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All right, guys, we made it. We made it to 2023. Happy New Year. This is going to be the best one yet. I'm not a big person in these New Year resolutions because I don't ever believe in waiting until January 1st. I believe in starting right away. Finally, my book, Bigger, Better, Bolder, has been out now for probably a week.
And I wanna say thank you to everybody who pre-ordered it because it debuted at number one in business. And I am just so grateful and thankful for you guys. I really do believe that we all can be more bold and show up in our life in a real way
with a little introspection, a little self-awareness, and we can design whatever we want for ourselves. I believe in creating a rich life, and that's not just money, you guys. That's about relationships, meaningful relationships, meaningful experiences. Now, if we're not born being bold, you can...
learn being bold. I have a workbook in the back of the book. So it keeps people accountable and you see yourselves getting bolder by doing these little bold moves. So we are not just acquiescing to a good enough life, but we're actually realizing
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So this episode is all about hormones and we have a hormone expert to talk about all of it. Her name is Candice Birch and she is a hormone health expert and we discuss everything hormones. We cover lots. We cover how it affects our sex drive, our weight loss, moods, stress levels, and even our relationships.
We also discussed the science behind hormones and how to get a better understanding of how they affect our bodies and those even around us. A lot of times we band-aid health issues and we don't get to the root of the cause when it could be something as simple as hormone testing, rebalancing the hormones.
So I wanted to kind of have this conversation to kind of put some light, shed some light on this and get some clarity. So enjoy the episode because if you have any kind of mood swings or stress or any type of imbalance, I think you're really going to enjoy what you learn from this episode. Today we have Candice Birch, who is a hormone health educator, right? Who let's before I, I don't want to misspeak.
So can you give us a very brief background on who you are and how you became this hormone health educator? So that makes me think, who am I? Who are you? Yeah, who am I? Well, I am...
a mother of two little girls when they were little. I went into that, you know, the hot flashes and the night sweats and the mood swings that come with hormonal change as you age. And I had been a journalist. I have a master's in health education. So I had been living in England working on
in publications, journalism, with deadlines all the time. So lots of stress. And I got to this place where I was just a screaming Mimi. I was just having a mood swing every 20 minutes and a hot flash in between. And I always tell the story about my daughter's
you know, looking at me with tears in their eyes, like mean mommy, who are you? They just, and at a certain point I realized I need to get a handle on what's happening with my hormones. Cause I was in that mid forties range about that time. I came to parenthood late. I had my Ryan, my old, my youngest when I was 41. So, you know, it was pretty much, it was pretty much a collision of, of, um,
you know, when I went into menopause, my kids being teenagers and it was chaotic. And then, you know, men, my husband was also sort of entering what we call andropause, the male menopause. So we had some stuff going on in the house and I just thought, I've got to learn about this. So I looked into, I started reading books and I actually, long story short, became connected with
Dr. David Zava who owns a, who had started a saliva hormone testing lab, which has been one of the more common easy ways to test hormones non-invasively and to determine what your levels are and what your, how they correlate with symptoms gives you a world of information. At the time, I didn't even know there was such a thing as a hormone imbalance. You know, the whole idea that you could have imbalances that it's not just about menopause and it's not just about women, it's about men and women. We share all the same hormones.
just in differing amounts. But, you know, I started learning all this and it just got to be something that I decided to specialize in. So that's where I am now. I worked for many years as the director of education at this lab. We tested millions of people. The lab has tested 10 million people now. So I've seen lots of test results. I've talked to a lot of people. And now we have formed Your Hormone Balance, which is a testing and consulting program
Family business where we test people's hormone levels and then we talk to them and say, this is what this means. And that's why you feel this way. And that's why you've been feeling this way that maybe you got used to, but you should realize maybe isn't normal.
um, or helpful. So that's kind of my story. That's what I'm doing now in my, um, I'm supposed to be retired, but I don't think I'm definitely not. Yeah. Wow. Well, that's amazing. They're needing information and, and, you know, opening up this subject. It's gotten, there's a lot more awareness now than there was when I started 20 years ago. So, yeah, well, I think there's a few things I want, I wanted to touch on that. You just said number one,
that you said something about male menopause, which I never knew was even a thing. It's called andropause, you said? Right. I've never even heard of that. What is that? Yeah, well, and so andro, as in andro is the Greek word for male, right?
And andropause refers to the pause in male hormone production as men get older. Just as women get old, you know, as we get older, our hormones start to decline or fluctuate and decline. And then there are, you know, the fluctuations can cause excesses, deficiencies, declines. You know, it's not just one thing or another. Think of a seesaw. But men are not immune to changes in hormone production.
levels. And there are many things in terms of habits and lifestyle that can influence how, you know, how rapidly somebody's hormones go AWOL, because certainly it's inevitable as we age that that that will change. But as when we're younger, and when we're in the shank of our, you know, 30s, and into our 40s, even we should be able to be sort of maintain, it's right around mid 40s, that things start to shift with hormone levels.
aided and abetted by poor health habits, poor lifestyle habits. But until then, people, if they're, you know, if they're following all the, you know, doing all the good healthy things and not getting too much stress going in their lives, you can pretty much maintain a good hormone level. But many people have symptoms they've gotten used to, they don't even realize that there's symptoms of hormonal imbalance. Yeah, I want to talk about that. That's a big one. Yeah.
For women, it's more like roller coaster time. When we start moving into hormone fluctuations, we can have, as I was describing with me and my kids, the mood swings. I was scaring my family. If it was freezing outside, I was making everybody open the windows. It could be very much, it's more dramatic with women. We kind of go up and down the seesaw, the roller coaster. We're having mood swings that are, everybody's rushing for the exits. And
And with men, it's more of a, it's a bit more of a slow slide, you know, more of a gradual kind of feeling of running out of steam. So, and not having the energy that they would, you know, were used to having to work out or to work long hours or, you know, to party all night or whatever it is, it starts to noticeably change tolerance for exercise, et cetera. But many men don't
They just think it's part and parcel of aging. And in fact, men don't usually talk about it like women do. We're talking about it all the time. But men need to talk about it more. They need more awareness. Well, that's what I want to talk to you about. Let's talk about the men's for a second because I think there is a lot of information, be it sex,
accurate or not on female hormones, male hormone levels, or like you said, andropause, which is male menopause. I've never really heard the term so much. I wanted to stay on this for a second. So you're saying a lot of it obviously has to do with habits, lifestyle, all that.
At what age does this start to happen? Is it, you said, in the mid-40s? Or does it really depend on the, like, give me the things that it depends upon. What habits and lifestyle, what are the symptoms that people would notice exactly? Like, be a little bit more precise so people who are listening can be like, oh, my God, that happens to me. And then I want to talk about the habits and things that can kind of change, like, what they can do to help it.
Right. Well, in men, it's, you know, all of this inevitable, the inevitable change and, you know, sort of transition into andropause for men is, should begin, let's say, early 40s, mid 40s. But we see that happening earlier. Okay.
Depending on the level of stress, and I'm talking about not necessarily good stress where we're getting married, we have great career success, we're traveling, whatever. I'm talking about an accumulation of stressors that are depleting our hormonal levels prematurely.
and getting, you know, interrupting the works, creating excesses and deficiencies. So that can happen in men around their mid-40s. And when I say andropause, andro also is used in the term androgens, which are the male, what we call the male hormones, testosterone and DHEA. But of course, women have testosterone and DHEA as well. We just have far less than men do.
And so because men don't ovulate and estrogen and progesterone is not made by, you know, ovarian production in men, those two hormones, testosterone and DHEA, are really crucial in males. But men can also become what we call estrogen dominant if testosterone levels fall too much. You know, it's like all these hormones exist in this balance with each other, this interactive balance.
they're interrelated, they interact, they rise and fall. If one hormone goes up, another one will go down correspondingly. And so for men, if their testosterone is down, their estrogen may be up. If their stress hormones go up, their testosterone will go down. These things are always shifting. So men, as men are kind of famous for not, as I was saying, not talking about this, not recognizing the symptoms.
But basically, it can be, you know, just running out of energy, having being more exhausted after exercise rather than rejuvenated, maybe getting injured more easily, not having the kind of tolerance for exercise that you had. You know, a guy who's been lifting weights can't lift the same number, the same weights. His muscles are now sore, muscle soreness.
muscle weakness, lack of strength, lack of stamina. The androgen hormones, what we call, as I said, the male hormones, but women have them too, are really connected to their anabolic. So they build bone, build bone density. They build muscle strength, lean muscle. We're dependent on those hormones for building and maintaining the structure of
So when we hear testosterone, we think about sex drive, but it's also key to physical structure.
our, you know, like I said, our strength, our stamina, and how well even, how well we process information, cognition. So men that start to feel sort of foggy brained, this is the same for women too, but feeling foggy brain, not being able to process information efficiently, not being able to concentrate or focus, you know, feeling distracted,
These are all examples of stressors. And in older men, of course, as they get further into andropause, they may have more serious kinds of symptoms, which they need to be aware of, like frequent urgency, frequent urination or decreased flow or.
or no libido, lack of libido, lack of drive, lack of ambition, all of these things. They're subtle, but I think people know that they're happening, but they don't want to
They don't want to necessarily, especially men who are not that great at talking about these things with their friends, they just carry on. You know, they just muddle through. But these are signs and symptoms of hormonal imbalance that may well be disrupting quality of life on a number of levels.
If that makes sense. Yeah, it makes sense. So you're saying if someone is not urinating, the decrease of urination or flow, that can be a symptom? Yeah.
of a hormone imbalance? Frequency and decreased flow is a common sign of prostate cancer or prostate enlargement, benign prostate enlargement. And a lot of that is linked to, in men in particular, an excess of estrogen and a deficiency of testosterone. So a poor ratio between estrogen and testosterone.
And that happens, you know, men are probably listening now and thinking estrogen. I don't make estrogen. You know, what are you talking about? Estrogen with me. But that men do make a certain amount of estrogen. It's, you know, they make way more testosterone. But the thing is, estrogen exists in so many forms in our environment, right?
It is made in fat cells. So overweight men in particular can have high estrogen levels. And what men need to know is that in fat cells, there's an enzyme. This is true for women too, but there's an enzyme called aromatase.
which actually exists in fat cells. So the more fat cells we have, the more aromatase action we have. And what aromatase does, and I think this is particularly significant for men, it uses testosterone as a substrate for conversion into estrogen.
So men who, you know, men who are noticing this loss of muscle strength, this loss of density, this lack of libido, lack of drive, they don't have the enthusiasm they had for the things they used to love to do anymore. They're injured more. Men who notice that need first thing not to rush to the doctor and get injected with testosterone.
They need to get tested and find out what their levels are and find out if they have too much estrogen that is depleting their testosterone, their bioavailable circulating testosterone. Is it being converted into estrogen?
because of fat cells that are in excess, because of xenoestrogens in the environment that we're being exposed to, because cortisol levels are high and depleting testosterone. There are so many things that work against males having the right level of things. And men, you know that – what is the word –
I'm thinking, you know, the word it's not, it's not a lovely word, but male moves mailed. But when you see a man, Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Matt, man boobs. I don't know what they call it. Right. Yeah. I hate that word, but, um, it has, uh,
I'm just forgetting, I'm blanking on the technical word for that. And it'll probably come to me at three o'clock in the morning. But anyway, you know, you can see estrogen is connected to increased breast tissue. Estrogen is a growth hormone. So it causes fat gain in the hips and the thighs and in the breasts. And so when you see men that have
excessive tissue there. That's a sure sign of a lack of testosterone and an excess of estrogen. I remember talking to a guy, consulting with a guy who was losing weight. He was in a weight loss program. I used to run a hormone program
testing component of a weight loss program that was in nationwide clinics. And he was doing everything right. But his his estrogen levels continued to remain high. We were trying to figure out what it was. And his wife was sitting there and she said, he's a milkaholic. So turns out, she said, Oh, he drinks a whole gallon of milk every day.
And he was sitting there, what's wrong with that? Well, were they using hormone-free milk? You know how many factory cows are injected with hormones? And what's the hormone that they're injected with? Estrogen. Estrogen makes, it's a growth hormone, makes cows grow fat faster. So you get milk, more milk to the, you know, you get more milk easily, more fat to the, all that. So, yeah.
That was his thing. He was drinking, he was taking in too much dairy and his levels were sky high. And once he stopped that and went to reading labels and if he wanted some dairy, it needed to be
You know, the label should say, and men become aware of this, read labels, don't leave it to your partner to do this, but note that something, it should say, these animals were raised without hormones, or there are no artificial hormones in this milk or cottage cheese or cheese. European cheeses are safe because they don't allow all these chemicals or hormones in the food. That's right. So does that, would you say-
That's a good example. So would you say overall, though, mention maybe want to stay away from dairy just for that reason? Or even, I mean, we'll get to that. I know meat can have it as well, right, with hormones. But this is a generalization, but maybe one of the nutritional, I don't know, one nutritional tip. What? Yeah. Well, a habit to cultivate would be to avoid excess milk consumption.
intake or dairy intake, because not only, you know, I'm talking about cows that are injected with hormones, but also a cow that is kept pregnant, or, you know, continually so that she's constantly producing milk is producing a lot of estrogen, right? Just naturally occurring estrogen, there can be 11 different substrates of estrogen in one glass of milk.
So, you know, men and then there's there's also, you know, there are the forever chemicals that are in nonstick cooking pans and floor polish and, you know, the phthalates and shower curtains, plastic softeners. The there are so many environmental estrogens. The fragrances that we use are loaded with chemicals that somehow get into the body and they take up. They they can attach to.
to the receptor side of a cell where hormones do their thing. So if you think about a hormone, it's a chemical messenger
that is bound to a red blood cell in, in the bloodstream, the body says, Hey, he's working out. We need to, she's working out. He's working out. We need a little more testosterone here. So what happens is a fraction of that testosterone is released from the bloodstream. I'm simplifying of course. And it goes into the tissues, the target tissues where it is received at a receptor site and it clocks, it docks on that receptor site. Or if you think of, uh,
a puzzle piece fitting perfectly. That's what these hormones do. They fit into the cell receptor and then they govern our mental, emotional, physical functions. So getting that balance of hormones right and not undermining that action is so important for people to be aware of.
No, I think that's real. Yeah, that's a good point. I think, well, that's why nutrition and what you eat and what you put into your body and also your environment is so like what you, what kind of moisturizer you use, what everything has, like every action has a reaction, right? And so being cognizant of these things.
Yeah, I was just reading this article from the UK. I was spending some time in the UK the last few months, and it was in environmental science and technology. U.S. researchers found these forever chemicals, these polyfluorocarbons that are so disruptive of hormones and other body systems, found in PFAs in all the stain-resistant school uniforms that they tested.
Those labeled, even those labeled 100% cotton products,
So when you think about stain resistant fabric spray on your couch, on your furniture, on your carpets, in your clothing, you know, men use women use fragrances that are loaded with these things that, by the way, don't need to be disclosed. Men use aftershave lotions that are, you know, that can be loaded with undisclosed chemicals that for some reason can take up. They can bind to that receptor site that I was just talking about.
They can get in there and though they do not fit the receptor site perfectly as a naturally occurring hormone would, what they do is they can bind to it well enough to be able to bump off the naturally occurring hormone that's trying to get in there. They can occupy that receptor site and then overstimulate the cell.
and create all kinds of disruption. And this is where we call xenoestrogens or xeno hormones, xeno meaning foreign or unfamiliar to the body. We also call them estrogen mimickers. Because like imposter, they're imposters, you know, they can
pull off a hormonal reaction, but it's not the one you want. It's an overreaction, overstimulation. And if people are just not cognizant of these things and not watching what they're eating, what's in the products, the personal care products they're using,
Shampoo is loaded. You know, you look at the back of a shampoo bottle, it's got 52 ingredients you can't pronounce and they all have X, Ys and Zs in them. That's in lauryl sulfate. That's a good one to avoid. Parabens, phthalates, heavy metals are in makeup and eyeshadow and all of these things tend to
don't tend to, they successfully disrupt hormone production. So on the conversation around men, what men need to know is even though they're not ovulating and producing ovarian hormones, they too have gonadal hormones produced by the male sex organs, and they need to be supported with the right
attention and awareness so that we're not compromising our natural ability to do, you know, we should be able to produce
optimal amounts of these hormones, especially men and women in their 20s, 30s, and then into their 40s as things start to fluctuate, that's when we have to take some tender loving care of our bodies, our adrenals, you know, and start really becoming diligent. So does that mean it's not enough just to kind of take tests? Because what a lot of people do that I know,
is that they start taking testosterone. They start with the testosterone cream or testosterone shots.
They and so even if they have a high estrogen count because of all the things that we've spoken about, they'll just offset it by the testosterone even and not even think about lowering the estrogen. So are you saying that sometimes that's not the answer? You can just lower your estrogen by getting it tested properly and then you can kind of get better or feel better or have less symptoms that we talked about?
Hormones are very potent, powerful chemicals. To just start taking a hormone, especially one as powerful as testosterone, in the absence of test results, to not know whether you are estrogen, whether there is too much estrogen circulating is a problem because the more, let's say,
A male is unaware that he has too much estrogen relative to testosterone. Perhaps his stress hormones are up because he's overbooked, overcommitted, overtraining, drinking too much caffeine or energy drinks, you know, whatever it is, it's constantly jacking up.
the stress hormones, if you haven't, you don't know what your levels are and then you're adding in testosterone. What if that is just serving as more substance for conversion into estrogen? You could be creating a vicious cycle. You're adding in testosterone through a pellet or an injection and you're actually creating a nice little, a nice little amount of, you know, a seed, seed bed for more conversion of,
of estrogen, you know, conversion of testosterone into estrogen. Now, there are things people can do, especially men need to think about using zinc in their men can supplement with zinc because zinc is an aromatase inhibitor.
and it has been shown to inhibit that conversion. There's also progesterone actually inhibits that conversion. Fiber in the diet, there are eating foods that are full of cruciferous vegetables that contain an enzyme that actually helps to ferry excess estrogen out of the system and helps to metabolize estrogens properly.
So there's something called DIMM. That's another supplement, which is like eating two pounds of broccoli. You know, if you're not getting enough cruciferous vegetables into your diet to help move that excess estrogen and reduce that estrogen burden, then you can use DIMM as a capsule. And all of those things can be steps that you take to
before you go for the testosterone, especially, you know, in the men you may be talking about, maybe in their in their 30s, do they really need to be injecting testosterone? Probably not. Strength training, of course, increases lean muscle mass, which then triggers the release of testosterone. And there's no evidence that you know, I think overtraining isn't isn't going to
isn't going to create an excess of testosterone, but what it's going to do is create an excess of cortisol. And excesses of cortisol trump everything. If cortisol is high, then testosterone is usually depleted.
And and now we're feeling, you know, again, the effects of of a low testosterone, the lack of energy, stamina, endurance, all of those things that are are so important to, you know, the male, the macho aspect of being male. But it's just as important to women. But I think men feel it more in, you know, more men.
you know, more in a way that they may not understand what's happening to them. So awareness becomes the most important thing, education and awareness. And we have a guide. We have a lot of educational information that is assisting men in knowing more about that because it's not a much talked about subject. You hadn't heard the word andropause. So there you go.
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That's rocket money.com slash habits. Let's stay on this horror on the estrogen, testosterone, cortisol part, because my question is now I, I, you've kind of given us a good idea of on the men's side. Now for a woman who has too high of estrogen, too low of testosterone,
Is it the same type of a same supplements to take a or what's the reaction? Like how does it? Did it affect? Does it are the symptoms different in women? And does it show up the same? So is it still like increased body fat around your midsection? If you have too much estrogen? Are you fatigued? You get sore when you work out like what is it the same?
It's slightly different. I should mention also that the, in women, you know, women are famous for having PMS and mood swings and, you know, emotional ups and downs. And they often talk about my husband or my partner doesn't know what to, you know, what to do. Should he move out for the, for the week that I'm having my period? You know, it's just, but, but,
But men also get one other thing I should mention is they get more emotional. And, you know, that's that's similar to women. They will have they can have mood swings. They can feel down or depressed or just moody. Men can, too. You know, yeah. Men get PMS.
Well, the similar symptoms. They're not getting PMS, premenstrual syndrome, but their hormones, you know, when their estrogen is high, estrogen is, you know, a high estrogen in women is very much associated with PMS, mood changes, bloating, weight gain, hips, thighs, bottom, even, you know,
What was I going to say? Oh, well, there's just so many symptoms of estrogen dominance, really, that one of the things that's important in men is...
that estrogen being a growth hormone is growing that prostate, enlarging it. In women, it's growing tissue that can become an overgrowth of uterine tissue and maybe lead to endometriosis, maybe grow fibroids or ovarian cysts. Excesses of estrogen are about growth, growing tissue. So I was mentioning
you know, the male, the men and, but for women, I think that the mood changes are more pronounced because we have more estrogen on board in general. And if we're estrogen dominant, yes, probably progesterone is very key for us because progesterone is the hormone that balances estrogen. And if we're not ovulating, um,
every cycle as we should, or we're on birth control for years, or we're moving into menopause, we're not going to be ovulating every cycle. And that lack of ovulation means that progesterone is not being produced.
So it's a bit of a different physiology for women. We become estrogen dominant because we're not making as much progesterone to balance our estrogen. Men become estrogen dominant because they don't have the balancing powers of testosterone.
So for men, it's estrogen, testosterone. That ratio is important. For women, it's estrogen, progesterone. But the symptoms in general, the weight gain, the moodiness, the...
You know, even thyroid issues are very much connected to too much estrogen. Estrogen can actually get in the way, run interference on the conversion of T4, which is the most abundant thyroid hormone, into T3, which is actually the active thyroid hormone. So estrogen excess can disrupt that conversion. And that's where we need to know, am I getting enough selenium in my diet? Am I getting enough
zinc and magnesium and all the things that aid and abet conversion of thyroid. So, you know, you start a lot of people, like you're saying, men will go and get the testosterone when that may not be the underlying problem.
women will run and get thyroid because they're desperate to lose weight and they're put on a thyroid medication when maybe they had an underlying imbalance of estrogen dominance that was running in disrupting their thyroid function. So it's really important to get a handle on. First, you need to know your symptoms. We have a symptom quiz at Your Hormone Balance, which is a really good one. It's not completely geared to men, but as we're saying, most of the symptoms are similar. Yeah.
Women too, when their testosterone is down, it's not only about libido, which can certainly take a hit, but it's about drive, your ambition, your enthusiasm for things, your strength, your stamina again. And for women, it's great to do strength training before they go and run and get testosterone. They need to also make sure and in taking any one hormone in, as we call it unopposed, supplementing with testosterone.
hormone and not creating a blend of, you know, these hormones interact and work synchronistically. So that taking of one hormone, as I was mentioning with testosterone can cause an imbalance of all the other hormones. So
You know, that's the argument. Okay, I have a couple of different things to go over. First of all, what it what is very clear to me is these this is this is this can be very complicated. And there's a lot of like, devil in the details.
It's not just black and white. And so what it says to me is you need to have somebody on your team or a doctor or somebody who is a real expert and understanding this, who is kind of guiding you. I think what happens a lot of times we Google things, me included, by the way, I'm not I'm not I'm not counting myself out of this.
and Google something and then I think that's okay, so now I should be doing this. And then I listen and I have no clue what I'm doing. So the first step I think is to get somebody that you see or get tested by somebody who knows what the hell they're doing.
and let them kind of like some that you trust and then they can help with this whole thing. Because just even listening to all these things on this podcast and other people I've listened to in the past, you know, it's like a science. It's an exact science and it's constantly ever changing. That's the first thing. What was that? I was going to say at times it can be an inexact science. I mean, that is the...
That's the devil in it is that these fluctuations are dependent on so many things. Yes, that's true. Naturally occurring production, what we call endogenous hormone production. We're looking at exogenous things from the outside that are affecting that. So it's an inexact science and it is challenging to try to figure, you know, to try to find that moment in time. With women, we test them at a certain time in their cycle.
So we can be, you know, very precise with, we have to be because we have to see, you know, are they ovulating? Are they producing progesterone? What's the relationship between estrogen and progesterone and looking at all the other hormones? With men, they can test any time, but we also, when we collect samples, they are collected at a certain time of day. So more...
June evening, nighttime tells us how these rhythms are flowing, you know, how especially adrenal cortisol stress hormones. So anyway, you were saying, yeah, no, I was gonna say also, the type of testing, I think that I heard that the taking a blood test is way more accurate than taking a saliva swab of saliva. Now there's they're doing poop testing for that stuff.
In your opinion, what is the most accurate way to test your hormones? So I'm in the saliva, I'm in the saliva camp, because that's been my training and my background. And it may it's the simplest way to start with testing. For one thing, the difference, you know, if we just start with the difference between the standard blood draw and a saliva test.
So a standard blood draw is going to often cause stress just because it's invasive, because there are needles involved. That can really skew test results, especially when we're trying to track the adrenal diurnal curve. Also, blood testing is looking at the reservoir of hormones that are in the bloodstream. It's not looking at the 2% to 4% fraction
That is leaving the bloodstream, as I was describing before, upon signaling, you know, we have all these signaling systems and feedback loops and the body instructing us.
the need for hormones here, there and everywhere, that fraction that leaves the bloodstream becomes active in the tissues of the body. And when they're in salivary gland, which is tissue, we can capture that saliva sample of a hormone that's on its way to the target tissues where it does the actual work. So it's this is active,
bioavailable levels that we're testing in saliva, which cannot, which are not tested in blood, unless you ask for a free, you know, you can ask for free levels to be tested, but the average doctor does not test free levels of hormones. And in fact, they usually don't test all the hormones that interact, they usually test just follicular hormones or luteal hormones in women and
and probably just testosterone in men. They're not looking at the estrogen and the other levels that are so important. So we're looking, first of all, it's non-invasive saliva. It's convenient. You're testing at the right time of the day
And throughout the day, the same day, if you're a woman, you're testing at the right time of your cycle, you're testing bioavailable active hormone levels that will now correlate much more closely with the symptoms you're experiencing. Too many people get a blood test and are told, oh, your levels look good. You know, you're looking at a reservoir of hormone in there. You're not seeing what fraction is actually active.
and you're not core it's not being correlated with with your your symptoms not not usually saliva testing is list is asking you in our requisition form we ask people to list there's like 144 symptoms there we're correlating symptoms with your levels you never get that with the blood test you get a level you get a number what does it mean what how is it
How is it related to how I'm feeling every day or why I'm not feeling myself? So I think those are the, you know, bioavailable active levels are being measured, non-invasive, convenient, optimal timing, and a great start. There are other tests, there are urine tests that go much deeper and look at metabolic pathways. How are hormones being metabolized? Which pathways are they going down? That can be a great next step.
Yes, now people are doing poop testing. It's these all of these tests test different things. They're looking at different aspects of the hormonal picture. But I believe that saliva is the I mean, the lab I worked for for so many years has now tested 10 million people.
and continues to test more. We can send the kit to your home. You can test at the right time. These are all in the privacy of your home. That's all really important and easy to do. And then the results come back chock-a-block with information that you can use. And hopefully people who test with us anyway will book a consult because we can talk to them. Or we can talk to people that have existing test results. But that's the important part is understanding
the, you know, what your results mean. We also can refer people to providers in their area if they have, if there are providers in their area. That's part of the reason why testing like ours can work because not everybody lives in an area where they can talk to a functional medicine doctor that's really savvy or trained in hormone testing and rebalancing. Okay. So, and so are you saying that the answer is not always, like I had a blood test done at one of these places and
A bunch actually. And my, and all the tests come back that I am like my testosterone, maybe this is like too much information, but whatever, uh, is really, is really low.
And so it could be because I have a lot of heavy metal poisoning. I eat a lot of fish. So that could be a reason why my testosterone is low. Like you were even saying the same thing. It could be a lot of environmental things, what your eating habits are. Point being, if I don't want to be on testosterone medication, which I'm not, by the way, there are lifestyle changes that I can try to help it, right? Right.
Also, right. Okay. So let's talk about that for a second for women and testosterone. Um, what do you feel about women going on testosterone? Because, um, I feel that it's there.
It's not as simple. Women, I believe, there's a whole thing right now about it'll help with lean muscle mass. It will help with energy. It'll help with all these things. But there's a lot of downside and different side effects for these things. So that's why I'm not a big advocate for just going on a hormone replacement thing.
So what are some of the things that people can do lifestyle wise to increase their women for their testosterone? Why can that be? Can they ever increase that much? Let's talk about that a little bit. Can they ever increase their testosterone levels that much by supplementing? I guess my question is women in middle age women or people in their 40s, when their testosterone dips,
Uh, besides weight training, uh, what can they do besides just going on medication? I get like going on, sorry, not medication, but going on hormone replacement therapy. Can they do that can really amp up their testosterone. Do women need testosterone as much as men do? I want to talk more about testosterone and women for a moment.
Yeah, well, I think women need, you know, if women do need testosterone and some of the symptoms of that also can, you know, low testosterone can go along with low estrogen where there's a lot of dryness.
And, you know, all the deficiency symptoms I talked about can also be accompanied by vaginal dryness and a lot of discomfort, which makes the libido even compromises the libido even more. And so women, of course, want to think about maybe getting some testosterone. But again, like with men, it's important first to understand what the whole picture looks like. The picture is
estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, DHEA, which is the precursor of testosterone, and cortisol levels. So if cortisol levels are high or out of whack, that's going to reduce testosterone levels.
If DHEA is low, that's going to reduce testosterone levels because DHEA is the precursor of testosterone. So the substance from which testosterone is derived and all these hormones break down to other hormones. So these you want to establish. I'm ready to note.
If progesterone is low, then you're losing out on the benefit, the great balancer benefits of progesterone, which can also give a little poke to, you know, boosting testosterone levels. So there, there are so many things that can be done. And I would say, um,
Before rushing to the testosterone injection, and many women that I've talked to have done pellets that have been injected to their bottom, and they feel absolutely fantastic for the first month or so, but these pellets are injected for maybe three to six months. What they do is you go from hero to zero. You're feeling awesome.
You're down at the corner going, hey, sailor. You're feeling just top of the world. But most of the women I talk to get into situations where then, you know, as the person
the substance decreases over time. Now they're feeling the effects in, you know, in spades, the symptoms that we're talking about of deficiency and feeling really awful. So it's hard to just get the pelleting. So I know what you're talking about. So for people who don't know, I, there's, you could take a pellet. You basically, they can put it in your butt at like on your butt cheek. Uh,
I know, and so like what I find interesting is there are side effects. Like also, that's why I wanted to talk about this 'cause I know a lot of my like people I know, as friends otherwise, we all talk about this.
And you can also gain weight from taking testosterone. You can get acne from testosterone. Like it's not just like people are looking at things that are like fast fixes, you know, like, oh, I'm a little bit, I'm getting older. I have a low testosterone. I'm just going to go and take a shot, a cream, a pellet. And like,
most like actually most people I know don't feel great, even though that's like the sales, that's like they sell it to you like that. They ended up actually gaining weight or not feeling so hot, you know?
We're building too much muscle and feeling thick and thick and just. Yeah. And really, I was going to add that, you know, some women feel fantastic and then they you know, then the crash comes really hard. Other women start, you know, all the symptoms of high testosterone start.
with acne and skin breakouts and excess facial and body hair and feeling irritable and edgy and aggressive and all of those symptoms of too much testosterone can be a real problem. So knowing those symptoms can tell you what maybe this isn't the right thing for me. And again, just getting a pellet of testosterone only
without balancing. Now, there are things like chrysan and progesterone and aromatase inhibitors that are also provided to women that are on testosterone alone and to men, hopefully. So, I mean, I don't know how savvy doctors can be about this, but that it's important to provide something that's going to inhibit that conversion.
of, you know, of testosterone to estrogen, because certainly just using testosterone is going very possibly to lead to that. And the other part of this is, are your stress hormones out of whack? How, you know, what's going on with the cortisol levels? Are they high so that they're disrupting testosterone production? And are they high because your life is high stress to the point where
Stress is kind of taking center stage in your life. And I always try to point out that, you know, our bodies are, there's such a thing as stress resilience. We are physiologically equipped to deal with acute stressors, you know, someone cutting up in traffic, getting injured, getting sick, you know, having an emotional breakdown.
break down whatever it is, we can bounce back from those things because our system is equipped to deal with the certain every living thing has to deal with stressors. It's all those internal, external stimuli that we have to respond to. It's when stress becomes distress or when it becomes
You know, when we get what we call an allostatic load that is burdening us down, we're stressors, that rubber band, that elastic that should bounce back is now stretched to the maximum. And that's when we start to see in the beginning, you'll see high levels of cortisol often at night.
where people are, their levels are the reverse of where they should be. We like to see cortisol high in the morning and hanging in there at noon and then slowly, you know, gradually dropping to lower levels evening and night in preparation for, you know, calming and sleep and all of that. But instead of that, we often see high levels at night,
and low levels in the morning, which is the reverse of the cortisol picture we want to see. Or we may see cortisol levels that are high across the board, like they don't follow that normal gradual decrease, decreasing of the diurnal curve over the day. And so they're just kind of elevated all the time. And that sort of thing is going to be very, you're going to see a low testosterone on a test result like that. And often,
And people that have high levels often don't sustain those over time. You can only go so long operating at warp speed. What was the old thing? Burning the candle at both ends, not making time. I notice when I talk to people now that a lot of people don't know how to relax. They don't know how to turn off the computer.
They're on their cell phone and computer at night, which is another big disruptor causing cortisol hormones to go up, which disrupts testosterone. So, you know, we aren't doing the things that bring us joy and happiness.
you know, take us, we are, many of us are, but a lot of people think, well, you know, I'm young now, I can work 12 hours a day and drink as much coffee as I want, which by the way, is a horrible whip to the adrenals when people are drinking way too much caffeine in these energy drinks. So we get into these high levels, but over time they start to decrease till these levels then can be even flatlined where you see a flat, you know, the morning level is quite low and then
just kind of drops at noon and then they're low throughout. And people will tell you, I have to push through my day. I can't get through the day without caffeine and sweets. And these are the people that are skipping breakfast. Maybe they're rushing, they're eating at their desk. They're not getting outside and getting some exercise and some sun and air and just taking time to smell the roses. And then all the other things that
create stress, like creating boundaries in your life. How many people have I talked to that say, oh, I work full time, I'm taking care of my aging relatives, and I'm raising my daughter's children. I mean, that's an example of a lot of stress. But so many people don't have, they don't know how to set boundaries and use the word no judiciously, but you know, say no, this is my time. I have to have...
I'm to myself, the old put the mask on yourself before you try to help other people. Right. But we're in a world of abundant stress. We're living in a world of ambient stress where there's always something on the back burner that we've just come through COVID and our politics are so disruptive and infuriating. There's just many things that we're
We're not managing our stressors well, and yet our body is equipped to do that. And the adrenals that manage the stress response are so key as we get older. Like even into our 40s when I was talking about these hormones starting to fluctuate, we just start to get depleted
in these hormones and we can't get our mojo back if we're overworked, overbooked, overcommitted, out of time and trying to please everybody.
all the time. And then you add on the chemicals that are depleting the other hormones in the picture that support and interact and keep that delicate balance and, you know, and you can be and then and then supplementing with hormones that are perhaps synthetic and not bioidentical. And that's a huge difference, the kinds of hormones that you use.
Are they plant-based or are they made of chemicals that are not duplicating the structure and function of your own hormones?
I know synthetic versus bioidentical is a whole other thing, right? It's a whole other thing. Yeah. Because bioidentical hormones are available. They're derived from plants like wild yam or soy. They're made in a lab, yes, but they're made to duplicate that molecular structure so they fit like that puzzle piece into the site. Right.
And they're usually applied in Goldilocks doses. So you're just either as a topical cream, a gel, or...
you know, a sublingual lozenge perhaps, and they should be in doses that are just physiologic. So you're trying to mimic mother nature. You're just replacing what your body or replacing or replenishing what your body is, is lacking. So we're not really take too much or jack yourself up to a point.
which is what can be a problem with testosterone. Sometimes it's like we were talking about, it can be given in high doses. We don't know always that it's bioidentical and it's not being used in concert with the other hormones that it should be supported by.
So you're saying you can take these small mini doses of natural bioidentical hormones. It could be testosterone. It could be estrogen. It could be progesterone. You could take, so it's not, there's a lots of different ones to balance out your overall hormone place. Yeah. Let's say, let's take a woman who's had a hysterectomy. So she has no ovarian production of hormones. Very, you know, her ovaries are gone completely.
And so she may be given a bioidentical combination of estrogen, progesterone and testosterone because all of those hormones are going to be absent once her ovaries are removed. So those that can be that can be a very nice combination.
package a nice way to present, you know, to have if a woman needs testosterone, to have it packaged and blended, formulated in a topical cream or gel. And that's the healthy way to do it. That's the balanced way to take these supplements. And with men, you
Progesterone is actually just a little bit, not as much as women might replenish with, but a bit of testosterone can protect against that conversion of testosterone into estrogen and help to balance whatever estrogen is present. Because just with natural physiologic decline of testosterone, estrogen rises relative to
declining testosterone, which is just a normal, inevitable part of aging.
So it's important to have those hormones on board. There's also an approach which women can and men can take, which is to use DHEA as a supplement, which is the precursor of testosterone and estrogen, by the way. So that's why testing is also important because you want to make sure you're not high in either of those before you use DHEA. But DHEA can be pretty effective at raising those levels of
in an, you know, sort of indirectly, instead of directly putting on testosterone, you're using DHEA, which is going to hit, you know, go into this, the cells of the body, and they're going to recognize it and say, okay, we can use you, we're going to convert you into giving this person a little bit of excess extra testosterone. And you use that in small doses as well. And testing can tell you where your DHEA levels are, are they low enough to justify that?
Also, DHEA is an adrenal hormone. So if it's low, you're going to probably have adrenals that are compromised, low cortisol levels, low testosterone levels, low estrogen levels. You know, it's all...
All related. All of it is. It is. So like if you are moody, if you're stressed out, if you're tired, this can all be hormone related, right? Like this can all be, this can all be helped if we regulate our hormones. Now, full disclosure, I've never tried your tests or anything like that. I've never done that. I've never done any of that stuff. I'm actually now curious to
to try, like you, you guys, you test for all this stuff. Cause I'd like to know what my, what my, what my levels are with you compared to what my levels were with these other people that I like functional doctors I went to and on offices because, um, and then how, how, how involved are you? So let's say I take your test, right?
And then what happens? I get my results. I call you, say, hi, Candice, or you say, hey, Jennifer, here's your test results. Do you give me a protocol then to follow and see if it helps or what happens? Well, first of all, we started the year on balance because there is a dearth of information out there about the fact that, you know, awareness, first of all, symptom awareness. So people get used to their symptoms. They become their symptoms. They don't realize that they're suffering. Right, 100%.
and could feel, people don't remember how good they used to feel or don't even have a clue about how much better they could feel because they've been living with symptoms for ages, sometimes ages. - Totally, I agree, I agree, yeah. - And there's also a good amount of data that tells us that people don't understand their test results when they get blood test results, especially they don't understand. So we decided and the conversation needed to be had
So as educators, we can help to interpret test results. The lab really interprets the result. There's a whole comment field. But what we're doing is taking out the mystery and trying to reviewing these results with people who buy. We have different packages.
So people can buy the test kit. And I should mention the test kit comes to your home. You're testing at home. You are testing. Oh, by the way, I want to say something. This is not an ad. I'm not getting paid. This is not a paid situation. This is legit me just asking these questions. So if anyone thinks this is something other than just me being curious because this is what we're talking about, you're wrong. Okay, go on.
So you get the test kit, you test when, you know, according to whether you're female or male at the right time of day and month. And then we, you send in your samples, you collect your samples, morning, noon, evening, bedtime, you send them in, in the mailer that is prepaid, you send them back to the lab, which is in Oregon, where I live.
The lab then, the same lab, ZRT, that has analyzed over 10 million results, provides a full-on test report with all of your levels, all of the symptoms you reported, and then a comment field that explains and correlates those symptoms with the levels that went down. The thing is, most people don't read, they don't necessarily read information
the full on comment field, or they just want someone to kind of walk them through. So if they do, then we are here. We have a consult, a build your own package. So you can either get the test. Wait, wait, wait, hold on. All I want to know is basically they can go on the website. They are interested. I want to know if the, someone sits with you or you do or whatever and being like, okay, given all of your results,
this is what we should try. We should put, we're going to put you on this supplement. We're going to try giving you this lozenger. Cause I think, like I said, it's very complicated and people don't have the, like you said, the wherewithal, the time and the bandwidth. Right. Like I want to have somebody who is knowledgeable to say, okay, this is what's happening. Let's try this protocol. Yeah. I mean, we can't, we can't diagnose, but we can review your test results and say, this is,
You know, these levels are low, high, trending high, trending low. You know, people will see a level within range and they'll think, oh, it's fine. Well, is it fine if it's trending on the low side of the normal range? So we point things out like that. We review and explain, correlate to your symptoms you're experiencing. And then we have and we have a whole rebalancing guide.
which is part of the package that, you know, we have different packages, as I said. So many people buy the rebalancing guide as part of their package, and it takes each hormone as per your results and discusses what would be helpful. And we have links to herbs, supplements, adaptogens, and even bioidentical hormones that are available over the counter that don't require a prescription. And
And I work with a doctor in Florida who's a compounding pharmacist, OBGYN, who's created a line of bioidentical plant-based creams, hormone creams that he's used for 30 years on his patients but don't require a prescription. So we can get you going. We can get you started. And we can also refer you to someone in your area if you're in an area where... But I think what I find is that most women and men...
And many of the men I've tested have been referred by their girlfriends or wives or partners because they're concerned about their stress levels or their sex drive or their stress, you know, they're just their constant, their lack of sleep, insomnia, that's so common for men. Right.
And a lot of men are a little bit more hesitant to talk about these things. But I find in general, just talking people talk therapy when it comes to hormones and some of these more personal habits. I mean, personal habits.
symptoms that may be due to long-term habits that one doesn't want to really admit to or review or take stock of, we can start to do that in this conversation. And I think it's really revealing and helpful to people and they feel comforted that they've been listened to. A lot of people feel like there's nobody to talk to about this.
100% I agree with that and I try to do is we review we correlate we provide what next information and a lot of education so people who are interested in what the hell does estrogen really do or you know why why does my testosterone matter if I'm a woman you know these sorts of things we have a full-on we talk about the different stages the different cycles in women we talk about
There are all kinds of things that come up for men that we can be specific about. We customize and personalize our rebalancing plans. So it gets pretty specific. No, thank you. I appreciate that. I think that this, I mean, more or less what I've gotten from all of this is that, number one, there's so many different things.
It could be a lot of information and it can be complicated, but the balancing of hormones is such a big indicator of your overall health and how you feel day to day. It can affect all areas of your life.
And to go get, I mean, to, for people to be cognizant and aware of it and not just to take something, uh, because their friend, friend says that they're doing something. I, I did that one time and, uh,
It didn't behoove me. It messed me up. And that's really more or less why I wanted to have this conversation with you and have you on. It's just more to kind of shed some light on all the different imbalances and symptoms that people may be feeling and they don't know what's causing them and to go get checked. No matter where they're getting checked, it doesn't have to be with you, obviously. They should just get checked with someone that they are...
comfortable with, and therefore they'll have more information. Information then gives people the ability, the knowledge to get better. So... In your case,
Communities where you live, if you have a compounding pharmacy, that's a great resource because the compounding pharmacies know which doctors in the community are prescribing bioidentical hormones or sending people into the pharmacy to pick up an adrenal support tincture or an adaptogen. They can refer people if you're lucky to have someone in your area there.
Or you can, you know, if you want to work with someone like us where it's basically education, but we're providing a laboratory, you know, test that is giving you a huge amount of information and providing you with all natural ways forward, you know, so that we're not...
We're not prescribing anything, but if prescribing is needed, then we're happy to refer. So whoever, if you're in a city where you've got access, like if you're in LA, you certainly have access to compounding pharmacists and doctors who know this stuff.
If you want privacy and you want to go online and do your testing, I mean, you're still going to take the test home if it's saliva and test at home and mail it into the lab and get your result. And then you're going to be sitting there with the result and need to talk to somebody. Absolutely. I just think having the being armed with information is.
Um, and then having someone that is extremely knowledgeable to help walk through. So you're not just randomly taking a bunch of hormones because there could be a lot of bad side effects. But, uh, Candice, thank you so much for taking up a ton of your time. Um, where do people find out more information if they want it? Do you want us to give you a website or?
Yeah, just yourhormonebalance.com. We have a symptom quiz on there, which is most useful for women, and we'll find it helpful. Love to give a code for Habits 50 for $50 off any test kit that we've got up there, test kit package. We also have a Black Friday sale coming up. And then we've got a great Instagram account.
at Your Hormone Balance so people can find us there. And we're constantly trying to put out more information, learning more, putting out, you know, the latest news you can use. This is what we're all about. It's just spreading the word that
you know, there is an andropause, there is a menopause, but there are in between when we're not in those places, what are we doing to remain resilient and to, you know, to have the most optimal hormonal balance? It's all it's one of those fundamental pillars of our health and longevity. Absolutely. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for coming on. I appreciate that.
Thank you so much for having me on. Any chance I get to spread the message, I'm here.
