Speaker 3: Member Jacko was saying that all these people were exercising
Speaker 3: and dancing. A lot of them were really mose are people.
Speaker 3: They're moving and they're enjoying the process of aging. And
Speaker 3: that's what one of our guides told us as well.
Speaker 3: It's not aging isn't looked at like it's looked at
Speaker 3: here in the US, which I think is so interesting.
Speaker 5: So that's where we need to change our mindset. We
Speaker 5: get to grow old, we also have the luxury some
Speaker 5: people don't even get to have the luxury of exercising
Speaker 5: or finding that menopause specialist or finding a friend to
Speaker 5: talk to. So changing our mindset and trying on an
Speaker 5: idea to see if it fits for you. So, for instance,
Speaker 5: I am a businesswoman and I like the idea of
Speaker 5: when I am postmenopausal, that my hormones will be more
Speaker 5: stable and I will know my hormones will be level,
Speaker 5: my brain will be level, and I will know who
Speaker 5: I am. You know, I do know who I am now,
Speaker 5: but like I do feel like the two days before
Speaker 5: my period, my brain is like a dodo bird. And
Speaker 5: I sometimes will tell my patients, listen if I cry today,
Speaker 5: it's not you. I don't even know. Like I'm happy.
Speaker 5: I just feel a little funny today. And then of
Speaker 5: course then I bleed. But I share that because I
Speaker 5: have days where my brain is just dumb, and I'll
Speaker 5: be like what I am known for being smart? I
Speaker 5: want to be smart. How did my brain leave? Oh,
Speaker 5: my estrogen is leaving, And so I'm just I have
Speaker 5: to fight harder to be me? And so how do
Speaker 5: I support myself? And that's where I come in that
Speaker 5: lifestyle modification. We have to support who we are. We
Speaker 5: do have to try harder, We have to make a
Speaker 5: conscious effort to move, We have to wait lit, I
Speaker 5: have to take omega threes. I have to increase my protein,
Speaker 5: which is like really ridiculously hard to have one grand
Speaker 5: of protein or ideal like my ideal body weight. Like,
Speaker 5: so I'm doing all these things to support me currently
Speaker 5: and future me. So we don't want to look back
Speaker 5: and compare our collagen to twenty year old us, because
Speaker 5: that's just not no, We're going to look at us now.
Speaker 5: How do we support me?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 5: How do I take care of future me?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 5: And that's kind of that mindset I want to have.
Speaker 2: I think along those lines. My final question is going
Speaker 2: to be when.
Speaker 1: So, if you're a woman who's either on the cusp
Speaker 1: of menopause or going through it late forties, early fifties,
Speaker 1: what are your top tips, like how do we get
Speaker 1: ourselves into the best possible shape and mindset to handle
Speaker 1: everything that's going to come at us.
Speaker 5: So it's a real big old lifestyle modification hall. We
Speaker 5: eat to nourish ourselves. We no longer starve ourselves to
Speaker 5: be skinny because that that game won't work in menopause.
Speaker 5: That is not going to fly. We have to move
Speaker 5: our bodies to keep what we have. So we maybe
Speaker 5: had great joints and we didn't have pain, but now
Speaker 5: I have to do mobility every day, like at least
Speaker 5: ten minutes of moving my body, like I practice getting
Speaker 5: to the ground. I have to use it to keep it.
Speaker 5: So moving your body, nourishing your body, and the other
Speaker 5: thing is don't feel bad about resting, Like I don't
Speaker 5: want to heal never did resting, so it's really odd
Speaker 5: the things I say. But like, I want you to
Speaker 5: sleep more if you need to sleep. I want you
Speaker 5: to move every day, and it doesn't have to be perfect.
Speaker 5: I want you to nourish your body. And then the
Speaker 5: other thing. This is what I tell my patients. You know,
Speaker 5: once I get the whiff of perimenopause coming in, Hey, listen,
Speaker 5: talk to your doctor. If your doctor doesn't give you
Speaker 5: a conversation, we need to find you a menopause specialist
Speaker 5: because you deserve to have a conversation. Every person deserves
Speaker 5: a conversation, and that really is like being your best advocate.
Speaker 5: So write down whatever symptoms you think you have in
Speaker 5: your phone because you're going to probably forget and then
Speaker 5: freeze up and maybe the brain fog from your perimenopause
Speaker 5: makes you completely forget, but like, make write it down.
Speaker 5: Fight for future you, because you fight for all your friends,
Speaker 5: you fight for your family, but now you're gonna have
Speaker 5: to fight for you with the same vigor that you
Speaker 5: took care of everybody else in your life. Yes, to
Speaker 5: take care of you.
Speaker 1: Speak to your doctor and ask for a menoc specialist
Speaker 1: and read Estrogen Matters. I'm totally Oh, it's a wonderful book. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm excited to order it.
Speaker 3: And I'm definitely like because I just feel like I've
Speaker 3: experienced the difference having had no formone replacement. It's just
Speaker 3: it's so fabulous for me personally.
Speaker 1: Now I'm a little less scared knowing that there's things
Speaker 1: that I can do for it and seeing how clear
Speaker 1: minded you are on the other side, not a crazy
Speaker 1: person like me.
Speaker 3: I'm still a crazy person. Let's not be silly, and
Speaker 3: we all know it.
Speaker 2: But that's okay.
Speaker 5: You don't have to be scared. You can be like prepared,
Speaker 5: you know, you can be prepared and be like all right,
Speaker 5: I've got this. Yeah, yes I could do this. Yeah,
Speaker 5: you can be educated.
Speaker 2: Tll everyone where we can follow you.
Speaker 5: We are happy to help all of these people. But
Speaker 5: I want people to follow me on like TikTok or
Speaker 5: Instagram or Facebook and kind of like I talk about
Speaker 5: this every day because I want women to know because
Speaker 5: knowledge is power. And if you hear me talk about
Speaker 5: this over and over when it happens to you, you'll
Speaker 5: be like, oh what I know this?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know this, so nothing to be scared of, right,
Speaker 1: as long as you prepare.
Speaker 5: I don't think so, I don't. I don't. I mean no,
Speaker 5: I will say, I can't sugarcoat ith. It does bring
Speaker 5: out some disease processes, like so you're more likely to
Speaker 5: have heart disease if you are not doing your cardiovascular health,
Speaker 5: if you're not doing hormones, if you're not taking your
Speaker 5: omega threes. But like we, we are meant to age,
Speaker 5: but the parts you choose to age is a difference.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there are parts that you can't. I guess even
Speaker 1: with estrogen replacement, you can't always take away like hot flashes,
Speaker 1: and they suck, So I can't.
Speaker 2: I can't see.
Speaker 1: There's nothing you can do about how well you can.
Speaker 1: You can take estrogen and even the prosac, but okay,
Speaker 1: I don't think that it always works the same for everybody.
Speaker 1: I mean, I experience plenty of hot flash in my
Speaker 1: in my the last five years. And even with replacement,
Speaker 1: something you.
Speaker 5: Got that you know, you so like you are being
Speaker 5: your own best advocate and and you know there are
Speaker 5: things that you could possibly do to maybe make you
Speaker 5: have less hot flashes, but it may not work. You know,
Speaker 5: sometimes things like not not having alcohol, not having spicy foods,
Speaker 5: avoiding hot climates. Uh, maybe that sauna triggers your hot
Speaker 5: flashes and you can't do the sauna.
Speaker 1: Now, I can't do it to you better than That's
Speaker 1: another Yeah, is that from menopause? You've always so everything's
Speaker 1: hormonal menopause. I mean I think you get melasmas. Everything's hormonal, yes.
Speaker 2: And then yeah, yeah, damn.
Speaker 5: Control everything controls.
Speaker 2: My God, talk about hormones.
Speaker 5: But I think you guys are like a perfect example
Speaker 5: of every part of perimenopause menopause transition. Much like we're
Speaker 5: part of it and it's totally natural. It just is
Speaker 5: a little high maintenance.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, but now kind of.
Speaker 5: Divas, we kind of do all these extra things.
Speaker 1: Well, we're grateful for people like you who show us
Speaker 1: the way, doctor Wendy.
Speaker 2: Thank you so well.
Speaker 3: Drag you, no, really, thank you. I've always wanted a
Speaker 3: best friend that would drag me. I've always wanted to be.
Speaker 2: A little I need to be a little good. I
Speaker 2: know you will, I know you will. Thank you so much.
Speaker 5: Well, thank you for having me. Ladies.
Speaker 2: Okay, talk soon.
Speaker 1: Great talking to you, Bye bye bye.
Speaker 2: That was great. That was amazing.
Speaker 3: Definitely great in terms of I feel like the range
Speaker 3: right like where you're at and where I'm at, and
Speaker 3: I'm hoping we have listeners that go they're even younger
Speaker 3: than you and older than me. And you know, I
Speaker 3: do definitely think that it's news to people that Perry
Speaker 3: menopause starts really early and the changes and some of
Speaker 3: the stuff you're feeling is about that, right, because I
Speaker 3: think back in the day, people thought, well, once you
Speaker 3: hit menopause, that's when everything goes to shit. But it's
Speaker 3: you know, they're ten years before.
Speaker 2: We have to change that thinking. Yea, nothing goes to show,
Speaker 2: certainly not anymore.
Speaker 1: I'm telling you there's so many, like doctor Wendy saying,
Speaker 1: there's so many like things that can help and that
Speaker 1: have in fact helped me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, amazing. So I'll be turning to you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't even know, because like I said, I
Speaker 1: don't get my periods.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: But when I get the first half flash, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be over here. Yeah, you're gonna tell me everything, you know.
Speaker 1: All right, guys, thank you for listening.
Speaker 2: We love you.
Speaker 1: Guys.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, and also leave us drop us. God, what does
Speaker 3: it slide into our DMS? Way too old for that.
Speaker 3: But tell us what you want to talk about, you know,
Speaker 3: I mean I.
Speaker 2: We have a bunch of really good ones coming up.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we have a bunch of great guests. But also,
Speaker 3: like you know, if you're listening, tell us what's on
Speaker 3: your mind and tell us what you'd like to hear
Speaker 3: about or hear us talk about.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, thanks till next time. Bye bye,