Today, I am delighted to have my friend and colleague, Dr. Mindy Peltz, on the show with me for the third time. She is a well-known women's health advocate, deeply dedicated to empowering women to trust and embrace the process of natural healing within their bodies.
In our discussion, we dive into her latest book, Eat Like a Girl, and she explains how her mom influenced the development of her nutritional and mindset philosophy and her approach to food. We explore the social media incubator, how societal norms shape our self-worth, and how to eat like a girl. We also discuss using food as hormonal medicine, the role of estrobolome, and how environmental toxins are in our personal care products and food.
I know you will love today's valuable, insightful, and thought-provoking conversation with Dr. Mindy Pelz.
IN THIS EPISODE YOU WILL LEARN:
How our childhood experiences shape our approach to food and health
Dr. Mindy discusses the five principles in her latest book, Eat Like a Girl
The unrealistic expectations of the diet culture and why we need a more flexible and personalized approach to food
The benefits of eating fermented foods
How protein is essential, especially for women who are fasting intermittently
How social media impacts health habits and the dangers of following short-term trends
Why women must take ownership of their health and make informed decisions based on their unique needs
The link between estrogen and people-pleasing
Using food as hormonal medicine
The importance of minimizing exposure to exogenous estrogens and other toxins
Why we need a holistic approach to health and what that includes
“I am anti-calories as it has led women continually down a bad path.”
-Dr. Mindy Pelz
Connect with Cynthia Thurlow
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Check out Cynthia’s website
Submit your questions to support@cynthiathurlow.com
Connect with Dr. Mindy Pelz
On her website
Dr. Mindy’s latest book, Eat Like a Girl, is available on Dr. Mindy’s website, Amazon, Barnes and Noble Online, or from most bookstores.
Transcript:
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:00:02] Welcome to Everyday Wellness Podcast. I'm your host, Nurse Practitioner Cynthia Thurlow. This podcast is designed to educate, empower and inspire you to achieve your health and wellness goals. My goal and intent is to provide you with the best content and conversations from leaders in the health and wellness industry each week and impact over a million lives.
[music]
[00:00:29] Today, I had the honor of reconnecting with friend and colleague for the third time, Dr. Mindy Pelz. She is a renowned advocate for women's health and is passionately committed to empowering women to embrace and trust their body's natural healing processes.
[00:00:44] Today, we spoke at length about her new book, the influence of her mom on the trajectory of her nutritional and mindset paradigm, her approach to food, societal culture's impact on her self-worth, the social media incubator, how to eat like a girl, food rules for hormonal medicine, the role of the estrobolome as well as environmental toxins in our personal care products and food. This is an amazing conversation with Mindy, I know you will find it invaluable and enjoyable.
[00:01:19] I guess maybe starting the conversation just talking about the influence of our families on the way that we have a relationship with food. I have a mom who is Italian and I always said that she was crunchy before we even knew what that was. She made her own bread. We weren't allowed to have sweets in the house. I mean, we rarely if ever ate out. And you know, I was eating organ meats, although my brother and I couldn't stand it. Yes, that was, typical Italians, they make everything and they're very much involved in the kitchen. But let's talk about the influence of your mom, not only on the trajectory of your own life, but in the evolution of this book. Because the one thing that really stood out to me when I was looking at it, my first go through was there's a tremendous amount of love and gratitude in this book and it's so evident in the writing. So, let's talk about the influence of your mom.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:02:10] Oh my God. So, first I just want to say thank you for seeing me because when we went to go write this book, the idea was, well, as you know, a lot of people could nail the fasting window, but the minute you talked about food, they were like, “What? What do I do?” And there was this real, dysmorphic relationship and very dysfunctional relationship that women have with food. And I feel like, although I've had moments of that dysfunctional relationship, for the most part, I was raised by a mom with high-high respect for health food. Now, what's really interesting and probably you experienced too, is I hated it as a child. A really funny story is we would go to health food stores, I grew up in LA. And we didn't have Whole Foods. There was nothing like that.
[00:03:01] It was like, “MOM & POP Health Foods Store.” And there was this old lady behind the counter that ran the health food store, and she had glasses on that were those pinhole glasses that were supposed to be corrective [Cynthia laughs] glasses that converged the light. But because I couldn't see her eyeballs, my mom would be off shopping in the store, and I would be looking at this older woman with these crazy glasses and think, “Oh, my God, this place feels unsafe. It feels mean, like I don't know.” And then, what happened is one day I asked my mom if I could have a Tiger's Milk bar. Do you remember those?
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:03:41] I do.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:03:42] They were the first power bar. They were the first bar ever. And I remember her like picking them up, reading the ingredients, and then looking at me, and she's like, “Okay, you can have this.” And I thought it was the greatest day of my life because I could have this, what seems like candy bar. But there are so many things like that my mom did. She taught my sister and I how to read ingredients. She taught us that the ingredients went in a very specific order and that what was ever in the first ingredient had the most of it. So, we couldn't have anything that had sugar in the first four ingredients. I always say I introduced rice cakes to my elementary school with the natural peanut butter and honey because we couldn't have jam because it had sugar in it. I mean, there are stories after stories, after stories of how my mom was a woman ahead of her time, which sounds like yours was too and why I dedicated this book to her.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:04:36] Oh, I so love that. And what makes me chuckle is, when you're a child, you don't want to be different. And I recall my mom would lovingly make these real meals and send me to school. And I remember I came home from school probably in second or third grade, and that's when Hostess Ding Dongs and Fruit Pies were a thing. And I remember asking my mom, as a treat, “Can you buy me a Chocodile-
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:05:02] Oh yeah.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:05:02] -HoHo or one of these things? And I remember when she bought it for me, I took one bite and didn't like it at all. And my mom was so happy. I remember her saying, like, “I'm so happy that you didn't enjoy that and that my mom would make things at home, from scratch, they were delicious and so reaffirming. My brother and I grew up eating, for the most part, very nutrient dense Whole Foods diet. And we didn't realize how much of a blessing that was until I got to college and started seeing what most of my peers were eating. And again, not saying this judgmentally, but we just didn't have the money to eat out. I mean, it was just the expectations where we ate at home. And it was very important to my mom that my brother and I knew how to cook. I think she took tremendous pride in knowing that we’re self-sufficient and that we could do that. And so, I love, we share that affinity all the time.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:05:50] I was just going to say I love that. I love that. I didn't know that, Cynthia. I love it.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:05:54] Yes, yes. But when we're talking about, you mentioned in the beginning that many people can get the fasting piece. What many women struggle with is what to eat. How do you go about educating women from this eat-like-a-girl principle? What are the things that we need to focus on so that we are eating for nutrient density, we're eating to balance our blood sugar, we're reducing the likelihood, we're experiencing cravings. All these things that I feel like so many women, especially women in perimenopause/menopause really struggle with.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:06:26] Yeah, it was interesting because when I mapped the outline out for this book, I was like, “I don't want to contribute to the rigidity of food that women are experiencing.” I want to actually do the opposite. I want to change this relationship. I want to free women. And so, I came down with five principles that I think are really important and I think you'll agree with and feel free to jump in on them because you may add some context to this. But I feel like if women just follow these five, they will nail their relationship to food. So, the first I know we agree on, which is blood sugar matters and I say calories don't. But I should have put a little asterisk there. And let me say why, if I'm looking at a science study, yes, calories matter, calories in, calories out.
But most women don't live in a lab. So, I don't know a lot of women that have succeeded long term at the calorie in, calorie out approach to food. And if I'm counting calories, usually it's at the expense of counting other things, like toxins or like blood sugar. The more I study metabolic health, the more I am convinced that metabolic health is the absolute most important thing that both men and women could do. But especially women trying to balance hormones regardless of where they are. So that had to be principle number one.
Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. And I agree with you. I think that we have gotten so rerouted from what the main focus should be. I think that it's very, very easy for us to focus on minutia of detail. And by that, again, calories matter to a point. But if we're so fixated, we're not machines, and if we're looking at our app calculator, and I do in certain circumstances, encourage women to track their food just to have a sense of what they are eating. [crosstalk]
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:08:19] Where they're at, yeah.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:08:19] But I think for many people, if they think that it's just about the calories, they're missing out on all these other very important-- When your blood sugar is properly regulated and balanced, you're satiated, you're not looking in the pantry at 9 o'clock at night, you're not looking for another meal one hour after you've eaten. So, such an important basic principle, and one that I think applies to everyone, every single person listening, the more you understand about proper blood sugar regulation, the more likely you are to be satiated, happy, whether you fast or you have digestive rest. Irrespective of your approach and philosophy to meal frequency, we can all agree on that for sure.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:08:59] I think the challenge I have for women with the calories is that when we don't succeed at calorie in and calorie out, and this is something I say throughout the whole book, we don't go, “Oh, that diet didn't work for me.” We turn on ourselves and we think that the problem is that we did something wrong. Whereas blood sugar doesn't do that to us. If we put a CGM on, a continuous glucose monitor now that woman has power, she can go and eat whatever she wants and she can let her blood tell her what works and there's no shaming or guilt involved in that. So, I think that's really why I am anti-calories as it has led women continually down a bad path over and over and over again, where she starts having negative thoughts around how she can stick to a diet or not stick to a diet.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:09:47] Do you think that's a byproduct of the toxic diet culture that we experience as women here in the United States? Do you think that would drives a great deal of that shame and inward focusing and feeling badly? I think without question this is something that we've started talking more about on the podcast because I think so many of us, we just assume that these things that we experience on a societal level don't really impact us, but they impact everyone, absolutely everyone.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:10:14] Hmm. I'm so happy you brought that up because-- Yeah and let's just break down the diet culture. The diet culture is there to tell you, you need to be a certain size. And let's talk about that. Are all women meant to be size 2, size 4? Is that the way we were all built? I think the number on the scale, the size of your pants, how you look on Instagram are like the worst measurements of health. This is why I wanted to put blood sugar at the forefront. So, what the diet culture has done is held the perfect woman up and said, “Hey, here's the perfect woman. Here's what she weighs, here's what she eats. This is how she diets. This is who she is.” And you will be loved by a patriarchal society if you look like her.
[00:11:00] And now we have all these women trying to go after one specific cookie cutter version of a woman, and that is doing more damage than anything else. So, I'm so happy that you're bringing this up because we are meant to all be different sizes. The whole idea behind BMI is crazy because we are just completely different bone structures, different distribution of fat. There's so much difference within how the size we're supposed to be and what we're supposed to weigh, and we need to relieve ourselves of trying to hit those marks.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:11:37] Yeah. And I think on a lot of different levels, as we're navigating perimenopause into menopause, that word pause is so critically important because it forces us to examine what served us maybe in our teens, 20s and 30s, no longer serves us. And I think that everyone listening, myself included, I've had those conversations with myself whether they've been reasonable or unreasonable, but holding ourselves to unrealistic expectations in many instances that are not even real. Like so much of social media. There's an account I've follow on Instagram and he points out, because I don't use any of these apps, but people that will try to make their waist look smaller, make their hips look smaller. And I'm like, no wonder why there's so many images that we see when we go about our day that are not even realistic. They're not even founded in reality. It is all this altered reality.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:12:27] Well, I mean, that's how I feel about aging. I'm committed to aging toxic free because I want people, A, that's in my ethos. But I also want to make sure that we understand what a healthy lifestyle does and what healthy aging looks like without manipulating myself. But again, at the core of this is worth. People will love me if I look a certain way, people will want me if I'm a certain size, and then I will be worthy. I think we need to blow that apart and say, be worthy, figure out what worth means for you outside of how you look. And then all of a sudden how you look and how you feel about your looks will change. But I really think we're living with a culture of women right now that don't feel worthy, and so we're easy to manipulate because of that core--
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:13:16] Yeah, that's such an interesting perspective and one that I think I'm starting to notice there are more and more women that will speak very openly, like on threads for some reason, it seems to be in my threads often. Women will say, “I'm no longer coloring my hair, no longer wearing specs or whatever it is.” It could be something big or small. But for people feeling empowered to be able to stand in their true authentic selves without feeling a sense of pressure, whether that's the patriarchy or external validation, women are starting to feel like they're much more comfortable in their own skin. And I think that's a message that is so important for both of us to talk about on our podcast.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:13:55] Yeah. I mean, that's really a huge thing that I think as people who are taking health advice from us, I really think we need to keep putting it within that context. In Eat Like a Girl, I really tried to highlight N of 1 because I really feel like. And it's really easy to all of a sudden go through your Instagram feed and see a 90-second reel that says, “You're supposed to eat this way, not that way.” And whoever's doing it is like, so certain. And then we're like, “Oh, shoot, okay, yeah, wait, I'm supposed to eat that way. I'm supposed to live this way.” And then we have this big toolbox of all these supposed tos, instead of asking what part of that fits into my lifestyle? What do I resonate? Do I like what that person's saying?
We just keep outsourcing our power as women. And I hope that by listening to people like you and I, women just start gathering the pieces of themselves back and they start going, “Wait a second. It's what I think about my health that matters.” So, now I walk into my doctor's office and I'm like, “Hey, you and I are equals here. You're not above me. I know a ton about my own body. I want to have an equal conversation with you. I don't want you to put me down.” And that's the empowerment, I'm looking to see change.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:15:06] Yeah, I think it's such an important communication pattern to make sure that women understand. You can see, we both come to fasting and middle age, talking about very similar themes, but saying like, experiment, find what works for you. Maybe it's 12 hours of digestive rest, maybe for someone else it's 18 hours fast, maybe for someone it's carnivore-ish, maybe for someone else it's keto. Like finding what works for you and being open to the possibility you can change your mind. Like I tell everyone, I change my mind as frequently as I can because sometimes, I'm like, “Hey, I do better when I eat three meals a day and not two.”
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:15:44] Agreed?
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:15:46] Yeah. [laughs]
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:15:47] Thank you for that.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:15:47] Yes, that's what works for me. Let's talk about carbohydrates. I feel like carbohydrates are so misunderstood. I think that in many instances people have been conditioned to believe that all carbohydrates are lumped together and that they're all bad. What is your philosophy about nutrient dense whole carbs as opposed to the processed variety?
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:16:07] It's such a good question. So, one of the principles in these Foundational Five is eat nature's carbs, not human made carbs. I, in studying nutrition for a good portion of my life, I am convinced that nature doesn't provide bad things for us. Is what we do to the food that the earth provides us, that is the problem. So, if you're looking at carbohydrate, like fruits and vegetables and potatoes and legumes, these are great, these are wonderful carbohydrates. So, let's just know how to use them and when to use them. I think if you're struggling to lose weight, a week of keto can be really, really helpful. But five months of keto and now your hair is falling out and you're losing your hormones.
[00:16:55] If you have an autoimmune condition and this isn't a carbohydrate thing, but if we take out the plant toxins which I guess falls into the carbohydrate and we just have you eat meat. There's actually science showing that the carnivore diet will up regulate T regulatory cells in the gut and will start to help rebalance the autoimmune issue that's going on in the gut. So, each one of these in carbohydrates, plant-based, carnivore, they all serve a purpose. We just have to know like a toolbox when to pull them in and how to use them. And when it comes to processed carbs, I can't find anything good about them. I will say there's a handful like fermented sour dough. Bread really gives off bacteria that goes through the vagus nerve, up to the brain and stimulates oxytocin. That's pretty cool. That makes me want to eat more fermented sourdough bread, just not every day.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:17:52] Right, right.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:17:53] So, it's like we need to like almost look at nutrition like a Swiss army knife. Like which one am I going to pull out? Am I pulling out the tweezers, the corkscrew or the knife? What am I doing today in relationship to what my body needs?
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:18:05] And I love that you speak to trying a particular nutritional paradigm for a week.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:18:11] Yeah.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:18:11] That in and of itself like keto for a week can be very beneficial. We know based on research that ketogenic diets in certain women, depending on what's going on in their gut microbiome may or may not be successful. The women that you probably know that will say I did keto, I gained 10 pounds in a month. Well, it's probably a reflection of what's going on in the gut microbiome. And I think a week is a very therapeutic thing. I think if you do carnivore-ish or you do keto or even had, I know you've had Felice Gersh on as well. She'll say to people sometimes do plant-based diet for one or two weeks.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:18:43] Yeah.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:18:43] It is like sometimes just doing full plant based can beneficial. So, I think that looking at as a like an hors d'oeuvre platter, you're deciding I take a little bit of this and a little bit of that and see what happens. And the power of the N of 1, all of which is super helpful. And talking about foods that support a healthy microbiome, I know you talk a lot about fermented foods. What are some of your favorite ferments that you like to recommend or utilize or you yourself enjoy?
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:19:09] Oh, my God, I love fermented food. So, fermented foods are definitely the hero food. And it's funny because you and I have been podcasting probably about the same amount of time, and we bring on people who have opposing thoughts on nutrition. And I think that's great. It gets everybody to think for themselves. But the one area I can see everybody agree is on fermented foods. I think we could even get Steven Gundry to agree on fermented foods, perhaps. But, I'm a sauerkraut fan. I have learned to buy different sauerkrauts and sprinkle them on my foods. I have sauerkraut every day. I live in California, so I get raw milk. I'm a raw kefir fan. Kefir has trillions of good bacteria in it. So, those are my to go-to is the sauerkrauts and the kefirs, because they're easy to eat.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:20:02] Well, and the big thing is, especially with fermented vegetables, you don't need a lot of it. This is where I'll tell people, if you buy a pouch or a glass jar of fermented kraut, that could last you a month or two, if you're taking two or three tablespoons, and when we talk about 30 plant species a week, as a something to work towards, that could be a little serving a crowd on the side of your plate. And that counts. I mean, all these things count. For those that are perhaps not dairy tolerant, I always think about-- there's actually a plum paste. I can't even pronounce the name of it. Dr. Lindsey Berkson mentioned it to me and you can purchase it on Amazon. And she sometimes will have that with miso. She'll put them together and she's like two ferments in one. So, just something to consider-- crosstalk]
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:20:49] Stack your ferments.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:20:50] Yes, stack, yes.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:20:52] [laughs] Instead of stacking your bio-hacks, the new stack of bio-hacks is stack your ferments.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:20:57] [laughs] I love it. Yes, absolutely. It certainly makes sense for sure. And then thinking about ferments are good for the gut microbiome. And then thinking about rounding out the two other macronutrients that you mentioned in the book. Equally important, thinking about protein and fat, how do you approach protein intake, especially for women that are intermittent fasting, when they've got a really tight feeding window and we're thinking about the fact that they need a little bit more protein with age and not less.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:21:24] So, protein has definitely become the topic of the moment. And I would say that in an ideal situation, yes, 1 g of protein for every pound of body weight. I've heard Sarah Godfrey say it needs to be even more. But definitely more is better is the approach we're taking right now with protein. I have a little different approach because I'm such a fan of fasting. So first, I have a whole chapter in Eat Like a Girl called Your First Meal Matters. Make sure that first meal you're getting at least 30 g of protein. You can even go somewhere between 30 to 100 g. Just focus on protein in that first meal so that you nail it there, you get these amino acid receptor sites to be available for all the other protein. Let's start there. So that would be the first thing that I would say.
[00:22:15] The second thing and I'd be curious if you see this in your world. I saw in my own world that a lot of women who were trying to hit this ideal amount of protein and fast at the same time, and we'll talk about, “Do you have to do one versus the other?” But they were gaining weight, so the extra protein was converting to glucose. I think that's a microbiome issue. You might be studying that right now, but I have a hunch it has to do with their gut bacteria. And so, they were actually putting on weight with this 1g for every pound of ideal body weight. And then the second thing is that we're back to counting. [Cynthia laughs] How many things do you want us to count? You wanted us to count the number on the scale, you want us to count the size we are, you want us to count carbs, macros, like enough already. We cannot have a healthy relationship with food if we're stuck counting everything.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:23:13] It's such a good point. Absolutely, I hear you and I agree with you. I think one thing that I think is important is to help women understand, what does 30 or 40 g of protein look like? So, can you eyeball it and you have a good sense of it? Great. Then you don't have to measure it. I think for a lot of individuals, if they're forcing themselves to eat like high fat meat, so ribeye, a lot of salmon, these are not intrinsically unhealthy foods. Let me be very, very clear.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:23:40] Yep.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:23:40] But if you're eating like a higher fat content meat, poultry, fish, etc., it could be very easy to as you're trying to push those protein thresholds where you could overconsume your macronutrients. And so, I definitely think that that can be problematic. So that may be contributing and I agree with you that the microbiome influences caloric extraction. I mean down to the science, it talks about that depending on your gut bacteria you may extract more calories from food. I don't want anyone listening to worry about this. But just if you really look at the science, it explains why maybe you take five women eat the same food and two of the five may actually gain weight from eating a nutrient dense food. So, I do think that the fat combination with protein can contribute to weight gain if you're eating excessive amounts.
[00:24:29] And I agree with you that we don't want people to be obsessing over the scale. I used to talk about the scale is a liar. We don't want people to be obsessing over hitting those protein macros, but building awareness around what does a good portion of protein look like. And don't be embarrassed if you're in a restaurant and maybe you're breaking your fast and you're sitting down with a steak or a piece of chicken, if it comes to you and it's teeny, tiny, minuscule on your plate, there's no shame in asking for a side of additional protein. That's where I think that it can be helpful. But we don't want it to be obsessive. We definitely don't want it to be where you live and die by tracking your macros.
[00:25:04] And unfortunately, I think about well-meaning individuals like social media influencers or fitness influencers that will tell everyone, track every bit of food that's going into your mouth. Well, it's fine if you do that for the short term, but for long term I think that can build an unhealthy relationship with food.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:25:20] We have hit a really interesting place in social media and I'm curious if you're seeing it too, where social media became this beautiful place for health practitioners like you and I that were in clinical practices or within healthcare facilities and we were giving advice and all of a sudden there was a new platform for us to be able to offer what we were offering in our clinic to the world for free. And I loved it personally. I was on Facebook when it very first started because we have some dear friends, he was like number 30 at Facebook and so I was there playing around and posting articles and it was a really fun time. Fast forward to where we are now and my new statement is don't judge your health habits off a 90-second reel.
[00:26:09] This short content that comes blasting through Facebook and Instagram and the trends on TikTok. There's all these food trends on TikTok. You should be curious about them, not rigid about them. Don't shame yourself or applaud yourself according to whatever these short blips of information. And I personally love the approach of like here's a bunch of great options. Now your job is to go understand these options for you and figure out what works for you. But because we have a healthcare system that hasn't taught us to be responsible for our own health, this is all converging together in a very unique moment.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:26:46] Yeah, it's such a good point and one that, in 2008 when I joined Facebook and I'm embarrassed to admit I know that's when I joined because it just popped up [Dr. Pelz laughs] on my Facebook and I was like, “Good lord, that's a long time.” 16 years is a long time. But the realization that as things have evolved, the recognition that it's a dual-edged sword. I tell my boys this. I have two teenage boys and thankfully as boys, other than Snapchat or they occasionally look at TikTok, they're just not as vested as my friends that have daughters. And again, I could be a small subsect of the population, but I think the influence of social media can be both good as you stated, like introducing you to something new.
[00:27:29] Maybe this N of 1 experiment will be helpful for me. But also, bad because you may have people that have very maladaptive relationships and habits that now have a platform. In some instances, it is not good information, it's maladaptive, it's bad information. And I say this with love because I hope and I endeavor that information that I share on social media. We're very conscientious. We try to make sure that we're sharing positive, uplifting information and that it's actually sound in either clinical experience or research or a combination of both. But I do think for everyone listening. And I think TikTok in particular, because the platform moves so quickly, things trickle down to Instagram, but TikTok is where it happens.
[00:28:14] I have grown as adult friends that sit on TikTok and I love [Mindy Pelz laughs] them, but they will tell me all the things they learn on TikTok. And I'm like, “There are no words.” [Cynthia laughs]
Dr. Mindy Pelz: “Oh, my God. Oh, my God.”
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:28:27] Take it with a grain of salt, because even misinformation can be propagated by anyone. And I think that's the point we're trying to make, is that if you're something that causes you to go down and research something and determine whether or not X, Y or Z works for you, great. But if you use that as a litmus test for your entire life, that is problematic.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:28:47] I always say look at social media as like a curiosity incubator. It's like, “Oh, look at what that person's doing. I wonder if I want to do that. I don't know. Let me try it. Let me see how that works.” “Oh, okay, wait, look at this thing. That's interesting. Would that work for me?” If we approach it with that, then all of a sudden everything going on in social media is really exciting. My favorite one that I've seen recently is a meme that says, “I'm sorry, I can't go to work today because I need to stay home and count my grams of protein. [Cynthia laughs] I'm like, “Okay, there's a perfect example of the protein conversation.” Yes, it's important. This is why I call it the hero macronutrient.
[00:29:32] But let's relieve ourselves of having to manipulate it into a number that some science study said was right, that had some curated humans in that study. We really have to look at this science on a lot of this stuff and say, “Very interesting. Does it work for me?” That's what I think we should do with every single science study that we see right now.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:29:56] I think that's important. And also giving yourself some grace. It's not that every day has to be perfect. It's like, over the course of a week, did you eat a variety of vegetables? Did you eat brightly pigmented foods? Did you have some ferments? Did you get your healthy fats and did you eat some protein? Hopefully, I think that is far more important. And it's interesting, when I'm running programs, people get so stressed. There's so much information overload that people are sometimes paralyzed into analysis paralysis. They cannot make decisions because they feel so woefully overwhelmed. And frankly, a traditional allopathic medicine provider doesn't have time in their day to talk to their patients with any extensive conversation. About nutrition and lifestyle, although I know that most of them want to do that, I don't want to sound critical of them. But that's where this information overload for many people becomes problematic. People are just confused. It's not that they don't want to take action. They don't know what to do. They're so overwhelmed with information that they can't make a decisive decision for themselves.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:30:59] It's interesting what you're bringing up because I think it boils down to women haven't learned to trust their own bodies and trust their own instincts. And this is why I think you and I both love fasting. Because when you take food out of the equation, there's a lot that shows up. There's mind chatter that shows up. There's fear that shows up. There's I'm not feeling good. Oh, wait a second. I used to use food to soothe my emotions. Like so many things show up.
[00:31:30] And I think where I would like to see with women going forward is that they use information like you and I are putting out into the world to get to know themselves and take ownership over themselves and stop outsourcing our health power to a doctor, to a social influencer, to a friend at Ladies Nights out, to a politician. Stop outsourcing it and start to get to know your own relationship with your body and then you will never lose your way again.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:32:00] I think that's so important. And what's interesting is as we're navigating perimenopause into menopause as we are losing estrogen. Estrogen is our people pleasing hormone. I remind women that it becomes much more easier as we're navigating middle age to start advocating for ourselves. It's like that voice that maybe we lost in our 20s and 30s. My kids sometimes will just look at me and they're like, “Please, don't.” I'm like, “I can't help myself.” I was like, “As a small business owner, I would like to make a recommendation.” And my husband's like, “Oh, here we go.” And I'll just say, “Listen, if it's such an impediment to have to pay 2.9%, just add it to your fees.” And they're like, “Oh” And my kids are like, “Did you really need to say that?” I was like, “Yes,” I knew that would be helpful. [laughs]
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:32:44] So what's really interesting on this, and this is a side turn from fasting and food. But part of where my brain has been currently is trying to understand this perimenopause and menopausal journey from a personality standpoint and from a behavior standpoint. And there's a beautiful feminist philosopher named Carol Gilligan who wrote a book called In a Different Voice. And what she discovered was that when you look at boys and girls at the age of 11, if you were to ask them what food they would want, they both would tell you exactly what they want. Now you fast forward two years later and you ask the boy and the girl, “What do you want to eat?” The boy will tell you exactly what he wants, and the girl will say, “I don't know. What do you want? What are you eating?”
[00:33:35] Okay. What changed in that time period is the influx of hormones. And that influx, specifically estrogen makes our brain very relational. We go from being linear in our thoughts to always making decisions budding up against the relationship of the society or the other person. Now, what I think happens during menopause is the opposite. So, you have somebody, a girl at 13, that has conditioned herself to be a people pleaser. Like you said, she's got estrogen now, and estrogen wants her to please everybody. But when estrogen goes away, all of a sudden, she doesn't want to please everybody. And all of a sudden, she's hearing her voice again. She's starting to get this authentic voice coming back.
[00:34:23] And I think therein lies some of the challenges that women have when they go through perimenopause and menopause because the people around them don't want to hear, like, “Wait a second.” You were so easy to be with now. And now all you want to do is speak up and say something in opposition of me. And I am dreaming of a world where we start to see that that is the true natural process of perimenopause and menopause, that it's a coming back home to our own authentic voice. And that's why we don't want to be people pleasers, is that we would like the people pleasing to go away as estrogen goes away. So that metamorphosis is something that I really feel like doesn't get enough oxygen when we're having these conversations.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:35:10] Yeah. And it's interesting to me, because I am a reformed people pleaser.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:35:15] Yeah me too.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:35:17] I think, as I was losing estrogen, as I was navigating my 40s into my 50s, and now I say, “If it's not a hell yes, it's a hell no.” And that comes to everything in my life, personally and professionally. And I'll say to my husband, if I go against what I intrinsically want to do, it eats at me to a point where I'm like, it is not a good visceral response, I am not honoring the hell yes versus hell no. That applies to everything. Every podcast guest, so my listeners know everyone I bring on this podcast are people I want to interact with and I want to interview, and I want to share their gifts with this community. We say no more often than we say yes.
[00:35:54] And I think that is part of that evolution. For the same reason, I'm sure you find, as your business grows, that you say no to a heck of a lot more than you ever did before, or you're like, “I really like that person, but I can't make that work. I can't make that timing work. I don't want to do that travel.” And so, coming home and finding our voice in the second stage of our lives, I think is incredibly empowering. It allows us to stand in our power as individuals and allows us to advocate for what we truly want and desire.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:36:23] That's right. So well said, that is so well said. A couple years ago, I became close with LeAnn Rimes, the country music singer, songwriter, and we've become quite good friends. And in the expansion of my own life, I was overwhelmed with all the things that flowed to me. And so, I went to her one day, and I was like, “Okay, you have to tell me, what do I do?” Like, “I'm drowning in my yeses.” She's 43 or 42. She's perimenopausal. And she said, “You need to make ‘n’o your best friend. Everything needs to be a no unless it's an absolute yes, yes, yes, yes.” And the minute I did that mixed with, I'm two years postmenopausal. No's get easier and easier and easier. And then all of a sudden, I realize actually, what the no is doing for me is creating space for me to do what I want to do.
[00:37:19] And I think this is more than just career advice. I think a lot of women have spent their whole life saying, “Oh, you need me to do that? Yes, yes, yes I'll do it.” And you're going to compliment me, you're going to make me feel amazing, then I'm going to feel amazing about myself. And then you go into the perimenopause-menopause years and all of a sudden you can literally, I so resonate with what you just said. You literally can't do it anymore.
[00:37:46] But when we look at the statistics of like women from killing themselves, the most common decade between 45 and 55, and when you look at statistics like 70% of divorces over 40 are initiated by women, I have to wonder if it's because we finally go, “enough, enough.” And that again, I don't think gets enough oxygen. I don't think then what do we do? How do we function in a patriarchal society that wants us to be polite and wants us to be look a certain way and act a certain way? This is why I'll hang out with post-menopausal women any day of the week. [Cynthia laughs] Because they're always going to tell you how it looks and what they think. And that is freedom to me.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:38:37] No, it is. And to me, I think about, I was part of a large sorority in college and all lovely, beautiful young women. But I think back to the pressure that we felt at that time in our lives to look a certain way and behave a certain way and garner attention from guy. I mean, I think about that now and it's just so exhausting. And it's interesting. There's only a few fashion bloggers that I follow. There's like one or two. But I like them as human beings, which is why I appreciate. I'm like, I love that they take the time to curate all these looks. But I'm like, it just looks exhausting, [laughs] grand scheme of things. There's so much that I see sometimes that other people do.
[00:39:16] I'm like, “I appreciate and value what they're doing, but it just looks exhausting.” And that's not the stage of life. That is not the place that I'm in. I want to make sure that we circle back to, you know you talk about food rules and I think these are very important conversations that you're having in the book. Talking about ways to eat to support our hormones, to eat to metabolize and break down and detoxify hormones. Let's spend some time talking about this because I think this is important. I think people still fail to understand that food is foundational to our health, how important it is. And I think that you do such a beautiful job talking about this, but when you talk about rules, it's not the rules that people think it is. It's really speaking about education and advocacy.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:40:05] Yeah. And this is another great conversation to have with you, because one of the things that I started to see trending through interviews and social media was that we became obsessed with getting enough of a hormone. That's not the end of the hormonal story. Just because you slap a patch on you, doesn't mean that all of a sudden you are hormonally balanced. So, there has to be deeper conversations around this and add to that we have heard the term food is medicine. But what I'm trying to add to the conversation is that food is hormonal medicine. So that means when I put a plate together, I do this all the time. When I put a plate together, I'm like, “Okay, I need to follow my own three rules and three Eat Like a Girl principles are eat to make a hormone or produce a hormone, eat to metabolize a hormone or break it down, and eat to detox a hormone.
[00:41:04] Okay, well, what does that look like? You can literally sum that up on one plate. So, if you want to produce a hormone, stop eating the same thing over and over again and over again. I am sure you have sat with women in consults where you're like, when you break down what they eat, it's like you're eating the same hundred foods over and over and over again. But you have trillions of bacteria. You have thousands of different species of microbes in your gut, and they all want you to feed them something different.
So, when I go to a restaurant, I don't ask myself, what do I want to eat. I ask myself what haven't I eaten? So, recently, I was in Istanbul, and on the menu was goat. And I was like, “Oh, I haven't had goat.” And then my brain was like, “I wonder what amino acid profile goat has.” [Cynthia laughs] And then I started thinking, like, “Oh, my God, I wonder what my microbes will do with goat?” Because I'm stuck eating fish, chicken, and meat at home but I don't eat a lot of goat. So, I started like, that got added to my plate. So that would be an example of, can we diversify the types of food we're eating so we're getting a variety of nutrients so we can make these hormones?
[00:42:18] The second thing is probably at the core of your next book, which is if you're going to break a hormone down, fiber, fiber, fiber. You have got to bring vegetables and fruits into the picture so you can break these hormones down, that estrobolome in the gut, the liver, they all play a part. So, look at your vegetables as metabolizers of hormones so that it can convert the hormone into a usable format for the cell. And then the last one is detox. How do you detox these hormones? I think the liver is very much struggling in our world right now, the liver is abused by many things, from medications to alcohol to repressed anger. And that liver is not just going to break the hormones down, but it's a big reason and even the gut too, to get these hormones out of us.
[00:43:12] So the bloating, the menopausal belly weight, the constipation can all be signs you're not detoxing these hormones. So, let's look at our gingers and our lemon and our radicchio and our dandelion greens, even bitter coffee, really good coffee can be supportive of the liver. But we have to stop just ordering things like, “Oh, what do I feel like eating?” And start looking at our plate as literally hormonal medicine. And that's the lens in which I look at it.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:43:43] I love that that strategic perspective. We will actually be in Istanbul this summer. It's at the tail end of a trip and I figured if we're over in that side of Europe/Asia, that we're definitely going to go. So, I'll have to make sure I investigate different types of proteins. But we're really talking about food monogamy is not, per se, a good thing. I always say-- [crosstalk]
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:44:04] Oh that’s so good. It is so good.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:44:06] Yeah, yeah. Food monogamy is something that we don't want to do. And it's not to suggest that if you have berries on Monday, you can't have berries on Friday, but making sure that you are introducing different plant varieties. It could be herbs. It can be different types of nuts and seeds. Although, remember, these nuts and seeds are not-- they are calorically dense. So just be remindful. Those are the one thing that I will measure out. Because I love salted pistachios, Mindy, just to be fully transparent. So, I have to measure them out. Otherwise, I'll eat like half a bag.
[00:44:36] But, like thinking strategically, have you had a serving of fatty fish that week? You know, as an example, no one in my house likes fatty fish. So, when I go out, I will usually get salmon or I'll have sardines on a salad. I mean just so that I'm getting some fatty fish. But just being strategic about the food that you do eat so that you are thinking consistently about how does this serve your body. The one thing that many women don't realize is that even though in the tail end of perimenopause and menopause we're producing less estrogen and progesterone, that doesn't mean we don't get exposed in our environment or personal care products or our food. And what is your governing philosophy when you're talking to clients about or educating them about these exogenous estrogens? How can we protect ourselves? How can we be proactive about that?
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:45:26] Oh yeah. I mean we live in the most toxic time in human history. Pesticides are an endocrine disruptor. They're sprayed to block out chemical or block out insects from our vegetables. So, we are completely manipulated by exogenous sources of estrogen. This is why I always think you need to either know how to read an ingredient label or you need to buy a food without an ingredient label. So, shop your farmer's market, grow your own food, buy organic, non-GMO. Now you've minimizing those endocrine disruptors. But then we also have to look into like beauty products and all of that can disrupt our hormonal system. So, I think it has to be addressed. But what's interesting to me in watching so many women go through the menopausal journey is the things we seem to get away with at 35, we don't get away with at 45. And by 55, we're like pretty much saying like fuck you to those things. [Cynthia laughs] We're like, you're out. Sorry. I hope I can swear on your podcast.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:46:36] Yeah, okay. We're clean, we're safe. [laughs]
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:46:38] Okay. But I think there's this again, this is why what I'd love to do is go to every 40-year-old and say here's what's coming down the pipeline. Like your hormones are changing, which means your lifestyle is going to require a change. Everything from the foods you eat to how you exercise to the amount of stress you can take and let's get to know what those changes are and have a real again personal experience with this menopausal journey and not become so rigid to the things that worked for you before because most of those aren't going to work for you anymore. And toxins has to be a part of that conversation.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:47:17] It's so interesting to me because I feel like we have to constantly redefine our new normal. As an example, my one last vice in life is that I like dark chocolate. I think everyone knows that and I can totally moderate.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:47:31] That's not a vice. [Cynthia laughs] I give you permission.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:47:37] I was like, the polyphenol content, I'm like, I get good quality dark chocolate. But what's interesting to me is at this stage of life, like if it's a birthday party, a celebration, I have the cake, I have the cookie, whatever it is, but I cannot moderate that stuff anymore. And so, for me, it's being very, very purposeful. I'm going to savor every single bite, I'm going to enjoy it. But I know that if I have more than my one serving, I know I'm going to feel bad and I'm going to be inflamed and puffy and not feel good. And so that is the realization-- I am now at the ripe age of 53. That is the realization I have, is that I can eat a little bit of that particular vice food. But if I eat too much of it, my body reminds me that I'm not 25 anymore.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:48:20] Yeah, that's my relationship to wine, to my glass of wine. [Cynthia laughs] It's like, you may have helped me in my earlier years and now you're affecting me negatively and even the smallest amount. So, I think you're absolutely right understanding that this relationship with our daily lifestyle changes is just important to note because again, we turn on ourselves as women and we think, “Oh, I did something wrong.” Or like one of the things that I see happening right now, I feel like, is because so many women are suffering through this menopausal journey, they think, “Oh, maybe I didn't get the right doctor or I didn't get the right dosage of HRT.” And I feel like we all just need to take a step back and ask, “What's the lifestyle here everybody?” What is a general lifestyle that needs to be looked at as we go through this hormonal transition? And I hope that starts to bubble to the surface in the cultural conversation.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:49:19] Absolutely. Well, I so love this conversation. Please let listeners know how to connect with you outside of the context of the podcast, how to get access to your new book, which is beautiful. The food photography that was done is lovely. And seeing photos of you and your mom and your daughter has really a little bit of an oxytocin boost as I was going through it.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:49:37] Thank you. Thank you. You're so kind. I mean, anywhere the books are sold, they are in almost all bookstores, the mainstream ones. I'm always a fan of Support the Indies because those independent bookstores are MOM & POP places. So please go support your local one. You can ask them to even order the book. Otherwise, you can go to Amazon, bookshop.org, Barnes & Noble's online. You can pretty much find it anywhere. And if you get lost, just go to my website, drmindypelz.com.
Cynthia Thurlow: [00:50:05] Awesome. Such a pleasure to connect with you again.
Dr. Mindy Pelz: [00:50:07] Agreed. Thank you. Cynthia.
Dr. Cynthia Thurlow: [00:50:12] If you love this podcast episode, please leave a rating in review, subscribe and tell a friend.
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