Hot Girls Should NOT Have Tummy Issues! Bloating, Farts & Hormone Chaos | Amy Migdalia

So many women think I have a hormone problem. That's what it is. I have a hormone problem. What might they actually find if they look deeper? Hormones are never a root cause. They are downstream from upstream root causes. Diet, blood sugar, digestion, underlying inflammation infection, environmental toxins, sleep, stress, and exercise. Those are the eight foundational things that influence hormones. Everybody says hot girls have tummy issues. Ladies, you should not be farting. That's a sign that digestive isn't dysfunction. Growing up, you're like, oh, I have a food baby. Not normal. Common, not normal. I fart after every meal. Common, not normal. And this is something else that surprises people. After you go number two, and you wipe, there shouldn't be due to one of the toilet paper. [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] Apparently, farting is bad. This should be on worldwide news. Today's guests completely change the way I think about digestion, hormones, and where most health problems actually start. Amy McDalia is a functional and holistic health practitioner, a former attorney, wife, mom, and someone who got thrown into her own health struggles and became obsessed with finding real root cause answers. Her entire approach is built around what she calls the three ease, eating, environment, and extras. And she believes that what looks like a hormone problem is often something much deeper upstream. In this episode, we get into where to begin on your health journey if you're a first timer, how to support your body after antibiotics, performance, optimization for athletes, the easiest way to get a skeptical husband on board with healthier habits. And this is a great tip, and so much more. Amy is one of my dear friends in absolute delight, and I have a feeling she's about to become one of your favorite guests, too. Watch this episode on the Real Alex Clark YouTube channel or culture apothecary on Spotify. Please pause, leave a five-star review to support us for all the hard work that we put into each show to keep it free for you. Please welcome holistic health practitioner, Amy McDalia, to culture apothecary. First of all, you and I are new friends. We hit it off instantly. And I think that you're going to be such a breath of fresh air for my audience because there's a lot of people who feel discouraged because they may have started off living very conventional lives. Now they're seeing the fruit of that. And it's not good fruit. And they're wanting to redo everything to get their health back on track, but they have no idea where to start. They also wonder, is it too late? My kids are, I don't know, eight, nine years old. They've been eating this way now for their entire life, almost a decade. Like, can I really change things up at this point? And what I love about your story, Amy, is that you had the same type of life. You were living a very conventional life. You were not crunchy whatsoever. You married an NFL player. You guys had kids. And then you started having issues and so did your husband, right? Yes, I grew up standard American diet, conventional products. I'm Hispanic. My mom uses Chlorox bleach. Like, we're using all the toxins. We're eating, you know, ruffles, cheddar sour cream chips, all the things. My idea of health at the time, because I was an athlete, and my husband was an athlete. We both met in college. He played football. I played softball. We started dating. The rest was history. Our idea of health was how you looked on the outside, right? And I also grew up in the era of like fitness and kind of like bodybuilding. And so before my husband and I got married, I actually did a bodybuilding show where it was like all about how you looked on the outside. Through that process, I wrecked my metabolism. I wrecked my gut. I struggled with acne. I went on a short run of acutane. I mean, I was just doing all the wrong things, and trying to fix what was going on on the outside with external things. So fast forward, I have kids. In 2018, I had two kids at the time, I have three kids, but at the time, I had two kids. My husband, since the day I met him, popped a legra or zertik every single day for allergies, struggled with eczema, snored at night. And as a professional athlete, you have to be able to recover well at night, because in the NFL, your football games are, there's only days in between each game, so you have to recover really quickly. My oldest struggled with severe constipation, skin issues. I made it everything conventional. So 2018, my second child sprays bleach in his eye. And I'm like, freaking out. I turn the bottle over, and there's skulls, flames, call poison control, and I'm like, wait, what do I do? I call my husband crying. I'm like, flushing his eyes out, and I'm like, have I just poisoned and blinded my child. And he's like, it's gonna be okay, it's gonna be okay. Like, we'll pray about it. It's fine, it's fine, it's fine. Praise the Lord, he was fine. But after that day, I was just like, why do I have this stuff in my house? And so it really started with my environment, where I usually tell people to start with your food, right? That's the easiest thing to control, and it's the cheapest thing to do. But I actually started with my environment, and I tossed out cleaning products, laundry detergent. I'm very all-in, okay? My personality, I'm radical, I'm like, listen, when I rededicated my life to the Lord, I was like, throwing little Wayne CDs out of the window. I am all-in, okay? When I decide that I'm gonna do something, I do it, and I go 100% and nobody else is gonna convince me otherwise. So for about two or three weeks, my husband would come home, and there'd be a different trash bag. And he's like, what are you doing? And I'm like, I promise, it's toxic, just trust me. So we started out cleaning up our environment, and then that led me down the rabbit hole of like, really paying attention to the ingredients of the foods that I was feeding myself. My family, my kids, my husband, and I'm like, this has gotta be connected to these health issues. I'm reading labels, and I'm like, what is this, because I only paid attention to the front. It's organic, it's gluten-free, it's, you know, 100 calories, you grew up on the 100 calories packs, okay? I like lived and died by the 100 calorie packs or low fat. And I'm like, reading the ingredients, and I'm like, I don't even know what this is. I have no idea what this is. So, changed up our diet, changed up our environment. At this point, not taking really any supplements, no labs, nothing. And those two like big areas, husband's eximo went away. Allergies went away completely. No longer takes Allegra, no longer takes Ertec. Kids digestion issues, constipation went away. Skin issues with the kids went away. I mean, just like everything started disappearing. Why is it bad if you're somebody that's popping Allegra or Ertec every night? When you take any type of prescription medication, whether it's over the counter or through a doctor, every prescription has some sort of mechanism of action, okay? So, it's either going to block a specific pathway or enhance a specific pathway. There's gonna have side effects with that, right? So, if you're popping Allegra and Ertec every day, it's gonna have an impact on your gut. For example, it's gonna have impact on your liver. It's gonna have an impact on other bodily systems that you shouldn't have to take those things in order to go about your day and not have your eyes watering and you're sniffling or you're sneezing all the time. And I am big in my practice with the people that we work with is getting to the root cause of what's going on. Because when your body is having an external symptom, whether it be the acne that I was struggling with or my digestive issues or my husband's skin issues or his allergies, your body's telling you something's going on. Something is going on, but you gotta figure out what's going on internally and what's driving that. And that's what we figured out with my husband and myself and my kids, what we were eating, what we were drinking, the toxins in the home, proper sleep, getting to underlying inflammation levels. I mean, even proper hydration, right? Making sure that we were drinking enough water. We've always exercised, we've always moved. Like I said, we're both athletes. So, that's never been an issue, but yeah, I mean, if you get to the root cause of what's driving and usually with allergies, it's gut-related, right? Because the gut is tied to everything, which is why it's foundational. It is tied to the liver. It is tied to the thyroid. It is tied to the brain. It is tied to insulin and blood sugar regulation. It is tied to hormones. I mean, usually when there's a breakdown in the gut, that's the first thing that happens. There's a breakdown in the gut, which again, if your gut is in dysfunction, you're not absorbing properly. And so if you're not absorbing your vitamins, your minerals or key nutrients for other systems in organs in the body, it's a recipe for disaster. You have basically done all of the main work in your own living environment. But you said you hadn't started any supplements, you hadn't started any blood testing or hormone testing or any of that stuff. So, who did you end up using to do all that? Okay, so fun fact, my friend Taylor Dukes. So, this is how her and I met. She started out as my practitioner. Now she's just a dear friend. But from 2018 to about 2020, that's when I had my whole epiphany. And then I started helping family and friends. And by trade, I'm an attorney. I have my JD and my MBA, and I thought I was gonna be like suits, okay? If y'all've seen this show, I was like, I'm gonna be like, you know, a corporate, imminent attorney, and like, you know, all the things. And then the Lord was like, nope, you're not. But I went back to school in 2020 to become a health practitioner. And that same year, I tore my Achilles. And after surgery, I, you know, had reoccurring UTIs, yeast infections because they anesthesia and the painkillers disrupted my gut. So I reached out to Taylor because another friend of mine, Alison Evans, who's one of the founders of Branch Basics, had been working with her. And so we got connected. We worked together. She ran my labs. It was the first time I had gotten my blood work, still testing food sensitivity. We just like did the whole thing 'cause I was like, I do not feel right. And I know what it's like to feel good. and I have a feeling that the surgery disrupted everything. So Taylor Ray. and all my labs, she did it for my husband too. We went on like, you know, a 12-week protocol and like everything went away. - Everything is so connected. So that's how I met you was through Taylor and Allison and there's such dear friends at the show. Obviously I talk about branch basics all the time. I used Taylor Duke's electrolytes, protein powder, all the things every day. So I am so stoked to have you. 'Cause as soon as I met you, I was like, oh my audience will love you. - Yeah. - 'Cause you just tell it how it is. - Absolutely. - But also, I don't think that you are aggressive and that you are very relatable and that you weren't doing everything perfect and you found a way and you slowly figured it out. And so I think that that will give people a lot of encouragement and hope. So what belief about health did you have to completely unlearn throughout this journey? - That it does not matter what you look like on the outside because I have worked with professional athletes who look amazing on the outside and are a wreck internally. A complete wreck. And this is for men and women because I see women fall into the trap of comparing themselves to these fitness influencers that are on Instagram who look amazing, right? Like they have like what we would define is like perfect bodies and chiseled abs and all the thing. And I'm like, yeah, but their hormones are a wreck. They haven't had a cycle. And I know this from experience because I was one of those girls. In my prep for that, you know, bodybuilding competition, I was like, oh my gosh, I look so good. I lost my cycle. I wrecked my metabolism. I destroyed my gut. Like it comes at a cost. The biggest wake-up call was like, just because somebody looks healthy on the outside does not mean that they actually are. And just because somebody, you know, maybe doesn't look, you know, super ripped or super lean doesn't mean that they're not in good health as well. I'm not saying if somebody's overweight because I don't subscribe to the whole body positivity movement. - No one with common sense should. - Right, you know, if somebody is extremely overweight, that presents a real concern. And issue with their health. That's not to say that I don't think you're still beautiful how God made you, but 1,000% it needs to be addressed. - Right. - And by the same token, I've worked with clients who are too thin and need to gain weight, right? So there's a healthy balance of optimal health. - So if you met the old Amy today, what health advice would the old Amy roll her eyes at that the new Amy does? - Stop paying attention to the number of calories. That's all I paid attention to. I was like, if I am under this certain number of calories, then I'm good. I do not count a single thing and not one person that we have ever worked with. Counts a single calorie, counts a single macro. And for my ladies who are like struggling to lose weight, all of my clients end up eating more and lose weight. If you're trying to lose weight, why wouldn't you count calories? - So at a basic level, like scientifically, if you operate in a calorie deficit, sure, you'll lose weight. But how you go about losing weight, there's a healthy way and an unhealthy way. Weight loss is not complicated. It is a mechanism of insulin and glucose regulation. So here's what happens. What you eat, what you drink has a massive impact on blood sugar regulation. So if you eat a food or a beverage that spikes glucose, it signals to your pancreas to release insulin because glucose is regulated in a very, very tight window, okay? So the pancreas is like, emergency, emergency. And it's like, we got to release insulin. And insulin is what brings glucose back down into range. Well, insulin is also a hormone. And it is your fat storing hormone. So every time glucose spikes, you're going into fat storing mode for six to eight hours. What causes glucose to spike? Starches, refined carbohydrates, sugar, even natural forms. So depending on the level of blood sugar and dysregulation that you have, sometimes we have clients cut out fruit and starches even in their whole food forms. Obviously ultra-process foods, you know, your chips, your crackers, your candy, all of that's going to spike glucose. But there are even some whole foods that will spike glucose as well. Rises, potatoes, you know, more sugary fruits like bananas. Again, not demonizing those things. But if you are somebody who is struggling to lose weight and your glucose is extremely dysregulated, so I look at your lab work and glucose is elevated. Insulin is elevated, leptin is elevated, A1C is elevated. Then it's like, hey, for a short temporary amount of time, we may have to eliminate those things in order to get your glucose back in balance. So then what is the ideal diet? If you need to eliminate those, you just say go keto, do you say go carnivore for a short time? At that point in time, it's like focus on protein. Protein and fats will not, will not elevate glucose. So your meats, your seafoods, your eggs, dairy can be a little dicey for some people. Everybody's level of insulin sensitivity is different. Okay. That's another thing you have to pay attention to. You'll see all these fitness people on Instagram that are super fit and lean. And they're eating, you know, potatoes and rice and fruit. Well, the average American is not training, you know, for hours and hours and hours. So I'm speaking to the average, you know, mom or dad who might get in a 30 minute workout each day. You do not have as much metabolic flexibility to maybe eat what those people can eat, right? Because when you have healthy skeletal muscle mass, it provides excess glucose uptake. That's just a fancy way of saying, you can store more glucose in the muscles when you have more muscle mass. So our professional athletes might be a little bit more metabolic flexible than say, you know, a stay at home, mom of three. Okay. Just because, you know, that man or woman is eating that way doesn't mean that you should. So at a basic level, you would want to eat foods that don't spike glucose. So protein, fat and fiber. Protein, like I said, your meats, your seafoods, your eggs, your poultry, fats can be things like, you know, avocado, olives, butter. And then your fiber, yes, fruit is a source of fiber. But again, if I was somebody who was focused on glucose regulation, I would have my fiber sources as like vegetables, leafy greens, fermented foods. And that will not affect glucose at all. If I dropped you into the average Americans life tomorrow and you could only change three things, what would those three things be? Okay, diets number one, diet, what you eat and drink and do not discount your beverages, y'all. So an ideal diet should look like what? For the basic person that doesn't have excess amount of weight to lose, just a little bit of weight, maybe. Just stick to real whole foods, okay? I'm talking like it doesn't require a label. Single ingredient items, chicken breasts. Chicken breasts, you know what it is, doesn't require a label. Broccoli, you know what it is, doesn't require a label. Single ingredient, whole food items. The way I like to explain it is from the farm to the fork, okay? If you see it raised or grown on the farm, play it on your fork. There are no cracker bushes, okay? You can't pick your cracker. There's no Oreo trees, you're not pulling an Oreo from a tree, like, and then even, I know this is probably controversial, but even like bread. So all of our, you know, homemade sourdough, while I love a good homemade sourdough, if you were really just trying to pair it down and not be overwhelmed, just pick single ingredient items. That's a great place to start. If you have the budget and you can go organic, grass-fed, grass-finished, all those things, absolutely right, but like 1000%. Even if you're just eating conventional ground beans. 1000% still do it. Okay, I did not grow up in a wealthy home. I am Cuban, my parents are immigrants. They came here with the clothes on their back, worked hard for everything, you know, that they had. We had conventional stuff growing up. I grew up on like white rice and black beans and chicken, like the cheapest of the cheap. So what I tell people on what my practitioners, you know, say the same thing, if you can just start out with conventional, do it. And then if you can afford organic, grass-fed, great. That is still gonna be 1000 times better than you getting some packaged or processed snack that comes out of a box or a bag or even fast food. And we actually did a reel on this a while back. I had my operations manager go to Chick-fil-A, buy a bag of Chick-fil-A and it came out to like $18. And then I had one of my practitioners go to the store and get a bag of rice, ground beef, some raw cheese. We got like the highest quality that you could get. 'Cause we just wanted it to break down. So it was like organic rice, grass-fed beef, raw cheese and then like a vegetable. And the price point difference, even using the organic and the grass-fed was night and day. And we got like, that Chick-fil-A was more expensive. The Chick-fil-A, one meal. Where you're only getting one meal was way more expensive than the rice, ground beef, veggie and raw cheese bowl. That was organic, grass-fed, all the things, right? And it would have fed five or six people. So this is what like when RFK talks about this and then people troll him online or like this is insane, like him saying people need to be eating organic food. Nobody can afford this. But how many times a week are you door dashing? It's like, people have been totally brainwashed by big food. Like that talking point of fast food is cheap. It's not, that has been pervasive for decades and it's not, especially now in this economy, fast food is so unbelievably outrageously fast food. - And so is door dashing, Uber E. - Yes. People have to be real with themselves. Open up your bank account. Look at how much money you're actually spending. I did this with my sister and my brother-in-law 'cause they were like going on a health kick and they were like, we didn't realize that we were spending like $700 a month, whether it was like eating out or you know, door dashing or Uber Eats or like it adds up. You take that cost off, I am telling you. It is way cheaper. The point of the Chick-fil-A versus like the organic grass-fed, let's just say you couldn't even afford that. If you did conventional ground beef, conventional rice, conventional cheese, although there's ingredients in that, a conventional vegetable, it would be even cheaper. The point that we wanted to make was that the fast food was still more expensive, even when we chose the grass-fed organic options. And we cooked it at home. And by the way, it is way faster to cook at home than door dashing. because another, I can't even tell you how mental and mindset-focused health is. People assume that if you cook at home, it's a three-hour process. I'm like, no. I can brown ground beef in six minutes. Add some taco seasoning. Get, you know, get a cheese grater and shred my cheese. Get some, you know, sour crowd, which is like, you know, fermented cabbage, sliced up in avocado, and I have a full meal for my family in literally 15 minutes. 15 minutes. I don't care what door dasher you think you have. It's about 45 minutes for a door dasher or Uber Eats person to come into. If, if people can get over the mental hump of cooking, it's going to take longer and it's going to be more strenuous, it's not. It's really not. We're dropping into the average American's home. Amy can only choose three things. First was food. Food, fat food and beverage. I would group those together like just drink water. You want to save more money? Get ready your coffee. Get ready your teas. Get rid of your lattes. Get rid of your alcohol. Get rid of your juices. Forget the side drinks. Just stick to water. Cleaning products and laundry detergent because your cleaning products touch every surface of your home and your laundry detergent touches your clothing, your bedding, your pillowcases, your towel, and then eliminate your candles and room sprays and anything that would fragrance the home. Why? Well, I mean, that's the most pervasive thing, right? So if we have the glazed plug-ins, we have the candles burning, we're spraying for breeze. I mean, those fragrances are pervasive and there's, I would say fragrance is like the artificial or natural flavors in the food world. Fragrance can be a concoction of a hundred to a thousand different, you know, chemical components. You have no idea. So does that mean nobody can ever enjoy lighting a candle or having something that smells good again? No. Like food, you pay attention to the ingredients in your home. So let's say you wanted a better candle. Look for a beeswax candle that's scented with just real essential oils, the end. But to the part of overwhelm and budget, you don't even have to have that. Just eliminate it. Toss it out of your home. You don't have to replace that. You literally don't have to replace the candle if you don't want to. You don't have to replace the for breeze. You don't have to replace the glued, the glazed plug-ins. Like people think that making swaps has to be super expensive. When a lot of times it can be a simple elimination and you're not even spending any money yet. Yeah. You don't have to swap. You can just clean it up. Correct. And then open your windows or your doors, right? Get some fresh air in the house, stagnant air and, you know, all the fragrance. Your home should be your sanctuary. And it's oftentimes the most toxic environment that you're in all day, as opposed to like being out and about in your, you know, in fresh air. So I would say my three things are what you eat and drink, those environmental things. And I would say exercise and moving the body. You got to sweat. Okay. A lot of people are sedentary or they're like, well, I went on a walk and I'm like, you need to listen weights. We need some resistance training. Healthy skeletal muscle mass is such an important factor for longevity. And like I mentioned before, having healthy skeletal muscle has benefits for blood sugar regulation, excess glucose uptake, even mental health, right? Like there's different neurotransmitters and hormones that are released when we're exercising and we're moving and we're sweating. And it helps with your body's internal detoxification system, right? Like, okay, you don't have access to a sauna. Go outside and work out. Okay. Get in the sun, sweat. There's your free outdoor sauna. Okay. Like I think people over complicate health and it doesn't need to be complicated. And it certainly doesn't need to be expensive. I am not one of these like biohack gurlies. I don't wear an aura ring. I'm not tracking my sleep. I'm not like, I'm just doing the basics. Like let's get back to the foundations, right? Let's get back to the foundations. What are we eating and drinking? You know, our environment and the toxins associated. Are we sleeping? Guys, we got to sleep, right? And I'm not like, don't go to bed at midnight and then wake up, you know, eight hours later. Go to bed. And your body is preparing for sleep as the sun goes down. What's your ideal bedtime for you and your husband? I would say an hour or two after the sun goes down. We usually go to bed between like eight, thirty and nine o'clock. Wow. And then you wake up at what time five? I wake up between five and six without an alarm. Right. Yeah. I'm the same way. Yeah. Yeah. I don't use an alarm either. It's something else that people don't know. And this ties back to digestion and blood sugar regulation. When the sun goes down, your body is prepping for sleep. So there's two important hormones, melatonin and cortisol. Melatonin is your sleep hormone. That should be increasing as the sun goes down. Okay. Candle down, turn your artificial lights off. You know, get off your phone, your TV. As melatonin increases and the body is preparing for sleep, it slows down other processes in the body. One of those being the pancreas. So if the pancreas is slowing down, it's ability to release insulin and be metabolically flexible is not there. You should not be digesting food or trying to metabolize food when the body is prepping for sleep. And when your blood sugar is dysregulated, it throws off cortisol. Cortisol is the hormone that's responsible for waking you up. So a classic symptom that we see when people have blood sugar dysregulation is they're waking up in the middle of the night. You know, they're like, I wake up at two or three just to wake up or I'll wake up at the middle of the night to go use a bathroom, clear sign of blood sugar dysregulation. So if you can move up your dinner time to like, you know, between five and six p.m. And then allow your body to fully digest, which shakes about four to five hours. By the time you're sleeping and melatonin is increasing cortisol is depressed. As it should be, you're going to be much more metabolically flexible. You're going to be able to restore, recover, and detoxify during sleep, not digesting and metabolizing. So a lot of people don't realize like your circadian rhythm is important. Obviously for several reasons, but it also has impact for blood sugar insulin, which affects weight and proper digestion. Another thing people are, I'm not hungry when I wake up. I'm like, yeah, yay, late. And if you eat late, that food hasn't even properly digested. So when you wake up, you're not hungry. So there's so many like, there's so many positive impacts for having an earlier dinner and an earlier bed time. Even if two people got the same amount of hours of sleep, the person that went to bed earlier is going to have a much better metabolic and digestive response and likely be healthier weight wise too. And what time do you guys normally eat dinner? Well, our kids play sports. So sometimes the dinner time can be a little off, but ideally, yeah, I would be having dinner between five and six p.m. There are even some days when I'll have dinner at four thirty, but I wake up really early. So if I'm waking up between five and six and I'm having breakfast, you know, within thirty minutes of waking, I'm eating breakfast between six and six thirty. And I like to have a gap in between my meals because again, digestion takes four to five hours to fully complete. And if you are eating every two to three hours, you haven't even completed digestion. And guess what's happened? You're exhausting digestive enzymes and you're exhausting one very, very important thing. You're stomach acid, hydrochloric acid. I can't tell you how many people have digestive issues because of low HCl and low stomach acid. So we don't want to deplete those things. We want those things to be robust. We want to have robust levels of those. And then from a blood sugar standpoint, if you're eating constantly throughout the day, you don't ever give glucose enough time to come back down. You're going to have a natural rise, regardless of what you eat. That's normal. But you need to have that natural come back down as well. Okay, this makes me laugh. I get a lot of hate online trolls, you know, people offended by my political views or whatever, you name it. And they're go to insult for some reason is to accuse me of having Botox. First of all, I have not gotten Botox since August of 2023. And by the way, it lasts like three months. So I will take that compliment because honestly, I think it's from the blue beauty drink from Taylor Deuce Wellness. This is anti-aging from the inside out. It's powered by blue spirulina, bovine collagen, biotin, and amla, real superfoods that work at the cellular level to nourish your hair, skin, nails, and even your gut. The collagen is the hero here. It supports elasticity. It helps smooth the appearance of fine lines, strengthens nails, supports healthy hair growth. All the things we're trying to accomplish is women. And it actually tastes really good. It's really lightly sweet. It's super refreshing. There's a hint of citrus from real ingredients only. Nothing artificial, no neon nonsense. I mix it with water every afternoon for hydration or I'll make it into a little mocktail moment when I want something fun, but still functionally you can add some cherry juice. If you want beauty that starts internally instead of just at the injection office, this is it. Go to TaylorDeuceWellness.com, use Code Alex Clark for 10% off the Blue Beauty Drink. That's TaylorDeuceWellness.com. Code Alex Clark for 10% off the Blue Beauty Drink. I have a friend. She goes on her first date with a guy and somehow they get on the topic of toothpaste. And he goes, "Yeah, I use this red cinnamon toothpaste with sparkles." And she's like, "Wait, doesn't that have red 40?" And he goes, "Well, yeah, but I found a case in an abandoned warehouse, an abandoned warehouse." He's like, "They don't even make it anymore, but I use it because it makes my brain feel buzzy." And she's like, "That seems dangerous. What if it's expired?" And he just looks at her and he goes, "I like danger." And obviously, obviously, she said yes to a second date. Sometimes your friends make terrible decisions. Don't be like my friend and don't be like her warehouse toothpaste boyfriend. Zeebra. Their toothpaste tablets are actually clean. No floor. I had no weird questionable ingredients. No dyes. Just chew, brush, done. It's simple. It works. And you're not brushing your teeth with something that sounds like a science experiment. And while you're at it, their floss is made of real silk, peppermint oil and xylitol, not plastic, not polyester, not slowly shredding microplastics into your gums every night like some kind of dental horror show. It's actually been tested. There are no detectable forever chemicals. This is really good floss and toothpaste. I love it. Go to Yezeebra.com. Use code Alex for 10% off. Go to Yezeebra.com and use code Alex for 10% off. What is something that women blame on getting older that is actually a sign that their body is struggling? We work with women of all ages, from like 20s to like 60s and 70s. And I think that the women who are in that age range of like late 30s, early 40s, blame their hormones. Or they say, you know, I have joint pain, I don't feel good, but that's just me getting older. I don't have any energy, but I'm Pyramid Apostle, so that's just me getting older. My skin, my skin, looks old. So fun fact about me, I'm almost 37. I've never had Botox, I've never had fillers, I've never done any of that. I've never even dyed my hair, okay? But that's like, you know, I grew up in a household where my mom wasn't, you know, like saying, oh, you should do this or you should do that. My sisters have never had that done, you know, cousins, all the things. So kudos to my family for, you know, not pushing that forward, but healthy skin. Aging, wrinkly skin, a lot of people blame on age. But your metabolism, your metabolic health and glucose play a big factor in accelerating the aging process. So people who eat the standard American diet, ultra-process foods, refined sugars, they are going to age faster than people who don't. Have you seen that girl on Instagram? She's super viral. Who has a major soda addiction. She's probably around our age and she's, I mean, she's drinking multiple leaders a day. No. Yeah, she looks like she's 80 years old. If people I've seen her on Instagram, then you know what I'm talking about. It's such a sad situation. She actually went several months, she was like, okay, I'm trying to break my habit, but then she slid back in. She's addicted to soda, but you can totally see it on her skin. A thousand percent. And people accuse me of lying. They always do. So I used to do that stuff, and it's been several years since I have, and they say that I'm lying. It's just at this point, I'm just like, okay, I don't know what to tell you. I don't have anything to proof. Yeah. You can believe me or not. Right. But I don't eat sugar. I don't eat refined foods. I don't eat ultra-process foods. So they thought that was crazy when I said that too. I was like, you guys think that because I completely changed my diet. Correct. So that when I stopped doing that stuff, my skin still looked amazing, and they were like, that's ridiculous. Let me tell you, we have worked with thousands of people. And one of the bonus byproducts of almost everyone that we work with is like, my skin has never looked better. Whether it's the clarity of the skin, the glow to the skin, halting the aging process, the health of your skin, just like the health of your nails and the health of your hair. And whether you have a regular cycle, these are all external symptoms of good internal health. So if you see somebody who's like, you know, super thinning hair, super aged skin, or, you know, even acne on the face or psoriasis or eczema, those are signs of the body telling you, hey, something's going on, something is going on, I mean, these are warning signs. This is the only way the body can talk to you. So when you start to see those things reverse and get better, it's a good sign that you're on the right track. And so I tell people, I'm like, look, yes, I take care of my skin, I got my skin care routine, but I really think that like my internal health, my gut health, what I eat, what I drink, I drink alcohol my 21st birthday, I thought I was disgusting. I've never touched you since. I don't drink coffee. I had a coffee con leche when I was a, when I was a kid, that my parents probably messed up. I'm like, why did you feed me? It's coffee with like condensed milk, which has got so much sugar in it. And we'd have it with like Cuban bread and butter. And I'm like, wow, that is a recipe for a glucose spike. I haven't touched that since I was a kid. I'm not a coffee drinker. I'm literally just drink water, like my husband, when he proposed to me, my champagne glass had water in it because I'm like, he knows I'm not going to drink it. Like it's just not me. So I think there's a combination of that, right? Like, never had alcohol. Don't drink caffeine. I drink what I'm supposed to, I eat what I'm supposed to, I don't, I'm really not a sweet person. It's possible. It's like chips and dip, okay, give me a mosa chip with some guac, and like, I'm a happy girl, okay? For anybody who is watching and listening, and you think that there is no hope, that is just not the truth. We have seen people reverse the craziest things you can think of by getting back to the foundations and putting those things in place. Does non-toxic automatically mean more expensive? No. When we're talking about home products, like your laundry detergent and all that. No, I know people who just use vinegar. Which is super cheap. I mean, you can get a gallon of vinegar for like five bucks. Maybe less. I usually buy it in bulk on Amazon, because I clean my floors with vinegar and water. And then we use branch basics, of course, which is fragrance-free, I've been using them for years. It doesn't have to equate to more expensive. Are there going to be more expensive swaps? Of course. And I would say outside of home products, the most expensive swaps in the food section would be like the swaps for the better chip or like the better cracker. But because you don't need it, and you shouldn't be eating it, every single person that we work with. They're like, I have the healthier bar and the healthier candy and the healthier chip and the healthier. I'm like, congratulations. That's fantastic. For the next 12 weeks, you ain't having none of it. I don't care if it's a healthier chip and it's beefed aloe and corn and salt. Like, no. We are eliminating package and processed foods, even the healthier ones, because you don't need it. And when it comes to home swaps, like you said, yeah, you can buy the pre-filled ones that are more expensive, but you don't have to. I mean, baking soda and lemon juice go a long way, vinegar goes a long way. I mean, I guess you can make your own candles if you melt some coconut oil in some way. I'm not that far. There are people that make their own shampoo and all that. Yeah. Now it's worth it to me. Now it's worth it to me, but I don't spend money in other areas. Yeah. And that's another thing that people need to realize is some people make comments on social media like, well, you can afford that. And I'm like, no, I make it a priority to be able to afford it. I don't have designer bags. I don't drink alcohol. I don't go out to eat. I don't have a Starbucks order every morning and all that stuff adds up. I prioritize my family's health. So I spend more money on food and I spend more money on environmental products. By the way, I believe America is the only Western country where we spend more on health care than our food. And we're the sickest. Yeah, and we're the sickest. So clearly, there's something wrong here where you have other Western countries who are spending more on food and they don't have to spend as much on health care. But because it's correlated, most of the root causes of the health issues that you're dealing with comes down to what you're eating. And unfortunately, most people think that they have it, right? They're like, well, I eat healthy. Maybe it's not Western, but it's like first world. I don't know. But you know what I'm saying. No, I know exactly what you mean. And you're right. So if you're on the input and what we're putting in our body and fueling our body with, then the cost of health care goes down dramatically. Amy, you know that every guest I have on, we talk about, you know, the purpose of the show and how I came up with the name culture, pot the care for those that don't know if you're a new listener is I thought, okay, I work at Turning Point, you say, if this is a shocker to you, it says it on there. Turning point. You say, okay. So, so this show is housed by Turning Point, USA. And so, you know, one thing that Charlie Kirk always talked about was, okay, how are we fighting the culture war? And I had become really interested in health. And so I was like, well, I feel like I'm contributing to fighting the culture war because I'm trying to heal a sick culture. And I was like, well, how is our culture sick? We're sick physically, emotionally and spiritually, right? Yeah. Well, where would people go for natural healing? They would go to an apothecary in their community that had natural remedies, herbs, all those things. Every guest brings their own unique remedy to heal the sick culture. So anyway, that's how I got the name of this show. I love it. And so, I love that we're talking about, you know, non-toxic living and food with you. But when you started making changes to set up your family's health, physically, emotionally and spiritually, how did you tackle education? If you called my mom today, after I had my first two really close together, they're like a year apart. And I was counting down the days to send them off to school. It's like, mom, I don't, you know, they're going to be in school any year. I mean, I was just like dying and if y'all don't know, the NFL life gets glamorized. But it is a very tough career on families. We moved 12, maybe 13 times in a 10 year time span. Geez. There is no support. Like the wife, like husband gets a call, either traded, cut, new team, they leave. And then the families are left behind to like facilitate the moves by themselves. So I facilitated a lot of moves by myself. And I was at a point with the kids where my gosh, I'm finally going to get a break, right? So my oldest went to like a little church preschool, which was fine just a couple days out of the week. And then when that child went to kindergarten, that was like full-time school. So it was like 8.30, pick up at 3.30, and then other child was at the little church, said church preschool. And I was like, I've made it. I get a break. This is great. And I will never forget that one school year. The Lord Himself was like, this is not it. And I'm like, what do you mean, this is what I have been waiting for. So I can finally have a break. And that entire school year, I just felt so convicted. I would, you know, wake them up, 6 am, hurry up, get up, get your clothes on. You know, eat breakfast, hurry up, eat your food. And I was just like rush, rush, rush, stress, stress, stress, and then I would drop them off. And I'm like, have a great day, meanwhile they're like, you know, just like, you've been yelling at me all morning and just, you know, and then they're gone all day. And I would, you know, pick up at 3.30, and then my kids are active, obviously, their parents played sports. So they play sports. So then after school pick up, it's like, let's change your clothes. We're going to your little activity or sport or whatever. And then we'd get home and it's like, okay, I got to make dinner. And then I'd make dinner. And by the time dinner is over, you're like, do you have any homework? And then we have homework. And then after homework, it's like. Oh my gosh, you have to go to bed because you've got to get up at six tomorrow. - Do it all over again. - And do it all over again. - And they're like seven years old. - Six. - Yeah. - Six. I had this pit in my stomach in like March or April. And I'm like, this can't be it. And the verse from the Bible is like train up a child in the way that she goes and they'll never depart from it. And I'm like, what the heck trained in am I doing? Like after dinner, they're going straight to bed and I've had five minutes of influence on my kids. And so I woke up one morning and I told my husband I was like, I think we're supposed to homeschool. He was like, what? And he's still playing, by the way. And I was like, yeah, I feel this very strong conviction. And again, this was 2020. I was like, I think we're supposed to homeschool. And was it during the pandemic or right before? - It was in the middle. I mean, the pandemic was like 2020, 2021. Pandemic happened March of 2020. That's when my oldest went to kindergarten in that fall. - Okay. - So it was like 2020 to 2021. In the spring of 2021 was and I had this epiphany. And Kurt Cameron, I see this like preview. I don't know if it was on my phone or on the TV that the homeschool awakening is showing at theaters. And I was like, we should go watch this. I really feel like this is what we're supposed to do. And if you knew my husband, he's very supportive. Like he's like, okay, you know, whatever you want to do, that's fine. He's the best. So we like go and we go to the theater and I like watch it. And I'm like, this is what we're supposed to do. And at the time, we were living in Michigan. My husband was playing for the lions. And I was like, I feel very, very strongly about this. By the way, really awesome homeschool co-ops and stuff going on for homeschoolers in Michigan. - Wait, really? - Yeah. - Okay, well I mean, that's where Ginny Urge lives. A thousand hours outside. - Wow. - I just got all the know-how. - I didn't know about them. And I, again, I felt very convicted about this. This is such a God's story. So I like, I had maybe two friends at the time, who we're doing it. And I like called them and I'm like, what do I do? Like, what curriculum do I use? And it's like helping me coach me through it. I found out I was pregnant with my third. And then that season, my husband ended up signing with a giant in New York. And I was like, well Lord, thanks for answering my prayers because my kids were not going to school up there. - Yeah. - And because it was wild and it was still COVID and they were still like, you know, mass and mandated vaccines. And all of these things that I was just like, not comfortable with. And I was like, look how kind the Lord is. In his mercy, really put this on my heart months prior. Preparing me for something that I didn't even know I needed to be prepared for. And so we like moved to New York and I homeschooled them full time for three years. And then this past year, they joined a co-op. And I love it. - And you're loving it. - Oh my gosh, I love it. - And the other moms are cool and they're welcoming and nice. - I haven't had time to get to know the other one. (laughing) - Well, Amy, you need to make a priority of that. Okay, so I was like, you know, I'm, you know, trying to grow my business and my husband just recently retired. So like this past year's been like a lot of change in transition. And I, yes, I have met amazing moms through our co-op and I love them. But I haven't had a chance to like really get plugged in. - Sure, sure. - You know, like there's one mom that like, you know, they host like coffee or they meet at the coffee shop, you know, once a week. - So cute. - It's really sweet. - That's literally my dream life. - Yes. And I want to be like, okay, let's meet for a water day. - Hey, yeah. - Y'all don't need that. But no, it's great. It's great. Now that my husband's retired, he helps too. So we tag team it. And I know that's not the reality for all moms. But yeah, it's been great. I love it. I love it. The youngest, I have a third. He's not in anything, which is fine. I'm not trying to like rush that. But it really has been like the best of both worlds. - So what I like about this story is you were clued in not only to the word and the Holy Spirit, but also your children. - Absolutely. - What does it mean to be an intuitive parent when it comes to all aspects of creating a healthy home? - My number one goal in life is to please God, period. And I won't get emotional. 'Cause I just some like, I feel like so many people look to other things for answers. And I'm like, it's in the Bible. It's literally in the Bible. So I've always prayed that God would give me wisdom. And there's a verse in the Bible that says, you know, whoever asks for wisdom, he will give it generously. I mean, you look at like Solomon in the Bible. And he didn't ask for riches or he asked for wisdom. And because he did God bless him immensely. And so I always ask for wisdom from the Lord first and foremost. And I think because God is so gracious and so kind to bestow that wisdom, it has really been able to dictate my decisions with my kids. I mean, even with vaccines, my older two, I vaccinated them and you know, decided, you know, a couple years in after paying attention to my kids and kind of really seeing what was going on and one of them kind of having a little bit of a reaction that I was like, I don't think this is for us. And you know, I feel like God has always led me down the right path. And I've crossed paths with people. And I don't think there's ever any coincidence about that. And yeah, I feel like that has what has driven me. I mean, you think about what you eat. Okay, what did God create? Let's eat that. And you think about like, you know, the toxins in your home. It's like all these man-made chemicals and synthetics and you know, just all the things. And I think when we pay attention to how God designed the body to function, we can restore it and heal it. And so I just always go back to that. And I do that in my practice and in my business, like a people ask us what are our, you know, core values and mission like we are a cry center business. And our aim is to glorify the Lord and everything that we do. But to help people restore their health back to how God designed it. - I have so many friends who just like you, they're older kids are fully vaccinated or circumcised or whatever. And then their younger kids have a completely different situation because they learn new things. - The youngest is different, exactly. I mean, my first two births were in hospital and my last one was out. - Oh, okay, yeah. So when you are changing things up like that between each kid, what is your advice to moms who feel guilty? Well, now my oldest child has this, this, and this and my youngest does. And how do I explain why they're different and how do I reconcile that guilt? - I don't feel guilty about it because I didn't know any better. And I think when you know better, you do better. And I am not somebody, I feel like something that I've noticed in the health and wellness space is, you know, with new information, people get so overwhelmed. And I'm like, oh my gosh, like the episode that you did with Hannah Dunning, right? - Oh yeah. - On the clothing. - On the clothing, right? Like people hear that and they're like, oh my gosh, it's just never ending. This is so overwhelming. And I don't see it that way. I see new information as a new opportunity to do better in other areas. - I mean, they're serious. - You and I are so identical. - That does not overwhelm me. I never get overwhelmed. It's just, I'm learning, I like to learn. - That's what I tell everybody. I said, I am a lifelong learner. The things that I said, you know, 10 years ago have changed. And that's okay. Like people have to be okay with changing their stance on things. - And the people get mad at me. They're like, all you used to do is drink Dr. Pepper and eat chicken nuggets. I'm like, yeah, exactly. So if I can change YKU, they try to use that against me. Like, well, she used to live off that. We'd be like, 100%. - Yes. - Like, it's my whole story. - Correct. - It's crazy, the victim mindset that people have. The thing is, Amy, is people just do not want to have to change. They don't want to feel convicted. They want excuses. - That's right. - They don't want to have to do the hard work. And it does require some hard work. - It does require discipline. And I'm going to tell you, we have had clients come to us with, you know, type 2 diabetes, reoccurring miscarriage, fertility issues, all sort of collitis, crones. I mean, every condition that you can think of, hormonal issues, the ones that make the changes and put in the work are the ones that see the results. - Yeah. So let's talk about this. So you went to Taylor Dukes. You had all your health info. You changed your life. You decide, I want to do the same thing. I want to help men and women. - Oh yeah, we do work with a lot of men. - Yeah. So you're also helping the husbands and the wives. You're helping them get optimal health. How did you decide to do that and what do you do? - So a dear friend of mine, again, this was in 2020. I was like working with Taylor and had gone back to school. I finished up with Taylor. And then before I finished going to school to get my certification, because my mom was like, well, Amy, honey, you can't work with people and say, hi, I have a JD and an MBA. Let me help you with your health. Even though I had, I really was self-taught. Okay, so I had been reading books, reading articles. I mean, that's where I could use my degrees. Okay, like I can research, I can read. I can just like absorb a lot of information in a short amount of time and understand what to do with it. So I had been helping it friends and family on the side, like, you know, free of charge, just helping them with their health and reversing their health issues. And a dear friend of mine, Mallory Irvin, she's an influencer in Nashville called me and she said, I've had four miscarriages. She had already had two kids and had been trying to get pregnant with a third and had miscarried four babies in a row. And was just at the end of her road, right? Upset because the doctors, all they did was shrug their shoulders at her and said, go to IVF, and she's like, well, I don't want to do IVF. And I said confidently, something about me that you'll learn is like, I'm confident that even if I don't know the answer, I will figure it out, okay? So with her, I knew that there were some blood sugar dysregulation, previous history of gestational diabetes had been on metformin in insulin. And I told her I said, I can help you with this. If you're willing to make the change, I can help you with this. So we worked together for, I don't know, maybe about six months. She. got pregnant, took that baby all the way to delivery and yeah, had no issues after that. So what did you change with her? What did she share that she did? So she had blood sugar dysregulation, was on prescription medication for it, completely changed her diet, what she drank, what she ate. She went on a diet like I mentioned earlier, things that wouldn't cause glucose spikes. We changed up a few of her environmental products. At that point I wasn't running labs, now in my practice we run every lab under the sun. So even without supplements, that's why I tell people I'm like the power of food, food can really be medicine or it can be poison, there's no great area. So we changed her diet, we changed up some environmental products in her home, got her glucose regulated, had her on a continuous glucose monitor so that we could really track and see even whole food items, what could potentially be causing an issue for her. And after doing that for about six months, when she got pregnant again, she saw that baby all the way to delivery. And then when she wanted to get pregnant with the fourth, she was able to get pregnant with the fourth and saw that one all the way to delivery as well. Can I save you money and also make your laundry smell amazing without using toxic dryer sheets? It's wool dryer balls, seriously. So I put a couple drops of my favorite essential oil on them, I'm using lavender right now. I throw them in my dryer, I have three of them and then I'm done. There's something I love about branch basics that tells you exactly who they are as a company. So they sell wool dryer balls. And what I first found out about this, I literally said to the owner, the founder, Allison, I was like, when she told me this, I was like, this is crazy, Allison, why do you have to have your own wool dryer balls? Like what makes this different than what I just ordered on Amazon? Apparently branch basics wool dryer balls come from one small sheep farmer named Olga. I'm not making this up. That is really her name because they refuse to source wool from operations where the animals are covered in pesticides, not in very well-kempt conditions, and they're just not cared for well. So these sheep that Olga is raising actually get to live like sheep and she's doing everything correct, organic, all the things. I love brands that obsess over details like that because it's never just about the product, right? It's about their values. And those are the types of values with branch basics that they use for everything that they make. They're cleaning products are fragrance-free made with plant mineral-based ingredients. I love their laundry detergent. I love their white brightening scoop stuff that I put in with my dirty laundry, my whites. They are only using clean ingredients that are completely plant-based. They are completely human-safe for families, babies, kids, and pets. One concentrate replaces so many different cleaners throughout your home, making your cabinets less cluttered. They're also cheaper than all of the conventional cleaning products out there that you're used to using. Their refill system is genius too, so you just replenish the concentrate when you run out instead of buying a whole new collection of bottles. You can now find branch basics at Target, Amazon, and of course, branchbasics.com. I really do recommend ordering from branchbasics.com because you will get 15% off with my code, so you'll get 15% off the premium starter kit at branchbasics.com with code Alex15. That's Alex15 at branchbasics.com for 15% off the premium starter kit. And after your order, let them know that you heard about them on Culture about the Carey. Everyone is sick right now. Everyone chances are you are too. Your nose is doing things that shouldn't be doing. You could probably serve a soft serve cone with those nose boogies happening up there. The McFlurry machine is always broken, but not this McFlurry machine. You know what they say. If you want to make a tissue dance, put a little boogie in it. Your first mistake. You didn't spray beekeepers, naturals, propolis, throat spray a week ago when you first felt that little twinge. That subtle moment where your body is whispering, hey, hey, something is off, something's happening. You ignored it because you were busy and now you're paying interest. Here's how I think about it. Spring beekeepers, naturals, propolis, throat spray is immunity hygiene. You brush your teeth every day. You wash your hands. Hopefully. You don't wait until things are dire. Propolis is what bees use to protect their hive. For us, it delivers antioxidants, supports the immune system and helps defend against germs right when they show up on the spot. Everyone in my family uses it. Adults, kids. That's why there's an adult version and a kid's version. It should live in every purse, every car console, every backpack, every bathroom sink. My nighttime routine also includes the beekeepers, propolis, nasal spray for an extra boost. It's non-toxic, non-habit forming, and it actually cleanses and sues nasal passages instead of blasting you with harsh chemicals. It clears, moisturizes, and helps your body do what it's already trying to do. Don't wish you had this whenever you need it. Be proactive. Go to beekeepersnatures.com. Use code Alex Clarke for 20% off, beekeepersnatures.com code Alex Clarke for 20% off. So many husbands are obsessed with having their lawn look perfect, right? And they put a lot of pride into their lawn care. And so they're using a lot of these weed killers or they're using pest control on the home. What are some great alternatives to pest control or weed killers that we should swap in our homes? So there's two brands that I really like and that we use in our home. It's Wonderside and Earthkind. Wonderside is an actual spray. They have like an indoor spray and an outdoor spray. And it's very essential oils base because certain pests are repellent like spiders for example, are repelled by certain strong scents. And then Earthkind has these like little pouches that we put like in the corners of our garages where like pests could come in the house. And we don't have a pest issue because I'm not telling people that they need to live with roaches and spiders in their house. That's not what I'm telling them. I'm just saying that there's better alternatives of keeping those pests out of the home. As far as the lawn is concerned, like if you wanted to like fertilize it, there's a great brand called Sunday that has like a better option for fertilizer. And like I said, Wonderside is a pesticide that you can use. They have an outdoor spray. And then for weed killer, I mean, we just use a weed eater or you can just like hand-pulled weeds. Well, I don't remember exactly, but I think it's like mixing vinegar with something people use. Absolutely. If you go back and listen to my episode with Joel Salatin or Will Harris, they're both organic regenerative farmers. I ask questions like that if you just search their names and culture about the carry. People can find out what they recommended for like homemade weed killer, which is super cheap and inexpensive. Very expensive. Cancel the lawn care service. I am begging you. Or if you're going to have somebody come over for lawn care, just have them cut the grass and weed eat. Yeah, that's it. They don't have to spray anything. But should we tell our mom if she still uses bleach? I have told my mom so many times. I'm like, mom, this is a carcinogen. You are inhaling it. It causes respiratory issues. It causes lung issues. I mean, it's just bad. And I have tried to scare her out of using it. She's getting better. She's made a lot of swaps in her house. I think generationally, the mindset around bleach is like, that's the only thing that truly kills. And that's just not true. There are cleaning products like a force of nature that uses a solution and it electrolyzes that solution with water that makes it an exact swap for bleach. Interesting. An exact swap for bleach. And then something like a branch basics is not a germ killer. So that one's a germ killer. Branch faces is a germ remover. Okay. So like bleach and an alternative, they can't ever claim that 100% of germs are killed. Right? So they can say like 99.9% of germs are killed. So I try to explain to my mom, hey, I get it. You want to use your clerks because you feel like that's what's really disinfecting and killing, but there are things that do the exact same thing or remove the germs all together. But what I would say to moms is there are better swaps for it. And the negative health impact that bleach has is not worth. It's not worth it. It's not worth the cost. That's what it is. A lot of women will come to us and they say, I have hormonal issues. I'm like, great. Okay. What's going on? They're like, well, I want to run a hormone test. And I'm like, if you run a hormone test, it is likely going to tell you that your hormones are in balance, but it's not going to tell you why. Okay. They are downstream from upstream root causes, diet, blood sugar, digestion, underlying inflammation infection, environmental toxins, sleep, stress, and exercise. So there has been a breakdown in one of those foundations. You're either not eating well. Your gut is erect. Your blood sugar is, you know, in dysfunction. You have some type of underlying infection or inflammation can be, I mean, we go deep. We even look at the mouth. I had a client with hormonal issues on anxiety and depression medication and on progesterone and progesterone creams. She had two root canals that have been infected for 15 plus years. I don't know. And you know, have you heard Jenny McCarthy's story on this? No. Oh my gosh. Go back and listen to my episode with Jenny McCarthy from earlier this year. It will blow your mind. She had so much stuff going on in her mouth and people do not talk about that. In our practice, we're literally like from the top of your head to the bottom of your toes. So outside of like root canals, we even talk about airway. So CaliHail is a dear friend of mine. Oh, yes. She's an airway dentist. Yeah. An inventor of tooth pillow. Yes. And she is my personal airway dentist. She's a Houston. And so we talk about airway, right? Like if your palate is small and your tongue can't fit to the roof of your mouth and you can't nasal breathe. If you can't nasal breathe in your mouth breathing and that leads to snoring and the snoring leads to, you know, other health issue. I mean, the body is connected. But we see infection in the mouth all the time or mercury fillings. And some people don't even know they have the mercury fillings because they have capped the mercury fillings. with like tooth colored, I don't know if NAML is the right word, but like a tooth colored cap, I guess. I'm not into dentist y'all. I just know a lot about it. But like for that particular client that I worked with at the end of last year beginning of this year, we obviously had to change her diet. She had gut issues going on, but she had both of those root canals extracted. And by the end of our time together, she had no hormonal issues, no gut issues, off anxiety medication, off depression medication, everything was re-regulated and she had her life back. Do you know who Dr. Pompa is? - Yes. - Okay, so Dr. Pompa came on the show and he also said that he had competing metals in his mouth. Like they had used different types of metal. Well, he started going crazy like mental issues, like super irritable, lights bothered him, sounds bothered him, smells, tastes. Like he was like, I'm going insane. Like I'm actually like losing my mind and then come to find out he had competing metals that were causing like a magnetic reaction in his mouth, affecting his brain. So yeah, the mouth just is brain, everything. - And so people, you know, number one, I don't think enough people regularly see the dentist that just in general. - No, correct. - And then two, don't even understand how much mouth stuff impacts all these other areas of the body. And so I really, really feel strongly telling people, I think that you should absolutely seek out a biomimetic, holistic dentist. - Yep. - While I look at this. - Yep, pay cash and get that stuff sorted out because if you have exhausted every single specialist, you cannot figure out what's wrong. I really wonder if it's something in your mouth. - I'll say two stories. We had one lady a couple years ago, who was diagnosed with breast cancer. And I asked her about her mouth. And she was like, yeah, I've had root canouse. And she's like, but my dentist said it's fine. And I'm like, well, what kind of x-ray did you get? And she's like, it's the normal 2D x-ray. I'm like, you need to get a CBCT. You need to get a 3D image of it. She did and her mouth was wrought with infection. It was on the same side that she was diagnosed with breast cancer. And all the symptoms that she had been dealing with prior to the diagnosis, once she got the root canouse extracted, went away. And then right now I'm working with a female client who's had thyroid issues for years, been on thyroid medication. She had, well, she didn't know it. I was like, you need to go see a biological dentist. She's like, I know I have fillings, mercury fillings. She was like, I didn't realize I had like eight mercury fillings. She got them removed. She's off her thyroid medication. She's been able to lose weight. She has energy, like there's just, I mean, obviously her diet was off like there's, there's so much that had to be addressed, but like you cannot ignore the mouth. If you've had your wisdom teeth pulled, that, you know, those sockets can be a site for cavitations and infection there. So, oh my gosh, the body is connected. It is connected. I mean, from your brain, down to your feet. It's connected. So, that's something that we, you know, kind of pride ourselves in is like, we're not going to leave any stone unturned. We really want to figure out what's going on. But also, it's a partnership, because we can tell you until we are blue in the face, what you should and shouldn't do, but if you don't do it, you're not going to see any results and you're going to try to blame us. And you can't blame us because we told you what to do and you didn't do it. Everybody says hot girls have tummy issues, right? What is the most common digestive symptom that women normalize that should be a giant red flag? Bloating, gas, aka your farting. What? I thought every human being should be farting. No. What do you mean women? What do you mean girls should be farting? No, men and women should not be farting. What do you mean? Yeah, that's a sign that digestive is in dysfunction. Your digestion is in dysfunction. What if it doesn't smell at all? Well, that's great, but it still shouldn't occur. But I don't understand. I thought we have excess gas that has to get out of the body. You should not have any gas. And in fact, I've worked with clients and we have completely eliminated their bloating and gas. But those are the two main things. You know, like growing up, you're like, oh, I have a food baby, not normal, common, not normal. I fart after every meal, common, not normal. I literally shook not one person has ever said you should not fart. You should not fart. Not does it happen? Yeah. It does. A thousand percent it happens. Okay, I'll give you an example. After you go number two and you wipe, there shouldn't be due to on the toilet paper. What? You should have a clean swipe. I mean, that is always the ideal way when that happens as a pleasant surprise. It's so correct. Does that let you know digestion is great. If you got some sludge on the toilet paper, it's off. Oh, wow. You like something you shouldn't have eaten or you drank something you shouldn't have drank. (laughing) I love people look at me and they're like, oh, what? There shouldn't be any poop on the toilet paper. Wait, this is actually incredible. Yeah. Okay, so those are like, I would say, the stuff on the toilet paper, the actual stool being loose. I'm talking like, whether it's like diarrhea or just like a pile, it shouldn't be that. It should be like-- (laughing) Okay, it should be well formed and soft. It shouldn't be goat pellets, right? So people have also constipation gets normalized a lot. Like you should be going every day and you should not be straining to go. And then yeah, the bloating in the gas is like the big one, you know, all the girls are like, oh my gosh, I'm bloated. It's my food baby. I'm like, not normal, common, not normal. And all of it can be reversed. What is your take on probiotics? Are those legit or most people wasting money? Some of them are a complete waste of money. There's, okay, there's two things with probiotics. Probiotics 1,000% can be great, you know, when you are using them temporarily for a protocol, you know, you know, we've run your stool tests and it warrants it. Where people get probiotics wrong because they're taking it every single day for months and months and months, years and years and years. And that, you don't want to do that. The gut is all about balance, okay? So you can have too much of a good thing. So your commensal and keystone good bacterial species, if you're taking probiotics all day every day for years on end, those can become overgrowth and it can cause inflammation in the body. And then by the same token, if you have low amounts of those commensals and keystone bacteria, you need some probiotics to likely bring those back up. Where you're wasting your money with probiotics are the refrigerated ones? Think about this, your internal body temperature is 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit and your stomach is super acidic. It's a harsh environment and it should be. You want your stomach to be as acidic as possible because that's what helps break down your foods and kill pathogens, right? It's like your first line of defense for killing pathogens. If a probiotic cannot survive the harsh environment of your stomach and its stomach acid, you are wasting your money. So if it has to be refrigerated, how the heck is it supposed to survive the stomach before it passes through the little helioseco valve to your small intestine and large intestines help reseed the gut? So that's where people are wasting their money is on refrigerated probiotics or just like, you know, poor strains. - What brands of probiotics do you like? - My favorite brand of probiotic is Megastorbiotic by Microbiome Labs. And it's a spore-based probiotic. It is not a transitory probiotic where like you take it, you poop it out. It actually helps reseed the gut, which I prefer. That's the whole purpose of the product. But you will not catch me putting somebody on a probiotic for more than three months. Because that's not the goal, right? The goal is, and that is probably where I am different than a lot of practitioners. I am not a supplement first practitioner. I am a food first practitioner. If your diet is not dialled and you are still eating like crap, you cannot supplement your way to health, okay? So no probiotic is gonna help your gut issues if you're still eating at McDonald's in Chick-fil-A. Or, you know, eating sour punch straws. I saw some kids eating sour punch straws the other day and I was like, so a sourcrout would be like a natural probiotic, right? - Yeah, fermented foods. Sourcrout, kimchi. You could even ferment your own vegetables. I've fermented, you know, cucumbers, carrots, radishes. I love red onions, like a good pickled fermented red onion. And then if you tolerate dairy, people say kefir, kefir, however the heck you pronounce that. - Yeah, I don't know either. - That's a fermented beverage. That would be fine. Kombucha is technically a fermented beverage, but it does come with a high amount of sugar. And so again, that's, we take everybody from a bio-individual approach. If you're somebody who's, you know, dealing with excess weight or blood sugar dysregulation, having kombucha is not helping. - Mm. - Mm. - So yeah, I'm a food first practitioner. I am not supplement first, but I absolutely use supplements in protocols to target things based off what we see off labs. - You hear leaky gut everywhere. - Yes. - What is that and how do you know if you have it? - Okay, best way that I can describe leaky gut is, think of your intestines like this, okay? They are, there's like these very tight junctures in the intestinal wall. And I think she's lacing her fingers together. - Yes, I'm lacing my fingers together. I'll put a couple that are listening and I'll watch it. - Yes, lacing my fingers together, very tightly where nothing could come through. Based off of, you know, poor diet, poor lifestyle, stress, I mean, stress depletes stomach acid. Stress impairs digestion from the jump because it's a parasympathetic process, but that's a whole other conversation. When we do these things that impair the gut lining, it starts to open up, okay? And it creates these little holes and looseness in that intestinal wall. And so what ends up happening is food leaks into the bloodstream and it causes an immune response. Because your immune system is like, what the heck are these food particles doing in the bloodstream? And then that's how people develop foods and sensitivities, food allergies, autoimmune reactions, or, you know, conditions or diagnosis. It all starts in the gut because 70 to 80% of your immune system is found in the gut, but then when you have food particles that leak into the bloodstream, then it causes even more issues. So that's leaky gut. Can you repair it? 1,000% you can repair it. Most symptoms of leaky gut would be things, you know. Your classic symptoms, bloating, gas, stomach pain, cramping, you know, things like that. But also, even your skin, right? Like, when we have helped clients reverse eczema, we have helped clients reverse the psoriasis, we have helped clients reverse acne, all of that is tied to the gut, rosacea tied to the gut, almost every skin condition that we've seen come back down to the gut. How many women are dealing with gut issues today because of rounds of antibiotics they took years ago? Oh my gosh, 100%. If you've taken rounds of antibiotics and you never addressed it, what happens when you take antibiotics is it disrupts the gut microbiome and the flora that's in there. So I mentioned commensal and keystone species. Those are your good guys. But there are also other species that are considered a dysbiotic or opportunistic. And what that means is given the opportunity to overgrow, they're going to do it. And then they're going to populate in the gut and wreak havoc. And so when you take antibiotics, break down the word antibiotic, anti and then biotic means life. So it's going to wipe out all living organisms good or bad, okay? A probiotic, pro life, right? We're trying to bring life back into it. So when you take antibiotics, you are wiping the gut of the good and the bad bacteria. But like I said earlier, the gut's about balance. It's not that we're going to have a completely sterile gut free of everything. It's that the good balance is out the bad. So the bad doesn't have the opportunity to overgrow, right? It might still be present, but it's not overgrowing. Does that make sense? Yep. I would say that if you are somebody who went on rounds of antibiotics as a child and like never ran a stool test or if you're an adult and you had antibiotics recently or even in the past and again, you didn't address the gut, then 100% of the time, there's going to be a dysfunction. What's the connection between recurrent UTIs, antibiotics and gut health? When you are taking antibiotics and you are struggling with reoccurrent yeast or UTIs, it comes down to candida, overgrowth, fungal overgrowth and yeast overgrowth. And because antibiotics wipes all of that out, when it comes back, it comes back higher. So that's what happened to me when I had that Achilles surgery. The anesthesia and the painkillers that I was on disrupted my gut like crazy. So I ended up having reoccurring yeast infections and UTIs, and when I did my labs with Taylor, my blood work and my stool test, it showed candida, yeast and fungal overgrowth. So it disrupts it and allows it to grow because again, when given the opportunity, it's going to overgrow. It's impossible if you have a child that is getting recurrent UTIs that was just recently on antibiotics. That could be related. 1000%. Okay. 1000%. So then what would you do for a kid? Same thing. What? We run stool tests for kids. So there are people that like keep giving their kids antibiotics because they keep getting UTIs. What should those parents do instead? I would run a stool test immediately because you got to address the gut. If you don't heal and seal the gut, you're going to keep having the same exact issue. And what is healing it look like? It depends. So on the stool tests that we run, we're able to see their levels of good bacteria. We're able to see levels of bad bacteria, aka the dysbiotic, the opportunistic, the inflammatory species, but we're also able to see the function of their gut. So we can see, you know, are they breaking down fat properly? Are there enough, you know, pancreatic or digestive enzymes to break down their food? Is there a lot of inflammation in the gut? So we're able to see the actual function of the gut. And so healing it first comes down to changing their diet, what they're eating and drinking. And then based off their results, putting them on a few supplements that can help heal and seal the gut. And get rid of or eradicate the bad ones. Another reason that kids might be on recurrent rounds of antibiotics is ear infections. 1000 percent. And what is that tied to? Airway. My kids were a product of that. My oldest was like on four rounds of antibiotics her first year of life from ear infections, which is why- Health-breathing, your mouth is trying to overcompensate moisture and stuff, it's getting stuck in your ear canal. Yeah. And the Eustachian tubes. And again, Callie, if you watch this, you can correct us. But yeah, because their mouth is not close and they're not nasal breathing, it allows fluid to pull in the ears more so than if you were nasal breathing. Got to get a tooth pillow, people. Yes. You got to get a tooth pillow. And my kids did the tooth pillow plus expanders when they got a little bit older. And it helped tremendously. So when your child needs antibiotics, what should parents be doing before, during, and after? Antibiotics can be life-saving. But the problem with antibiotics is they're overused, and then the body can, you know, work up a resistance. So then when you actually need the antibiotics for life-saving measures, it doesn't work. So we don't want that. But in the case where it's like, hey, it's an emergency, this is a life-saving thing. Obviously, we would want the kids to already have a great diet beforehand. Because if you go to the doctor and they're like, you need antibiotics, it's not like, oh, we got to clean your diet up in the next 12 hours. So unless they were eating really well prior, there's really nothing you're going to do beforehand. While they're taking the antibiotics, 1,000 percent their diet needs to be super clean, right? Whole food, single ingredient items. And then I like doing the probiotic after the antibiotics are done. Because sometimes, and again, there's like new studies and research. So who knows, it could change. But recent studies and research so that the antibiotics won't be as effective if you're taking the probiotic during the round of antibiotics, and that it's better to be done with the round of antibiotics and then go on the probiotic. Okay. Other people say you can take them interchangeably. I prefer for the antibiotics to do what they need to do. And then afterwards, I don't just do a probiotic. I run a stool test. I want to know exactly what it disrupted. I want to know what pathogens have come out, and it's more than just a probiotic. And the diet always has to remain dialed, always. When you're talking about hormone testing and stuff, I am a huge fan of the Dutch test. I've told my audience I love the Dutch test. You have a hot take on the Dutch test. What is it? If you are a cycling female, that means you actively have a period. I am not a fan of the Dutch test. Why? Here's why. The Dutch test only shows progesterone metabolites, alpha and beta-pregning dial, okay? So it is a urine sample. You cannot get the active form of progesterone. You can only get its metabolites. The Dutch test for cycling females does show estrogen pathways, which is great. But if I'm running a true comprehensive hormone panel for a cycling female, for fertility purposes, or miscarriage, or whatever the case may be, I need the active forms of progesterone, all three forms of estrogen, FSH, LH, and I want to look at the bell curve in the ludial and follicular phases. So the comprehensive hormone test that we run is actually a saliva test. It's very comprehensive. You're like spitting in a tube every two to three days for your entire cycle from day one of bleeding until day one of bleeding the next cycle. So when we get the results, we're able to see, did progesterone peak when it was supposed to and did that peak happen at the amount and level that it should? The Dutch doesn't show that. Now. Wait, I got to do this. The Dutch complete is fantastic for men, we run it for men, and it is fantastic for men apostle and postmen apostle women, because at that point, I don't need to see that, right? I don't need to see the bell curve. I don't need to see that. But if you are a cycling female for fertility purposes, the Dutch complete misses the mark in that area. Okay. I want to do that. I want to get pregnant ASAP. Yes. Yes. But what, we do not ever run hormone tests in a silo. I will never allow a client to run a hormone test by itself without blood and stool, because your blood and stool show why these hormones are awesome. I agree. Yeah. I agree. But I mean, I have those results. I have those results. Yes. Okay. As an NFL wife, what should performance athletes be focusing on? Performance athletes need to focus on a few things. Big thing is their diet, every NFL player that I have worked with, because it is a physical sport, your body is already under stress and is naturally going to inflame. What you eat and drink is either going to continue to drive that inflammation or help lower it and combat it. And when we have high levels of inflammation with our performance athletes, you're asking to be more susceptible to injury. And every professional athlete, the goal is longevity with their career, right? So what you eat and drink, super, super important. Your diet has to be dialed during season and in the off season, because what you eat and drink drives performance and how you feel, your strength, your energy. So you got to cut out, you got to cut out the crap. I see a lot of NFL players who come to me and they're like, you know, eating skittles and eating twizzlers and drinking alcohol and soda and just like, you know, all the normal things. And I understand why they do it because a big thing, at least in regard to the NFL is keeping weight on some players struggle to keep weight on. Some players struggle to lose weight. So depending on who I am working with, whether it's somebody who needs to lose weight because they have weight clauses in their contract or somebody who needs to gain weight to keep within that weight clause, this strategy is different, but we're still using real whole food to do it. Another big thing with performance athlete, we always run their testosterone because we need testosterone to be high. They're in a violent sport. They're literally out on the field trying to kill each other. And so testosterone needs to be high because that particular hormone in men is really going to drive motivation and it's going to drive their performance as well. Yet so many women are like, man, I just, I feel like my husband is so lazy. I just wish that he would like. lead our family and be enthusiastic and blue. - Their testosterone can be low. And we have seen it low. I have had some of my NFL athletes testosterone levels come in the 300s and it needs to be above 650 minimum. - So how do you fix that? How do you increase testosterone in a man? - Most of the time it comes down to poor diet and it comes down to stress and it comes down to lack of sleep. And then if they're dealing with any type of underlying infection which we would see on the blood work or the stool test, that can also be a driver of lowering testosterone because the immune system is just on fire, trying to battle an underlying infection. Most of the time with my performance athletes, they, it's their diet. It's what they're eating, it's what they're drinking, it's their levels of stress and then their lack of sleep. They are staying up super late, they're waking up super early. And so the second important thing for performance athletes is recovery. Well, you're recovering the most when you are sleeping. So I give them like hard and fast. Like you gotta be asleep by this time. But the good thing about my athletes is they're very disciplined because it's what they've done. They can be disciplined. I can tell them to go jump off a cliff if it will extend their career and they're like, I'll do it, not really. But you get what I'm saying. From a dietary standpoint, they're very disciplined. So they're easy to work with because whatever I tell them to do, they'll do it. And they almost always see results from it. Most of the time I end up working with them in the off season which is usually like February, March, April and then they go into like OTA's mini camp and then training camp in July. So I just wrapped up with a few of them and it's like, I had one NFL player this year at the beginning of this year, you know. Older player who's trying to extend his career, joint pain, inflammation. Just like, man, when I get out of bed, I can feel it. You know, not as much energy, digestive issues was like on prescription medication for digestive issues. Got them off all the prescription medications. Just like jumping out of bed, so much energy, like reported to OTA's. And like the GM and the coaches were like, dude, what have you been doing? That's awesome. He's like, I've been working with Amy. I love it. And so I'm like, yes, this is like my reward. Thank you. You know how people always joke about hearing voices in the walls? I knew the walls. Check it out. I found some glasses. Well, what if they're right? What if they're not ghosts? What if they're just trying to tell you to stop eating seed oil's? Think about it. You're sitting on the couch at midnight eating fluorescent orange tortilla chips made with industrial lubricants and preservatives. And suddenly you hear, read the ingredients. I don't think it's a demon. I really don't. I think it's your mitochondria begging for help. The other night at my friends, I grabbed a random bag of healthy chips from her pantry. I started snacking, watching love after lock up and halfway through. I felt like I'd been tranquilized. I looked at the ingredients, seed oils, preservatives, natural flavors. It's just a chemistry experiment pretending to be a snack. And then I remembered, oh my gosh, I have mosa chips at home. I should have brought that. Three ingredients, organic mixed malized corn, sea salt, 100% grass-fed beef tallow. That's it. My favorite flavor is lime right now. They are crunchy. They're so filling and satiating. They taste so much better than the junk nasty chips. People are obsessed with these chips for a reason. If you're ready to give mosa chips a try, go to mosachips.com. Use code real Alex Clarke for 25% off your first order. One thing to know, because mosa uses real ingredients and they make everything in small batches, certain flavors do go out of stock regularly. So if you've been waiting for a while to get a flavor, that's probably why. So I recommend getting it while you're thinking about it. Go to mosachips.com. Use code real Alex Clarke for 25% off or click the link below or scan the QR code. I'm not exaggerating when I say that more than almost any product I've ever talked about on this show, people stop me in public to tell me about their Jasper. I'm serious. People have come up to meet events at airports, restaurants, and they're like, oh yeah, I bought one. My sleep is completely different or my allergies are gone or I had no idea how bad the air in my house was until I got a Jasper. We had mold, we didn't know we had. And it was really helping with our symptoms. Most air purifiers are too small to actually make a meaningful difference in your home. Jasper is different. It was originally designed using the same commercial grade air scrubbing technology used for wildfire smoke, mold remediation and disaster cleanup, but built for everyday home use. It captures ultra fine particles like dust, pollen, smoke, pet dander, and mold spores. It also removes VOCs from things like cleaning products, furniture, paint, and all of the hidden chemicals that can affect your indoor air quality. If you are painting your child's nursery right now, do not do that without a Jasper going in there while you're painting if you're not using non-toxic paint. The reality is that many of our homes were never designed with air quality in mind. There's actually a term for it. Sick building syndrome. Jasper helps solve that problem. If you're serious about your family's health, your sleep, and creating a truly clean home environment, this is one of the best investments you can make. Visit Jasper.co.jasp.co, use code Alex. You'll get $200 off your Jasper. That's Jasper.co.jasp.co, code Alex for $200 off. They do have an option that you can opt out of or use, which is a subscription to get your air filters every six months sent to you. Highly recommend this because I don't know about you, but I totally forget. When it's been six months and when I need one, I just like that it comes straight to my door, automatically charges me. So that's what I would do. Let's go into fertility for a moment. Perfect. If a woman wants to get pregnant in the next year, me, where should she start? She should start with labs, which I think that you've done a good job baseline. If you know that fertility is at the issue, then I would also add in the conference of hormone panel. Other things that I would do is really dial in my diet, the timing of my eating, really focusing on sleep, and stress levels. Stress levels have to come down. I know that you're somebody that's like traveling a lot. The body perceives that as stress. So I would like lighten, lighten the travel load if you can't get into a routine. The body loves consistency. The body loves and craves routine. So like, you know, you're eating at the same time. And and this is a big one, not just for you, because I see it every day with our women. They don't eat enough. Oh, I don't. They do not eat enough. And I'm like, y'all, this is a big struggle. This is a huge struggle. So not only could you have potential gut issues, which impairs your absorption of the nutrients that you need to get pregnant from the little food that you are eating, if you're not eating enough, the body is going to perceive that as stress. Or like famine. It's like, oh, I don't know when I'm going to get my next meal. And because of that, the last thing that's prioritizing is fertility. Wow, yeah. It's going to be prioritizing keeping your major organs and body systems running, right? So like I see people and I'm like, oh, my hair's thinning, my nails are brittle. I can't get pregnant. And I'm like, well, that's the body telling you, it's devoid of the nutrients that it needs. Now, that could be because you're not eating enough or you're eating enough and you're not absorbing because there's digestive issues. And I know that you had mentioned, you know, you were diagnosed with Hashimoto's and thyroid issues that gut and the thyroid are very intricately intertwined. I mean, the thyroid affects gut motility and how often you go to the bathroom. So if you have hypothyroidism, you could be dealing with constipation issues. And I don't know if you go to the bathroom often or not. But we see that a lot and then vice versa, you know, in order for you to get the nutrients that you need for the thyroid to function properly, your gut has to be functioning in a way where you're actually absorbing it. Because you could have, at the end of the day, you could have a perfect plate of food, which I know that you eat well. But if your digestion is off, you're not absorbing and converting those nutrients in the body, which is why I tell people digestion is foundational in the body. So for you and really, for other women, I almost always increase the amount of food every single female client that I've worked with. They're like, "Oh my gosh, I've never eaten this much in my life." And I'm like, "Keep eating." Because you need it. What prenatal do you like? Neated, wenatal, parallel. I have an app that has all the healthy swaps in it and so it has all the brains in there. And there's like a healthy mom section that's like, pregnancy, postpartum, there's a supplement section, all the things. Those are the ones that I can think off the top of my head. - Do you think that pregnant American women need to put much stake in the dietary guidelines that they give pregnant women? - Okay, I said earlier in the interview, like I had my first two kids in hospital, you know, conventional OBS and was like, "I'm not eating that stuff." And then my third, I was like, "I'm having my raw milk and my raw cheese and my tin fish and all the things." I think if it's a whole food item, it's fine. Again, an attorney. So for legal and compliance purposes, consult with your provider. There's my disclaimer. But no, I don't prescribe to, I personally think that the ultra processed foods and the fast foods that all these pregnant women are eating that the doctor tells them nothing about is way worse than you having some raw cheese or some raw milk. - I fully agree. - I fully agree. - A truthfully, right? Like I'm more concerned with your doctor pepper or your Coke than the raw permission. - I mean, they're literally telling you, they're telling these women that they need to take three vaccines while they're pregnant, that they need, that it's okay to take their SSRIs while pregnant. By the way, we have so much scientific evidence of how that is extremely dangerous for your baby. - Absolutely. - And the health impacts that has on your child as they grow older, if you are on SSRIs during pregnancy. And I've done episodes on that to look it up. It's like, that's all okay, but you can't have an oyster. You know what I mean? - Doesn't make sense. - It makes no sense. Also because half the world eats that way while they're pregnant. - Yes. And obviously, if you're gonna have raw fish, pay attention to the sourcing. - Yes. - Right, like don't get your raw fish from Bucky's. - Yes. - Exactly. - Buh, buh, buh, buh, buh, buh, buh. - Bucky's sushi. - Right, like don't get Bucky's sushi. And I said, "Bucky's" of a Texas girl. That's the first gas station. - We just opened one here in Arizona. - Get out of here. - Like yesterday and there's been lines and lines and lines. - It's an experience, go. I don't know if there's anything else. - I don't know if there's anything else. I don't find any bathroom there, it's nice. - The bathrooms are nice. - Yeah. - When we rode tripping taxes, we stopped at Bucky's to use the bathroom. - Exactly. - We are not getting the beaver nuggets though. (laughing) I tried to get a brisket sandwich from there, and I said, Dad. - Ew. - Is that why I want you to hold this sandwich up and I want you to read the ingredients? 'Cause he's thinking it's just meat. - Oh, there's like 200 listed. - Oh my, the brisket was not just brisket. There was literally 50 ingredients for the meat and 50 ingredients for the bun. And he was like, gosh, this is terrible. I'm like, yeah. And my uncle was like, did you know pizza has bioengineered ingredients? - Uh huh. - I'm like, yeah. Have you ever thought to look at the label? He's like, well, I thought since it was frozen, it didn't have preservatives. I'm like, no. The ingredients are he hasn't bought it since. I said, what'd you do with it? He goes, I gave it to your aunt. Oh my god, you poisoned her. - What is a holistic hack for postpartum hair loss? - Eat your meat. You have got to increase your protein intake drastically postpartum. I'm like, more than like normal. So think about it this way. You are pregnant for nine months. And all of your nutrition is split between you and your child, okay? So at delivery, and that's assuming you ate well in pregnancy. In my pregnancies, I got sick. I threw up like a lot of food a versions. So that's like, you're naturally rolling in to postpartum unless you were somebody who like didn't get sick and had like, you know, a great pregnancy. We hate you. But not really, my best friends did. You're rolling into postpartum, relatively depleted. And because of that depletion after postpartum and on top of that, you're breastfeeding which further depletes the body. The first things that are gonna go are the things that don't matter in the body. - Your hair and your nails and stuff. - And your nails and your skin, like those things, you know, they say, you know, the kids have sucked the beauty out of me. Well, truly, they have. Like you're just nutrient depleted because your body goes through a lot during pregnancy. You're nourishing the child as well as yourself. You could potentially have some sickness throwing up. I did. And then postpartum comes and you're immediately breastfeeding and it's a huge transition. I mean, there's trauma in delivery. I mean, that 10 centimeter dilation, pushing the baby out and, you know, getting sewed and stitched up and all those things. So postpartum is really when you have to prioritize your protein intake because the vitamins that you need for healthy skin, healthy hair, healthy nails are your B vitamins. And the highest concentration and sources of those are going to be in your meat. Even your seafoods, girls, eat your sardines. I am a 10 fish girl. - Same. - I keep jars and tins of sardines, mackerel, trout, salmon. I mean, if I'm in a pinch and I got a couple jars at home for the kids, I'll saute it in some butter and like season it myself and like put that with like some cucumbers and, you know, a couple of mosa chips and like here's your lunch. There you go. Like it can be very quick. So you have to start. Again, I didn't know this was my first two. So after my first two, I had a ton of postpartum hair shed. With my third, I had a little to nothing. But I prepped in advance. So I was like, okay, maybe you can get some meal delivery services. There's a great one. It's called restorative roots. They used to be mom meals. - Yeah, yeah. I met the owners at Expo West and it is, I gifted that too. I gifted it to a friend of mine who recently had a baby, gifted it to my boss. She was like, what is the stuff? I love it. It's really good. Yes. So they do a great job. But like if you can't afford a meal delivery service like that because it is more expensive, you can literally go onto Amazon, get some like, you know, paper containers or cardboard, whatever is not the plastic stuff. Prep a bunch of ground beef or, you know, soups and stews and like put it in the freezer. And then postpartum, you are not worried about, oh my gosh, I don't have the energy. Because you don't, right? Like you're sleep deprived. You are breastfeeding around the clock. Like if you don't have a village around you, like a mom to come and cook for you, which would be great. My mom couldn't do that. But I have a few friends who like the mom stayed with them for like a month, which is fantastic. I would love to do that. One day for my kids, then you need to have stuff prepped in advance that all you have to do is like, open it up, dump it in a crock pot to warm up or like put it in the oven. I think that that is just, you have to prepare to nourish your self postpartum. And that's how you can really lessen and mitigate that postpartum hair loss. Because otherwise you're going to end up like baldy with spots all over. And I've been there and I'm like, oh my God, but then again, this was, again, years and years ago before I knew what I know now. How do you get a skeptical husband to be interested in health without sounding crazy? Run their labs. This literally just happened. Okay, so that female client was telling you about earlier. This is so funny. I actually met the husband first. We have some mutual friends. I met him and he was like, and I'm, he's asking me all these questions about health because he's super, super skeptical. And if you met it in person, you would agree. And he's like, well, I don't need this, but like this sounds like something my wife needs. She's struggling with her mental health, anxiety and depression medication, hormonal issues, you know, acne on her face is on the other. And I was like, great, I'd love to help her. So we worked together first. And he noticed that his wife had like completely changed her life around, okay? So sometimes ladies, it starts with you. And when the husband sees that you're like feeling good and looking good, they're like, okay, I want to. So fast forward, I tell the husband, I'm like, listen. You don't have to work with me. Let me just run your labs and then you can determine it. And he was like, I feel good. This end of me mind you. He's like on peptides, nicotine patches or pouches. However you say that, like, you know, drinking all the things. I run his labs, we meet. And he was like, so you're telling me like based off his results. I was like, this is way worse than you even thought. And he was like at the end of the meeting, he's like, I feel like I should get down on my knees and thank God that I'm even alive. I'm like, exactly. You didn't realize how bad it was until you actually saw the evidence. And that is, I can't tell you such a clear distinction between men and women are so body aware. Men are not. And God wired us differently. Men naturally push through their providers. They're going to like hustle. It doesn't matter how they feel. That gets ignored and pushed out. Whereas women are like, they know when they don't feel good, right? And they know when they do feel good. They're paying attention to the symptoms. Guys don't pay attention to any of the symptoms at all. When I meet with my male class, I'm like, how are you feeling? Good. I'm like, anything else? Meanwhile, I'm asking my female clients, how are you feeling? And we're going into a diet tribe of everything that is going great and some things that are still lingering. Guys don't notice that. So you want to know how to get your husbands on board, run their lab so they can see they're so evidence-based. All my male clients almost always wear some type of tracking device too. So when we work together, it's like, oh my gosh, my HRV is better. My sleep score has never been this good. Like what we're doing is working. There's so data and evidence driven. So I tell the ladies, I said, just get a blood panel and a stool test run and then that will dictate whether they should or they shouldn't. Because unless a man actually gets a full-blown diagnosis, they're not going to do anything about it. Now with my performance athletes, they see the value in being preventative with their health. But like the average American dad and husband is just like living. And I actually had a phone call with a guy the other day who had just gotten diagnosed with Hashimoto's. And it had been on prescription medication for like a week. And it was like, I probably need to do something. I'm like, you probably needed to do something two years ago. And you ignored the symptoms and the warning signs. And he was like, actually, you're absolutely right. Because I was dealing with this, this, this, this, and this. But you know, he's married, he has kids, you know, he's working, he's providing for his family, which again, no knock, that's amazing. But you can't ignore it. And then come to a full-blown diagnosis and decide that you want to change. I mean, you should come to us if you have a full-blown diagnosis. And we can help you. But my point is, you can do so many things before it got there. And that's what I showed this husband. And I said, listen, you are on a path of, there's like, we're at a crossroads. And if you keep doing what you're doing, yes, it can turn into this. Because he's like, am I gonna have a heart attack? I'm like, no. But you're definitely at an increased risk for it. Am I diabetic? No. But you're on the path of becoming potentially prediabetic. Is my liver just shot? No. But your liver enzymes are elevated. Like, so it's like, if you keep doing what you're doing, you're going to reach a point where you're at diagnostic ranges, outside of the diagnostic ranges, where the doctor comes in and makes a diagnosis. And that's what's different about us than going to a primary care provider. We are looking at ranges that are in optimal range, right? These are the ranges that the body need to stay in in order to function optimally. Doctors are not looking at it that way. Doctors are looking at diagnostic ranges. And those ranges move based off the mean average of the population. The problem with diagnostic ranges is, they're going to tell you, regardless of how you feel, that your labs look normal, unless a marker is outside of that diagnostic range to make a diagnosis and give a prescription. That's the only time the doctor comes into play, really, unless you find one who is like, really trying to be on the preventative side of health. This is just like the standard PCP. That's what they're gonna do. So I can't tell you how many people come to us. And then like, I went to my doctor. I got my blood drawn. And I feel terrible, but my doctor said I'm normal. And I'm like, well, one, there isn't diagnostic ranges. And two, they're running basic panels because that's all insurance covers. We do not take insurance and we run a very, one of the most comprehensive blood panels that I've seen. So how do people work with you? Oh, they just go to our website and join our waiting list. And then we open up spots to work with us. usually every few months. So what's the website? We're rebranding. So just follow me at Amy McDalia and I'm going to post about it. But we're undergoing a name change and a rebrand and hopefully that website will be up at the end of this year. Right now, it's Amy McDalia.com. Okay. But you're not going to go there anymore at the end of the year. Okay. Okay. Exciting. That's a surprise. Okay. Not all food scanning apps are created equal. What are some of the most unreliable ones? Because everybody asks me like, what? What app should I use in the grocery store? Everybody wants apps. Okay. So the two most popular that I'm aware of are the Yucca or Yucca app. How are you pronounced that? And then the OASIS app? The Yucca or Yucca app. My problem with that is that it rates foods based off old information. Okay. So it's rating foods based off of saturated fat content. Oh, yeah. It's rating, basing foods off sodium content. Like, oh, if it's high in saturated fat, bad score. If it's high in sodium, bad score, that is not what our app does. So our app is called swapped SWAPD. Swapped looks at one thing and one thing only, which I believe is the most important thing to look at. And it is the ingredients. I do not care about how many calories are in it. I don't care how many grams of saturated fat are in it. I don't care about any of that. Okay. Now, there are some items like higher sugar content that you might want to, you know, that will put like a cautionary for, but we are looking at the ingredients. The OASIS app is they do like heavy metal testing. My issue with that is I don't think that heavy metal testing is always accurate. Because if you go and test a potato, like I grew up in the country, we had a garden. There are natural metals found in the. Yeah. I can't even your body can naturally detoxify those. I hate all the ways. Yeah. The metals that you're worried about are the synthetic ones, the man made ones, right? The OASIS app is again, I think that testing for heavy metals in foods is difficult because how do you distinguish like, okay, years ago, there was like some study that was ran and it said that who chocolate was like really high in metals. And I'm like, well, yeah, they use the real cacao bean. So of course, because that's in the earth, but it's not they didn't inject it with synthetic heavy metals. I'm not concerned about that. Right. Right. Like you're going to find natural metals in the foods that you eat. Go test your sweet potato. It's going to come back higher. Any tubers or, you know, anything that's grown really in the ground that you dig up and pull it out. Yeah. That's what people try to say about Redmond salt. I've toured their salt minds. They're regenerative organic farm. Right. Redmond is so legit. It's not even funny. So that stuff is just like you got to let it roll off. I think there's a lot of crazy fear mongering. By the way, the main women on Instagram that are like, led are all the ones that bragged about fully vaccinating their children, which have led and making sure they did the boosters. They're all about that. Right. So it's like, what are you talking about here? I would be more concerned with injecting led in a man-made vaccine than I would be eating foods that have natural metals in them. So anyway, so the yucca up and the oasis up, those are kind of my issues with them. And then the second thing is, I'm not against AI. But with our app, it is me. I, myself and my practitioners, we have done the research. We are the ones who have uploaded the blacklisted ingredients. We are the ones who are doing like, it is not some AI robot who is determining which ingredients should be blacklisted or cautionary. It is me. Now, is AI and UPC databases help us with barcodes? Yeah, sure. And the UPC databases, something that you run into that I've seen other apps run into is sometimes the UPC databases that you pull from are not always up to date. So for example, like I was testing our app out last week, and I scanned a cracker brand that in the past had canola oil in it, but currently no longer does. It's just olive oil. And the UPC database, when you scanned it, it brought up canola oil in the ingredient list. But that's because the business hasn't updated it in the databases. So sometimes that can happen with apps. So we always tell people, if you're going to use this any scan tool, whether it's ours or anybody else's, make sure that you pay attention to the ingredients that are actually on the box because the UPC databases that we pay for rely on the companies and the businesses to keep their ingredients up to date. And sometimes that can take a little bit of time. Sure. So there's not going to be like, that won't always be 100% perfect because you're relying on other people to keep it updated. But we do our best. And so they search for what in the app store swapped SWAP. The other thing that makes our app wildly different is our app did not start out as a scan tool app. The scandal is just the bonus. Okay. It's just the bonus. The app was about helping people swap things out in their home. So it's like swapped. Healthy swaps made simple. It started out as this PDF document when I was like helping friends and family in 2018. It started out as this word PDF document. And my mom would be like, well, what's the swap for that candle that you said? And so I just started making delicious. I just send it over. And it started out as like this 50 page document of just like brands of, you know, everything that you can think of in your home to paste or everything. You name it. We got it on there. There's like almost 4,000 products already loaded in the app. Cool. So you can go to like healthy food. And when you click healthy food, it says freezer fridge pantry. And you click on that and it's like chips, crackers, pizza, cookies, like all the things are listed in there. By the same token, if you go to healthy home, it's like, you know, cleaning garage, bathroom, beauty, hair care, skincare, serums. I mean, there's there's thousands and thousands. And then there's a whole healthy kid section. So mattresses, bedding, clothing, kid snacks, formula, like everything that you can think of is already loaded in the app. If you want to use the scandal, you can. But that's not like the main part of the app is like we wanted to load in all these healthy swaps in there for y'all to easily access. So if you hear this episode and you're like, Oh, I need to switch out my cleaning products. There's more than just branch basics in there. There's a whole list. And so you can click on it and decide which is within your price point or your budget. Or I want a better concealer. It's in there. I want better shampoo and conditioner, deodorant, toothpaste, mouthwash. I mean, pesticides, yeah, everything. Water filters, air filters, at home, water testing kits. I mean, like even all the biohacking tools and devices, your red light therapy, your saunas, even like no EMF step trackers. I mean, we've EMF protection devices, like everything that you can think of. That's awesome. We have put it into the app. I love that Amy. Yes. What is your Instagram again at Amy McDalia, AMY, M-I-G-D-A-L-I-A? If you could offer one remedy to heal a sick culture, physically, emotionally or spiritually, what would it be? 1000% Jesus. He is the master physician and he will heal a sick culture, spiritually, physically, mentally, emotionally. And if you don't know him, get to know him. Because it truly is the only remedy, right? Like, if we keep looking to man, we're going to keep on this rabbit hole and vicious cycle of not getting things right. But it's like the Bible said, like, and I'm going to paraphrase this because I need to have it memorized. But it's like, you know, the verse in the Bible that says, you know, any nation that would, you know, turn from sin and return to him and repent, that their land would be healed. So I take that literally. I'm like, yes, like we need to be like turning back to God, getting on our knees, repenting, and we will see a complete change in our nation. This was an excellent episode, Amy. Excellent. I know everybody will love this. So go follow Amy. She's been, she's become such a good friend and she's in good company because, you know, you guys love Allison from Branch Basics. You love Taylor Duges. Yeah. She's besty with all of them. So like, she's good people. Okay. Thank you for coming on Culture Pot the Carry. Thank you so much for having me. If you loved this conversation, which I just know you did, make sure you're following Amy in sharing this episode with a friend who needs to hear it. As always, if you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to subscribe, leave a review, send this episode to someone who's on their own health journey. It helps the show more than you know. New episodes come out every Monday and Thursday. It's 6 p.m. Pacific 9 p.m. Eastern. Anywhere you get your podcast. Please leave us a five-star review on Apple or Spotify. It's been a while or you never have. Tell me how long you've been listening. It takes two seconds to do and immensely helps the show. This content is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be taken as medical advice. Always consult with a qualified healthcare professional regarding any questions or decisions related to your health or medical care. I'm Alex Clark and this is Culture Pot the Carry.