Insights from the Couch - Real Talk for Women at Midlife

Ep.58: Rethinking Menopause Naturally with Maryon Stewart

• Colette Fehr, Laura Bowman • Season 5 • Episode 58

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This episode we’re joined by the incredible Maryon Stewart, a global pioneer in natural hormone rebalancing and women's health advocate. Maryon drops serious wisdom about how women can navigate perimenopause, menopause, and beyond—without relying on HRT. We talk all about phytoestrogens, nutritional deficiencies, and how small, science-backed changes in diet and lifestyle can lead to huge shifts in how we feel.

Whether you're just starting to notice changes or deep in the menopause journey, Maryon’s natural hormone rebalancing protocol (NHRP) offers a roadmap to feeling vibrant again. We go deep into what’s actually happening in our bodies, what the research shows, and why the medical community still isn’t fully caught up. This is the conversation we wish we’d had years ago—so don’t miss it!

 

Episode Highlights:

[0:00] - Intro to Maryon Stewart and her revolutionary work on menopause
 [4:50] - What the FEMMAR community offers and why real-time research updates matter
 [9:13] - How the NHRP was born and what makes it unique
 [14:26] - Breaking down the Natural Hormone Rebalancing Protocol (NHRP)
 [17:21] - Understanding phytoestrogens and how they mimic estrogen naturally
 [21:07] - Can you really go through menopause without HRT?
 [24:52] - What phytoestrogens actually are and how they work
 [28:22] - A look at the diet: what to eat, how to eat, and making it easy
 [32:27] - Belly fat at midlife: why it happens and what to do about it
 [34:14] - Post-menopausal zest, community support, and long-term vitality
 [41:30] - How the medical world is responding and FEMMAR’s growing impact
 [45:32] - Where to find Maryon, her community, and free resources

 

Links and Resources:

Femmar - website and community sign-up https:femmar.com Free Phytoestrogens Food Guide - download from Femmar.com (https://www.femmar.com/newsletter-downloads) 

Femmar.Hormonal.Health on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/femmar.hormonal.health/?hl=en

Maryon Stewart BEM on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maryon-stewart-bem-b806634/ 

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Colette Fehr:

Marc, welcome back to insights from the couch, where real conversations meet real life at midlife, as always, we're your hosts, Colette and Laura, two therapists and best friends who are going through the journey right alongside you. So whether you're feeling stuck, restless or just wanting something more, not sure what's next. This is the space for real, honest, messy, raw conversations. And if you find yourself nodding along, come join us in the chat. This is our community for women to talk about all the things, ask questions about the podcast, share resources, all the good stuff. Go to insights from the couch.org, and click join the chat. We'll see you there. And today, we have a very special guest that we're so excited to dive in with. And Laura is going to introduce her.

Laura Bowman:

Yes, we have Marion Stewart, renowned author, TV presenter and women's health expert. She's the CEO of FEM Marc and creator of the natural hormone rebalancing protocol, often called the pioneer of the natural menopause movement. Marion has helped hundreds of 1000s of women manage menopause and PMS symptoms without drugs or hormones. She's written 28 books, hosted TV and radio shows in the UK, and now presents Marion Stewart's menopause solutions, the first US public television series focused on menopause. Marian has been honored with the British Empire Medal and named by Forbes as one of 11 women changing the conversation around menopause. We're so excited to have you this is such a timely conversation, because in our chat group, we are women are so hungry for information about this, so we're so excited to have

Maryon Stewart:

you Excellent. Thank you so much for giving me air time, as it were, because there's so much to share, and I'm so passionate about imparting knowledge and wisdom that comes from published research. And I think that's what everyone's missing, the fact that most doctors are not educated by their own admission. You know, the Mayo Clinic survey in 2019 said that only 7% of doctors and Gynecologists feel adequately educated how it weren't going through menopause, and yet every woman's going to go through it. So it doesn't make any sense to me, and I have, I feel a deep sense of injustice that there's all this amazing published research. My team has been helping women for 30 years to manage this journey, always based on published research, which is always evolving. Every week there's new research, and so we have to update the chat. Do you know? And women's needs change as well. And you know now we're talking about perimenopause, but 10 years ago, if you'd done a survey in the street, most women wouldn't even know what perimenopause was. Do you know? So it's, it's now you've got a whole group of younger women who are much more inquiring, much more demanding. Do you know they don't want to be fobbed off? They don't want a scam, they don't want to be sold to. Do you know they really just want to be helped? They want to be informed so that they can make their own choices? And I think that's what this is all about now. And so we pride ourselves at fer Marc in connecting the dots with the research and attracting some of the best experts on the planet in our community, so that we can get the experts and the women together and women can really get their questions answered. Do you know you talked about it being messy conversation? It could be as messy as you like, you know, because we, we did a survey a few years ago, now, probably five or six years ago, on what goes on below the waist, or, I should say, what doesn't do. You know, when you get into menopause and everything starts drying out, and sex becomes painful and all that, it doesn't have to be that way. You can turn it all around. But women don't understand that, and they go into this very sad place where they feel hopeless. Do you know no one tells them that there's quality life after menopause, and that's that's really not It's not okay, just isn't.

Colette Fehr:

I couldn't agree with you more. Everything you've just said is exactly what we've been talking about in our chat group, how we're hungry for information. There hasn't been enough research. The doctors who are out there don't seem to really know the research. They haven't been trained in it, and how hard it is that we have to go out there and find information and really advocate and educate ourselves. So your community, maybe we could start with that as we get into what you've learned that's going to help our audience so much, but your community, femar, tell me more about that and why that's so important, and your approach there.

Maryon Stewart:

Okay, so the femur, for me, is a dream come true, because, as you said, I wrote 28 books, and pretty much did a book. A year and all the medical references. So it's like having a baby, as you know, when you write a book, you know, you go through this painful process of making sure it's all right, and then you submit it to the publisher, and then it takes about a year before it's published.

Colette Fehr:

I'm loving it right now. It's awful. You finished it if you

Maryon Stewart:

if your book is based on medical research. So much more research has been published in the year. Do you know, by two years down the line, it's old, and so the beauty of the community is we can update the research every day, literally. Do you know we can change our protocol when there's new research? We can tweak things. We can explain to women exactly you know, how much protein they need, how much phytoestrogen they need, these wonderful substances that are plant based and mimic estrogen. They're hormone Harmonizers. Do you know we can answer questions? We can give the research that's needed to help women to navigate this journey in a very kind of honest and down to earth way. And so what I wanted to do, because for all the years, my team and I have focused on one to one consultations for women, and that's really not sustainable. You can't do that for every woman on the planet, and so we have now taken all the science based information from our protocol, and obviously we're adding to it all the time, and we've turned it into a protocol on a page so that is accessible through our community. So there's all the instructions that you need. So your goals for the day, how much, how many phytoestrogens do you need? What time of day do you ideally need them? What form do they come in? So that you can make choices? How much proteins you need? How much fiber do you need? Polyphenols, probiotics and probiotics, again, we can talk about this later, but they've got. The new research shows, in recent years that they play such a key role in even helping to metabolize the phytoestrogens, so that you become what's called ecorn producer, so you can really use them. But no one's talking about that. No. And then it's the environmental estrogen, the xenoestrogens, these ghastly, harmful, toxic estrogen look alikes that are in the environment. They're probably in our makeup, in our home care products, and they're in plastics and pollution. We're just environmental sitting ducks if we fill our receptor sites, when your ovaries start to retire, the receptor sites in your cells remain empty because your ovaries are not producing estradiol anymore. These plant based phytoestrogens have a molecule that looks just like estradiol. So you can actually fool the brain into thinking everything's normal again. So that can affect your skin, your hair, your nails, your vagina, your brain. Do you know? Everything and so and and also, if there was a race between those phytoestrogens and the environmental estrogen. They the natural plant based estrogen gets in there first, seals off the space. So we're actually protecting ourselves, because the xenoestrogens actually increase the our risk of breast cancer, for example, and other cancers. So it's not just a nice idea and also the research shows that the recommendations that we provide for women going through perimenopause and menopause, by sheer luck, I suppose, help to prevent things like bone loss, which we're much more predisposed to As we go through perimenopause and menopause and beyond heart disease, which we become so much more predisposed to much more than men after menopause, and also defers things like dementia and all sorts of other memory issues, and keeps us nicely moist below the waist, instead of feeling like a dried out prune, and that helps us to enjoy our lives. And do you know, feel like women and feel

Colette Fehr:

feel better in every way, esteem entire

Laura Bowman:

So Marianne, I'm just really curious. Like, how did you come to this protocol? And like, was this driven by your own personal experience and figuring it out?

Maryon Stewart:

No, we figured this out a long time ago, in the early 90s, and so it was because of published research. And when I heard and read about phytoestrogens, I started coming to the US, to the annual conferences. Do you know, to learn about it. And so I suppose I've always been hungry for information and then to interpret the information for women. And that's that's kind of where my whole career has been centered. And so now for me, the community is this amazing place where we can invite women to come and join us and soak up the. Information and also tell us what they need and what they want. Do you know, if we haven't already got it, we'll go and find it. Do you know if we don't know the answers, we'll be honest and say, well, actually, I'll go and research it and come back to you or find the best expert. Do you know we've got an on our advisory board. We've got experts in every kind of discipline, whether it's gut health or brain health or hormone health, nutrition, sleep. Do you know there's just so many issues that affect us as we go through this phase? And a lot of women, they don't even associate the fact that they can't sleep, or they've got brain fog, or they're feeling extra anxious, apart from the hot flushes and night sweats, which most people know are related to menopause, most of those other symptoms, like aches and pains and fatigue, they have no clue. They just think it's part of the aging process. I can remember, you know, so many times I've been in my clinic, but I can, I so remember the day it was in my clinic in London, in Harley Street, and I think I was 48 at the time, and a woman was sitting on the other side of my desk telling me how terrible she felt, how tired and depressed and anxious and forgetful. And then she said, Well, what can I expect? I'm 47 I just I'm not often lost for words. But I looked at her and I thought, well, and I did say to her, you know, you can expect a great deal more than that, you know. And so I think the the women, we're busy, we're, we're carers, we look after everybody. We work, you know, we're, we're housekeepers, we're everything. And so we leave ourselves till last, naturally, and we don't, until we fall over, we don't really ask for help. And so from my perspective, the earlier you come to this party, the better. You know, with no stigma, no shame, you're just you know, this is midlife, and you need to learn about your changing needs, and what you can do to get yourself into feeling like your old self again or better, and then what you can do to stay in the driving seat going forward, so that you match your health span with your lifespan. Because there's no point living to a ripe old age of, you know, 90 something or 100 if you've fallen apart, you know, if you're completely crippled by osteoporosis, exactly, you've got heart issues, if you can't even remember your family, do you know all that kind what's the point? What's the point? But there's so much wonderful research, and we see the most incredible transformations. I mean, I could spend the next hour or more telling you about people who were leaving the workplace crippled by their symptoms, and we know that 20% of women leave the workplace around menopause because they can't cope. They can't obtain thoughts, they get hot and embarrassed, they feel anxious, they can't sleep, and so they can't show up in the way that they normally did, and so careers just go sideways. Well, I mean, we have so many women who've been through the natural hormone rebalancing protocol, who go from feeling like that, like bombing out and giving up, to feeling like the best version of themselves, where they're made Head of Department of a university instead of leaving the workplace leading A team of midwives, you know, leading international, global companies being, you know, the CEO and having that So, for example, the doctor who was CEO of Virgin care, she she was a general practitioner for 20 years. She became the CEO of urgent care, and then during the pandemic, she had 5000 nurses on the front line, and she came through our program. After trying hormones for I think three goes, it didn't work for her within four weeks, she said her symptoms were under control, and She then invited us to come and support the nurses in the workplace during the pandemic, which was amazing. That's incredible, you know, just help them be strict. Help them be stronger. And gave them hope that they could get through whatever they needed to get through in a much more resilient way, right?

Colette Fehr:

And it sounds like from what you're saying, there are solutions that many of us don't even realize are out there that are research backed. So I'm glad you mentioned your natural hormone rebalancing protocol. Can you tell us what that is, and what you've found that is speaking to these transformations you're describing.

Maryon Stewart:

Yeah, so we decided to bring all the science together into this protocol on a page, as I said, and call it an HRP, so natural hormone rebalancing protocol. And the idea is that when you go through menopause, it's not just about estrogen, it's about all your hormones. You know, you've got progesterone, you've got cortisol, you've got all the different hormones that can cripple you as you go through the transition. So we need to learn how to not. Normalize the hormone function, how to harmonize it all again. And so what we did with an HRP is we brought all the research together, and we made it very easy for women to navigate so that they know exactly what to do. There's no guesswork. Do you know? There's no overwhelm? And it's very, very simple, and so that, because, as you said, before, you know, we're all out looking for a solution, but trying to find the solution in this crowded marketplace when you've got the wonderful internet, which sometimes can give you pearls of wisdom and other times takes you down a dark alley and just sells you something that you didn't ever really need, or it's even not what this says on the label. And that's what a lot of supplements, for example, just don't contain what they say on the label. And so I feel bad for women that they're being misled in many cases, and I just feel that somehow you need the pure information, and so that's what nhlp really is, and it's there for women to come and make choices. So for example, when we say consume 50 milligrams of phytoestrogens a day, we've got a phytoestrogen Food Guide, which is pages long, which gives you all the options and serving sizes, so you can make choices and you understand exactly what you're doing. That's been endorsed by at least a dozen doctors, and we've got more endorsing it, and it's also backed by 70 pages of research. So we've done the work. Do you know that's the point? We did the work, and now people can come and feast on it,

Colette Fehr:

and it's simple and easy to follow, but so backing up just even a little bit, because this is so much, it's so exciting, and this is going to be a real mind blowing piece of information for a lot of women to hear. I know this is totally new to me. When you talk about phytoestrogens and this natural hormone rebalancing protocol give our listeners a little just basic idea of what this is. Is this a food based I mean, that's what I think like a natural food based solution, that you can eat a certain way and have a very different experience through Penny perimenopause, menopause and post menopause? Yes.

Maryon Stewart:

So what what we're aiming to do? Because what the early research showed was that very often women have got low levels of important nutrients. So we did five studies looking at nutrient levels of women with PMS in the very early days. And since then, there's been world research done, global research done to show that a billion women have nutritional deficiencies. So as you get to midlife, you've had your babies, you've breastfed, you've lived life in the fast lane, you maybe drank too much, didn't eat enough. Do you know and your your nutrient levels are even lower, coupled with the fact that your ovaries are retiring, that's an untenable experience for most women. So what we're aiming to do with the NHL P is we help women to identify nutritional deficiencies and fix them so that they get back into optimum nutritional state. That's so that's first. Second thing is fill the receptor sites with naturally occurring estrogen, with those phytoestrogens. And we can talk more about that, and I can explain how you do that. Great. The receptor sites don't stay full for very long, so we try and thread them throughout the day, in the evening, so that you're always fooling your brain that you've got normal circulating levels of estradiol. Obviously, it's, it's plant based, but it's and it's a weaker version, but it does the job in terms of seeing our symptoms off in our experience, and also helping women to look better, because it affects our skin and our hair and our nails as well, and and our energy levels, you know. And so instead of showing up like a sad, pale version of ourselves, we can be more vibrant again, and we can feel better now. There's so much you can do to keep feeling well. So that's the that's the second part. The third part is taking some science based supplements. And we try and with supplements, we go for supplements that have been through properly conducted clinical trials, so they've been shown to be safe and effective. And we're looking at the irreducible minimum that you can take to get the maximum effect. So that's the supplements. Then we we're looking at lifestyle, things like movement, mindfulness, meditation, you know, all those good things that keep the feel good hormones present so that we can and we rest our brains. You know, we're not super women. We need to take a break during the day, or, you know, early evening, or whatever it is, to do something good for ourselves so that we get our bring our cortisol down in this stressed world. Do you know, so that we are calmer, we can go into our evening enjoy our relationships and family life. Without falling asleep on the sofa after dinner. Do you know so with so this is, this is life. You know, it's not the dress rehearsal, and we just need to. We need the blueprint. We need the road map about how to live it from perimenopause for the rest of our lives.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, as you're talking, this is all like, really pinging for me, like, I don't know if you're familiar with, like, Brooke gold nurse work on hyper nourishing and like Neil Barnard's work in the space of phytoestrogens with soy. And it's just all it really, like, rings true to me, and like, what I've been told for, like, overall healing and health, but, but I'm also wondering, is there a role for HRT, and what's like your take on the way, like, because HRT is one of these things that's really making a resurgence, and is there's a lot of women out there saying, you know, you really need this to protect your bones and your heart and for longevity. And I'm just, I think a lot of women are confused that can we really do this naturally, or do we need something more?

Maryon Stewart:

Well, the answer is, you can do it naturally, because the research backs it up. Do you know on this 70 page document, we've got a section on bone health, we've got a section on brain health, a section on heart health, do you know there's a section on all the key things that we need to cover all those bases now with HRT, it's, as you say, it's had a kind of up and down history, and it's having a resurgence at the moment, having said that only under 2% of women in the US are using it at the moment.

Unknown:

How much? How much under 2% really,

Maryon Stewart:

and over 50% in surveys, multiple surveys show that over 50% of women want a natural approach. So my view is, obviously it's important that women have all the information so they can make informed choices, right? I don't believe you necessarily need HRT, but that's up to each individual person, because even if you took HRT, it wouldn't correct nutritional deficiencies. For example, do you know it wouldn't necessarily get you off your chair and moving and doing all the things that we do in this natural with this natural approach? So I think that's one thing to say, and then also, if we're living so much longer, then maybe if people do take HRT. Sometimes we have people on our program, on our protocol, who are actually using HRT, and they do the two things in parallel. Sometimes they come on to wean off their HRT, which they do in conjunction with their their doctor. It's very individual thing, but I wouldn't, I certainly wouldn't say that you have to take HRT in order to thrive at midlife and beyond. I don't believe that. And I've been doing this for such a long time. The only person who ever went back onto HRT in all the or, or I say because we've, we've helped a lot of women with breast cancer who can't take HRT, right the medical reasons. So the only person who ever got breast cancer again was a woman who went back onto her HRT under with her doctor's recommendations. So I, you know, I hear what's being said, and it's up to each individual person to make a choice, but I don't believe that they absolutely have to take it in order to be well. So

Colette Fehr:

this is a very exciting solution to something that maybe HRT isn't necessary for anybody, but certainly, if you can't take HRT or don't want to, it doesn't mean that there's no way to thrive through the menopause journey and beyond. I mean, it's funny, Marian, I as you're talking I was thinking you described, you know, the dryness factor, because I've just gone through menopause myself, having learned that menopause is one day from the year from the day, one day a year after the day of your last period. And I don't, I haven't been getting periods because I had a uterine ablation, so I had no idea when menopause would happen. And I was just in Scottsdale, Arizona, and looking around at the Desert beauty, I also had this thought of, oh my god, this is a metaphor for my current vagina, yeah. And I need to not let that be the thing. So I think this is so exciting. You are doing exactly what this world needs, educating women, giving them solutions, taking the research and making it accessible and easy to follow. Now, for someone like me who has not been on the journey the same way as Laura, you know, I don't know any of the people she just mentioned, the first I've ever heard the term phytoestrogen. Is you saying it right now? I mean, going back to high school biology, I can take a guess at what that means. But can you give us a little bit of education about phytoestrogens and how that works? Well,

Maryon Stewart:

phyto just means plant, right? And if you look at the molecule under the microscope of estradiol, which is the s. You have before menopause and the phytoestrogen, they're almost the they're not the same, but they're almost the same. Wow. So those spot the difference, things that you stare up for age is looking at to see what the difference is. There is a difference, but it's not massive. And so you can fall the brain into thinking that you've, if you're, if you're consuming them regularly throughout the day, in the evening, then you fool the brain into thinking that everything's normal. Again, what happens when your ovaries wind down is that you the cells that protect you from heart disease, for example, the cells that keep your brain functioning, the cells that keep your vagina moist and keep your bones growing. The factories closed down, right? So when you get these, you fill the receptor sites with these estrogen look alikes, these hormone Harmonizers, the factory lights go back on again, and that's how harm you get through the brain fog. You get moist again in, you know, important little places your skin changes. Obviously you can't see bone loss and what's going on inside your heart. But the things that you can measure, you can you can see directly. Now, some things take longer, things like hot flashes, night sweats, feeling anxious, not sleeping at night, all of that kind of stuff. The brain fog, it those things tend to even in six weeks, we notice a massive difference. The women notice a massive difference, you know, and that encourages them to go on things like what goes on below the waist. That takes a bit longer, but it's months, you know? It's not, it's not years, and you there are so many things that you can do for vaginal dryness that you know, from plant based food in our diet to supplements that have been through clinical trials to show that they help to increase the number of mucous cells that are made and help With the elasticity and the lining so they improve what's called the integrity of the lining of the vagina. And then there are gadgets like V fit, for example, which is red light therapy that you can use, bit like a vibrator, but it's and it comes with hyaluronic acid gel, and that helps. That's kind of a magic wand.

Laura Bowman:

Never heard of that. Have you ever heard of that?

Colette Fehr:

I have heard about it, but I don't know, with great specificity what it was. So this is something that just kind of stimulates the vagina in a healthy way, like brings it back to life, if you will. It

Maryon Stewart:

helps. What help? The red light therapy helps to repair the tissues. So there's a load of research on that. But, I mean, I'm not suggesting everyone runs out to bind that, because I think they're, you know, for probably eight out of 10 women, from my experience, managed with the diet and the supplements, you know, but then, you know, that's there. And then when you're past menopause and you're in your 60s and 70s or whatever. You still may want to be active and have good sex, and so therefore you've got that as an insurance policy, and you don't have to worry about that side of your life dying.

Laura Bowman:

You can keep it. Can you tell us what like the diet looks like? Like? What? What are you eating in a in a day? I mean, how heavy on the plant food is it?

Maryon Stewart:

Yeah, it's very easy. So you and again choices. So whether you eat fish and meat or whether you're vegetarian or vegan or whatever you are, you can make the choices, because we're not deciding for you. So you've got lists of things that you can choose from. So I love fruit and salad and vegetables. So I'm kind of big on those that lovely rainbow diet. I love flax seeds, which are full of plant based estrogen. You can get soy milk and yogurt and tempeh and tofu if you want, but you don't have to. I love sesame seeds. They're another source, a rich source, and I just make sure that I have plenty of protein. So the protocol is recommending that you have a certain amount of protein with each meal, certain amount of fiber with each meal. And you can choose your sources, because there's just lists and lists of things to choose from. So it's up to each individual person. What you like do? You know? I happen to like salmon. Some people hate salmon, you know. So it's just, I, you know, I make the choices that make me feel that's yummy. And you can throw some edamame beans on to add some more plant based estrogen. It's just easy. And it becomes, it becomes second nature, like cleaning your teeth, you know, you don't have to think about it. We even get into shopping lists. And, you know, the easiest places and the cheapest places to buy the things so that you can get them delivered to your door, and you don't have to go and, you know, bring back heavy bags full of flax seeds or whatever you're going to shop for. With all my books, I've done recipes as well, so I've got these lovely do. Delicious recipes that I've had Michelin star chefs cook of various events, which is really thrilling to fast option menus where you just literally throw things together in a quick way. And then when I was doing those recently for the community and we were analyzing them, I suddenly thought, Well, hey, they're too complicated. So then I did a whole load of no cook options, where you literally go and buy the food and put it together assembly, and don't have to spend any time in the kitchen whatsoever, but you still got really nutrition. You know, nutritionally dense diet that's going to provide you with everything you need. And so it's it. So whether you like spending time in the kitchen or whether you're allergic to the kitchen is irrelevant. You can still have this wonderful phyto feast and feel good again. And that's the key thing. So we want to tell the world, so we've created the phytoestrogen Food Guide, which is free to every woman, so you don't have to be a member of our community to get that. And I know you've got the link, so you can share that, so

Colette Fehr:

everyone can share everything in the chat.

Maryon Stewart:

Everyone can have a copy of that. And then if they want to come to the clinic as well, it's, it's for $4.99 a month. So that's we tried to make it really affordable for everybody, so that they don't have to spend hundreds of dollars to find solutions, you know. And we have live sessions every month, maybe sometimes more than once a month, where the experts come together. We're doing we've got the next one, I think, is on xenoestrogens, then we've got another one on belly fat, by popular demand, because that's something that's so common. And so we try and listen to the community and hear what they want to hear about, yeah, so that we can get the right experts together. So we've got for the belly fat one. We've got the celebrity diet coach who's helped numerous celebrities to help we've got amazing gut specialists. And, you know, people that come and I love it, because they give their time so generously, to genuinely come to help women to understand and navigate this. And that's what's you know, we just need to pull together so that we can get through this in a really loving way.

Colette Fehr:

Yes, well said. So while you mentioned these two topics, belly fat and the xenoestrogens, can you give our listeners a little bit of your take on the belly fat situation? Because that's that's a tough one.

Maryon Stewart:

Yeah, belly fat is when your estrogen is winding down. You're you no longer require the same to stay the same shape. Do you know, as you did in your child bearing years. So the fat disappears from certain places and redistributes, especially on your belly.

Colette Fehr:

Well, that makes it make a lot of sense already, because my figure has completely transformed already from what it was. So yes, please go on. This is fascinating. And also

Maryon Stewart:

your metabolism slows down, yeah, so your that's the rate at which your body ticks over. So there are eating the plant based estrogens the first thing, because, don't forget, you're falling your brain to thinking everything's normal again. And so that way you can start to get your shape back, but also with movement and doing the right kind of movement for yourself. I love my hula hoop, for example. I just love my weighted hula hoop. And the research on that shows that you can decrease your waist and your belly even within the space of a month by doing that for half an hour a day. So really, finding things that you love that light you up. So for me, I just put music on Beatty music, and I'm off with the fairies. Do you know? So you just find, find what works. Yeah, it doesn't really matter what it is. So and then you can maintain your shape. I think, you know, I've had four kids, and I don't I'm probably a little bit heavier than I was when I was in my 20s, but not that much, only a few pounds. And I think that it's because I stay active, and I've learned to do things that light me up, do you know? So I want to do them because they make me feel good, right? And I think if you want to be here to help other people, you've got to keep yourself in good shape in order to be able to do that.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, I was talking to somebody yesterday about the phenomenon of post menopausal zest. I mean, I had never really heard Have you heard of that? That sounds like a new concept to me, but like, once people get through menopause, that there's like, this uptick in, like, just feeling clear and alive. And you've never heard of this?

Maryon Stewart:

Oh, I haven't. And I tell you, I remember being at a book signing at menopause, the musical in Australia, and listening to the women filing past saying that they've been there, done that, and got the t shirt. But why would you feel better when you've got low levels of nutrients that haven't been fixed, you've got empty estrogen receptor sites? Do you know you're tired? You're not sleeping well, you're feeling anxious. You've got. Dry vagina and brain frog. I don't know.

Laura Bowman:

I'll do more research on it, but it's, apparently it's a thing. I'll tell you it is. Maybe it's a mindset.

Maryon Stewart:

Well, I don't think, from my perspective, because we've had a lot of women on our protocol who are older, is that, and it's never too late to start, because you need to actually get your nutrients back into an autumn range, plug into the plant estrogens and make sure that everything's in in a good range in terms of your nutrients and your receptor sites, and then do your movement and everything else. Then I'd say, yes, you can get your this back, but I don't think you can automatically think, and that's why a lot of women don't do anything because they think once they're through menopause, that magic day a year after their period, they're going to be okay again. But I'm here to tell you, do you know over 30 years that we've had so many women come to us in their 60s, 70s and even 80s who are still having hot flushes? Wow, let's alone. The other symptoms, oh

Colette Fehr:

my gosh. Marian, what you're saying, This is so crazy. You just said that because I just went to see a play here in the Orlando area, and I was chatting with a woman during intermission who was in her late 70s, and she she kind of said to me, Oh, it's so cold in here. And I said, Oh, I'm sorry. I'm at the phase of life where I don't get cold. And she laughed. And I said, you know, I'm 51 going, I'm 52 so we started chatting about menopause, and she said, I hate to tell you this, but I still have hot flashes, and I'm 77 and I was like, what? It kind of freaked me out, so exact. And I had never heard that before, never heard that before. And what I'm getting from what you're saying, because I do feel like I have post menopausal zest, even though I've never heard that term before, but I think that's more my personality and my mindset and the way I show up in the world. And I think what I'm getting from what you're saying is that obviously women are going to have different degree of symptoms, but that this is a long journey most women, if we just look at scientifically what's going on in the body, there are going to be things that make it very difficult to feel super zesty, unless you're taking control, and that nutrition is really a missing link for a lot of us, even though menopause and the surrounding perimenopause, post menopause is Becoming a topic of conversation I'm not hearing personally, unless you're already plugged into the nutrition world, super dialed in. I'm not hearing a lot of conversation about that, and it seems like a huge missing piece that is absolutely critical to address the way you

Maryon Stewart:

eat. Yeah, it's so it's just fundamental. It's almost like a builder building a house on marshland, you know it's going to fall apart. So you can't go into easily. Well, for most people, can't easily go into through menopause and out the other end of it feeling great, unless they learn to meet their needs, and unless they really understand, as I said, the research is always changing. There's always new things and easy things coming that make it exciting for us to be women at this time. You know, it's this, there's there's so much we can do, and I think also coming together in the way that we come together. Because I remember the first film I ever made on menopause, which was years ago in the everything 2006 and we got together, six of my patients came together for a weekend because we wanted to film them doing movement, meditation and everything, all together and eating together and being together. And that was the first time any of my patients ever met. And I promise you, it was a life changing weekend for them. They never forgot and they stayed in touch with each other. They bonded. You know, it was such a wonderful and so I think coming together in a community has that added value. It's not just about you and your symptoms and how you feel or how bad you feel. It's coming together with other women and the excitement of seeing them go through the transition, you know, seeing them come out. So you may be having a bad day, but then you hear someone who's just had such a big win. Do you know they're just feeling so good now? And it just gives you that bit of encouragement. You don't feel like someone's trying to sell you and tell you you're going to feel you know you'll feel better. You've got you've got other people in the community who are affirming that idea through their own experience. And I think that women, women need that. You know when we need

Laura Bowman:

we see that too, and in our work that we've done, where we've brought women together in groups to support each other, and we do a midlife master class type thing, and when we bring people together, it's just magical and transformative. And women need each other. They need the information, they need the support, they need the imagination for like, what else is out there? Because you can very easily get trapped in your own little bell jar of this is my life. This is all there is.

Maryon Stewart:

Is yes, and that's that's far from true. We

Colette Fehr:

need the uplift. I mean, I think what we see, and it sounds like you're describing the power of community. The agent of transformation is community, yeah, the connection with other people, where women are supporting women, we are nurturers. And now I see a movement in society where instead of nurturing everyone, we've been told we're supposed to and leaving nothing for ourselves, women are really supporting women in a different way, and it's very fulfilling. Yeah,

Maryon Stewart:

it is. And I think adding to that is that we're in our community because we're putting in the science on hormone health, on lifestyle, medicine, on, you know, nutrition and biochemistry and all of those things. We're we're creating a really trusted place where people can come and know that they're only going to get quality information and they're never, they're always going to be listened to, and they're never going to be sold at do you know? And it's not about us, it's about us serving them to get them through this journey and feeling well again. And that's the whole purpose for going up

Colette Fehr:

there. That's beautiful, and that's what makes it unique, because I don't think everything out there is geared that way. Unfortunately, how are you finding the medical community overall is responding to you and your work in today's time?

Maryon Stewart:

Well, I think it depends who you say in the medical community. So for example, we asked 12 well known doctors to endorse and give us a comment on the fighter, estrogen Food Guide, and all of them did so generously, and I've got some more waiting to, you know, give us the comments so we can add them on. You're going to always get skeptical doctors. And I remember in the beginning it was much harder than it is now. But I think now most doctors come into the profession because they care about helping people, and they recognize that diet plays a really important part. Diet and lifestyle are probably the first line approach when you get to midlife and menopause, that's the first thing you should be doing. But they're lacking information, and so they may tell you to eat a better diet or move more, but they don't tell you what it looks like, yeah, you know, and they don't tell each individual what it looks like in order to achieve their goals and their personal preferences. And so I think that's where we come into this, because we're so geared to individual help, and also the most women can manage just with the protocol. But other women that have got a more you know, they've got a medical history, they've got different medication and different things, like they may have had cancer or whatever else it is, they probably need the one to one consultations. So we have a team of nutritionists and who are trained in nhlp, and they give them proper guidance according to their needs and likes and tastes and everything. So that's possible too, but for most people, they can get on by themselves in the community and just enjoy soaking up the information and asking questions that they genuine. Get Genuine answers to from amazing experts. So, you know, I just, I love being the catalyst, and we have the most amazing, dedicated team. We're a small team, but we're incredibly dedicated, and just have a mission to help women all over the world understand that with the right information they can get through this and, you know, doing the irreducible minimum amount of change, they can feel turbo charged. Do you know, feel better than they can remember? Because we go downhill so slowly we don't remember how far down we've gone until we bounce back up

Laura Bowman:

again. This is so helpful because there are certain things in my medical history that make HRT really challenging, really contraindicated, honestly. So this is just such like a fundamental reminder that wherever you are on that continuum, whether you choose to do HRT in some form or fashion, that this piece is so important that this is just a fundamental cornerstone that you need to incorporate it as well, and

Colette Fehr:

maybe it's the only piece you need. Yeah,

Maryon Stewart:

we do. We help women in the workplace as well. We're working with Jackson health system in Miami, for example, where we help those women who are on the front line in the health system, we also do. We're just starting a pilot study with Ultra human with the wearable ring, and so we're getting biomarkers as well. While we're delivering the nhrp, we're also helping women they self. Process so that we can see that their severe symptoms become more mild and then hopefully disappear. But they also have the biomarkers that they can measure their sleep and their heart rate and their temperature and all the things that you can measure with those kinds of things. So we're really excited about that as well.

Colette Fehr:

Oh, that is exciting. Oh my gosh, there's so much to learn, and I think everybody is going to want to get your protocols, your book and find out more. So tell our listeners where they can find you your community and a little bit about your new book too. Yeah. So

Maryon Stewart:

the the the community, well, the website is femal.com it's F, E, double, M, a, r.com and then I think the community is femoral.com forward slash community.

Colette Fehr:

You've got the link, yes, and it'll all be in the show notes too. The book, it's called

Maryon Stewart:

Manage your menopause. Naturally, it's not new. It's actually three years old. But, and as I said, it's it's fine. And if you love reading books, then please read it, because it has got all the guts of an HRP. But you have to remember that it was written that time ago, and since then, there's even more new research, which is what we're dealing with. I get things popping into my inbox every day about new research, and so we're always updating and excited about how how that comes and how it it a lot of it doesn't change what we're doing. It just validates what we've been doing for all

Colette Fehr:

these years. And I love that you're focused on the community, because, like you said, there's new information all the time, and you're really about serving your community with information that will help. I will definitely be joining, and I bet tons of our listeners will too. So again, all of this information on how you can find Marion and her valuable research and information is going to be in the show notes we like. Could this could not have been more exciting. I really wasn't privy to any of this, so I'm sure there are many people listening who are fired up about this too, and we're just so grateful to you for being here today.

Laura Bowman:

Yes, definitely, so helpful.

Maryon Stewart:

Yeah. And we, as I say, anybody who wants to come to our live sessions as well, they can. They'll find those we in the community, definitely. And we have links so anybody can just come to the website and come, and you don't have to be a member of the community to come to some of the live sessions, so they can come and soak that up and then get a taste of what we offer, and come and join us after that if they feel like it

Colette Fehr:

wonderful. Oh my gosh. Well, thank you so much, and thanks to all of you for listening to insights from the couch. As always, we hope you got some valuable insights from our couch today, and if this sparked something in you, please join our community. It's at insights from the couch.org. It's free. It's called the chat, where we can answer each other's questions, share valuable resources, empower and excite and encourage each other and keep the conversation going. We will see you next time you.