Adrenal Health and a True Paleo Diet: The Surprising Connection

Join Dr. Mary Louder and Beverly Meyer, CCN as they discuss root-cause approaches to fatigue, adrenal health, and menopause, and how miracle cures and biohacks can lead sufferers down the wrong road and to dead ends. Instead, they discuss lifestyle changes that can make a big difference over the long term, and how sometimes food really is the best medicine, whether it's through a true paleo diet or a diet guided mostly by genomics. Then they delve into another major factor in life quality: sleep. Listen to learn more about the prevalence of sleep apnea in women, including some lesser-known signs that could point to sleep apnea being a problem when nothing else does. A great conversation!

To learn more about Beverly Meyer's work, find her at her website below:

 https://www.ondietandhealth.com/

Transcript

Mary Louder - 00:00
Welcome to the Dr. Mary Louder podcast, a place where we're going to explore healing story and soul.
Today's guest has walked this path with grit, grace, and a fiercely independent spirit.
She took charge of her health in the 1970s, long before integrative medicine was a thing, battling chronic viruses, hormonal imbalances, anxiety, and poor sleep.
She sought out answers where conventional medicine fell short.
In 1989, she was board certified as a clinical nutritionist, which is a distinct field separate from dietetics, and became a passionate teacher of what we now call the paleo diet before that term even existed.
Known for her expertise in viruses, adrenal health, GABA, and vitamin K2, she's faced and solved health challenges that nearly ended her life.
Today she shares that wisdom through her consultations, articles, and her long-running podcast, Primal Diet, Modern Health.

Mary Louder - 01:01
So let's dive into a life on purpose, lived with persistence, and a deep belief in the body's ability to heal.
Welcome, Beverly Myers.
Well, welcome, Beverly, to the Dr. Mary Louder podcast show.
We've had a brief introduction in what we would call the virtual green room.
And I think we're going to have a wonderful conversation about something that I deal with every day.
And of course, you do, because it's right in your wheelhouse.
So without any further ado, please provide a short introduction of who you are, how you got to where you are.

Mary Louder - 01:38
And I'm not really talking like what street you live on.
I'm talking about your journey, of course.
So share with us, if you will.

Beverly Meyer - 01:47
All right.
Well, Beverly Meyer.
And I have been a patient of natural health, health alternatives, complementary medicine since the early 70s.
So my whole life has been defined by, well, that person didn't help me.
Who else can I talk to that might help me?
And I had career in big business.
I have a master's in finance.

Beverly Meyer - 02:15
But my own body was not able to keep with the stress of franchise systems and all this stuff.
And I was sick all the time.
And eventually I said, no, I'm quitting that and learning how to take care of myself better.
And that's what my life's been devoted to, my website, my podcast, all that is how to... take care of yourself better and just to have a more comfortable happier life.

Mary Louder - 02:46
Well, that sounds good.
I think, you know, it's interesting because you actually are one of my main demographic patients have been everywhere and couldn't find answers.
And so they come to me.
I had one patient call me Last Resort Louder once.
And I'm like, you know, I'm not sure I like that name, thank you.
But I certainly get and hear all the time that patients have been around the block.
Patients are trying to get answers.

Mary Louder - 03:13
And it's an interesting, it's an interesting conundrum because I sit at the intersection of informed consent, shared decision making and inner wisdom.
And it's a great place to be, except not a lot of people get there.
And they get it interpreted into, well, if I go to the doctor and don't share with them everything, I can keep doing what I'm doing on the side.
Or, yeah, I'm not going to see them again, they totally blew me off.
I can just figure it out myself.
I can just do a little research and figure it out.
It's something that's exquisitely complex.

Mary Louder - 03:54
And then they get into some trouble.
And there's a lot of misinformation.
And then the other is, well, yeah, you want me to do that, but there's a cost barrier that's a perceived cost barrier, because it's actually not because if you really look at the cost of not doing something.
Yeah, that urgency and the opportunity loss for not doing something.
And then they keep doing their own thing and they want me to keep bailing them out.

Beverly Meyer - 04:17
Yes.

Mary Louder - 04:18
So that's a real conundrum.
And I sit in the world that listens to patients, helps them bring clarity to their diagnoses and really gets them on the right track.

Beverly Meyer - 04:33
All that is very much exactly how I define my practice as well in clinical nutrition that, yes, people are often coming like, okay, I've seen seven doctors and I'm sure I have a thyroid problem, but they won't.
talk to me about it, or they just put me on Synthroid or whatever their story is.

Mary Louder - 04:52
And

Beverly Meyer - 04:52
I'm like, yes, I understand.
Let's talk about this.

Mary Louder - 04:56
And

Beverly Meyer - 04:56
yes, there is an investment in food and not working 60 hours a week.
And and health care
practices that aren't covered by insurance if they do or do not have it.
But as I sometimes not jokingly say, well, just one small heart attack is going to pay for a lifetime of osteopathy and chiropractic and fitness training and pastured meat.

Mary Louder - 05:30
Exactly.
So what do you think because we're, you know, we're going to, we're going to look at this cultural thing and then we're going to get into some nitty gritty things that you know about exhaustion and fatigue and adrenals because really that's the second thing behind why everybody's always in coming to
see us.
But look at this cultural thing, what, you know, with the misinformation, the disinformation, which is misinformation with an attitude is really what that is, right?
And with an agenda.
How do you guide your clients, your patients through that?
And maybe you can give us some tips on that.

Beverly Meyer - 06:05
Do you mean that they think they know what to do?
Like, I need these 12 supplements and I have to become a vegetarian, that kind of misinformation?

Mary Louder - 06:15
That would be a good one.
That's frequent.
Yeah.

Beverly Meyer - 06:18
Well, you know, I'm a passionate researcher.
I've had to have been because I would have been dead multiple times if I hadn't.
researched and dug myself out of the hole.
And then that's the information I'm sharing with people and articles and podcasts and the online store and all of that.
It's like, and I think that gives people hope and courage that, oh, you've been there too.
And you actually sound like you know what you're talking about.
and that you care.

Beverly Meyer - 06:51
But there is terrific research out there.
And, you know, I could spend hours researching a condition for a patient that I'm about to see that they may have some issue that I'm just not all that... confident about.
So yes, there is terrific information out there.
You just have to stay off the miracle cure websites.
That's that's, and I do a lot of work with herpes patients.
That's where my health went off track back in college in the 70s.
And then flash forward 50 years find out I have an immune deficiency that's genetic and that's why I've spent a lifetime accumulating knowledge about that virus trying to keep it under control and Epstein-Barr.

Beverly Meyer - 07:40
But I'm off the subject.
But yes, research is good, but miracle cures are not the answer.

Mary Louder - 07:48
Yeah, and another way to look at, because I think people don't think about it being a miracle cure, but it would be the bio hack.
That is miracle cure dressed up.
And, you know, one of the big areas we look at is, you know, menopause.
Menopause isn't a medical condition.
It's a woman's transition in life, going from one stage of life to the other, and emphasis on the word pause.
And there's so many complexities to that.
There is no such thing as a biohack for that.

Beverly Meyer - 08:23
Well, you know, one of the most important things I find to tell women about menopause, maybe they're 40 or wherever they are, is that I love to ask this question.
I say, do you know what part of the body makes your female hormones for you before menopause and after menopause?
And people are stunned find out, well, when the ovaries stop working, gosh, I don't know what is making my hormones?
I say, it's the adrenals.
Right, right.
They're like, it is?
Well, then I think maybe we'd better get to work on that.

Mary Louder - 09:04
Exactly.
And how estrogen and the lack of estrogen changes all the receptors.
And some of the research we're finding on the uterus, since it's really a transducer.
rather than, and it's just a big hubbub of information, not only for estrogen and progesterone testosterone, but also cortisol, actually insulin.
The others.
Insulin.
Yeah.

Mary Louder - 09:31
And so how all that plays into so many things around female health that we never knew, and there's insulin receptors on bone.
Yeah, and I said that in a conference about a year ago.
And I had a, I was speaking to a room of physicians, and I said that, and they're like, no, it isn't.
I'm like, here's the article.
I mean, we're physicians in this room, you know?
And so I think one of the things is the lack of curiosity about new information.
is one of the things that pushes that misinformation and disinformation because they're looking for a quick fix.

Beverly Meyer - 10:13
Well, and the lack of curiosity on the part of the medical profession, as an example, dentistry, that, you know, one of my little examples for clients, I say, all right, pretend you're in a room with 100 dentists and ask them to raise their hand if they have been completely mercury-free in their
practice for more than five years.
I said, and you might get one two, maybe you're in a... particular area of great wisdom.
And there's three to five Dennis say, oh yeah, we've been mercury free a long time.
And the rest are like, do what?
Why would I do that?
And what happened to their curiosity not to mention the medical articles and so on saying, hey, you've got problem, you're endangering yourself and your staff,

Mary Louder - 11:06
not to

Beverly Meyer - 11:06
mention your patients by not at least allowing them a choice.

Mary Louder - 11:11
Yes.
And I have and am board certified in Kulation therapy.
And so I have treated many patients who've had mercury toxicity and exposure, dentists, dental staff, you know, things like that.
So that's a whole very interesting field.
And it doesn't come down to that commercial four out of five dentists, does it?
No.
4 and a five dentist surveyed.

Mary Louder - 11:36
Nope, it's much less than that.
And it's surprising that we still can put mercury in the mouth, but we can't put it down the sink.
We have to use a very specific container that goes into a very specific part of the landfill and a very specific part of a community for it to be stored forever.
because of the half-life, but we can put it in the mouth.
And so none of that makes

Beverly Meyer - 11:59
it.
And there are no good thermometers anymore.
You know, we're creating a thermometer to me is still the best.
So

Mary Louder - 12:05
it is, that always was.
I agree.
Yep, yep.
So anyway, all right, we've bandwagoned all that stuff now.
So that was fun.
That was fun.
But let's get into that concept of the adrenals because we are and we do deal with, you know, fatigue is one of the most common reasons people come to see me.

Mary Louder - 12:27
And they always say my labs are normal, but I'm exhausted.
Well, you know, I mean, if they saw the labs that were ordered versus how many labs are available, that would be one thing, you know, because it's a range.
But I want to turn it over to you to bring your knowledge to our listeners about adrenals, fatigue, because that's a big topic.
So go for it.

Beverly Meyer - 12:51
Well, okay, so, all right.
First off, I like to have people visualize that thyroid and adrenal work like a seesaw on a child's playground.
And if one of those is being pushed high or is being exhausted low, the other will raise or lower to compensate.
The body is trying to keep you in balance.
And it's so easy.
more or less for women to be put on thyroid prescription and then it helps for a while and then it doesn't help for a while so then they just keep increasing their dose and what i find is happening is that the thyroid's being kicked up into overdrive and it's help it's suppressing the adrenals,
which may actually have been the real cause of that person's fatigue in the first place.

Beverly Meyer - 13:48
And so there's that, something that I can't leave out sleep apnea because I think it's tremendously under-diagnosed as a cause of fatigue.
And I'm encouraging all my clients over the age of 60 that they must do an at-home sleep test.
It's easy, just ask your doctor.
But that being outside, the adrenals, you can't talk about the adrenals without talking about the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system.
And during our time long ago in evolution, We were in parasympathetic, relax, work, do whatever we have to do, hunt, skin a rabbit, cook, have sex, tell stories, dig a latrine, whatever, climb a mountain.
All of that is the parasympathetic nervous system, which is good.
And we only flip into the sympathetic when something's trying to kill

Speaker_02 - 14:56
us.

Beverly Meyer - 14:57
Okay.
And that's how we evolved, kind of like a, you know, 95%, 5%.
And yet modern life is not even remotely that way.
Everything is a trigger, an alarm, a worry, a rush, an anxiety, an accident, a problem.
imagined or real and this keeps us in sympathetic overdrive.
And I know I go on too long, but...

Mary Louder - 15:29
No, you're

Beverly Meyer - 15:31
doing great.
Okay, but when that Tiger comes racing out of the bushes at us.
There are distinct physiological events that happen in the body driven by, yes, the brain, but the adrenals.
They blast out cortisol and adrenaline.
pupils dilate, our muscles firm We start clotting blood.
um uh and you know all of this starts to happen that we can fight flight because we're in fright and yet we're living that way now with the just the traffic on the highway, even if they're minding their own business.
I'm in a semi-alarm state trying to not get hit, much less the rest of life.

Beverly Meyer - 16:25
And this right there is a huge problem for our adrenal glands globally.

Mary Louder - 16:35
It is.
And then people, where they stay in that stress response because they're used to it.
They don't understand exactly how to get out of it.
We don't have a way.
We've all just adapted to stress being now the new norm.
And even anxiety, when I work with my patients about anxiety, I try and not use it as a diagnosis, but rather as a pointer to what the body is requesting what their mind, their soul is requesting for more information.
versus, well, yeah, I'm just anxious in a state of anxiety or I'm just an anxious person.

Mary Louder - 17:10
It's like, nope, there's something underneath that is requiring or requesting safety.
So when we're in the state of stress and we're requesting safety, and we go from place to place, we try all these different things, where does a person jump in that could be something super practical to be able to do?

Beverly Meyer - 17:30
Well, as you know in your practice, everything to me starts, we all say root cause, functional health, we're trying to get to the root cause, but to me, We must work with what we eat and how we sleep.
That is to me, I'm absolutely grounded on that with people that contact me.
Can you help me with ABCD and R and Y?
And I say, yes, but we're going to work a lot on diet.
and sleep first, and I'll probably take you off most of the supplements that you are on, but we're not even going to talk about supplements other than let me have a test for your vitamin D levels, please.
But it's, so for me, Women especially, but it's true for men too.
But we've been trained for decades to stop eating meat and to stop eating fat.

Beverly Meyer - 18:34
And this is a huge problem that can be quickly corrected.
And most people find when they eat what I call true and correct paleo or ancestral or biological or that people tend to get much more grounded immediately and have a little more energy like, wow, I even forgot to eat lunch until one o'clock and usually I'm starved by 11 or whatever the story is.
So I start with, let me explain what a true paleo diet is and how we can nudge yours that way.
So that's number one is what you eat and drink.
And number two is sleep.
And if we can have impact on food and sleep, We haven't, we haven't, quote, worked on the adrenals or worked on that inflammatory problem, but we are.
Yes,

Beverly Meyer - 19:37
you
are.
Because the whole point of what we do as practitioners is, and what people are asking, whether they know it or not, is change my body's chemistry, please.
That's what they're asking is, I have this, and this.
Can you change my body chemistry to make this go away?
I say, yes, but I'm not going to do it with four pills, but I might well do it with the 20 meals you're going to eat this week.
coaching you on the right supplements and so on for really much better sleep.

Beverly Meyer - 20:14
And that is going to put impact right off on your chemistry and then let the body start to do things it already wants to do.
Right.
It's just too hungry and exhausted to try.

Mary Louder - 20:25
Yeah.
So what you're saying is get the right environment for the body to heal itself, which it does inherently and has the wisdom to do so.

Beverly Meyer - 20:39
Yeah, and that's the starting place.
And for some people, that's like 50% of the thing right there.
And for other people, it's like, okay, that's great.
And actually that did stop my migraines, but I still have this and this and this and that and the other.
And I'm saying, great, well, at least now you know if you want your migraines to come back, you know what to start eating to make them come back.
So, you know, this is a good start.

Mary Louder - 21:06
So, you know, there's a, what's been in the market for a long time is food sensitivity tests, different than an allergy test where they have the scratch or the poke test, that's an IGE mediated one, histamine-driven immediate reaction, even into anaphylaxis.
And then you've got this IGG test.
What are your thoughts about those... I'll tell you mine, but you show me mine, I'll show you your thoughts, or vice versa, I'll show you mine if you show me your thoughts.

Beverly Meyer - 21:38
Well, and I do get asked that question a lot, and I encourage people, most people, I say, look, you can go spend three or $400 on IGG or IGM testing.
but i'd frankly rather you spend three or four hundred dollars on a freezer for your garage that you can load with good grass-fed, grass-fed meats and you know put your money into something more direct and the flip side of that is i was saying earlier about true and correct paleo is that the, the
first rule of biological ancestral paleo primal gaps, specific carbohydrate diet, my own DVD, the diet for human beings.
The first rule for all of us is no grains.
Humans did not evolve bent over with spines parallel to the ground and nose to the ground.
And that's what horses and zebras do and cows.
But humans are upright and looking for, we hunt for motion.

Beverly Meyer - 22:44
We use our eyes to see pigeon, rabbit, deer.
Whereas a horse, looking at the ground, is looking, you know, stick, weed.
Ooh, tasty weed.
So that's how they find food and eat food, and they have, of course, different digestive systems.
So when we get those inflammatory rice and wheat and corn out of there, so much of the general inflammatory processes in the body tends to shut up, and they're often driving like, I don't know why, but I seem to react to carrots or whatever it is.
So it's, we just kind of pull a big piece of the rug out of there, and the immune system will generally respond pretty well.

Mary Louder - 23:41
Okay, so if the, so we're not, so help me understand what a real paleo diet means then.
And because, yeah, I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't, I'm not familiar with that concept of that.
I'm familiar with paleo.
And I use genomics.
And so we, you know, which is, I think, very helpful because we're following a person's blueprint.
But it, it's, it doesn't quite tell you, the test I use doesn't exactly quite tell you everything you need to eat.
Right.

Beverly Meyer - 24:17
The way I open my video on this topic is what species are you?
Are you a cricket?
Are you a hummingbird?
Are you a wolf?
So every species has a history of its teeth or its claws and its digestion and its excretion and its enzymes.
that we're exquisitely set up for certain pathways.
And we definitely are not set up for corn syrup and oh my, I'm so sorry.

Beverly Meyer - 24:54
We're definitely not set for cinnamon rolls and plates of pasta and all of that.
That's just not, it's just not our food.
So one thing I see about true and correct paleo is there are a lot cookbooks that say paleo cookbooks, but half of the book is devoted to paleo desserts.

Mary Louder - 25:21
Okay.

Beverly Meyer - 25:22
So right off the bat, I'm a little suspicious because my great, great ancestors 100,000 years ago didn't have a concept paleo desserts.
They had proteins, fats, and vegetables, and some tubers and some eggs and fruit and mushrooms and oysters whatever.
But they didn't have a concept of dessert.
So it's same thing feeding cats.
Cats are obligate carnivores.
And that is what they eat.
They don't eat rice potato and wheat.

Beverly Meyer - 25:56
And when people switch cat food to raw, freeze-dried raw cat food, their cats really can

Mary Louder - 26:03
blossom.
So then if you were to put in the real paleo for so are you saying that then everybody should be paleo

Beverly Meyer - 26:17
for the most part okay the question is depending on what's going on with a person, how much, definitely we're reducing the carbohydrate load.
There is no question about that.
The sugars, the bread, the pasta, we're definitely reducing the carbohydrate load and increasing the animals, the healthy fats.
And by that, I mean no canola.
and cooked vegetables and some tubers and all the rest.
So it's, but then there are people with very, very elevated lipoprotein, small and large density particles and pre-dementia Alzheimer's that are not processing fats or gallbladder clients, whatever.
So sometimes you have to play a little bit with the fat side of things.

Beverly Meyer - 27:10
But I generally feel that, yes, we are designed to eat animal protein.
You know, I mean, we know historically that there are literally mountains of oyster shells prime places along coastal places all over the world.
I mean, you know, humans ate a lot of oysters and, and of course, as hunters as well.
And we didn't, we didn't grow plants, we didn't eat plants much until the, before the Egyptians, and that is when the first agriculture began, when we began keeping animals, and we have to plant and grow grasses to feed the animals.
Okay.
And somewhere along the line, we started eating the grass seed as well.
Okay.

Beverly Meyer - 28:06
And then by the time of the Egyptians, we were definitely stratified into the rich and poor society.
The rich can afford the animals and everyone else eats millet, basically.
So we've kind of been stuck there ever since.

Mary Louder - 28:22
Interesting.
So, and when you say the ancestral diet, it's not like, so my genes are 87% Bavaria, Germany.
And so, and I do tend to gravitate towards foods that you would find in Germany, cabbage, I do, and beef, certain porks, not, you know, not, I'm not talking like all the sausages, although some of those, but that's not the vast majority, but it's more of the, you know, meats like that, And not so
much seafood, to be honest.
um yeah

Beverly Meyer - 29:08
well and that's fine you know we hunt rabbits I mean there's protein everywhere you know a protein is something that moves under its own will you know an octopus or a frog they're all proteins

Mary Louder - 29:25
well

Beverly Meyer - 29:25
some flowers like sort of move on to their own will but proteins basically means it's a self-propelled um creature.
But sure, there can be different variations based on blood, but if you keep going back, obviously, you're a human species and not just my great-great-grandparents from Germany, you know, we're more historical than that.
But yeah, there's good information everywhere about that.

Mary Louder - 30:00
What about, you know, there's a lot of discussion about the plant-based diet being the best for cardiovascular, cardiovascular health.
Let me finish the sentence, you know, and we've got the research, um, the doctor's name escapes me, he's,

Beverly Meyer - 30:22
Well, there's many of

Mary Louder - 30:23
them.
Yeah, he was one of the first that really put out some of the plant-based stuff, you know, in the 80s, 90s, and turn to the... Anyway, sorry about that.
We'll get that reference.
But, you know, looking at plant-based proteins for cardiovascular health, because paleo doesn't include that, really, or does it?

Beverly Meyer - 30:46
No, it doesn't.
Unless it's a plant that you ate 100,000 years ago, But to me, it's a false, back to that root cause thing.
If somebody has highly altered, I'm working with couple clients right now with highly altered LDL, small particles and large particles and lipoproteins A and some of these more complex things.
And I'm... To me, I've got to always look at the canola oil, corn oil and soybean oil, the incredibly dangerous effects of so-called vegetable oils, which course are not vegetables, they're seeds.
And again, in our human history, we didn't have seed oil.
We also didn't have olive oil.
What we had was, you know, a bear about to hibernate that was loaded with bear grease, bear lard and other fats that and coconuts.

Beverly Meyer - 31:53
So depending on whether we lived in northern or southern or equatorial latitudes, coconut or animals have generally been up to us and not and now we have all this artificial the canola oil is infiltrated everything and even olive oil, and it doesn't it doesn't have to say it on the label.
There is no law that requires avocado oil and olive oil to say that it may be 5 to 80% canola oil.
have a good article on a podcast on this topic.
Are your canola and olive oil is pure?
Is the name of that?
But the whole... I don't understand the whole let's not eat animals and saturated fats, and that will help our arteries, because what we know is the arteries in this person may be in trouble.
But having the meat plates of pasta and green beans and some nuts, that's fine, but they're going to be hungry.

Beverly Meyer - 33:09
They want their fish or whatever.
They want their animal proteins.
And okay, fine.
They don't need to use five tablespoons of butter.
And so... which of course, again, is a very modern food.
Dairy is a very modern food, but the fats from the animals are, and coconuts are our original fats.

Mary Louder - 33:34
Okay, so with dairy being modern, It's interesting that it feels interesting that it's modern because it would think that if you had a cow.
I mean, did we have cows 100,000 years ago?
Yes, yes.

Beverly Meyer - 33:52
Actually, not really, not what we would consider a cow.

Mary Louder - 33:55
Okay.

Beverly Meyer - 33:56
But yes, sure.
You can you can milk a mammoth, you can milk a horse.
There's a lot of animals that you could have milked, but we did it.
I mean, we didn't lasso wild horses and attempt to milk them.
Or
yaks.

Mary Louder - 34:12
Yeah, or yaks.

Beverly Meyer - 34:12
You
know, wow, look at all this hair.
And that, so again, that was part of the... When we came, when humans came out of the last ice age, which is very recent, ending about 15,000 years ago.
And humans thrived, we multiplied like crazy because we had fire and furs and hunting skills and the animals were not getting fed.
They were easier to kill and capture.
So we hunted a lot of animals to extinction.
But we came out of it just fine.

Beverly Meyer - 34:50
And so now you have a situation where we have a population problem, all things being relative.
And as the tribes began to move and separate, there's fewer animals, more people.
And that's what spawned the idea of... You know what, let's our family group, we're going to take this whole canyon as ours.
We're going to put rocks on one end and whatever.
And that's, we're going to start raising and keeping these animals so we don't have to roam to hunt and stay away from our canyon.

Mary Louder - 35:30
Okay, gotcha.
Okay, interesting.

Beverly Meyer - 35:31
And that's how cities start.
And then now you've got captive mountain goats or horses or camels or whatever.
And then it's like, well, the baby's eating it, maybe we can try it.
And that's when we discovered butterfat, which is a terrific fat that we need, not so much the way and the casein  and the lactalbumin, but the butterfat and the ghee and the heavy cream.

Mary Louder - 36:01
Yeah, we get a lot of butyrate for that, don't we?

Beverly Meyer - 36:04
Yeah.

Mary Louder - 36:05
And that's really, really good for the microbiome and, you know, metabolism and everything.
So I love, yeah.
And I find people low in butyrate, interestingly, quite frequently.

Beverly Meyer - 36:18
Very frequently.

Mary Louder - 36:19
Yeah.
Interesting.
So what, how do we cut through then?
What's a, how do we cut through the fads to get to really what is important?
How do you, how do you do that?

Beverly Meyer - 36:35
Good question.
I mean, I can answer for me as a person that's been chronically unwell since the 1970s, and with several really bad things along the way too, to the point of call your family together and say goodbye.
But it, the first piece is to help our clients and ourselves understand that there may not be easy answers Hacks and biotips are definitely not necessarily going to provide the answer, but that we are living in an age where research is free to do.
And I have experience now with a person close to me diagnosed with pre-dementia.
And I have never worked really in dementia and Alzheimer's and memory.
And I'm in my 70s, so suddenly it's like, well, yeah, I better start taking a look at this too.
And so I'm gathering information from a lot of sources.

Beverly Meyer - 37:45
And I go to websites that I trust to, if it's okay to say one, which would be Chris Kressor, for example.
Chris with a C, K, Kressor with a K. So if I want to notice something, I may go to Chris Kressor Alzheimer's or Chris Kressor Elevated LDL.
And that, for example, maybe a starting place, like let's see what he says and who are the guests he's interviewed and what are the medical studies he cited.
And so I like to kind of ground myself someplace that I feel comfortable that person is not just there to sell you the latest miracle pill, but they're actually there to make a difference.
And that's not that's not easy.
But yes, if you pay attention, you, you know, you can find the people you trust.
That's, of course, the purpose of my whole website and your podcast and mycast is is, yes, let's there's a consistent theme of how to be grounded and how to take courage and how to have hope and how to do your research.

Beverly Meyer - 38:57
And, of course, the all-important self- experimenting.
So we're back to question of like dairy or gluten or shellfish, whatever, that yes, go off of this food for one to three months.
notice changes in any part of your body, life, mind, depression, aches, pains, digestion, sleep, body, odors, etc.
And then do a trial and go back and just eat that food for a week or two weeks.
and observe what happens.
That's the simplest way to see, wow, I did not realize coming off of gluten really helped my depression a lot, but now I can just barely get out of bed from eating pancakes and hamburger buns or whatever.
So... Self- testing is useful when you have some data to do things properly.

Beverly Meyer - 40:06
You can't really do that with supplements.
You've got to get the groundwork in.
Like, you know, I really need to see an osteopath.
I really need to see a chiropractor.
I really need to see a physical trainer.
I need a neurologist.
I need an ear, nose, and throat, an ENT person.

Beverly Meyer - 40:25
Okay, I didn't like that ENT person.
Let's find another one.
And, you know... I have the luxury of having the funds and the time to do that.
And I understand, of course, that a lot people do not.
So you use the free resources as much as you can to learn what is this doctor's philosophy and what is, did anybody else ask him about chronic headaches or whatever.
You do your best.
And one of my own personal models is when I get discouraged, It's like, okay, hope and courage.

Beverly Meyer - 41:03
Hope and courage.
You've been through a lot.
This will get handled.
Hope and courage.
And then I get back on the computer and start researching another twist on something.

Mary Louder - 41:17
Yeah, that sounds like resilience.
And just think if that computer was a horse, how many times you've fallen off and gotten back on?

Beverly Meyer - 41:25
Well, and in my case, yes, quite a few.

Mary Louder - 41:28
Yeah.
So let's go into your credentials a little bit, because it's a different, it's different than what people have that are throwing out the bio hacks that are saying, hey, here's a bandwagon, get on.
mean, you've got grit, you've got chops, and you know, and as a doctor, boy, we get nothing in nutrition, we really don't, a lot of, you know, two semesters of pharmacology, and we've got biochemistry.
But I want to delve into the different types of nutritionists that are available to people, what sets you apart, and what, you know, how people can kind of sort through that and vet that.

Beverly Meyer - 42:06
Yeah, thanks for asking that.
So in one area you have nutritionists and dietitians, and they have some distinctions and some licensing and their education, but tends to be very the curriculum itself tends to keep people in a pathway of you know how to calculate how many beans you need and what whether there is a difference
between organic this and organic not oh what a surprise no there's no difference at all. Well, I don't believe that but But there's a distinct pathway that most nutritionists and dietitians are funneled into.
And then, course, they have an option to pop out of that and say, well, that was terrific background.
But I want to know more about clinical nutrition.
And that's what I am as a clinical nutritionist.
And then within our field, we have... multiple, as in so many fields.

Beverly Meyer - 43:14
Yeah, I took a weekend course and got a certificate.
Or, yeah, I took a four-year course and passed a three-hour exam, which is my end of things.
That, you know, that's another little tip for people, by the way, when you're looking for practitioners... is remember I was saying about dentists, like how long has your practice been mercury free and how long have you been practicing cranial sacral therapy or that's always a good question to ask
people.
And
what percentage of your practice is oh I love cranial sacral I just love doing that that's great so what percentage of your practice is oh I have a lot of people what percentage of your practice is it.
Well, I don't, maybe, wow, a person a week, it's just terrific.

Mary Louder - 44:05
So I'll answer those questions 32 years, 30% and yeah, no, yeah,
same thing, chops,
yeah.

Beverly Meyer - 44:16
You want to find out people's passion because they're more likely to help you if you, if they're passionate about something, and that might be reflective to you.
And, but in clinical nutrition, I, for lack of a better term, I call us the chemists of the body.

Mary Louder - 44:35
Okay.

Beverly Meyer - 44:36
So we're the people that want to understand zinc and the nine different types of zinc and where they're used and what hormone calls for them and how it's transported over here and what it binds to and And, you know, is there any link between sinus infections and zinc?
I just, all that kind of question that to me, that's chemistry.
It's not, okay, how many grams of carbohydrates am I allowed in a day if I want to get into my wedding dress in three weeks?

Mary Louder - 45:16
Yeah, that's the macro molecules.
You're looking at minerals.
You're looking at biochemistry and pathways.
versus just macros.

Beverly Meyer - 45:26
Well, and again, back to authentically, what is the root cause?
And I take massive histories on people and a week's very detailed food and sleep diaries and so on before I'll even talk to them, because again, we're back to that, what is an appropriate access point like a key to open a door.
This key won't work, that key won't work, this key won't work, a sledgehammer.
Well, that might work, but that's not what we want.
So we're looking for keys.
And to me, that's why I start with food and sleep.
And then as things get more settled down, you can look at, well, that supplement I suggested for sleep.

Beverly Meyer - 46:19
isn't working really the way you'd like it so how about we add a little bit of this or let me explain to you why that multivitamin you're taking is not what would be the word.
It's just, it's not a professional product.
Sure, you can buy it on the shelves and it's got a nice label, but for example, look at the form of in it.
Is just say B6-HCL, or does it say Paradoxyl-5-phosphate or P5-P?
And that's quick clue whether a multivitamin or a B-vitamin is properly made or not and this stuff is really important because if you I mean if you here's another stupid analogy but you know are you going to eat the hamburger are you going to eat the menu picture of the hamburger Yeah.
You, you, if, you know, if you're on the wrong type of, of zinc or B6 or vitamin A or whatever it is, is it's not.

Mary Louder - 47:35
It's not likely.
Yeah. It's

Beverly Meyer - 47:37
not as likely to go where you want it to do and, and turn a key.

Mary Louder - 47:43
Yeah.
And that's interesting because you speak of the lock and key.
And that's really what I describe and have described for hormone therapy over years.
I mean, when back in the 90s, I quit giving out Primarin and Provera.
Why?
Well, pregnant Mary's urine.
It never rang a bell until somebody told You know, it was like my first year in practice.

Mary Louder - 48:03
I'm like, oh, I didn't, I just didn't understand that.
And then so it's conjugated equine estrogen.
Okay, great.
That's horse pee.
So then I just started with the tagline.
Well, if a horse is getting rid of it, I probably shouldn't give it to you, you know.
And then same with progestin, which is the provera, which is like a master key into this big building where progesterone is a key into a door in the closet in the back bedroom that does certain things right and the difference is huge and weaning women off the Primarin and Provera that I did years ago

Mary Louder - 48:45
and then just the Primarin took forever and then rebuilding their adrenals as a result of that.
And that was one of the most fascinating things, but it really highlights, I think, the things that you say about the complexities of clinical nutrition and the need to dig down to more roots and maybe root vegetables, but roots and you know into really understanding where our food comes from and
how we can best access it and have the best choices for ourselves.
And that takes just as much planning as it does to really understand.
You know, why things have gone off the rails.

Beverly Meyer - 49:34
I want to highlight something you said in case people didn't hear you.
The synthetic form of progesterone is progestin, T-I-N,
like a
tin roof, progestin.
And the real progesterone is progesterone, which ends in O-N-E, like the word one.
And so a lot of times women have no idea what they're taking, but if you look on the label, And
it's

Beverly Meyer - 50:03
progestin like a metal roof.
You don't want progestin.
You want progesterone, which there are already compounded versions or manufactured versions like Prometrium, etc.
It doesn't have to be custom manufactured.
Oh, boy, don't get me started on that.
To me, it's, okay, let's be polite.
I find that many doctors are doing bio-identical hormones for profit.

Beverly Meyer - 50:32
They're running a lot of blood work, which is not as accurate as salivary testing, which is the way I test salivary testing.
They're requiring their patients to custom compound exotic formulas when it is not necessary.

Mary Louder - 50:49
Right.

Beverly Meyer - 50:51
And then they have to keep coming in every six months and run all those labs and everything again.
And then they're like, oh, whoops, your testosterone is 10 times normal.
I'm like, yes, because you know, that's another story.
But saliva testing, salivary testing, to me, every client I have is doing that, even the teenagers.
because it highlights the three different estrogens, E1, E2, E3, which you can't even run those by blood if you wanted to, you can only run E2.
It don't exist.
But the ratio between those three estrogens is, and then the ratio between them and progesterone is incredibly important.

Beverly Meyer - 51:36
And as you know, when you order, I'm sure, thyroid labs, you make sure to order free T4 and free T3 or testosterone by blood can be accurate.
It doesn't have to be saliva if the doctor orders free testosterone.
But cortisol, the adrenal cortisol, the three estrogens, progesterone, and a lot of other things like dihydro testosterone.
To me, they are not accurate by blood.
Saliva is a free, it tests the amount of free progesterone in the body, not already used, not already bonded to something.
I don't care how much total progesterone I have.
If it's all bound to mercury or something else, I want to know how much available progesterone or testosterone I have.

Mary Louder - 52:30
Yeah.
I think that those are really, really good points.
And one of the tests that I use is the Dutch test.
Yeah.
And I use those urine metabolites in estrogen and then how estrogen is metabolized down through the first phase, cytochrome P450.
We pick up then the phase two detoxifiers.
And I bounce that back to their genomics.

Mary Louder - 52:58
And then I can find, I call it, it's an interesting thing, I call it the backdoor methylation problem.
I don't know.
And you may just roll your eyes at me and that's totally fine.
But what I find is it's not always the bees.
It's the magnesium, it's the zinc, it's the choline that we need to balance that methylation pathway so it can function.
And then we put some bees down it to make it to support it.
Because if sometimes you give too much bees, it's going to just shut methylation down

Beverly Meyer - 53:30
further.
Yeah, people take too many B vitamins
generally.

Mary Louder - 53:34
Yeah, and so I call it the backdoor methylation problem, which is very much connected to histamine, by the way, because the histamine can blow that up.
And then if women have this variation in the clock gene, and you put that together in a certain stress pattern, I have seen that more than not in breast cancers.
Yeah.
More than not.
And I've been able to back women out of every having a recurrence breast cancer.

Beverly Meyer - 54:01
Well, I have to say, I admire you for running Dutch testing because it's easier on the patient just to pee on little strips.
Whereas salivary is a little more, you have to fill saliva tubes, a tube about that big four times in a day, which is not a great hardship.
But the interpretation of the dried urine, the Dutch test is very complex.
And most practitioners, myself included, my eyes will just roll trying to follow the chemistry in there.
It is a very complex test.
So good on you for actually being able to dig through
it

Beverly Meyer - 54:46
and for the kernels of good perfect data.

Mary Louder - 54:50
Yeah, and it's, you know, I've been able to help women who've struggled.
you know, after having breast cancer and chemotherapy, and then they're on the estrogen blockers and it's just destroying their life.
And now that, you know, and now we've got some of this new research coming out that's been there forever hidden and suppressed.
And the margin, you know, we can speak woman to woman here, how the medical research has marginalized our needs, you know, and... And that's, if there is a bandwagon, that's the one I'm on, honestly.
And to get the right information to women, because I'm also in that age group, totally menopausal, stacked family history of heart disease.
My mom died from a dissecting aortic aneurysm.
She had stints, my father had stints and had an MI.

Mary Louder - 55:44
And so, you know, it's just stacked family history.
And, you know, the siblings don't get the same genes, but they don't always get the same snips.
And I got those damn cardiovascular snips more than my siblings did.
And so, you know, so I, this is a topic that like you have had to really champion myself.
And then that's driven me to bring the clarity to patients and to education and And I then, you know, in adapting the model of instead of going one on one, try to go one to many so we can have a bigger impact and really teach people how to advocate, how to have good informed decision, shared
decision, and using their internal guidance to guide them, you know.
And the complexity is there.

Mary Louder - 56:41
You've outlined it beautifully.
And thank you for not being a hack.
I mean that in the most positive way.

Beverly Meyer - 56:51
I understand.

Mary Louder - 56:52
And I'm just so thankful for this conversation because it's kind of like people when they listen to me, they're like, yeah, doctor, whatever, whatever.
I want that shortcut.
And so the fact that you and I are just meeting on this podcast and I was intrigued by your work.
and wanted to interview you to have this rich of a conversation right out of the gates.
I'm very grateful for that and very grateful to be able to share your experience, your knowledge, and the tenacity and the drive and the complexity of humans taking good care of humans as themselves.
And so I really appreciate that.
And I'm really thankful for our conversation today.

Mary Louder - 57:40
So do you have any parting words of wisdom, like medium well, medium, no, I'm kidding.

Beverly Meyer - 57:47
Well, I just, yes, we are resonating on a lot of areas and I agree with what you're saying.
And I just, I want to put a plug in for the most recent work, I'm actually in the thick of it right now, where women are being... ignored and thin people like myself are being ignored.
And this is sleep apnea.
And I, for my own reasons, asked my doctor to, I said, can I run a home sleep test?
I want to watch, see what's happening to my blood pressure over the night.
I get these terrible headaches during the night.
And I've been at this for 10 years.

Beverly Meyer - 58:30
I've seen 20 practitioners.
And can I run a home sleep study?
I know I don't have sleep apnea.
I tape my mouth.
I don't snore.
But I'd like to watch my blood pressure.
And she ran a sleep study.

Beverly Meyer - 58:44
Well, surprise, it came back moderate sleep apnea.
So now I'm learning how to deal with that but along the line it's when I go on different websites and there's this okay it's an overweight male with a large neck that drinks or smokes and snores and that's who gets the attention for hey buddy we need to run a sleep out in your test on you and
And it's not even the women who are overweight with a large neck, who snore, who maybe drink or smoke.
So just the fact that they're female, they're not being tested.
And then you have somebody like myself, who is definitely not in the overweight, large neck category and don't drink and don't smoke and don't snore because I tape my mouth.
I have multiple articles on that.
So I fell through the cracks of all of these other doctors with a blazing clue, nighttime headaches.

Beverly Meyer - 59:54
And it's one of the six tips why you should be checked for sleep apnea.
Okay, snoring, sleeping, dry mouth on a rising.
waking up, having to pee too much at night, just as a list.
And there it is, morning headaches.
And I'm like, the neurologists, the doctors, the ENTs, nobody picked this up.
didn't pick it that... I have sleep apnea yeah so I'm just putting that out there that yes as women we have to look beyond the oh this is a male thing or an overweight thing or an underweight thing or it's an all thing if you're human it's your thing

Mary Louder - 01:00:41
yeah I and that's a wonderful public service announcement I'm going to take it as such and we'll yeah I agree fully and And that's great.
I think that's a wonderful place to stop.
Everybody, let's get tested for sleep apnea at home, super easy.
After menopause, because the collagen changes and the soft tissue changes, we see more relaxation of the soft tissue.
And, you know, we don't look at jaw structure enough.
And we've got the dentist doing one thing, we've got the doctors doing another thing, could we please, I mean, y'all, come on now.
And then also, same thing about prices of gadgets.

Mary Louder - 01:01:24
Sometimes it's a simple fix with a, truly, with a pillow and a different type of bike guard versus a $3,000 or $5,000 or $10,000 gadget, you know, versus a CPAP.
So really figuring that out much better we would do.
And because that's a huge contributor to the number one cause of death in females, which is cardiovascular

Beverly Meyer - 01:01:44
event.
Absolutely.
Sleep apnea is right up in there with

Mary Louder - 01:01:47
it.
60% of the people who have their stroke have undiagnosed sleep apnea.

Beverly Meyer - 01:01:54
Yep.

Mary Louder - 01:01:54
So yes, okay.
All right, we've got that.
All right.
I really, Beverly, appreciate your time today so very much.
And it's lovely getting to interview you and speak with you.
And I think we should plan down the road to circle around on some other things because you've got some other great topics.
So if you're willing to come on back, I'll come up with something and we'll have added again.

Beverly Meyer - 01:02:20
Absolutely.
I can talk for hours on almost any topic.
We could talk about sleep.
There's a lot we could talk about.

Mary Louder - 01:02:27
Oh, that would be wonderful.
That would be wonderful.
Well, thank you again.
And we'll have some resources.
We'll have how to reach you, how to reach your website available with this podcast.
And also that researcher that you said, Chris.
Oh,

Beverly Meyer - 01:02:44
Kresser.
Chris with a C, Chris with a K.

Mary Louder - 01:02:48
K-R-E-S-S-O-R.

Beverly Meyer - 01:02:49
K-R-E-S-S-E-R.

Mary Louder - 01:02:52
Yeah, okay.

Beverly Meyer - 01:02:53
And yeah, Chris and I are somewhat similar that he's, he was, is, and was an acupuncturist who got to be really well known in the paleo community because he was male.
And, you know, he and I are very much contemporaries, and I actually helped create Paleo.
I'm actually one of the founders Paleo.

Mary Louder - 01:03:16
Interesting.

Beverly Meyer - 01:03:16
Back in the old days, before it had a name.
But his star just rose quickly because he was a very smart, is a very smart male, and the community took him on.
And anyway, he has, he's an amazing resource.
He's really one of the smartest people I know.

Mary Louder - 01:03:38
Okay, well, we will put that out for a resource and thank you for being one of the originals.

Beverly Meyer - 01:03:43
Yes, well, thank you for having me on your show.
This has been great to actually have a serious conversation about real things, and I really appreciate

Mary Louder - 01:03:51
that.
Oh, you're welcome.
You're welcome.
All right, folks.
Rate and review us.
You know how that goes.
It always helps us out.

Mary Louder - 01:03:59
And if you don't like it, don't rate and review us.
Remember?
Very specifically.
All right.
See you guys next time on the Dr. Mary Lauer podcast show.
What a gift to learn from someone who's lived the questions and found her own answers.
I thank Beverly for being our guest today.

Mary Louder - 01:04:15
So if something in today's conversation lit a spark or stirred a memory, I invite you to follow it.
Healing often begins in curiosity and is sustained by courage.
You can find more about Beverly's work, including in-depth articles and her podcast, Primal Diet, Modern Health, at her website.
The link will be in the program notes.
Please rate and review this podcast wherever you listen.
Let us hear from you if you have a question or feedback.
Thanks for listening and be well.