13: Transform Yourself using Intermittent Fasting with Cynthia Thurlow

[00:00:00] I never knew that you can be more physically active and workout harder in the beginning of your cycle and things you can do to benefit the follicular versus luteal phases. I think those are the things I think would have been a gift to have known. And I just don’t think we as a society we’re as sophisticated, you know, back when I first started getting my menstrual cycle stuff, I had a daughter that would definitely be part of it.

Hi there. Welcome to the field better now, podcast. I’m your host, Jackie Balca. And if you’ve arrived here, no, there is something in here to spark yourself to create a better future in your health, in your career, in your relationships for both yourself and for those around you, just one small action. Step at a time with so much love and gratitude to be your guide.

Let’s get started.[00:01:00] 

Jackie back. Hey everyone. Jackie backer here I am psyched to date, introduce you to my guests, nurse practitioner, Cynthia Thurlow. She’s the queen of intermittent fasting. Cynthia has a rocking TEDx talk on intermittent fasting that has over 10 million views and rising. And she’s now launching her new book.

I have 45 transformation. It’s really good by the way. Oh, and just on a side note, she’s been recognized as one of the 21 founders changing the way we do business. She is a total rock star. We have the best chat nerding out on blood sugar imbalances. What makes your hormones go crazy? Of course, man. Boobs, how to approach intermittent fasting.

And it’s especially important to know that women are not small men. I’m going to let you listen in to find out why enjoy. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome. We are thrilled to have you here, Cynthia, master of [00:02:00] intermittent fasting. How are you today? Thanks for coming on the show. Wow. I’ve been really looking forward to connecting with you.

Yes, me too. We’ve got lots of friends in common. And from my research on you also lots of heroes. I heard that you love Robert Lustig as much as I do. So isn’t here, Jim. He has, and you know, actually interviewing him this past summer for the podcast was such a treat. Yeah. Yes. He reminds me of a cardiologist that I used to work with for years and years and years, even down to they physically resemble one another.

And to me to have the opportunity to share his gifts and his brilliance was absolutely one of my favorite aspects of podcasting in 2021. Yes, absolutely. It would be a bucket list item for me, but maybe people don’t understand that, but I’m super nerdy and dirty like that. So we can geek out today.

Absolutely. I’m psyched to have this chat intermittent fasting and fasting in general, such a popular topic. I [00:03:00] feel like there’s still so much confusion. So I’m really excited to have you on the show today to talk about that such an important topic. So I would consider you Cynthia. So graceful. So masterful, when it comes to defining what intermittent fasting actually is, what are your thoughts?

Yeah, well, I think the word fasting can be triggering for a lot of people. So it’s always a good way to kind of segue into saying fasting is simply eating less often, you know, in our kind of over harried overwhelmed existences, we’ve gotten into this mindset and methodology that we need to eat frequently.

We need to stoke our metabolism. That breakfast is the most important meal of the day. And I would actually argue that it’s the meal frequency patterns and our food choices that are really contributing to a lot of metabolic health issues. Intermittent fasting really represents eating within a feeding window and having a period of time during the day when you’re not eating, which most of that encompasses when we sleep.

So it really isn’t all that much time of your [00:04:00] waking hours where you’re not eating. Yeah. Yes, I totally agree. And I think the other thing I like to talk about is very much of the ancestral health. And, you know, even if we go back to 1970, we were consuming 500 less calories a day. So over the course of the week, that’s a pound of weight.

What are your thoughts on that? Well, it’s interesting. I had the opportunity to interview Vinnie shorter, rich, and he’s done so in amazing documentaries. And I had the opportunity to view his most recent documentary beyond impossible right before it came out. And it was interesting. He had photos of people during Woodstock from the 1969.

And then the variation 30 years later, and everyone in the 1960s was thin, there were no obese people at Woodstock in sharp contrast to what you saw in the 1990s. And so I really think metabolic health is truly a reflection of the onslaught of high-fructose corn syrup, certainly seed oils, and then, you know, the [00:05:00] bastardization of fat.

So, so many people are consuming, highly processed foods that when they take fat out. They just increased the sugar and now we’re consuming everything from condiments, like ketchup or salad dressings, all the way up to, you know, sugar-sweetened beverages like the half high-fructose corn syrup. And then, and interestingly enough, there’s this direct correlation with fructose and its impact on liver health and its impact on the gut microbiome, as well as the Tatie cues and all sorts of science-y things that go on within the body.

So I really think that the degree of obesity and insulin resistance that we’re seeing is a direct reflection of our lifestyle. But also our dietary choices. And unfortunately it’s at the point where I say it’s really a public health threat. If you look at statistics, even from 2018, there was a study done at the university of North Carolina chapel hill school of public health.

And they were talking about that 88.2% of Americans at that time were metabolically unhealthy. And I would’ve already given the last two [00:06:00] years, it’s probably not better. So it really is a huge problem. And unfortunately, when people assume that whatever they find in the grocery store in a box of Agora can, is healthy.

And I remind people all the time, we have to just be so diligent about the types of foods that we’re consuming and trying to eat less processed, trying to make better choices. I am a total realist. I get it. I have teenagers. And so they have kind of found a whole new world outside the last two years of going over to friend’s houses and having different kinds of foods available to them.

So trying to find some balance in terms of navigating the grocery store and options that are available there. But I think a lot of it Jackie has to do quite honestly, with the rise of the processed food industry. Seed oils and high-fructose corn syrup, all of which are really detrimental to our health.

Yes. Oh, I concur funny story. I’ve got a seven year old and a 10 year old as you know, and my son, when he gets really tired. So during the day, he’s [00:07:00] great. And he’s always saying, I love how we ate, obviously, a household of unprocessed food, whole foods, you know, real food fruits and veggies and healthy fats and help clean proteins.

And then whenever he gets tired, He just drops his bundle. And it’s so interesting to watch him. That’s the cue that he is tired. He starts crying. He’s like, look at me. I have to be gluten free. I’m gluten free, soy free dairy free. And it’s just fascinating to me. Let’s just dive a bit deeper because I think the seed oils for me, what I love explaining to people is what actually happens.

That those oils sitting on the shelf they’re bleached they’re deodorized. So we don’t actually know that they are rancid. And what happens to around said that it gets stored as a fat cell. And so talk about that concept for me about the seed oils and the impact on. [00:08:00] Yeah. I think that the CDLs are thought of as being really benign.

You know, these quote-unquote vegetable oils like canola oil, soybean oil, safflower, sunflower are good examples. And I remind people that they disrupt our cellular membranes. So our cellular membranes can be disrupted for up to two years. They can oxidize. They create inflammation. I remind people that it requires quite a bit of effort to make these oils.

They are, as you mentioned, they’re exposed to hexanes and chemicals. They’re oftentimes bleached they’re rancid. And so I remind people that there are byproducts of the processed food industry. They really aren’t. Naturally occurring in any capacity they’re cheap. And I remind people, there’s a lot of great work being done by Dr.

Kate Shanahan. And she talks quite a bit about how seed oils will drive carbohydrate addiction, which then drives insulin resistance. And so I think it’s really important for people to understand. It’s not just about a crappy low quality oil, the damages yourself, either membrane. We know that it [00:09:00] disregulates keys to take any hormones and you, then aren’t making good food choices and that can turn into the carbohydrate cravings.

And you’re not going to crave a sweet potato. You’re going to crave chips and crap foods. And so I remind people it’s just yet another reason to really read food labels, be really diligent about them. My entire family knows. We just did a Costco video yesterday talking about trying to navigate Costco, which here in United States, it’s kind of one of these bigger grocery store items.

And my sole thing is no soy. No Seattle. I mean, I literally walk around with my cell phone and like show like the picture of the packaging that’s done to be spending mirrors so that no one looks at what’s on the back. Someone had asked me to try to find a clean protein bar. Well, that was a joke. But the point being that a lot of seed oils are kind of played off as being super benign, that they’re innocuous, that they’re not problematic.

And I think when you really look at the advent or the introduction of seed [00:10:00] oils into the processed food industry, you really starting to see some significant health changes, you know, in the United States. I know the number one consumed fat is soybean oil, which is based on research from Dr. Ben Beckman.

And so I just like to remind people that it’s not that benign. So think of. The most consumed fat in the United States is soybean oil. And that to me is just hurting. And I’m sure you probably could replicate that information, other westernized nation. So it really isn’t this benign entity. It is really driven by the processed food industry because soy is a really cheap substance here.

It’s subsidized here in the United States. That’s why it’s so proliferative in the process foods. I can’t speak to what goes on in Australia, but I just know here in the United States, it’s just a by-product of all the crappy. Ingredients that the food industry likes to use to emulsify or just to use as an oil-based product or a multiplicity of reasons.

I always tell people that I’m sure fermented soy in certain cultures [00:11:00] is celebrated and that’s obviously very different, but most other soy products are really just a bunch of processed junk. Yeah. The latest stat I read was that 80% of soy is genetically modified, but it’s a great time to talk about bio-individuality and because your specialty is working with intermittent fasting with women.

And a lot of the time we talk about when you’re in perimenopause and experiencing PMs and menopause, but it starts decades before that. So talk about the relationship between soy and hormones, even from when were. What’s interesting. And the term bio-individuality just means that an N of one, each one of us are unique individuals.

And unfortunately, there’s this been this conditioning that what works for one works for all. And I just like to remind people that we need to really intuitively lean into what our bodies are telling us and soy, if you look at soy, as a crop is [00:12:00] designed to be estrogenic. And so we get a lot of estrogen mimicking chemicals in our food or personal care products, our environment.

And so if you’re consuming a lot of soy that could potentially create a degree of hormonal imbalance, you know, I was just talking to a woman this afternoon. We just did a special test called the Dutch and she’s estrogen dominant. And I was kind of running through the litany of all the things that could be contributing to this.

And she had no idea that there are estrogen mimicking chemicals and our personal care products and cleaners that we’re exposed to and foods that we’re exposed to. And. You know, one of my grade bugaboos about soy is that if it’s consumed and there are a lot of people that eat primarily a plant-based diet and they’re consuming a lot of soy, soy burgers and all sorts of things that are out there.

And so cumulatively, they’re getting a lot of soy protein, isolate, soybean oil, et cetera. And over time that can really break some imbalances. And typically what I will see as a degree of estrogen dominance, and that can show up along with some [00:13:00] degree of insulin resistance, it could be infertility problems.

It could be irregular menstrual cycles. It could be polycystic ovarian syndrome. It could be a woman in perimenopause who’s estrogen dominant, or even a woman in menopause. Who’s estrogen dominant. I know people seem to think that there’s no way a menopausal woman is going to be estrogen dominant. Trust me, it happens a lot.

So it would kind of impact. Yeah. And it can also impact men. A lot of men where they are exposed to quite a bit of soy, I call it the soy boy, but it’s really this manifestation of their testosterone or robotizing into estrogen along with this degree of insulin resistance. And so it really is hugely problematic for both genders.

And it’s definitely one of those things in terms of an education really explaining to people like if you decide you want to be vegetarian, I mean, that’s, that’s your choice. Absolutely. But you don’t want to be dependent on soy protein as an option. If you’re going to go that direction, there are cleaner protein choices.

Obviously I think animal-based protein is obviously [00:14:00] superior, but if you decide to go, plant-based, you know, there are certainly cleaner protein options than soy, for sure. Yeah. Yes. And I think it’s just making that informed choice, which is why I love having you on the show, Cynthia, because knowledge is power and you call it soy boy.

You know, we live in a coastal town as you know, and we’re on the beach all the time and there’s all the. I call it man, boobs and men bombs. And I look around us and talking about your Woodstock images. I can’t imagine that we would see those man boobs and even children. We’re seeing breasts develop a lot earlier.

We’re seeing menstruation start cycling, starting a lot earlier, and I contribute that to the hormonal imbalance in this spiral. That’s going in the wrong direction. What are your thoughts? I do think so. It’s interesting. I just interviewed Jeffer Smith. He’s kind of a GMO expert. And we were talking about specific types of growth hormone that is given to cows and how a lot of countries, this is abandoned.

But up until fairly [00:15:00] recently, it was still being utilized here in the United States. And you start to think about the cumulative impact of these are female cows that are getting antibiotics, because they’re getting a lot of mastitis and they’re producing a lot of milk and not to mention that they’re given growth hormones so that they’re producing more milk and then we’re consuming.

I don’t consume it. I’ve been dairy free for a long time, but people are then consuming traditional non-organic milk and they think nothing of it. And again, it’s a subsidized entity here in the United States. So what do you have a lot of dairy cheese, yogurt, et cetera. And so I think it’s a combination of exposure.

And then dietary choices. And you’re seeing escalating rates of diabetes and children. We used to only see type one and children. Now we’re seeing type two. We’re seeing kids with fatty liver disease, and this is a direct reflection of the exposure to fructose. So fructose is a type of sugar. To me.

Fructose is a little different if you’re getting it from a piece of fruit versus soda and so very important for people to understand. [00:16:00] Fructose is processed very differently in the body can disregulate a lot of these satiety cues can contribute to insulin resistance. So I think it’s really important when we’re talking about the health of our children, that we’re really looking very closely at what types of foods they’re eating.

We just had this hyper palatable environment and we’re very dope in the narrow Jack. We like everything to be right now. We want to watch whatever we want to watch. You want to eat whatever we want to eat. It horrifies me when my kids, you know, talk about their friends ordering like door dash. I don’t know if you’d have that in Australia.

It literally people don’t have to leave their house and they get like a hunk of junk at their doorstep. And so I’ve never used that service and we don’t eat out a lot, but I think the greatest concern I have is the degree of fructose that’s in people’s diets, especially high fructose corn syrup and the proliferation.

I think about sodas. Like one of the worst things you can do is consume soda on an empty stomach. I was listening to a fructose researcher. This is what I consume my time with. I’m like, I [00:17:00] cannot learn to learn. And so there’s a fructose researcher based out of one of the medical schools in Colorado. And so, um, Rick Johnson, who’s coming on in a couple of weeks.

And so I was listening to his explanation about fructose and what happens when you consume it on an empty stomach? And he was like, let me make it clear. This is not like having a piece of fruit, which has some fiber, which slows down the absorption. But drinking a soda is like one of the worst things you can do on an empty stomach, because it’s almost as if you are.

Setting yourself up for the way that your interior sites and hepatocytes, I mean, so like liver cells, your gut cells, the way that they take up that fructose, it’s really fascinating how it really changes the way that our body metabolizes the fructose. It’s really interesting. Yeah. Fascinating. Along with all of their science experiments, where they pour a coconut, just burns a hole in things.

Think of what that does to the microbiome and our immune system. Oh my goodness. Well, we could go down a huge rabbit hole with that. So I’m going to side super a little [00:18:00] bit and just help people understand a little bit about you Cynthia, in 2019, you stood up and gave a Ted talk and not long after you had just got out of hospital.

So how did you get up on stage physically and mentally and perform like. Knowing that public speaking, something creates a lot of fear and you know, that amygdala goes crazy. So you did such an incredible job. Talk to me about that experience. Thank you. Well, I’m an introvert. People are oftentimes surprised to hear this.

So in 2018, I had said to my husband, I wanted to do a Ted talk because it seemed like a scary thing I could do, but it’s scary, safe thing. And so in 2018, I sent out a bunch of applications. I got my first offer to do a talk in Toronto in December of 2018. And around that time, I was offered a second in March of 2019.

And so I accepted the second one around that same time. And I looked at my husband and said, what do I know a lot about? And he said, intermittent fasting. And it was that easy. Like it was just, that was the effortless decision that [00:19:00] was made. And so my husband in February of 2019, I actually accompanied him on a business trip to Hawaii and we came back and about 24 hours later, I just really wasn’t feeling well.

And I thought I probably had food poisoning. And the next afternoon I knew it wasn’t food poisoning. I was like, I’m legitimately sick. And so I told my husband, I was like, I need to go to the ER. Wow. By the time I got there, I was in so much pain. And for anyone that’s a healthcare professional. When patients tell you they have an impending sense of doom, like you feel like you’re going to die.

You take it very seriously. And I remember saying to the nurses. If they don’t figure out what’s wrong with me, I’m going to die. I was in so much pain, like way worse than labor pain. And so they initially weren’t taking me very seriously, which is unfortunate. And so it wasn’t until they got my labs back, that all of a sudden I was getting rushed to get a cat scan.

And then I had like three surgical consults and to make a long story short, I had a ruptured appendix, but it wasn’t just a ruptured appendix. My entire length of my colon was inflamed. And they were concerned that if they took me to surgery that night, I would, I would [00:20:00] probably lose my colon. And I looked at the surgeon and said, You can’t take my colon.

You can’t like, well, we could. And I was like, no, you can’t, I’m not going to live with a bag, a colostomy bag for the rest of my life. So that started a 13 day hospitalization where I had a slew of complications. I was very sick. I actually almost died. And so the whole first week, I don’t remember a whole lot, but I remember the first week I was very thirsty.

And so when you can’t drink or eat anything, all you do is think about water. And so I had dreams of water and then week two, I was very focused on getting home to my boys. And for some reason, I said to my husband, as crazy as it sounds, I said, I have to do this talk. And I think for me mentally, I needed to do the talk.

So after 13 days I went home with IVs and I was getting intravenous antibiotics and antifungals. I had a central line in, I lost 15 pounds. I’m not a very big person. I lost 15 pounds. The skeletal looking. And I remember telling the TEDx organizers, but I still wanted to do the talk and I’d missed every deadline [00:21:00] because I’d been in the hospital.

And so I got on a call with them. This was probably two weeks before, and I said, I really need to do this talk. And they were like, well, we don’t want you to compromise your health. It’s a no, no. So I had just done another talk. So I knew that I had enough time to pull it together. And so literally all I did was sleep the first two weeks I was home.

And then the week before I was like, okay, I’m going to pull this talk together. And to this day, I don’t know how I did it because when I can’t even watch. That video. I can’t because my brain had not caught up with what had happened to my body, but I got up on stage and I will never forget this there’s a clock.

I only had 12 minutes and they made it very clear to all of us, you know, don’t go over because then the whole day get the timing gets off. And so actually about a minute before I was to finish, I realized I still had three more minutes to go. So I had to fast forward in my head to my talk and execute and get off the stage.

And I walked up to my. Coach. And I said, that’s the worst talk I’ve ever given. And she said, the only people in this room that know that you left anything out, or you or [00:22:00] I were fine, I’m so proud of you. And so I went off and celebrated with my son and some of my family was there and I didn’t give it another thought.

I was just so grateful that I got up there on stage and was able to execute it, not realizing what was coming. So you can be as surprised as I was when two months later, a colleague of mine called me and said, I think this is going to be different. And I was like, what do you mean? They’re like, you’ve got like 89,000 views in a day.

And I was like, what? And so that was the beginning of things changing. It was just really humbling. I really fervently believe that the universe takes the universe Gibbs and that talk was meant to happen. And I always say to, you know, our colleague and our mentor, that how many people would not have done that, how many people was made an excuse and not done it.

And all I wanted to do is still my voice. I was okay. That was really. The intention I set for that talk was to get up there and show them I’m okay. Oh, thank you for sharing such a beautiful, vulnerable story, Cynthia. And what I love is that in exactly what you just [00:23:00] said, a lot of people wouldn’t have gone through with that because you’re already an introvert.

They already would have been a fear around it. And then you had that traumatic incident, but you’re an action taker and feelers and courageous, and you went forth and listened to your inner being, which was telling you this, this must happen. I. Do this so kudos to you, Bravo. So, and it’s changed as a result.

You only have to look at the comments on that video, which is having over 10 million views now about how life-changing it is for people. So I’m so grateful that you did face your fears and follow your heart. So it’s a great time, I think, to talk about intermittent fasting, because the comments on that video, or just beauty, I screenshotted so many of the comments because people are literally posting their data of how they watched your talk and they implemented the plan because it was so [00:24:00] inspiring to be empowered with knowledge so you can make informed choices.

So let’s talk about how to approach intermittent, fasting into your lifestyle. If you haven’t done it before. And I was going to my practice, I was going, assuming that people. Dysregulated blood sugar. So talk to me about how you would approach that. Yeah. Well, and thank you for those kind words. It’s really been an incredibly humbling experience over the last couple of years.

I mean, truly I’m so very grateful and just feel so profoundly fortunate to be able to impact so many people. But when we’re talking about blood sugar dysregulation, and let’s be honest, that’s most people, the first thing that we really have to do is we have to restructure meals. Most people are consuming far too much carbohydrate and not enough protein and healthy fats.

So yeah, the very first thing is that I don’t start with fasting. If someone has significant blood sugar dysregulation, we have two. Restructure their macro. So making sure they’re really hitting their protein macros, and I’m a huge proponent [00:25:00] of women in particular, uh, aiming for 30 to 40 grams of animal-based protein with each meal, and then adding in some non starchy vegetables.

That’s a good way to ensure that they’re keeping their blood sugar stable. Their satiety signals are telling their brain they’re full. They’re not looking for more foods. So I think it initially starts with no snacking and then making sure you restructure those macros and really ensuring that you’re able to get from breakfast to lunch and lunch to dinner successfully.

If you’re having energy slumps, if you’re running out of gas, you know, you have to think about hydration and electrical. But also have more protein. And I tell people if you’re not hungry for protein, you’re not hungry. So kind of the standard mantra is you want to be aiming for more protein. And I find that a good adage is to say a hundred grams of protein a day.

Most people are probably getting 40 or 50. You don’t go from 40 to 50 to a hundred overnight. That may take a couple months, but more animal-based protein is going to keep you. [00:26:00] Satiated is going to help with muscle protein synthesis and really critically important for women in particular. So that’s a good starting point.

No snacking restructure your macros. And then once you’ve gotten to a point where you have sustained energy in between your meals, you’re not getting slumps. You’re not having significant cravings. You’re sleeping. Okay. Then you can start really working on 12 hours of digestive rest. And that’s really how it starts.

We start low and slow, especially with individuals that have got blood sugar issues. And I find 12 hours of digestive rest for a lot of people that are used to snacking all day long and eating, you know, many meals is a massive departure. It is. Really challenging for people initially. And I tell everyone, lifestyle changes are not meant to be easy.

They’re meant to be sustainable. So you have to think long-term, it’s not a quick term fix. And so as people get successful at 12 hours, then they can go to 12 and a half and 13, then 13 and a half, et cetera. And they kind of move along that continuum. Now I think the more carbohydrate dependent [00:27:00] someone is the more challenging it can be for them to fast for longer periods.

It doesn’t mean that it’s impossible. It just means it could take you. Four to six to eight weeks to get to a point where you’re going to be successfully fat-adapted. And in fact, that notation really speaks to being able to move between using carbs and fats for energy. It really is that easy and that’s metabolic flexibility, but so many of us are stuck using carbohydrates.

And I love the analogy that Jason Fung uses, where he talks about the refrigerator. You open up the refrigerator and the carbohydrates are in the fridge, the app to use up all the carbohydrates before you can get to the what’s in the freezer, which is where the fat is. So a lot of people. And I use the analogy of you’re always topping off the gas tank.

We’ve gotten conditioned to never really burning through our glucose stores and never really burning through our stored fuel because we’re constantly eating. We’re constantly topping off that gas tank. And so it’s really no different than that. And so I think about it this way that we want to use up our fuel sources before we start adding more fuel.

One of the things [00:28:00] that I find is hugely impactful as users with kilometer or continuous glucose monitoring. And really having set points for what is the number when you get hungry and what is the number after you eat? So you can really see the net impact on your food choices. I do find as one example, like taking a walk after dinner can help with insulin sensitivity for a lot of people.

In fact, I have a new patient that has about 50 pounds of weight to lose. And so we’re starting off really low and slow. And I told her, take a walk with your husband every night for 10 minutes after your dinner. And she’s been successfully doing that. I’m really proud of her, but let’s trigger.

Dysregulation is so profoundly common, but really starting slowly, no snacking restructuring as macros. And then moving on to, you know, using a glucometer, looking at your continuous glucose monitor. So you can really, really hone in on what your blood sugar is doing. Here’s the thing our blood sugar should not be trauma.

There shouldn’t be a tremendous variability throughout the day. I’m not saying no variability, but when you’re seeing blood sugar fluctuations of 50 points after a [00:29:00] meal, that means you have too many carbs and. Really reestablishing, better patterns for people. I remind people that you shouldn’t get tired after a meal.

You shouldn’t feel like you’re unsatisfied. You need to keep eating. You shouldn’t be hungry after eating. You know, those are all signs that you’re not structuring your meals properly. And so I think that there’s so much freedom in getting to a point where you structure your meals properly, that you feel really satiated.

Unfortunately, that’s not how most of us feel we’re just way too carbohydrate heavy, not enough protein, not enough healthy fats. And that can really set us up for problem. Yes, it’s interesting. Isn’t it about the satiation factor of protein we had, COVID go through our house about a month ago, and I think I ate the first thing on day four.

And by then I’d lost about 7, 7, 8 pounds. Um, you know, about three and a half, four kilos. And the first thing I craved was fruit. So that’s interesting high water content carbohydrates. I got better. And about maybe day 14, I [00:30:00] had insatiable appetite for protein. And I wonder if what I had lost in that time was my skeletal muscle and the muscle.

Talk to me about that and how important it is to I suppose, lose the right weight. Well, I mean, a good example is when I was in the hospital, And lost like probably 10 pounds the first week, because they were weighing the everyday in the bed. That was all muscle. So my muscle was being, catabolize broken down as a fuel source because I wasn’t eating at all.

Now, you know, losing weight between, you know, a few days can be related to the loss of glycogen. So if you’re breaking down stored glucose, you will lose water and relationship that a lot of people will say, like I pee a lot when I’m going low carb. And that’s really the loss of glycogen, which pulls electrolytes.

And so you’re gonna urinate quite a bit, but if you’re not eating enough, your body will break down muscle because your body’s just looking for a fuel source. They will break down. I’ll go in and catabolize muscle as a [00:31:00] fuel source. And so that’s designed like as an emergency backup system, obviously, like I didn’t expect to be in the hospital and not eating.

But I ultimately ended up on a bag of junk, which is a whole separate conversation, but it kept me alive. So I can’t complain about that. But I do think for a lot of people, when they’re sick, they really lean into what their body’s cues are telling them. It’s saying, I want you to fast, like right now you just need hydration.

You need to rest. And you know, we’re really speeding up a , which is this waste recycling process in the body. And I think when we’re sick, one of the best things we can do. Not eating is not necessarily a bad thing. It’s really like leaning into what your body is telling you and your body really just needed to like repair, get rid of things that didn’t belong, break down, you know, old proteins and misguided proteins and kind of get rid of them.

And autophagy is one of the benefits of when you’re fasted, but I think it’s very much a fine balance. Obviously we don’t want to be catabolising muscle in order to keep ourselves alive. That should be an extreme thing that occurs. [00:32:00] But the other thing is making sure we’re getting. Of the right healthy foods when we are feeling good into our diets so that we can maintain muscle, not break it down in response to not being able to eat.

But I think certainly in your case, probably a little bit of both, probably a little bit of catabolism of muscle, but also some glycogen. I’m sure. Some like a gin sparing because you were probably not eating much of anything. Keeping yourself hydrated. Yes, yes, absolutely. Tapping into bio-individuality again, there’s some great research talking about twins, which is why I think it’s so important to really experiment with what works for you.

So we talked about step one, get your macros, right? And then we talked about step two, look at the length of that overnight fast. And the study that comes to mind is one of, I think it was seven groups of twins and they fed the twins. It was a weight loss study. So they fed the twins the same amount in terms of caloric intake as best they could over the course of a week.

So they tried to keep the caloric intake around [00:33:00] 1500 calories and some twins lost, say seven pounds and some twins. 17 pounds must have been longer than a week. So I think it’s just so important to your point earlier. It’s not about Cynthia did that, so I’m going to do that and it worked for her, but it didn’t work for me.

We have to use ourselves as that sample size of one and do that experimentation. I think it’s really important. And women in particular, we can be our own worst enemies at times. A good example. I was talking to a lovely woman this afternoon is in one of my groups and we were reviewing some labs and she just casually mentioned she waves herself every day.

And I said, okay. I was like, so tell me why you weigh yourself every day. And she explained why. And I just said, I really think that that’s not a healthy strategy. I think maybe you should weigh yourself once a week, put the scale away. Don’t put it next to the shower, go by how your clothes fit you. And then we had a discussion on how often I weigh myself.

I don’t weigh myself very often. I go by how my clothes fit because the scale can. [00:34:00] Be helpful to a point that it can also be detrimental. And so I think we’re in this kind of dieting culture where people want to fix, they want to see the numbers change on the scale instantaneously. And we as individuals, depending on where we are in our menstrual cycle, depending on where we are in life stage wise, depending on how well our sleep is or not how our stress management is, there are so many variables that impact whether or not we can move that needle up or down.

And so I think it’s really important for people to be fully transparent, to be honest about what they’re doing. Are you drinking too much? Alcohol? Are you eating too many carbohydrates? Are you eating the wrong macros for your body? Are you under nourishing your body and your body? Really saying, okay, there’s a food scarcity issue and I’m going to like slow everything down.

Are you overexercising there are so many factors that could impact weight loss or weight loss resistance. And so I think it’s really the N of one. I tell everyone, like one of the reasons why I’ve stayed dairy free over the past three to four years is that when I [00:35:00] took dairy out of my diet completely and perimenopause, I lost five pounds, five pounds.

I could not get rid of no matter what I did. And it wasn’t even eating that much dairy, but it just goes to show you that in my body dairy was profoundly inflammatory. And so I think it’s important for everyone to experiment right now. I’m like completely biohacking and geeking out on sleep strategies to the point that there’s a colleague of mine who works in my business.

She’s another advanced practice nurse and we bounce ideas off each other all the time. And then we use the ideas with our patients and clients. And so I just think it’s important to intrinsically be open to the possibility that you may need to change things up at certain stages of your life. I know up until I hit perimenopause, I never actually struggled with weight loss.

I got pregnant, gained a healthy amount of weight loss, and over the time I was breastfeeding, With two kids. I don’t say that to sound arrogant. I’m just saying like, I genuinely had never experienced weight loss resistance until I got into perimenopause and I was like, whoa, wait a minute. What is [00:36:00] this?

And so out of that came a lot of strategies that I’m now kind of known for. And one of them is fasting. But to your point, I think it’s important for everyone that’s listening. Every person that’s listening to understand that we may need to do things a little differently for each one of us to honor our bio-individuality to honor our own physiology, to honor where we are in time and space and to recognize like a strategy might work well for awhile, and then we may have to change it.

And that’s not a bad thing. Yes, not at all. So let’s talk about women’s hormones. I love the story that you told about the scales, because what I find so fascinating, if you did weigh yourself every day of your cycle and let’s say change nothing else, you would see weight fluctuations that can really mess with think in particular female, just through whatever’s happened to us culturally, over multiple generations of the diet culture.

Talk to me about a woman’s cycle moving from day one [00:37:00] to when they mentioned. The sad thing is that even as a nurse practitioner, even though I trained at a big leading research institution, I now know more about menstrual cycles than I ever did before. So day one is the first day of bleeding up until oblation.

And so that is designed day one through 14, ideally is the follicular phase. This is when estrogen predominates culminating in ovulation. When you get these fluctuations and testosterone and estrogen and progesterone. And then the luteal phase begins. And this is the phase in our cycle when progesterone predominates, you know, I always say progesterone is the kind of like laid back mellow sister.

There’s some diuretic impact of progesterone. It tends to be anti-inflammatory anti-anxiety follicular stage when estrogen predominates is when you can generally push the envelope with fasting. It’s when you can do harder, tougher workouts. When you’re in your luteal phase, it’s the opposite gentler forms of yoga and not as intense, you’re not doing hardcore fasting and [00:38:00] that time of your cycle.

And what a lot of people fail to recognize is how uniquely positioned our body’s. Like there’s so much cycling of hormones throughout the month. And this is someone who has a healthy menstrual cycle. There are lots of people who have luteal phase defects, progesterone, and my dogs don’t make enough progesterone in the second half of their menstrual cycle, which can.

Impact when they non-straight and can proliferate with some other symptoms that go on. But when we hit the ovulation stage, testosterone’s high that’s when we feel a little frisky, we may feel like we want to bond with our partner. We may not have sex. You know, even like our lips get more full and they’re all these physiologic changes that encourage us to have sex and to mate, and then, you know, the luteal phase as we get closer and menstruation, this is when.

Sometimes women will they’ll notice weight gain depending on whether or not they’ve got at a progesterone levels that their sleep may be impacted. They may get diarrhea. They’re all sorts of things that go on. And then day one of our menstrual [00:39:00] cycles when we start bleeding. But I always remind women.

There are innate and important changes in differentiations throughout our menstrual cycle that we have to honor in terms of when or, or whether or not we do or do not fast. And the same thing happens as women are kind of going through perimenopause that five to 10 years preceding menopause. It’s really important.

And just recognizing what’s changing physiologically in our bodies, it kind of starts with our ovaries are as old as we are. A lot of people don’t know that. So if you’re 40 years old, your ovaries are 40 years old and you may not be obsoleting every month. You may get a menstrual cycle and they bleed, um, may not be obviating every month.

And so when they get this relative estrogen dominance and we have estrogen dominance, this is when women can have heavier cycles. They may have fiber cystic or tender breasts. They may gain weight without loss of progesterone. You may have trouble sleeping. You may feel more anxious and depressed for a lot of people.

They feel that they’re just not as balanced during the stage. And it’s not at all uncommon during the [00:40:00] stage when their sleep is disrupted. That means. There are cortisol is up and they may have some blood sugar dysregulation may impact gut immunity. There are so many things that come out of that. And so I feel like perimenopause for a lot of women is where they get stuck because they don’t really understand physiologically what’s going on.

And what they’re typically offered is synthetic hormones and IUD and ablation, or maybe to have their uterus removed. And there’s no judgment for anyone that makes those choices because we all have to decide what works best for ourselves. But when I was offered those four options, I was so frustrated with my GYN that I said, There has to be another way in which I figured it out.

But with that being said, we have a culture where we want to control symptoms. And so one way to control symptoms is to add in synthetic hormones. So either with the IUD or with the oral synthetic hormones, or, you know, going in and scarring the inside of the uterus, if someone’s done having children or even removing the uterus.

And I think it on [00:41:00] so many levels, especially cause I’m in a different stage now, I think it’s this kind of silencing of women’s symptoms instead of really doing the work and digging deep to. Help make better lifestyle choices that can impact balancing hormones and other ways, you know, there’s a lot, I wish I had known more about my peak fertile years because I probably would have done things differently.

I was one of those people that was on oral contraceptives for years, largely because I had a regular periods. And, you know, initially it started as a, this will fix that and then use it for contraception. Then I met my husband and went off with them and all of a sudden I remember saying to him, I didn’t, I never had bad PMs.

I had terrible PMs for years because of being on the pill. And even though you’re not even getting a real menstrual cycle, you’re getting a, just a breakthrough bleed. I always had horrible PMs the week before my pier, my so-called period. Oh, absolutely. Uh, you know, as a teenager, we had a name for it. I’m one of three girls.

So my father, uh, you know, he was surrounded by, uh, cycling women [00:42:00] and we called it bad man. Like that, that’s what it was coding now household. And I was the same. Cynthia was on the oral contraception and, you know, then I went and got the injection in my arm. That conversation needs to be the same as the conversation that salt was bad and that that’s, we’re bad now.

Like we’ve got to take responsibility. I still have so many beautiful people come through my practice where their children are being put on oral contraceptives because they’ve got some ex. You know, the impact is, you know, on gut health. And then we look at what’s going on in the DNA, in their gut. We look at the leaky gut and the issues and that’s having with the dysbiosis.

And then we look into the Dutch test. I love looking at the Dutch, it’s an incredible test. Isn’t it? Where we, people just think sex hormones, estrogen, progesterone, but what’s happening with the cortisol, the melatonin and the DHA, the testosterone. And so I love encouraging people to do a deep investigation of what’s going on in your body, not someone [00:43:00] else’s.

And don’t you owe it to yourself to do that investigation? I absolutely agree. And I always caution women that if they’re going to make the investment in doing a Dutch, to make sure that they work with someone, who’s looked at hundreds of tests. I think they’re all the years of working with different types of testing.

You know, my whole background is in ER, medicine and cardiology. So I’ve had access to some really, really intricate testing modalities. And I tell everyone. When I took the class to interpret the Dutch, my binder was this big and it took me about a hundred before I felt really proficient. And I was talking to a woman today about hers and she’s 50, but is estrogen dominant.

And so we were kind of going through like all the things that could be contributing to this and saying to her, like your cortisol is flat and you know, you’re, you’re estrogen dominant and you know, your melatonin’s off and you’re not making a lot of cortisol. I think it can be a really invaluable test.

I’m so glad that you offer that to your clients and your patients, because it’s another piece of the puzzle. Like we [00:44:00] still need blood labs. That’s still very helpful, super, super helpful to see how we metabolize estrogen. What’s our circadian rhythm look like, plot it out on a graph. And what’s our melatonin.

Like I was actually surprised this woman’s melatonin was in the forties, which was probably the highest I’ve seen in awhile. I have a lot of people who have like a melatonin, a five I’m like, Ooh, that’s not good. But I think it’s really valuable to have different pieces of the puzzle so that you can make the best decisions.

Like I do a Dutch every year. At least I do a GI map every year, at least. And I find that it’s incredibly helpful and allows me to kind of stay the course, like, am I on the right course? Or am I not on the right course? And what do I need to do to course correct? Because even us as clinicians and teachers, we still have to do our own work.

Like. Embarrassingly enough. I have no problem sharing this with your community. I’ve done a lot of travel, a lot of international travel and a colleague of mine based on some of the places I’ve traveled to kept saying, I think you have a parasite because we had done every [00:45:00] test in the world could not find this parasite.

So I actually ended up having a very. Expensive microscopy test done here in the United States. And sure enough, I had two parasites. It just goes to show that sometimes you really have to dig deeper, but I knew something was wrong and you know, none of the conventional things were figuring it out. But now that I’ve been through that protocol, my husband’s been through the same protocol.

I feel a whole lot better. It’s amazing. What we will put up with thinking is what’s normal when it is. Oh, common is not normal. And I love what you say. You know, I’m so passionate about encouraging people to do a deep investigation of any equals one of your cells, blood chemistry, full bloods, not just, you know, what’s my leaping panel doing what is my fasting glucose like the full thyroid panel, including reverse T3 and misery of our adrenal health.

Uh, the Dutch, there are other sophisticated stool tests now yearly. And imagine [00:46:00] the reduction in disease. I remember doing my master of human nutrition and I distinctly remember. The lecturer is saying, there is no way to measure if someone is pre-diabetic, there’s no screening with currently happening.

And so every time I coach my clients to work with their GP to get a full blood panel, I give them the list of markers. One of them is fasting insulin. I mean, why aren’t we measuring fasting insulin? I just don’t get it. I’m so confused. I’m interviewing Dr. David Perlmutter on Wednesday for the podcast and this new book is called drop acid.

And so it’s about uric acid. And so like I’m seeing a whole other side of uric acid. This is another metabolic marker. I may have to add this to my list of recommendations. Really good, Bob. Like I think it might be my favorite book that he has written, but drop acid is really looking at the role of uric acid and fructose consumption.

That’s why I was talking a lot about fructose because I read his book over the weekend, but I agree with you that we need these metabolic markers. I tell everyone, in [00:47:00] fact, there’s a company called so well and you can do instant at-home fasting and fun, but it’s like metabolic markers, but you can do it at home.

I love that. She, yeah, she’s a physician. Uh, yeah, so good. Amazing. Yeah. And she’s absolutely lovely. I had her on the podcast. I was like for all the patients who tell me that their primary care provider or internist or GYN or whomever will not order a fasting insulin. Now you can go through their company and a physician actually looks at the lab.

So if there’s anything that’s of concern, they’ll reach out. But it’s really been. Enlightening for me, how many clinicians are not willing to order a fasting insulin? Cause they don’t know how to interpret it. exactly. It’s like then find out because I can’t tell you how many people have a relatively normal fasting glucose, a relatively normal hemoglobin A1C.

And then their fasting insulin is 10 and I’m like, well, or their fasting, leptin’s 25. And I’m like, well, you [00:48:00] know, Jesus, well, it’s so difficult for you. Yeah. Like we we’re making it. What I find it’s heartbreaking for me, you know, it can be so easy for some people and it can be so like pushing. I can’t swear on this, but pushing , you know, for others, but there’s always a reason.

So we have to dig deeper and we have to take responsibility for our own self. No one else is going to, but that actually brings me to a beautiful quote of yours, which I totally agree with. I’m a master in psycho linguistics, which is combining all the functional medicine principles and investigation.

We’ve talked about with the language that we use mainly with ourselves and with others. And I always say to people where the thoughts that we have represent our beliefs or our limiting beliefs, unfortunately, a 90% of the same as the thoughts you have the day before. So what are your thoughts saying about you?

Are they supporting your health or are you driving yourself into the ground? And you’ve got a beautiful [00:49:00] quote about fasting and health? I do not believe nor do I support the limiting belief that women have to accept weight gain as a normal function of aging. Cynthia Bravo, what a beautiful quote. Talk to me about that.

That was out of utter frustration because when I know truly, I mean, when I hit the wall of peri-menopause, uh, I was doing everything wrong, really stressful, demanding job and cardiology husband traveled a lot internationally young kids, probably over exercising, probably too low carb diet, not sleeping enough.

And so my primary care provider who is Nevada person said, you know, you’re like a 43 year old woman, like. And I just said I’m five foot, three, 10 pounds on me as a lot really is. And so I was stuck and I was so frustrated and some people would have taken that and been sad about it. And it just made me mad, made me mad and motivated.

And so [00:50:00] I, I’m a huge proponent of women. Not buying into that methodology of like, this is just the way things are going to be, because that’s complete BS. I mean, you and I are a part of a large group of women and men for that matter, who we’re all at different age groups that all look amazing. And so it’s not so much about the physicality as much as it is about us feeling about ourselves and the recognition that we have to change what we’re doing.

Like you just don’t have the same flexibility in your twenties and thirties as you do in your forties and fifties. And we get flexible in some areas and less flexible than others. And so. I think you really have to find your Anub one. Like, what is your sleep need to be like your stress management nutrition, which is so critically important and not enough people talk about it.

And I think people put coup elimination diets, but they can be hugely impactful, but also validate the standard. After all this, after many, many decades, I love I’m a big fan. They’re a big part of my, [00:51:00] yeah. And really getting real about like, what’s your nutrition? Like, are you under eating your protein? You know, reading your carbs.

And you know, we know that as women start losing estrogen, Astra dial, it’s an insulin sensitizing hormone. So what does that mean? It means you can’t eat carbs like you did. That’s a fact, obviously the more metabolically flexible you are the better off you are, but that doesn’t mean that you can eat copious amounts of anything carbohydrate wise.

Unfortunately. So I think on so many levels. When I said that quote, it was out of utter frustration and I really live that fervently. And I want women to know that they don’t have to buy into that. What I call antiquated dogma that you’re above the age of 40, 45, 50, whatever that age is. And somehow you’re invisible.

You’re irrelevant. You’re not important. Unfortunately, I think especially here in the United States, we’re a very age focused culture. So I think women feel uncomfortable talking about their age to feel uncomfortable, talking about what’s changing to their minds. And so that whole shaming and methodology, I think it’s really important [00:52:00] for us to just be real and, you know, certainly be transparent.

I have no problems telling people that, you know, there will always be things that we have to kind of find workarounds for. You know, I’ll be the first person to say that writing a book and trying to, you know, get lots of pre-sales and, you know, try to impact as many lives as possible is super stressful.

It’s like running a marathon every day. I work very hard on the other side to like manage my stress and kind of work on the parasympathetics the restaurant repost side of my body and all the things I do to help with sleep. And so each one of us has our own little journey, but no one has to accept that gaining weight is part of the way things will be as you move forward, unless you’re grossly underweight and you’re not healthy, then obviously.

It would be in your best interest to be healthy. But unfortunately I think there’s just kind of mindset around aging is really detrimental to women. I think it really does. It’s a tremendous disservice, you know, one of the examples I’ll give is the new sex in the [00:53:00] city show. That’s out. There’s been a lot of talk about what the women look like and how they dress.

And I was like, you know, if this was a bunch of meds, That had a rerun of a show that was out 20 years ago, no one would be as fixated, but you know, we sometimes are in a culture that can be pretty cruel. And so I hope that there’s more acceptance of what a normal person looks like as they’re aging, so that women don’t feel as much pressure to look perfect because that’s not sustainable.

And it’s exhausting. Um, yeah, you’re right. In terms of that toxicity towards each other and be a culture of judgment. And interestingly, you know, if you’re judging someone that comes from within, so bringing it back to fasting, one of the benefits people don’t realize. And I think people talk about the weight loss and probably the increased focus and clarity of thinking, but the increase in self-esteem, which improves relationships with yourself and with others.

So there’s just so many benefits to [00:54:00] adopting this lifestyle, including anti aging. So we might not need other interventions. So Cynthia, what’s something you’re personally working on yourself now. Like what are you looking to? You’ll let me scientist and always, I’m always looking at upleveling, my health.

What are you personally working? Right now I’m biohacking sleep. That has been, I mean, I knew heading into the bulk launch that I was going to need to be even more diligent. And so I’ve been experimenting with super physiologic melatonin, which melatonin is more than just a hormone. It’s a master antioxidant.

Um, I would say that and just really being good about I’m working on my heart rate variability, so nice seeing the autonomic nervous system. So those are two areas that like, when I say work, it is I’m really diligently working on those because it gives you so many benefits. And for me, sleep is like an art on [00:55:00] constantly tinkering with supplements and melatonin and magnesium soaks.

And I mean, there’s all sorts of things. You always say, I’ve got my super sexy blue blockers on, but there’s all sorts of things that I endeavor to work on so that my sleep quality remains really optimized so that I can like tackle my day and be really productive and. Still be a good mom and a good wife and take care of my, my doodles, my dogs be of service to my community.

So yeah, I think it’s, there’s so many, so many little factors that come into play. I love that. Thank you for sharing. Cause I think it’s important even as health practitioners, that I’m always striving to improve my health. And that’s why I called my company the global field better Institute. Cause we’re all trying.

Well, hopefully we’re all trying to feel better that little bit better every day and because feeling good makes you feel good. If I was your daughter, Cynthia, what message would you instill in me? [00:56:00] Oh gosh. I mean, I think if I had a daughter and I don’t, I have all boys, but if I had a daughter, I would want her to understand the gift of being a woman and how innately beautiful becoming a woman is and the menstrual cycle and educating her about how to maximize.

Each part of her cycle, like I never knew that you can be more physically active and workout harder. And then beginning of your cycle and things you can do to benefit the follicular versus luteal phases. I think those are the things I think would have been a gift to have known. And I just don’t think we, as a society were as sophisticated, you know, back when I first started getting my menstrual cycle stuff, I had a daughter that would definitely be part of it, but I think also encouraging her to honor her own individuality.

I certainly grew up with parents, you know, I’m a people pleaser and my parents were divorced very much a people pleaser. And so. You know, I’m a reformed people pleaser, but I think it’s important for young women to [00:57:00] understand that they don’t have to be in a position where they feel like they have to be accommodating instead, you know, articulating what they want and need to have happen and not feel like they have to accommodate.

And I’m not saying this in a negative way, just not to be as accommodating. I think that that would probably be the prevailing and I certainly have young men and they’re not people pleasers and they’re not accommodating. And so I think that’s a really good way to kind of navigate life, like thinking for yourself, articulating how you feel, being a good human being of course, being smart and intelligent and thoughtful, but not being a people pleaser.

Yeah. And I think that just comes from honoring myself. Your sons have learned that from you and whatever modeling is happening at home. So it’s obviously it’s a Testament to your amazing parenting. I think I would love to meet your voice. Tell me who has been an inspiring mentor to you personally, or professionally or both?

Whoever becomes to mind it’s had an impact. [00:58:00] I probably have a couple of mentors when I think about them. And one was actually someone I interviewed on the podcast a few years ago and I initially chose. My older son to her as a clinician. And then I went to see her because after being in the hospital, I was a disaster.

And then my younger son went to see her. And then I ended up working with her on like a professional level. And she’s someone I really admire enormously and has taught me so much about myself and, you know, navigating the entrepreneurial space. I think that the entrepreneurs that I’ve interacted with with over the past several years are just some of the kindest, smartest wisest.

Passionate people I’ve ever met in my entire life. And they are such, go-givers like, they genuinely want to make the world a better place and they genuinely want to help each other. And so I feel so very grateful. So I think of that woman in particular and she’s in my book, she’s actually one of the people I wrote in the acknowledgement section, so [00:59:00] amazing.

So good, beautiful. So Cynthia is so accomplished. You’ve got your amazing podcast, everyday wellness, always putting out more and more beautiful messages and being a change maker. Tell me what adventure you are embarking on next. Uh, well, the adventure I’m embarking on right now is the book. So intermittent fasting transformation.

I have 45 is my book that we published officially March 15th. Yay. Yes, you can grab it off the website, www.cynthiathurlow.com. You can find it on target, Amazon Barnes and noble or your local bookstore. There are a lot of pre-sale bonuses that will only be available up until the publication date. So there is a masterclass of may.

There’s something called clean and 14. There are all sorts of other bonuses that will help take your results to another level. I’m really, really excited. I think a lot of people do book bonuses and they don’t end up being particularly helpful. [01:00:00] So these are definitely book bonuses that will take your experience to a whole other level.

So I feel really, really grateful. And thank you again for having. Oh, Cynthia, and anyone that’s listening, this book is awesome. So clear, so practical and the recipes and you’re right. Those bonuses getting and get those bonuses because I think you’re right. Bonuses can perhaps sometimes not be helpful, but also sometimes they’re hidden gems and you don’t even realize that you’ve got access to them.

So yeah, my advice would be to grab those bonuses. And if there is anyone that is a remaster of intermittent fasting in particular for women. Anyone, it needs to look at this way that human beings are supposed to behave. Yeah. It’s been an absolute pleasure to have you on the show today. So graceful, so courageous, so fearless.

Thank you so much for your time generosity now. Thank you for having. Really been a pleasure [01:01:00] if you made it to the end of this episode, celebrate yourself because it means you are truly dedicated to feeling better in your health, in your career, in your relationships. And I am so proud of you. And if you want more.

Feel better now. So tune in every Monday for new episodes and join our community on Instagram at Jackie Barker for all the behind the scenes action and more. Hey, why don’t you sign up for a chance to have your question answered@fieldphyticinstitute.com slash signup. That’s feel better institute.com/signup, but most of all, please keep reaching to feel better because the world needs you to feel good.

So you can share that very special gift that only you have. So with that said you soon here’s to feeling better now,

[01:02:00] Jackie.