Gut health can play a large role in the overall wellness and health of a woman. Dr. Jennifer Roelands- OB-GYN, Health Coach and Hormone Specialist, shares her insights as a woman with PCOS and treating patients every day. Dr. Roelands came to health coaching during her own journey with PCOS and autoimmune dysfunction. She learned how to heal herself with nutrition, lifestyle, and mindset. Now, Dr. Roelands has brought more than a decade of Ob/GYN practice coupled with her training in holistic medicine and health coaching and created multiple programs for people who were once just like her.
Highlights
Check out Dr. Jennifer Roelands at Well Woman MD and follow her on Instagram at WellWomanMD
Tune into her podcast Ignite Your PowHer for more healing conversations.
Don’t forget to follow Dehl Nutrition on Instagram and Facebook!
Connect with Dr. Adrienne Youdim
3 Ways to Get More From Adrienne
1. Subscribe to our Newsletter. Subscribe Now and get the 5 Bites to Fasttrack your Health and Wellbeing https://dradrienneyoudim.com/newsletter/
2. Buy the Book. The current weightloss strategies have failed you. Its time to address your true hunger. Purchase 'Hungry for More' https://www.amazon.com/Hungry-More-Stories-Science-Inspire/dp/0578875632
3. Leave us a Rating and Review via Apple Podcast. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/health-bite/id1504295718
Gut health can play a large role in the overall wellness and health of a woman. Dr. Jennifer Roelands- OB-GYN, Health Coach and Hormone Specialist, shares her insights as a woman with PCOS and treating patients every day. Dr. Roelands came to health coaching during her own journey with PCOS and autoimmune dysfunction. She learned how to heal herself with nutrition, lifestyle, and mindset. Now, Dr. Roelands has brought more than a decade of Ob/GYN practice coupled with her training in holistic medicine and health coaching and created multiple programs for people who were once just like her.
Highlights
Check out Dr. Jennifer Roelands at Well Woman MD and follow her on Instagram at WellWomanMD
Tune into her podcast Ignite Your PowHer for more healing conversations.
Don’t forget to follow Dehl Nutrition on Instagram and Facebook!
Connect with Dr. Adrienne Youdim
3 Ways to Get More From Adrienne
1. Subscribe to our Newsletter. Subscribe Now and get the 5 Bites to Fasttrack your Health and Wellbeing https://dradrienneyoudim.com/newsletter/
2. Buy the Book. The current weightloss strategies have failed you. Its time to address your true hunger. Purchase 'Hungry for More' https://www.amazon.com/Hungry-More-Stories-Science-Inspire/dp/0578875632
3. Leave us a Rating and Review via Apple Podcast. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/health-bite/id1504295718
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 0:06
Hi, and welcome to health bite. I'm your host, Dr. Adrian. I'm a big believer that we can all make big changes in our health and well being with small actionable steps, small bites towards better health. Every week I interview a guest that will share their spin on what steps we can take to live well. As always, I'm grateful to have you here. And let's dive into this week's episode. Welcome back to health bite, our podcast where we discuss all things health and wellness. I'm really pleased today to have with us Dr. Jennifer Roeland's. She is an ob gyn and a women's holistic health coach and hormone expert. She is also founder of well women MD. Thanks for being here. Jennifer,
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 0:49
thank you so much for letting me be here. I'm so excited to be here and chat with you today.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 0:54
I love that you have this expertise in women's health and women's hormones. This is an issue that women deal with, of course, in their 40s and 50s. And their perimenopausal period, but it's also something that women deal young women deal with, right. And so I'd love to hear about some of the common ways in which hormonal issues present in your practice at both ends of the age spectrum.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 1:24
Sure. So for the patients that I work with in clinic, oftentimes, they're young women who are trying to get pregnant and struggling to do so because they have irregular periods. And so from a traditional standpoint, working in my ob gyn practice, I typically do a workup for looking you know, for infertility causes and trying to figure out what their reason why they're not having a normal period. And oftentimes we talk about let's help them conceive with medication to help them articulate the difference in human I do sort of in my day job as an OB GYN practice. And what I do in integrative medicine or holistic care is I really try to figure out what is the root cause of why they're actually having that irregular period? Why aren't they able to conceive, because if it's a woman in her mid 20s, she has a very good shot just from age alone, that her ovaries are still making eggs and doing well and doing the things they're supposed to. So what is the actual challenge and trying to figure out why they're not having that normal period to begin with? Because sometimes we don't always know the answer, by bloodwork by lab tests, it doesn't always reveal the actual cause. And a lot of times I find that people have poor nutrition, so they may be really overweight, or they may be really underweight. And so it's affecting their oscillation to begin with. And if they took some small steps and small changes to change their diet, they might actually conceive naturally without having to use any medical intervention, like medications or even up to the more extreme like IVF to get pregnant. It's so interesting,
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 2:42
right? Because infertility is actually a huge problem, as is miscarriage, which I think are kind of opposite faces of the same coin. It's something that I'm happy to see more conversation around, you know, more women are vocalizing the struggles that they have around conception. And while certainly there are many circumstances in which there are medical issues that need to be addressed with medications, to your point, there are also many circumstances in which diet and lifestyle and also emotional well being play a role in infertility. I know just from my own experience in medical weight loss, that five to 10% of weight loss can help restore ovulation and someone who's overweight, you know, 5%, if you think about it, somebody 200 pounds, that's 10 pounds. It's not insignificant, but it's not tremendous, either.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 3:36
Yeah, that's actually a very common scenario that I work with women is they'll say, hey, I want to have a baby in the next six months to a year, what do you think I can do to change my chance that I may have a difficulty conceiving, especially someone like pcls, who you're talking about obesity, but oftentimes, there's this sort of line where pcus patients are sort of pre diabetic and close to that sort of metabolic dysfunction. And so they often have very irregular periods. And if they just optimize their health by losing some weight and focusing on a diet that's more geared towards sort of moderate carb, they would actually conceive naturally, much more than needing a pill right off the bat,
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 4:12
to need to find PCs and PCs. Oh, and talk a little bit about the hormonal issues there. And what are some of the clinical signs and how people can make the diagnosis?
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 4:20
Yeah, so pcos is polycystic ovarian syndrome. It's actually a syndrome. So it's a diagnosis of exclusion, meaning you've thought about all the other things and you kind of put it into that category. There are really two criteria that they have to meet which is irregular cycles. So not in that normal 21 to 35 day range and evidence of male hormone excess. So it could be by bloodwork that they had like a testosterone level or da ga s level, or it could be that they have physical signs that they have higher levels of testosterone. Oftentimes, it can be pretty bad cystic acne hair that's darker on your arms or like a hairline along your belly, sometimes getting these dark patches along your neck, so sign That you have a little bit higher level of testosterone, sometimes growing some hairs along usual hair, hair, yes, that's more common in males. So you can make the diagnosis by just physical signs. But most often we check by bloodwork to say, do they truly have pcus. And sometimes you can see it's not a criteria anymore to see actually cysts on the ovaries, but it used to be at old criteria that that you'd have to see it by ultrasound. But there are people don't always have that evidence by ultrasound, but actually have pcls.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 5:26
And I think that's an important distinction to make, because the name is polycystic ovaries. And yet, you don't need that. And that's something that I think, you know, people are not necessarily educated in, but will help advocate for their own health. So a constellation of symptoms like abnormal periods or missing periods for prolonged months facial or body hair. And that can be cultural, of course, but if there's thick, coarse hairs, and that's more consistent, and then acne also and hair thinning. So those are the constellation of symptoms, yes. And then the diagnosis. So we talked about weight loss. Can you talk a little bit about specifically, you alluded to this, but give us some more detail on the type of nutrition that would help reverse or address the polycystic ovary syndrome?
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 6:13
Yeah, so we put it in a category we call essentially, women with pcos kind of pre diabetic are likely to develop a metabolic dysfunction later on. And so they have issues with insulin resistance. If I eat a cheeseburger and I don't have PCOS, and someone who has PCOS eats a cheeseburger, the sugar that I metabolism and break down, it's going to be a different rate than someone who has PCOS, because they're going to have a harder time breaking that sugar down because their insulin is not appropriately dealing with it in the bloodstream. And so that makes it more difficult for weight loss because they have a little harder time losing weight, because they aren't able to metabolize those sugars at the same rate as someone who does not have PCs. So I often talk about diet, I think a lot of women think that if they just go on a keto diet, it's gonna work great, and they're gonna lose 30 pounds, and all is great. Well, that's like the worst diet for some of us, because they already have this dysfunction in how they metabolize sugar, and then you put them on a really strict low, low, low carb diet, and it's just not sustainable for them. So I often say, you know, the best type of diet, in my opinion for pcls patients is an a moderate carb kind of level. So if you're trying to lose weight, versus try to, you know, just lose a couple pounds to oscillate and have a baby, but the moderate carb level, as opposed to that strict carb level, so that you can get better balance and better glucose control and better balance and your blood sugar levels, as opposed to just taking them for being on a strict keto. So we talked a lot about like you mentioned, losing just a couple pounds, even 10 pounds can be instrumental and getting their population back because having that insulin resistance interferes with their ability to have that egg release, you know, mid cycle, though, if they can fix that insulin resistance, or at least make it better, they can usually oscillate.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 7:50
Yeah, and insulin resistance is a key feature of PC or PC OS. And I think it's important to also mention, particularly because we're on the heels of women's heart health month that having a diagnosis of pcus, early in life is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease later in life. And so it is something that gives us more motivation, I guess, to manage with diet. I like the term moderate carbs, because we like to vilify carbohydrates. And also, we like to lump all of them under one umbrella, I also have a problem with the keto diet, because it does just that it puts all carbohydrates under the same umbrella where we know that a cup of garbanzo beans, it's going to give us up to 20 grams of protein almost and high fiber and has been shown, you know, to reduce mortality, right? Beans and grains actually are healthful is different than I was compared to a pop tart. And they're both carbs are different, right?
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 8:48
Yeah, carbs are not all equal. Yeah, absolutely. metabolic dysfunction, same later on, they have a higher chance of having high cholesterol, heart disease, diabetes, like all this sort of range that you sort of see when we talk about metabolic disorders,
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 9:01
which is also preventable. I always like to say that while we highlight the risk factors for women, we don't want this to be like doom and gloom, we want them to recognize that actually, cardiovascular disease while it is the number one killer in women, which is surprising, we kind of fixate on breast cancer and other fears. But the beauty of it is, is that it's actually something we can prevent with lifestyle.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 9:24
Yeah, I often mentioned to women too, with pcls. It's important that you do it now because oftentimes they have family history of those particular problems. So if you change it now, you're going to drastically change your future if you can work on it now while you're 20 or 30, as opposed to waiting till you're 45.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 9:38
Right, and the trajectory also for offspring, which is another point. So let's talk about something a little bit more common. We talked about acne in terms of pcus but this is something that is common to all women and it's not reserved unfortunately to our youth. There's, you know, adult acne, talk a little bit about diet and how you address it with diet. And maybe I'm interested in your thoughts about dairy and acne and maybe some other truths versus myths and misconceptions,
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 10:09
you actually hit on a personal level there because I stopped eating dairy about eight months ago, because I got that lovely 43 year old acne on my chin. I have pcos, by the way, and have had that for a long time, but it's been under control, but hit the 40s. And then suddenly, your hormones get a little bit crazy. So you have to make some changes. So gut health is definitely something that I practice myself, as well as with patients and clients trying to talk about the gut health and what is the type of bacteria that are in your gut, it also there's bacteria in your skin, you know, having normal bacteria, the type that will help you not hinder you is important, there's often a very big connection between what you eat, and what happens on your skin as well. And so oftentimes, when people have hormonal imbalances, and I'm talking to say, like a 43 year old, 45 year old who's having these, you know, it can't lose weight, I'm having bloating, I'm having hot flashes, my periods are getting a little crazy, we talk a lot about gut health and how we can change there are certain foods that are probably triggering inflammation and causing them to have bloating and causing them to have breakouts on their face. So they need to identify what foods that are causing them those particular issues. And dairy is often a very common, I would say irritant, maybe a better word to say that causes the gut to become leaky. And they often get breakouts very easy and can cause not only their digestion issues, but also cystic acne, it's not the one with a wide head. It's that deep acne that it's painful and takes a long time to go away. Or there other foods that you would recommend staying away from or incorporating in terms of anti inflammatory diet and specifically for acne or inflammation in general. Well, I usually talk to people about trying to find what are the foods that cause it because for me, it's dairy but doesn't mean it's dairy for you. Sometimes it's say wait for someone, like I've had some mine who had anytime she had anything with corn, like fillers, and a lot of different sauces and things have corn, and she would have problems where she broke out. So it's about finding out what actually are the foods that bother you that are not agreeing with you. And so if you first of all, identify those foods and then eliminate them from your diet, there are other ways to sort of have natural good bacteria, there are foods that actually have say vitamin C that are going to help naturally keep your skin healthy, you can certainly use as you age college and you lose collagen. So having a collagen powder is important in your 40s. You know, there are other ways you can actually get both through your supplements and through your nutrition to improve your skin health overall and making it more healthy and vibrant. Because all of us are going to age we're all going to have wrinkles, there's nothing that's going to avoid them. So whether or not you want to age gracefully or age the way you want to. That's really what you're deciding, you know.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 12:38
And I like that you brought up the point that there's the intolerances to food are very unique. I agree that these broad strokes that we put out there sometimes like avoid dairy or avoid gluten are not necessarily important for all people. And also we have to think about the things with which we're replacing those food groups. So oftentimes, gluten free results in you know, processed and packaged foods that are labeled as gluten free, but are processed and refined and devoid of nutrients. So I think elimination diet or you know, taking out one at a time or replacing one at a time so that you really have some idea around your specific intolerance, as opposed to just eliminating foods that you may like or that may have some nutritional benefit.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 13:29
You brought up a great point about gluten because I also am gluten free. And certainly a lot of gluten free products substitute for sugar, right because they don't want to taste bad. So they use white rice or brown rice and so they aren't stretchy or don't taste very good. So they add a ton of sugar. Well, if you're eating a ton of refined sugar, it doesn't matter if you're gluten free, that's not gonna fix your face, you're gonna have all kinds of problems if you're eating a ton of sugar in the best way is just a look on the back of the container and see how much sugar is in per serving. Because oftentimes to make it taste good, they just add extra sugar and sugars gluten free so that the average consumer would know that it was bad for you because it says natural gluten free, that doesn't always reflect that it's actually good for you. And I also talk to people about clean beauty products too, because I think what you put on your face is just as important as what you put in your body. If you have a sensitivity to certain foods, then you probably need to focus on gluten free makeup or focus on things that have clean products that people are not you know having a bunch of extra fragrances and stuff in them and then ultimately cause you you get rid of all those good foods you wanted to eat and then now you put on some stuff that's $5 from the grocery store and then end up breaking out from that. So focusing on clean beauty products are also important too.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 14:35
That's really interesting. I've never heard of gluten free makeup.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 14:39
There is I use actually use that for myself because I noticed I was still having issues with stuff I put on my face and there's an Environmental Working Group has a great website that has a list of companies and it'll tell you how clean they really are not like say lush, they'll say oh Everything is awesome and we're vegan. So you may see that some of their products are not actually as clean and I like lush There are some products. This isn't an anti lash domain, but it's a great way to kind of look things up and to see if your Neutrogena face wash is really natural is that product in that company really endorsing what they say they are?
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 15:11
Yeah, and I think this whole concept of looking at labels is really important. And back to the food piece, you mentioned the sugar, you know, looking at the sugar, but also looking at added sugars, what you were specifically talking about, because sometimes there are natural sugars. And that's different than adding the sugar back in, as well as the fact that gluten free doesn't mention anything about sodium content doesn't mention anything about fat, trans fat hydrogenated oils. So I agree with you that if someone doesn't truly have a gluten intolerance, they should probably think about avoiding some of these other more harmful food additives, as opposed to just gluten. And the other point that I would just make is that sometimes people equate how they feel when they consume certain processed carbohydrates with gluten. But again, it's not the gluten it's the fact that the wheat containing product like the crackers, or the chips, or the you know, processed bread is making them feel bad, but not the gluten that is contained with those products, all important considerations. Back to speaking about hormones, though, let's talk a little bit about perimenopause. And when this becomes an issue, I think in our minds, we all think of menopause is like an older woman's thing. But perimenopause can begin frighteningly up to 10 years before actual menopause. So talk a little bit about that when women should start thinking about it. What are some of the symptoms that they can consider?
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 16:42
Yeah, so you know, the average age of menopause is 51. But that means there's going to be younger women and there's going to be older women who go through menopause perimenopause symptoms, the most common that I hear are difficulty sleeping, having hot flashes or night sweats. It usually starts with night sweats. people throw the covers off in the middle of the night and are warm at night. And then they start having those hot flashes during the day, sometimes difficulty concentrating, not really focused on things. We call that brain fog, where they just don't seem to be kind of getting the same things they would get quickly. They can often manifest at work or at home, they kind of go, what is that guy's name again, I've hard time remembering certain things, having difficulty staying asleep, it could be due to hot flashes, but also just their sleep cycle gets disrupted as well as they sort of start transitioning. And then the one that I hear the most just waking, I'm eating the same thing, Doc, and I don't know what's going on. But for some reason, I'm gaining weight. So that is probably the most common that I hear is those symptoms. And for some people, they have symptoms that bother them and some people don't. It's amazing how many women have different experiences, like I can have someone come see me and they want to do something, you've had one hot flash and they're like, fix it. I need it fixed and another person is like sweating while they're talking to me and they're like, Oh, that's fine. It's very different.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 17:55
Yes.
Let's say someone is suspecting that they're going through menopause or perimenopause, what kind of hormonal evaluation would you do for that person.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 18:05
So in clinical practice, the bloodwork there are sort of the standardized bloodwork tests that we can do looking at someone's hormones. Unfortunately, those tests are much more accurate and better for women who are postmenopausal than for Peri menopausal women because the range of normal like say estrogen is 20 to 200. Someone can be miserable at 20, or they can be miserable at 200. So the lab work when you're pre menopausal and perimenopausal meaning you haven't actually gone through the full change is not always helpful, it's definitely much more helpful for someone who's postmenopausal to see where their levels are, those ranges are much tighter. And I think
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 18:37
that's really important because a lot of times women come in and they're experiencing these symptoms that you described, and they want blood tests. And we try and educate them that the hormonal tests are not going to be diagnostic of anything, their symptoms are diagnostic, you know, just listening to the patient is more important than obtaining the test. Because it won't be diagnostic until you've already gone through menopause, which means one year of not having had any periods. So it is really just evaluation of symptoms and not the concrete laboratory tests that sometimes people want to help validate them,
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 19:13
and a validation of their quality of life to yes bothering them. Yes, someone may not be bothered by night by hot flashes, but maybe they're really bothered by brain fog.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 19:22
Well, I first want to talk about like the indications for hormonal therapy. And I know that that doesn't apply to the pre menopausal person. But let's talk about that a little bit.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 19:32
Yeah, so not everybody needs hormone replacement therapy. It's really whether or not those symptoms of perimenopause or menopause are actually bothering you and interfering with your life. So I don't offer it across the board to everybody. It's for women who really say I don't want this this is for the birds like help me out I need to get this fixed. And so that's where I'm a little bit different probably than a traditional ob gyn because we typically use pharmaceutical options like a pill, a patch ring, badgal cream, I also am an advocate of compounding. So I do offer my patients compounding options, which a lot of times in you hear that under the term bioidentical in a way that there are bioidentical pharmaceutical as well as compounding options, that term doesn't always just mean a compounded option. So I do offer patients other options because first of all, insurance doesn't cover those options very well to begin with hormone replacement therapy. But just like diet, I don't think that one size fits all. I think people have different needs. And so I want to focus on what their concerns are. Is it bad general dryness? Is it brain fog? Is it hot flashes, like, let's find the right option for you that you're comfortable with. But also that will be something that you can use that works for you.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 20:43
So explain to us what bioidentical hormones are and how that compounding without getting too technical might vary based on the different symptoms.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 20:54
Yeah, so bioidentical just means that essentially, those hormones are identical to the ones that are present in your body. And so some pharmaceuticals make hormones when you when you think of the pharmaceutical company like Merck, and all those guys, they do make bioidentical hormones. But most people think of it as a compound and meaning that someone went to a pharmacy and they made a particular hormone just for them, they created that. So compounding pharmacies, their rules are essentially they can't replicate what is available commercially available, they have to make their own formulation. So it can't be the exact same recipe as a company that already exists. And so they offer a little bit more options. So they offer things like transdermal cream, so a cream you can put on your arms or your thighs that have hormone in it. They also offer a dissolvable as you can put it underneath your tongue, they have injectable hormones, they have vaginal preparations, you can almost make it specific. So say for example, badgal, dryness is pretty common, someone may want estrogen cream through a prescription. And there's really only x rays and Prem red, which are estrogen cream. But if you went to a compounding pharmacy, they could put estrogen, progesterone and testosterone all in that cream, you can make what you need for that patient, which I like, especially when we talk about vaginal dryness, because sometimes you have to start really low and work your way up, as opposed to just giving everybody the exact same dose. And so I feel like it's a way to individualize what someone needs, because there are some women who are more sensitive to medications, or they just, you know, they don't want to be putting a lot of stuff there. So there's some needs that might need to be addressed. And so I like the idea of essentially making something for them. Specifically,
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 22:27
I think it's important to point out that your sources important, right, so who your physician is and who your compounding pharmacy is because one of the benefits of, you know, you mentioned Merck, or you know, pharmaceutical companies is that at least there's some degree of regulation and consistency. So you can at least expect that the tube that you got last month has the same amount of active components as the tube that you're getting this month in terms of the Vaginal Cream, for example. Whereas with compounding, you know, it's left to the individual who's who's prescribing and doing the work doing the compounding
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 23:02
That is true. Yes, it does not have the standard FDA regulations that Premarin you know, would have and whenever people ask me about, can I take this over the counter for you know, this progesterone cream, I'm always saying it's about quality I for people to certain pharmacies in town or certain products, because they're not gonna have the same standards for quality control. So you have to be, you know, trustworthy of that particular pharmacy who's compounding or a brand that you like, just like things that you offer for your clients about weight loss, those supplements and bars, knowing that you are, you know, a trusted authority is important, and that you will make sure that you get those clients the right things that you know, are good quality. So it's the same kind of ideas for me, I don't just sort of go Oh, yeah, Walmart sounds good. Let's send the prescription like, it's it's a local pharmacy that I've worked with for 13 years that I know that they do quality control, they're in a very small town, so they would have a very hard time if they did not produce a good quality ingredient, you know?
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 23:58
Yeah. So it's just something important for people to be mindful of that, you know, as consumers ourselves, you know, we have to be educated and do our research. So let's shift a little bit from the pharmacologic aspects to nutrition and supplements. This is an area that supplements are touted, you know, for pre menopausal symptoms, what are some of the supplements that you value or you think that are have utility? Well, whenever
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 24:26
we're talking about symptoms, I do try to make sure that their symptoms are related to say, not sleeping, or super stressed out or other things because you can take a supplement, but if you don't fix those other things, it's never going to completely go away. Doesn't matter what I gave you. So if you're sleeping two hours a night and you're up pacing around your house, because you're stressed out about work, it doesn't matter how much black cohosh you take, you're still gonna be able to have difficulty sleeping unless you address those underlying problems. So I always try to make sure when we're looking at supplements, like what are we trying to fix? What is it that you can't get from diet lifestyle Things like sleep in dress relief, what is it mindfulness work? Like? What is it that you're missing that you need that supplement for, because sometimes those supplements are really about, say, what's missing in your diet, or what's missing in falling asleep initially. So then I'll talk to people that will maybe we should take magnesium at night to sleep, you know, trying to figure out what it is that we're trying to actually treat. I'm not I don't like those supplements, I have like 10 things in them. Like, take this and you're gonna fix everything you ever thought you were gonna ever have for the next 10 years. Like, this is not what we need to do, we need to actually figure out what works. So I always try to figure out what we're What are we treating exactly, I use it hit or miss, it's not a very common thing that I say, go get this supplement, because usually there's other things they can do that will make their life better, besides just sort of taking a pill.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 25:43
Yeah, and I think, you know, we speak about lifestyle, often in this podcast. And the same concepts keep coming up over and over again, like mindfulness and good quality sleep and stress reduction, I think it's still understated the degree to which addressing these factors really help quality of life. Oftentimes, people feel like they can't manage stress. And so I mean, all of us would love to have a pill that would help take away you know, whatever discomfort that we have. But for example, we know that adequate sleep does reduce brain fog does help cement memories and prevent memory loss. And we're not even talking about like cognitive decline, but just I think the memory issues that we're all experiencing multitasking and being taxed in our lives and in our sleep. And so while there is true insomnia, there's also of course, the attention we don't give to sleep, we compromise our sleep. And that often results in insomnia more than something organic.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 26:48
Yeah, and poor sleep. I mean, people often have poor sleep, because they spend two hours on their iPad before they go to bed. They have that blue light in their eyeballs. And then they just were thinking about whatever they were watching and go to bed and don't really sleep really well. It's amazing how many times I work with clients like on a one on one coaching. And then I'm like, Well, what time you go to bed? What time do you wake up? And they're like, I don't know, sometimes it's midnight. Sometimes it's too sometimes. Like, what are you doing till two o'clock in the morning? Like, you know, I'm watching Netflix binging the Netflix series. It's like, well, this is terrible sleep for you. Because if you watch a Netflix series on murder mystery before you go, I don't know how you're going to possibly get any adequate sleep when you have all this stuff in your brain. So I think those are things that a lot of people just don't think about.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 27:30
Yeah, or that you don't need to watch murder mysteries. You can just watch the news channels you know, that's sufficiently aggravating before bed. And we did have a integrative leaf specialists on the podcast a few weeks ago that did a deep dive on sleep, which I would recommend if anyone suffering from insomnia. But let's go back to nutrition. What are some of the nutritional guidance that you provide people again, to address let's say, the brain fog and the mood issues that may come we didn't mention depression, but that can also be a symptom of perimenopause and menopause.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 28:04
Yeah, mood disorders for sure are in there. When we talk about omega as getting the good omega is in your diet, either in your diet or by supplement which we were mentioning about supplements, you're losing a lot of calcium mostly in your bones as you age and so you need to replace it by either nutrition or supplements with vitamin D. I also talked about weight bearing exercises, which are hugely important if you're bothered by weight loss, you need to focus on weight bearing exercise after 40 you got to change up your routine to have some weight bearing exercises. I talk a lot about clean diet, you mentioned minimally processed food because those will disrupt your hormones. So if you can get your hormones in better balanced by getting rid of some of that processed food, getting down to whole grains, whole ingredients. So you know an apple is an apple, not an apple that's mashed up with cinnamon sugar and high fructose corn syrup in a gel like it needs to be the actual ingredient
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 28:55
or juice right, where you're eliminating all the vitamins, minerals and fiber of the actual fruit or vegetable.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 29:01
Yeah, a lot of people think if I have the, you know, the water of electrolyte water, that flavor like an apple, it's the same thing. It's not the same thing. It's not the same nutritional value. So you have to focus on getting rid of those artificial sugars and certainly clean eating and getting rid of processed food. If you can't read the label, you have no idea what the name of the ingredient is, you should not be eating it. If it's like got 22 letters and you don't even know what it is. You shouldn't be eating it.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 29:24
So I want to just highlight a few of those things. omegas omega three that comes from Marine or fish sources and for people who are supplementing to be mindful of, you know, Mercury free also there's plant based sources of omega spirulina and algae. flaxseed is another good source. In regards to the weight bearing exercise. I think what you're referring to really is preserving muscle mass which we know in women, you know, we start to lose muscle mass in our 30s and that gets accelerated around menopause and protein supplementation either through food or through the collagen you spoke of, or whey protein is also valuable. And yeah, those are things that I also recommend. So I just wanted to highlight those. And in regards to mood, do you have thoughts on ashwagandha? Are you familiar with it happens to be one of my favorites?
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 30:18
Yes, when we talk about diets and sort of good sustainable diets, I often will recommend if someone has a sort of midday snacky problem, or they need to have something, so we'll often talk about putting things like that in our smoothies that have a lot of good nutrient dense veggies and fruits in them. And so I often will talk to people about those kind of ashwagandha. And then, you know, it depends on what we're talking about for age because sometimes the younger women will use things like maca powder for increasing their fertility or for helping their hormone balance if they have pcls. So it just depends on kind of what the needs are the particular person, you're very different when you're 20,30,40, 50, and have different needs. So a lot of this is trying to figure out, you know, who you're working with, and what they need from that standpoint.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 31:01
But I think the universal ideas that kind of came through regardless of what you're experiencing, what the concern is, or what your age demographic is clean nutrition, goal nutrition, so more from the earth less from the pantry, right movement, which we touched on just a little bit sleep, these are all important and relevant to all age groups. So I think a good take home message
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 31:27
and clean living making sure the products that you use in your house or on you or you know, clean products that are going to avoid some of those chemicals that are not going to they're gonna mess up your hormones as well.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 31:37
Yeah, equally important. Well, this has been a great conversation, thank you so much for your time. And tell us how we can find you for those of our guests who are interested in a deeper dive in hormonal issues,
Dr. Jennifer Roelands31:49
have a website called Wellwomanmd.com. on that website, I actually offer digital courses for women who are trying to balance their hormones naturally without medication. And also talk a little bit about clean eating and how to help women, you know, do a better job about eating more clean and making it simple and easy to do. It's a lot more simple and easy to do than you think and not expensive. I think a lot of people feel like all that organic stuff is expensive. But it's not necessarily about organic. It's about just trying to recognize what you're eating and what's on the back of the label, like we talked about today. And so they can find me at the website or I'm on all the social media handles which Instagram, Facebook and YouTube channel.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 32:28
That's great. Thank you. We'll put all that information in the show notes and make sure we make it available to the listeners. And again, I appreciate your time.
Dr. Jennifer Roelands 32:36
Thank you so much. Of course Have a lovely day.
Host-Dr. Adrienne Youdim 32:38
Thank you. This episode of health White is sponsored by Dell nutrition, a line of functional nutrition bars and supplements I've personally curated to enhance health and well being my inspiration for this product line has been working with hundreds of patients over the past decade empowering them to better health, you can find out more at Dell nutrition.com. I hope you've enjoyed this episode and are inspired to take a small bite towards your own health and wellness. If you love what you heard, please subscribe on iTunes and Spotify or anywhere else you podcast and share us. If you're looking for more info you can find lots of content and sign up for my newsletter at Dell nutrition.com. There you can learn more about me and my curated line of supplements and functional protein bars. Thank you for listening, and I look forward to seeing you again next week.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai