Decoding Slow Metabolism & Thyroid with Angela Brown, FDN-P, LPT, CPT

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Are you struggling with runaway weight gain, weight loss resistance,  sluggish thyroid, hitting keto hard and still gaining weight? 

The answer may be in your minerals! Get off the struggle bus and find out what might be going on so you can finally reach your health goals with Angela Brown.

Angela is a holistic health coach from St. Louis, MO.  She is a certified Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner (FDN-P), a licensed physical therapist, as well as a personal trainer.  She specializes in advanced testing and thyroid healing for women.  She has recovered from hypothyroidism herself after being diagnosed at the age of 22.  She used her experience and education to create her program called “The Sexy Thyroid Solution” to help women no longer suffer like she did and get to the root cause of their health issues.  

Angela's Website and Blog:  https://angelabrown.org/ 

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/angelabrowncoach/  (Angela Brown Thyroid Coach)

Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/angelabrowncoach/?hl=en  (angelabrowncoach)

Grab The Secret To Reading Your Thyroid Blood Test here: https://www.angelabrown.org/landing-page-the-secret-to-reading-your-thyroid-blood-test

Transcript

Hi Angeles. Thank you so much for joining me today. I'm really excited to have you here on podcasts. Hey Dory. It's good to see you too. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me by the way. 

Absolutely. And,  I am really excited about the topic that you chose to talk about and was wondering if you could share, just because it's not something that we hear a lot about, , how you started working with women with minerals and what got you excited.

So probably the biggest thing that started with me is I have hypothyroidism myself. I was diagnosed when I was 22, I'm now 45.  But I had a lot of big struggles with it. And, , that's what made me start reaching out, figuring out what else can I do here? Because I was really struggling with my own health and it was super frustrating.

And the conventional medicine route, I would just kept getting worse and worse and worse. And I was like, there's gotta be something else that I'm missing here.  And so I started investigating.  And found,  someone who actually does mineral testing. And so I was like, I'm going to investigate like doing minerals on myself and see if that's a game changer or has anything to do with it.

And boy, was it a big game changer for me? And I thought, wow, this is cool stuff. I'm going to use this in my practice. I'm going to help other women with us. Um, it has been such a huge, huge piece,  when dealing with hypothyroidism. So it was more of a, my own personal struggle that led me to it. And now I love using it in my practice.

So what are the kinds of things that, drew you to , working with it and  what was the thing that was said about it? That. 

So the one thing that actually the biggest thing that was the kind of like, oh, I think I need to do this is, um, when we start looking at minerals, it really looks at what your metabolism is doing.

, obviously we know that metabolism, there's such a massive connection to what the thyroid does based off the metabolism, the adrenals that just showed a lot of connection.  I was going through a phase where like my thyroid blood panel looked pre. And I was like, I don't feel normal. Like you telling me it's normal, but I don't feel normal.

And what led me to go, oh, I think I need to do the mineral stuff. Was the, there was a lot of information I was getting that you can have like normal blood panel with your thyroid, but if the minerals are really imbalanced and there was some particular ones, if they're really imbalanced, it is going to slow.

The metabolism is going to slow your thyroid and you're going to be spending on a hamster wheel and you're just going to keep having. So-called normal thyroid panel, but still feel like dirt. , that's what made me go. Oh, okay. I need to look at these minerals because I felt horrible, but my panel kept looking pretty.

Okay.  And I was like, that's, it's not okay. Somethings else is wrong here. And  it was very intriguing to me as well, because then it showed so much connection with the thyroid and the adrenals and even digestion. Like there's a lot of things on it. So it wasn't just, oh, we're only looking at metabolism.

That's a big.  Because it even tells you, are you in a slow metabolic state or are you in a fast metabolic state? Majority of the women I work with they're typically in slow and that's where I was, but I was like, kept being told that everything looked normal on my blood panel. So I was fine and I knew something was off.

I could feel it. So that was why I was like, Hm, we got to these mineral, this mineral status.

Yeah, it sounds like it's like a big missing link to what a lot of people are struggling with because you were looking at the labs. And I know just from what I know about you, you go in deep and you like to analyze things and really get to understand things. So when you're looking at your labs, you're feeling like that's what you're being told by everybody.

And to  listeners,  Angela is a master of reading thyroid panel labs and other things. For her to see things being normal. She knows also functionally what to look for when you're seeing things, a new normal to see if there's something more to it. So I'm sure you exhausted what you were able to do with that.

And then we're looking for the next thing. And I don't think a lot of people hear about mineral testing. Why do you know it's something that people would, 

 It is not common and it's pretty crazy too, because I'll, I talk about on social media constantly, and you can imagine the amount of DMS direct messages.

What is this? I've never even heard of this. Like, they've heard the word mineral obviously, but they're like, I thought you tested for it in blood and I'm like, well, you can't test it for in blood. It's not that it's not okay. In blood. It's just going to tell you the snapshot, like right now, it's not going to tell you what it's been for, like the last three months.

And the hair tests that I do for minerals is going to tell you the three month average, which I'd rather have a three month average, then just like.  So that's why I do it that way. But like I said, most people are like, I had no idea. And what the heck does minerals have to do with your thyroid? Um, so it's just not a common thing.

It's definitely not common because conventional medicine doesn't do it. In fact, I had a lot of clients who've gone to their doctor and say, Hey, I just. Hair tissue, mineral analysis with my coach. And they're like, what? They don't, they've never even heard of it. Um, it's just not, it's just not a common test and yo insurance doesn't pay for it and all that stuff.

So because of that, it's not like most people don't know about it and most people don't hear about it, but it's been, it's been a huge, huge piece for me personally. And then for my clients, I just see such big changes for people. Um, particularly in the thyroid world. When we start looking at.

Yeah.  I've had some people say, yeah, you know, I've had my magnesium levels tested. And it was a blood test here. And explain, can you explain to people why maybe that isn't always accurate? You just mentioned a little bit about it, but why is blood not a good marker? 

Yeah. Yeah. So like, for example, what you eat because you know, food has minerals.

So what you eat could like affect what your minerals look like? Like, so for example, if I had a really high sodium food or high magnesium foods, , like the day before my levels might be a little bit more the next day.  So if you just go get your blood test that next day, then you're just going to see like, what's going on.

Like the last, maybe like 24 hours.  Which again, not terrible, but, they're going to be skewed a little because it may look like you have totally normal calcium or magnesium or sodium potassium.  So the hair test gives a three month average. So it's interesting. When you take that's the hardest part is when you do it as a hair test, a lot of the women that come to me, one of the issues they have is they have hair loss and I'm like, well, we actually have to take a hair sample.

They're like, oh great. So now I have to take more hair out, but I want just trust me. You're going to be happy that you. Um, but the half of an inch of hair growth, um, is, uh, one month of minerals, basically. So it, you take like an inch and a half length of the hair, and that's going to give you a three-month average.

Um, I much rather would have a three month average of minerals to get a better idea of where I am than just like what it is today. Because again, everything. How the weather is outside can affect what your minerals are doing. You know, if it's really hot or really cold, I mean, there's so many things that can affect it.

So I would much rather have a three month average than just like today and just like that snapshot for right now. So like I said, it's not a bad marker. It's, you know, and I will compare it to blood testing, but more often than that, it's not even as relevant because it's just telling me today and I, that's not going to tell me.

To go, oh yeah. You are really deficient in magnesium. Well, maybe you aren't, maybe you just had a ton of magnesium foods or, um, you know, you took your magnesium supplement and got your blood drawn, like an hour later. Like there's so many things that can affect it. So I that's why.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. You don't want to take something from one day a snapshot and do something with it over a few months or however long your protocols are. And it wasn't accurate. It was just that moment in time. So yeah, that totally makes sense. Yeah. So , what are things that are trending that you're seeing in people who have direct problems and need support in their metabolism?

The big thing, I mean, the most common symptoms that I see are that the typical slow thyroid symptoms. So I'm usually seeing women typically, , and they're usually, you know, weight loss, resistance, or gaining weight for like no reason. Um, you know, saying they're eating healthy. Working out and they're like, I'm putting weight on or it's not coming off.

I just, something doesn't feel right. , and hair loss, constipation, extreme exhaustion, usually it's, you know, quite a bit of fatigue.  Sometimes they start to lose like part of their eyebrows, the outer third of their eyebrows. Anxiety is a really big one that I see as well, depression, even that's that all can be brain fog is of massive one, two, that all can be connected to the thyroid.

So that's typically what, when women are coming to me, that's typically what they're telling me is these are all my symptoms and they're like, it's a lot of symptoms. And I'm like, yeah, that's that sounds, that's like thyroid symptoms. That's pretty typical when we have a slow thyroid or even like Hashimoto's, typically we're going to have those kinds of symptoms.

And then I always look at. What our symptoms are. And then I correlate it to what I see on testing. And like on the mineral testing, I always see patterns. It's very, very typical. I'm going to see patterns and I'm usually going to see are typically in a slow metabolic state. So we call it a slow oxidizer,  you're either a slow oxidizer or a fast oxidizer.

, when we look at minerals and typically they're slow, which is exactly how it sounds, the metabolism is slow. Um, and then typically  there's some minerals on there that will. You can look at ratios, they have, it's like a thyroid ratio. They have an adrenal ratio. And typically the thyroid ratio shows that the thyroid is sluggish.

You can have a totally normal thyroid panel. So your blood tests might look okay, but your hair tests could look like a train wreck. And that's actually what I usually see. And that's why there are saying my thyroid panel looks normal, but I feel terrible. And so typically I will see, they have usually elevated calcium is a pattern.

I typically see one calcium. I always use this now he kept, calcium's not a smart mineral. So like calcium supposed to be in bone and teeth. And when it gets out of Bowman teeth, it doesn't know how to go back. So it's, it's just hanging out. It's going where it's not supposed to go. I think about calcium, like calcifies so it's going where it's not supposed to be going.

 But it doesn't know how to go back. It's just hanging out. The problem with that is it typically will end up slowing the thyroid down. So I typically will say. Um, elevated calcium. I usually also see very, very low potassium, almost every single woman that I've worked with. They either had really low potassium on a hair test, or it was extremely high, which doesn't mean it's high.

It actually means you're losing potassium. It's not staying inside the cell. One of the biggest things we need to ask him for his potassium helps too, does a lot of things, but it helps to sensitize our. So that we accept that our hormone, this is where something like we call it. Cellular hypothermia comes into play.

Diary panel might look good. You might have thyroid hormones. You might have them floating around, but just because they're floating around, doesn't mean you're using them. And that's where I usually will end up seeing the mineral testing will show. You have your thyroid numbers, you might have your thyroid hormones, but you are not using them because if calcium is up and potassium is down, it's pretty difficult.

You're usually typically not using your thyroid hormones then. And that's why you have all the symptoms of a slow thyroid. It's not that you don't have the hormones and you might not have the hormones either. I do see that a lot too, where they don't even have the hormones much less. Are they using the hormones?

But it's really, really common to see that high calcium, low potassium. And, um, that's a super common one, um, that pattern and that's actually, , a thyroid ratio. We look at affect the thyroid ratio, um, as that is, a calcium potassium ratio. Um, and then it adrenals,  we also have a ratio for that, which is sodium magnesium.

And th the, the four main minerals that I'm really looking at are calcium, magnesium, sodium potassium. And I usually will say, Calcium's up. Usually we have a magnesium loss and then sodium depends because if someone is on a serious stress and overdrive, their sodium is usually high. If they're in the exhaustive phase where the body's like tapping out, their sodium is usually low, but typically, always potassium is tapped out.

They usually don't have potassium.  So I always, I usually see this pattern with them and it's like, gosh, once we just start addressing those first four minerals and we look at other minerals, selenium is a really big one for thyroid. Um, and we look at irons and things, but that the big ones that I'm looking at are, are those first four.

I mentioned calcium, magnesium, sodium potassium. And typically if we have those are off, you're probably not going to feel very good even with taking thyroid medication. And that's another common thing I hear is I'm taking thyroid medication and I'm miserable still. Um, because your body's probably not using it because you don't have the minerals.

So that's why I'm always, like, we gotta look at minerals and I do every single client I work with. It's the first thing we do. We go right into minerals. Cause I'm like, I don't want you to spend it on a hamster wheel where we're like, oh, we'll try this. And let's have you take your thyroid medication. You know, obviously we go over food and all these other things, but if the minerals aren't happening, it's it's makes it a longer.

Yeah. There's so much Sarah that you mentioned. I mean, one is that you were saying the  potassium could look low or high, but actually be the opposite you were talking about just how some things can  get out of balance really quickly and that you can actually be taking medication and not be receiving it.

So it really doesn't matter how much you're taking and you're going to continue to feel bad. It's probably doing more damage than good at that point. And so. It makes a lot of sense that when you look at the mineral balances and you're understanding it in the way that you do that, you're able to really see what to do next.

I mean, how do you resolve that? Because it's not taking more thyroid medications, right. It's going to make the difference. So go ahead. Yeah. Oh, I'm just going to zoom back in and, um, ask if you can explain what minerals do, like, why are they so important? You've already tapped into how like calcium supposed to be making in the teeth and the bones and the past whom and what it does, but overall, what is, why are they so important and,  necessary.

And why do we need to know more about. 

So minerals, I always use this analogy too. Minerals are like spark plugs. They are literally like the spark plugs of your body. So if they're off, it is hard to correct other things.  So I, I'm always adamant about looking at minerals for that main reason is because they are like, sparkplugs.

The other factor is. Uh, when we have any sort of stress and we're talking a stress response, it could be like, you know, emotional stress, but it could be like, you might have leaky gut. You might have liver stress. You might, um, have, um, stress from, you know, gut healthy and off, or you have a food sensitivity.

So you can all kinds of stressors. Anytime we have stress. Minerals get used. We have to use minerals to respond to that. They also get used just like, you know, we have cortisol present, all that stuff. We use minerals, they will get depleted as we go on in life. And we've had any sort of stress. You can't avoid stress a hundred percent.

It's impossible. So I actually like looking at kind of like a timeline for people to, and like my intake form, I go in, in pretty depth of what stressors have you had in. I want to know more details, timeline, and all that, because if someone has a timeline and their stress timeline has been like from five years old and they're now 40, and they've never had a mullet where they weren't.

There are minerals are probably going to be pretty depleted and a train wreck, um, compared to someone who maybe just had a little bit of stress going on for a year ago or something. Um, so that's one thing is, is if we have any sort of stress, which, like I said, it's inevitable, you are going to start depleting minerals.

You have to have those minerals for like so many functions, magnesium alone. We need it for like 3000 different activities in the body. That's a lot of activity. We need it for. Potassium, for example, we need 4,700 milligrams of potassium a day, just normal function. That's one, if you're deficient, it's really hard to get 4,700 milligrams of potassium a day just from food.

Yeah. It's not an easy, so you can imagine if you're low in it and you aren't getting 47 milligrams, it's going to be really hard to, to, to bring that back up. Now. I love using. For bringing minerals, um, back into the body, I'm always adamant about using food as well, but sometimes it's ended up, sometimes you have to do supplementation, um, in order to do that, but keep in mind that your body can't manufacture minerals itself.

You can make hormones, you can even make more neurotransmitters. You can, um, make different, um, uh, nutrients and things like that at times. But minerals, you can't, they, they, you either have them or you don't. And typically you're going to get them from food. And that's the other factor is, you know, or food sources these days, they have gotten much more deficient in nutrients and neuros than they were years ago.

And, you know, because of soil and all that stuff. So there's a lot, that's a whole nother subject, but, um, because of that alone, the minerals, the mineral depletion, it, you know, it's, it's pretty, it's pretty prevalent. There's a lot of people with mineral deficiency. Um, because of that. And, um, you know, like I said, you, you can't make your own minerals and we need them for everything.

I mean, magnesium, like I said, you need it for so many things sodium. We need sodium for adrenal health. Um, we need calcium for our bone and teeth. Like, we need those things for so many different things. Potassium's important for heart health. So there's a lot of functions that they serve, but they also have so much connect to them, to what our metabolism is doing to what our adrenals are.

To what our thyroid's doing, even our sex hormones, um, there's so much connection there. And so that's why I'm like why it's important to really look up minerals. Like I said, they're little spark plugs and they can kind of make or break when you're trying to correct different patterns in the body and things like that.

It can make it a much bigger challenge when we don't have those minerals in check. 

Yeah, and like what you were saying with the food and the, soil that we're also using, there's a lot of toxins and things like that. Imagine that's another as well, so, and avenues to be losing our minerals.

So Angela, what if I just buy a really good quality, general supplement and just take that, will that fix everything? 

For some, it can like if you're just efficient across the board, any old mineral supplement would suffice for something like that. But it's pretty rare that we'll see someone where they have a deficiency kind of across the board.

Usually they have some that are too high. Sometimes that means a loss. Sometimes that actually means it might be too high depending on the mineral. Um, sometimes they're low. So usually I don't have people just blindly start taking a mineral supplement. Now I will say. Um, if you're doing like, um, uh, minerals, uh, like they make liquid minerals and things like that, those, um, across the board, like anyone can take those, but typically there's, it's only got a certain amount of like magnesium, a certain amount of like all these, the, the minerals that's only have, has a certain amount of them.

And so, for example, Like if you're super deficient in magnesium, maybe a little deficient in potassium, not bale with sodium, you're going to get the same amount for every single thing. So it might not be, it might be that, you know, just doing a general mineral supplement would help you kickstart things.

But like, if you're really deficient in potassium, you may need extra calcium on top of that. Um, so it's, it can't hurt to do that, but at the same time, like I said too, I don't always recommend Matt. You can make things worse. If you have something that's high, like for example, if your sodium is extremely high, that's usually an acute stress response.

If we see sodium really high, we gotta be a little cautious with how much sodium we're taking in, um, even like Celtic, sea salt, you know, things like that because we might, when your sodium is really high, it can make you. Um, kind of almost anxious. It can make you snappy, um, people just when they have high sodium, I can tell because they're like, oh my gosh, I have to know patients.

I'm snappy. I just feel like I'm on edge all the time. My anxiety's anxiety is through the roof. I'm like, yeah, your S your sodium's extremely high. So you, that's why you kind of have to be a little careful when we're just kind of, let's just have people take things and not necessarily know. But like I said, across the board, if you're taking a pretty normal dose of things like that, it's not going to make things worse.

It sounds like it's gotta be pretty customized and fine tuned. And, um, it's hard to do that with just something that's really generic, especially if you have an extreme deficiency and like that if something's actually quite high already. So, so basically when you have a mental deficiency and,  you work with a woman and you find out her results, how do you put together something to help her?

How do you get started with her in. 

So there's a lot of factors I look at, um, when I look at the test result, first of all I analyze, are we in a slow state? Are we in a fast state? Typically most of them are slow and I have to do a lot of like health history and things like that to find out are they going to be okay if we're doing some, um, mineral supplementation with hill form, are we better off to have like a powder formula?

There's a company that I work with that,  can we create a kind of a customized formula with. That has everything in it that they could possibly need, um, to sort of correct that. However, if someone's like super sensitive, um, or, um, they're really sick, like have a lot of things going on, I'm going to take things like way slower.

So we're going to do like individual supplements, one at a time. It's a very long journey and that does happen. But, um, Uh, most of the time what I'm doing is I'm looking at what are we deficient in? Let's get you, let's get, you let's work with food first. So I'm always gonna recommend food. And then, um, again, I'm usually looking at other test results with it.

So if I see like their gut health as a train wreck and they have leaky gut and their inflammation is through the roof. Putting them on a ton of supplements, they might not absorb a ton of it. So I'm going to like start working on and let's get some inflammation worked on let's work on leaky gut stripped stuff first.

So I'll do it in phases depending on what I see. But if someone's not terrible with other testing, then I will go into the minerals a little bit more aggressively depending on where they are. But I like to have liver health, you know, drainage pathways opened up liver health work done. I like to have those sort of things.

And gut health maybe started to address some of those things. So that way, when we started doing, because when you start balancing minerals, it, it, you have to be a little strategic with it. Cause you can make people feel really yucky. Um, if you're going like straight into it with a lot of minerals and it moves stuff around and can move toxins around.

Cause everyone I put on a binder when we start doing mineral balancing, cause you can move things around. So you, you do have to be a little strategic with it. So it depends on the. Um, but yeah, usually I'm addressing a lot of other things prior to us, even like going straight into let's let's start bouncing or minerals.

It kind of have to be strategic depending on the person.

Yeah, it does. And so what you're saying is that when you start  moving minerals, it changes things in it. You are moving things around and change things in your body, and it actually could be work. Your body's going to have to do things and adjust to it.

And part of that is detoxing. And so it makes sense because it's, they get into your gut and it's going to get into your other systems and your classification processes. And so if those gateways aren't open, you're going to make the person feel worse. Yeah. Instead of better and that's what we want.

So, yeah, exactly. And it sounds like,  there's just a lot of things involved with it so that, you don't just take them all and just think, okay, I'm deficient and let me just take as much as I can to throw up. That's just not how it works, right? Yeah. 

Yeah. Cause you can totally, I mean, you can definitely make yourself feel worse and kind of like you said, like, you know, few haven't.

So for example, if someone's really, really, they got, they got a lot of issues going on, really sick. Their liver is a total mess. They're not really,  hooping very well. They're not detoxing very well. And then I just go right into doing minerals. They are going to feel pretty lousy. So I I'm always like, and it's tough because some clients are like, just give me the minerals.

I want to boost my metabolism. I want to lose this weight. And I'm like, oh no, we gotta take a step back here because I'm looking at some of your other tests and. Everything else, a train wreck. So we have to go like in slow phases. I'm like, you will thank me for this later. Cause you don't feel lousy if we just go right into it.

That's one of the reasons why I put everyone on a binder when we do start doing mineral balancing. Cause it does it stirs things up. Um, especially metals muscles, metals is a really big one other, it will start stirring some of that stuff up, which that has also checked on the hair test. Um, and that's going to make you feel kind of lousy.

So you have to be, you definitely have to be strategic. 

Can you say a little bit more about the metals and what we might find and why? Like  how would they get there and why is it making them not feel good when they say. 

And metals are tough because like it, once you have metals in you, I mean your liver, obviously as a filter, it does as much as it can to get things out, but not all metals are going to excrete on our own and you can get a big buildup.

I mean, like mercury, you can get, build up, , pretty easily just from, you know, if you eat sushi a lot, like you can have a build up or mercury. Some people do great with it, but some people will hold onto it.  Aluminum, arsenic, like there's so many metals that we can get buildup from. And the tough part with those is, you know, uh, most of them have some sort of connection to the thyroid.

And that's why I like looking at the metals as well, because, um, some of them will inhibit conversion of T4 over to active T3. Some of them will bump out iodine. Well, we need iodine. You have to have four out molecules to make T4 in three months. To make T3 your thyroid hormones. So there are some metals that will knock the iodine out of the way so that you can't make your thyroid hormones.

Um, there are some that will knock selenium out of the way. We also need selenium for thyroid hormone conversion. So there's a lot of reasons why I'm like that. And that's one of the reasons why I like that they do the metal. As well on the hair test that I do, because there's such a, such a massive connection.

So you can start metals like to stay really hidden in tissue. They like to stay stuck down sequestered. So on a first hair test, I don't always see metals right away. And I always warn people because I'm like when we start balancing minerals, they might start coming out. So you cannot miss your binder because we want to bind that up so that we don't make you feel lousy for one, for another.

When we do a retest, don't be alarmed. If now you're like, oh, why do I have mercury? I didn't have it on my first test. It's probably been there the whole time. You just don't see it. Um, but that's why I like being able to look at those and assess those. Um, but we always, regardless if there's metals or not on a test on a first test, I'm always to buy into, because I know that they're probably stuck in tissue.

We're not seeing them.  And they can knock out. Think about the periodic chart I always use. Help kind of think about what the heck the metals have to do with minerals on a periodic chart, you have your metals and you have minerals. So if there's a metal that's present, it can knock out the mineral that's in that same.

And take place for it. So it will, your body will think, oh, we have selenium when we don't, because we're actually using like mercury instead. Um, so that's why you, you have to like, be super cautious when you do start balancing minerals. You're putting some in there, but those metals have to get out of the way now.

So we start moving them and moving metals around doesn't make women or anyone feel very good. So you have to like, that's why you use. Um, and, and bind it up and it's not a metal detox. That's a completely different ball game, like a metal detox. You're you, you're taking things to pull the sequester things out.

So that's a different ball game that makes people feel really yucky. Um, this is just binding up. What's present. What's already there. What your body already it's like out of tissue and not stuck in tissue. Um, you bind that up and yeah. Get rid of it so that you don't okay. 

Yeah, that's so fascinating.

Isn't it like your analogy with what you're saying about the periodic table that the metals have similar properties as the ones that you actually do want. And so your body kind of grabs for them because it's trying to make up for something that's not there. And now it's like a play a game of musical chairs and a bounce.

The ones that you don't want. So, is that why you say you work with, uh, main minerals first? 

Yeah. Yeah, the main minerals.  And like I said, it's not that the other ones aren't important. Sometimes the other minerals can fall into place too. When we start getting those first four balance, I mean, you could go down a rabbit hole.

There's a lot of minerals that's checked and you could go down a rabbit hole and roll everything that you're low on. You need to take, I mean, A lot of minerals and that's crazy. Um, some of them we do address, but some of them you don't have to because some of them can just bounce back. As we start getting, you know, the first four balanced, some of them will come into play then.

Um, for example, like, um, zinc, if someone's low in zinc, but they're also low in sodium, I will not have them take any zinc cause equal, lower sodium. Um, if someone has extremely high sodium and we have low zinc, I'm like, let's use a little zinc. That'll help bring that sodium down. So, you know, you have to be strategic with it.

Um, like I mentioned, but there's some that will, they will bounce back. Um, as you start balancing those first four, the first four were always going to be the most.

Yeah. So it sounds like for those listeners out there, they're thinking there's just so much to it and I just don't know where to start. So when you work with somebody,  can you share a stories about maybe somethings that have you've seen experience so people can kind of get a sense of what it's like to work with a practitioner like you, and also, They can see what evolves after that.

Yeah. So, um, I actually just had a client recently. I had two clients recently,  who are both on thyroid medication. They don't have for quite a while actually, but pretty lousy feeling, just terrible. And their, their numbers don't look terrible. I've looked at the numbers. They don't look bad, but they're just not feeling good at all.

 And so we started, um, I, I usually am doing most clients. We're usually doing the heroin. , a hormone and adrenal test and then a stool test. , that's kind of my homework one. Sometimes I have to throw in extra things, but I'm usually doing those regardless. Um, these two particularly , are off their thyroid meds.

Their doctor's like, I don't know what you're doing, but your numbers look normal and you have zero symptoms. So I don't want you on your thyroid meds anymore. So they've been able to go off their thyroid meds and a lot of clients come to me with that goal. It doesn't always go that way. I mean, I, I have to take thyroid medication.

I've been on it forever. I'm on a super low dose now, compared to what I was, but I don't know if I'll ever come off of it because my career was so mismanaged for like 15 years, unfortunately. Um, but like the ones that have come to me, they're like, you know, I've been on it a while, but I'm pretty miserable.

They, um, typically are not have, some of them haven't even been, been like consistent with taking it. Cause they're like, I feel worse when I'm on.  And so their doctor's like, no, you have to take it as your numbers. And, um, Wolf's obviously the hair testing is one of the tests we'll do. And when we start working on, usually I'm going,  over a lifestyle, a lot of lifestyle things.

So we go, we dive into what food you should eat, what you shouldn't eat, um, based on gut testing, based on hair testing. Cause we can even see. You're a sole oxidizer. So like, we need to make sure that you're actually eating your carbohydrates. Like you cannot do low carb, um, or you're deficient in magnesium.

So we're going to boost these magnesium foods. Um, so we can really get a baseline of where their food should be. That's been a big, big piece that my clients always tell me. They're like, I love this because I never know what to eat. I don't know if I'm making things worse on if I'm making things. I'm so confused.

The food part is a really big portion of it. So I'm usually really diving into what they should eat or shouldn't eat, um, uh, meal planning, things like that, so that they have a better idea of, yeah, this is going to help me balance my minerals and keep my blood sugar balanced and all that stuff. Um, and then we dive into liver health, stress, sleep, you know, uh, W wait way more in depth on gut health, depending on their stool tests.

A lot of times we have to go way more in depth. Um, cause most times. Not always the best either when I get those back. Um, but we look at the body as a whole, so I'm doing more full picture and that's the part that people love. Cause they're like, I like that. You don't just, we're not just looking at thyroid.

They're like I have hypothyroidism or I have thyroid symptoms, but my doctor won't look at anything else. And so they liked that piece of it because sometimes we'll find other things. Um, even, you know, I'll actually ask for extra blood testing. Sometimes we'll find that they're iron deficient or that they have a copper toxicity.

Um, their cortisol is completely a train wreck on their adrenals are totally tapped out things like that. And it's stuff that like, they're not going to see in the typical testing. And so they love that aspect of it that we're doing full body. So I'm going more into, I mean, I go into sleepy, man. I'm like, look, we got to go over your sleep pattern.

You're not sleeping, or you're doing things that are making your sleep pattern worse. We need to, we need your sleeping. So, um, you know, it, it's, it's just this full body approach instead of just like, we're just gonna look at your thyroid panel and that's it. Um, so when I'm working with someone it's like phases, like I said, kind of like with, you know, supplementation from like the hair test, I do everything in sort of phases.

I it's, um, like step sell, take with them. Cause they're usually with me for at least six months. Um, because you can't like it's too overwhelming. I could not, like, I always think about it like, well, what. Back in the day, um, when I was miserable and I'm like, I would have wanted this kind of program, but I don't want it all thrown on me on one day.

Cause I that's too overwhelming. So I do it in like steps and phases.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. The CyWrite doesn't function in a vacuum and that's kind of how it's being treated. 

Oh, it is. Yeah. It's, it's literally tree that way and it isn't it there's. And I always use that analogy to think about a triangle. Your thyroid's on one corner, adrenals are on one corner.

Sex hormones are in north corner. They all have to play along with each other. So if one's off, they're typically all off and that's why you have to look at the body as a whole. To approach it than just, oh, here's your thyroid numbers. Take your thyroid meds. I'll see you in six months. It doesn't work like that.

It just doesn't work like that. And it's frustrating. I've been there 15 years. I battled that. And, um, that's one of the reasons, one of the main reasons why I work with women, I created my program. Cause I'm like, this is so unnecessary. It doesn't need to be.

Yeah,  and,  listeners, if you think of the symptoms that Angela has been seeing, those are also all being dismissed as signs of aging. Right. But the longer you've been on the planet, the more you're likely to. Yeah, right. Exposed to these kinds of things and dealt with all these chronic stressors and had sleep deprivation and all these other things.

So with those three different things, you mentioned the triangle, we're all getting affected by these things. I think it's a unicorn out there. Isn't a lot that it's not being effected by these kinds of, hopefully, as we get into midlife where I feel like we're so busy and we're doing so many things, taking care of so many people and, you know, trying to take care of ourselves as well.

So it sounds like, , it's a really kind of dicey game to try and biohack this yourself. I know that, especially in the midlife space, we're all being told to eat more fat and protein and cut out the carbs. And so if you have a spirit, you find out you're a slow metabolizer, then you're probably seeing that happening to 

yeah.

And I will tell you a lot of women that have come to me, they're like, oh, I'm trying keto, or I'm trying low carb. You know, I'm too scared to eat carbs now. Cause my doctor told me I need to cut them all out because my thyroid Sloan I'm like, oh boy, that's like the exact opposite. Um, and typically we'll see it.

Like, we'll see the hair trusting. And I'm like, oh yeah, you know you can't. And I actually, I have a client I just started working with, she's been doing pretty hardcore keel for years. Um, and just feeling worse. But her doctor was just pushing her and pushing her. You have to stick with it. You have to stick with it.

The weight will come off someday. She's up 50 pounds and I'm. 50 pounds. And the doctor keeps telling her, just keep going, it'll come off someday. Don't worry about it. She's 40. And I'm like, you can't, that's not, that's not right. Well then we got our hair test and I'm like, and it's one of, probably one of the worst patterns I've seen.

It's like the slowest pattern I've seen. Um, and I'm like, we, you have to stop. So the tough part with her is that is. 'cause I can't just go, oh, eat all the carbs. Um, because she's going to feel like she's like a balloon from the water retention and everything else. So I'm like, we were getting very, very slow carb integration, but yeah, her minerals were terrible and I'm like, oh my gosh, no wonder.

You're not feeling good. Um, and this is making you worse and there is a time and place. But the majority of the women that I see typically they're still oxidizers and that's just going to make them feel even worse, at least down the road. Maybe not immediately, but down the road, it probably will.

 It just underscores how important it is , to test these things and understand what your body chemistries. Not look at the trends or, you know, what working for, , this other person out there in the ether, and then think that it's going to work for you. And that's really sad too, isn't it?

That  she's feeling probably like she's doing something wrong.

Right. Then I might. And that's what she said. She goes, what am I doing wrong? And I'm like, nothing. Like, you're just, you're you're following what the is telling you to do. It's not that you're doing it wrong. I'm like, you, you actually are doing the keto diet.

Like she's doing it hardcore, but I'm like, it's just not your, body's just not in that state where it could do it. Maybe someday she could, but I'm like, your body is not in that state where he could do it. It's just not going to, it's just not going to happen for you. Um, and it is unfortunate. It's there, you know, you can go on Google and look up.

What's the best diet for hypothyroidism. And like 15,000 different diets will pop up and you're like, oh, which one should I choose? Um, and there's, and I, people ask me all the time, what's the best diet for up with autism. I'm like, there isn't one, there isn't one. It's like, I don't say follow that. I don't put people in like a cookie cutter.

This is the diet that you need. Now I will say, eat more of these foods, eat less of these foods. , but like, I would want it customized anyways, based off their test results. Um, as far as what that would entail. But yeah, I'm typically like that there is no diet, the only diet that I'll say that, um, like if someone has Hashimoto's I'll,  recommend them to go on like the autoimmune protocol.

Um, and I won't even call it a diet cause I'm like, don't use the word diet with my clients. They will get hung up on that. So I like the autoimmune protocol for 30 days. Um, so I will make recommendations like that, but it typically, it's rare for me to say, yeah, you need to follow only the paleo or only in the Mediterranean or something.

I'm like, because it's there, there's so many intricate things with each person that I might, I can't tell you to follow that diet. Cause like you don't fit the cookie cutter approach with that. You don't fit the mold with this. Um, it's usually kind of a pick and choose sort of thing, depending on what we see.

Yeah. So the more like symptoms you have and the, you know, the more that you're struggling with, something that's chronic, the more nuanced it is, what you can and cannot handle because so symptoms telling you something is off balance. And so you can't just do the thing that, maybe you did when you were a little bit decades younger.

So yeah. 

That's funny that you, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I'm like, no, I'm I always, and that's one of the things, um, one of the pieces that I actually go over a lot of mindset stuff with my clients, right. When they start with me. And that's, I, I go into a lot of questioning about, are they using the word diet? Do they feel like they have to be on a diet?

This isn't a diet. Like I, we really have to work on getting that word out of their vocabulary. Cause I'm like, diet is temporary. This is not temporary. Correcting things, but you're going to, you know, you're going to feel better that this is a long haul thing. Um, so yeah, I'm, I'm pretty careful with using that word, um, because it just, it can, it can really mess with people's heads.

Yeah. And you were about to say, you actually had begun your journey in your twenties, right. Is that where you were about to bring up? 

Yeah.  So, and that's what I always, and I always remind people cause you know, I, I can understand that. So I was diagnosed when I was 22. I was having tons of symptoms all throughout college.

I was in college for physical therapy school. I graduated and got my finished. My degree started working in physical therapy and I was miserable. Finally got diagnosed at age of 22 and they all told me, oh, you're, you're just hypothyroid because your physical therapy school was so hard that you were.

Okay. I was 22 at the time. I didn't know any better. So take this medicine. Well, it was just like in and out of doctor's offices, feeling worse, feeling worse by the age of 24, I had a doctor tell me that I was hitting menopause and that's why I had so many symptoms. And I was like, I'm pretty sure I'm not hitting menopause.

Not a single woman in my family has hit menopause early. Even that I'm 24, like no way. So. What I can say from that is like my body at 24 years old is very different than me at 45 now. So maybe I was eating a certain way back then, and maybe it did work that does not mean that 20 years later, it's going to work for me now.

And that's why I love talking to women about that too. Cause I'm always. They'll say, well, I, it worked for me when I was, you know, in my twenties or pre kids and I'm like, okay, that's great. I'm glad it worked for you then, but that like, your body is different. It changed. I mean, just a year, your body can change so much.

So I'm like, don't even look at the past. Let's just, we're moving forward, new day, new thing. What do we think about what, what worked in the past? Because everybody's body changes. I mean, even for men, so I'm like, you can't, you can't really compare to what worked back then. Um, because. There's too many, too many changes.

Yeah. Amen to that. Yeah. So, so if  you're able to speak directly to the person out there, listening, thinking this is a lot, I don't know what the next steps are.   How do I get myself some help? What would you say to them? 

So there, there are a lot of practitioners out there that are in the thyroid world.

So I would say definitely reach out, find a practitioner that. Focused on thyroid stuff,  um, and I'm going to be biased here, but functional medicine realm.  Because it's conventional medicine, you're not going to find a conventional medicine doctor practitioner doing like hair tissue, mineral testing, even stool testing.

Like it's pretty rare. So I want to make sure you're finding a practitioner in like the functional medicine world. That's always going to be my preference. That's what my certification is in.  Because I feel like you're, you'll get more. Let's find the root cause approach versus let's, band-aid it with the next medication you're going to get more root causes.

 So you're not chasing symptoms. You're literally getting rid of symptoms because you're actually chasing root causes. So we're not going after this. We're not treating the symptoms in other words. Um, so that's why I would prefer, um, I always tell people I'm like, look for a functional medicine practice.

Um, that's the best place to start. Um, is some, something like that and someone that, you know, obviously has some experience with thyroid health, whether it's Hashimoto's or just hypothyroidism, that would always be where I would have people approach, um, that way. Um, for sure, because, and you know, that utilize lab testing because the lab testing to me is such a crucial piece of it.

And that's, that's overlooked.

 This is a really good tips. And,  as you were saying, it's related to hormone and stress and everything. So as you're going through midlife and you're doing all the things you were doing before, and they're not working and you're maybe doing some new things or you're taking thyroid meds. And it's not budging.

Then it's time to really consider looking off the medical model of care and look at don't keep doing the thing that wasn't working for something better. And what Angela was saying, you work with people, you said for six months. And so it's not a one and done. It's not like really quick fix. The process.

It's something you commit to and have somebody walk with you who can give you the ups and downs because that healing isn't a straight path. If you might, you know, get, uh, uh, maybe a mineral dump or something or metal down when you start feeling bad. And it's important to have somebody there holding your hand saying, okay, this is what's going on.

It's not that this thing isn't working it's because. Media to do this, to adapt to us as part of the healing response or the thing. Yeah. It's not something you go through and DIY by yourself. 

Yeah. Yeah. And that's, that's one thing, because a clients will ask me to like, um, wow, six months, like it's, it's going to take me that long.

And I'm like, ah, yeah. Like I always tell people I'm like your body didn't get to this. It did not happen overnight. Um, most of the women that are coming to me, they've been dealing with it for years and years. So I'm like, it's going to take some time, be patient, like know that you're doing all the right things.

And by usually by three months, they're typically always like, oh wow, I'm already noticing some changes. And then by six months, they're there, they're feeling pretty good. Some that are super, super sick. I mean, we're talking a year, year and a half, even for them like. Co-infections and like, I have one that has Lyme disease like that it's a longer journey, so everyone's very different with it.

But I like to do at least six months, because just like you said, too many things change, a lot of things I would rather have had my handheld when I was going through my stuff and someone being there for. Like, okay. We need to tweak this and then we're going to talk about this. And so I'm like in your face, at least once a month, sometimes twice a month, I'm on a zoom call, like coaching you through what we're doing next.

Um, what we're working on next? Are we going to tweak anything from, um, your supplements or your protocol or whatever it may be? So, yeah, I feel like there, it works so much better when you have that.

Oh, absolutely. I can't, it's really hard to get through something on your own. It's a solitary thing too. Cause you don't feel comfortable talking to everybody about these things. And so it's somebody in your corner and also somebody who's been through what you're going through, so they can speak from a place of experience and understanding that you wouldn't get from somebody who just kind of stopped it and just decided they wanted to go.

Right. Okay. I help people with. So how do people find you if they want to find out more about you and they'd like to be able to learn from you and people maybe work with you. 

So,  I am on social media a lot. I love being on social media. So on Instagram, I'm Angela, Angela Brown coach. , on Facebook. I have, , a business profile on there too.

I'm Angela Brown thyroid coach, but I have a website. Angela brown.org. , I have a ton of info, a lot of free guides on there. I love giving away guides,  because that's always a great place for people to start, especially when you're overwhelmed. And you're like, I don't even know where to start. So I have some freebies on there and I have an email list, , that I'm sending out at least a couple of times a month with recipes, tips, all kinds of things, even exercise stuff.

I go a lot into exercise stuff cause I have exercise background obviously. So I  do a lot of tips and stuff like that on there. 

Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I would recommend that you all go on Angela social media. There's I mean, it's just sit and scroll through. You'll learn a lot from the things that she's posting and really awesome lady.

So hope you hop on her social media, check out her website and keep following her. I know that she's got a lot of value to add to people that she works with. Thank you so much for joining me today on this episode in. I'm really glad that you're able to share so much information about how you work with women with thyroid issues and just demystifying some things about minerals.

Thanks so much for having me appreciate it.