Hormone Prosperity Podcast with Dr. Kyrin Dunston

Dr. Kyrin Dunston: From Exhaustion to Energy: Combating Menopause Fatigue and Hormonal Poverty

Are you waking up exhausted, no matter how many hours you’ve slept? Do you find yourself wondering why your once-sharp brain feels foggy and why simple tasks take so much energy? You’re not alone. This week on The Hormone Prosperity Podcast, Dr. Kyrin dives into the real reasons behind extreme exhaustion during menopause and after hysterectomies—and what you can do to reclaim your vitality.

Episode Highlights

• Why Menopause Fatigue Is More Than Just Aging

Dr. Kyrin explains why hormonal poverty is not "just a part of getting older" and explores the critical differences between gradual hormonal decline and the sudden hormonal drop caused by hysterectomies. Discover why your exhaustion might be a direct signal from your body that hormonal imbalances need attention.

• Beyond Estrogen, Progesterone, and Testosterone

Think fatigue is only about sex hormones? Think again. Dr. Kyrin reveals how cortisol, thyroid, and insulin levels play a significant role in your energy levels, mood, and even sugar cravings.

• Surgery as a Hidden Trigger

The invisible trauma of surgeries like hysterectomies often goes unaddressed, but the effects linger. Learn how surgical stress, anesthesia, and antibiotics impact your body long after you’ve been discharged.

• Practical Solutions for Hormonal Poverty

Dr. Kyrin doesn’t just highlight the problem—she provides actionable steps. From identifying hidden hormonal imbalances to understanding what traditional doctors often miss, Dr. Kyrin guides you toward hormonal prosperity.

What You’ll Take Away

• An understanding of hormonal poverty and why it includes more than just menopause.
• Insight into why your exhaustion, mood swings, and lack of restorative sleep might not just be “in your head.”
• Practical, easy-to-follow steps to help you regain energy.
• A supportive reminder that what you’re experiencing is not normal—and that you do have the power to feel better.

Your Call to Action

Take the Free Hormonal Poverty Quiz

Could you be in hormonal poverty? Find out in just 90 seconds!

👉 CLICK HERE to take the quiz and assess where you stand.

 

Help Other Women Get Their Bliss Back

Enjoyed this episode? Please share it with a friend who’s also struggling with hormonal imbalance or midlife metabolic mayhem. Together, we can help more women reclaim their vitality and health. Don’t forget to leave us a review or rating—your support helps build this empowering community!

 

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No one deserves to live in hormonal poverty. 🛑 Drop the disempowering question, “What’s wrong with me?” and start asking, “What would hormonal prosperity do?” (#WWPD)

Catch the full episode now and start crafting the vibrant, healthy life you deserve.

✨ Listen Now ✨

 

Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

Are you feeling extremely exhausted in menopause? Maybe after a hysterectomy or without one? Here I lay out what's going on. Why are you fatigued with hormonal poverty and mostly what to do about it. Greetings friend. Welcome to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin. Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me? To ask empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag wwhpd, join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your genes and back into life, because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there. Welcome. Let's get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:09):

Jump into the maze. Question. Hi there. I'm new here, but I had a hysterectomy last December, so I was thrown into menopause pretty quickly. I'm 53 by the way. The hot flashes, I worried about the constantly cold feet I wasn't prepared for, but the thing that's killing me is I get spells of extreme exhaustion all in caps, like, I'm too tired to talk kindly. Who else can relate? One minute I'm fine. And then the next, I feel like I haven't slept in a week. It's causing me to make mistakes at work and become irritable with my hubby. Sometimes I go to bed and sleep for hours and still feel tired when I get up. Other times I'm dying to sleep and I just can't. I have an appointment with the doctor to discuss HRT next week, but I haven't really found anyone who is suffering from the same thing.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:50):

This is driving me crazy and I have so much I want to do and no energy to do it. The other night I was all caps too tired to order takeout. That's tired, may, and then last night I ate all of the large bounty batter, extreme blizzard. I don't normally do that. So I love this question. May you point out a bunch of different things. So many of you probably have had hysterectomies where they took your ovaries out, threw you into menopause immediately, sometimes at a young age, in your thirties, forties. And it can be extremely disturbing. You know, there's the old adage, how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. And unfortunately, because most women go through perimenopause in a very piecemeal state, right? Little by little by little, our hormones are declining, declining, declining, declining into hormonal poverty.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:42):

We're descending. We don't really notice what's happening until it's too late. And then we don't have that extreme comparison to I was normal. One day I went to the hospital, I had a hysterectomy, and then a few weeks later I was down here. So when it happens, very gradually we come to believe the insanity that this is normal for our age. So may you really highlight this discrepancy, and I wanna point it out for anybody watching, because whether you're in the extreme discrepancy category where you had your ovary surgically removed and you get it, something's wrong. And this is related to my hormones. That's actually what I love about this question. There's no question in your mind, this is related to my female hormones, I had my hysterectomy but I'm gonna shed some more light on that 'cause it might be other hormones too. Whereas the women who go gradually into hormonal poverty don't have that quick discrepancy.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:39):

And so they're scratching their head thinking, my extreme exhaustion, most women who didn't have surgical ovary removal don't get it, that it's related to hormonal poverty and menopause. And so they're all over the internet searching for why, why am I so extremely fatigued? But you get it. So I wanna cue the women in who are searching for that to know that this is related to the hysterectomy. So that's the first thing. The other thing is that yes, this can be related to your sex hormones, estrogen, progesterone, testosterone. But when I hear someone with extreme exhaustion, excuse me, more, what I think about is insulin, cortisol, and thyroid, the other hormones, and why do I think about them? So surgery is a huge stress on your body. It your body cans consider surgery life-threatening. You know, on some level you are anesthetized, but your subconscious mind is still picking up information during surgery.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (04:48):

And they've even done studies where they've given messages to people through their ears during surgery. And some of the information has been retained consciously after the surgery. So even though you are in a subconscious anesthetized state, your body still registers that someone came at you with a knife and cut you open that you were traumatized. So that in itself is traumatic. Plus the antibiotics that they give you before and after the anesthetic compounds are fat soluble, highly volatile, highly toxic, and have to be processed by your liver and kidneys and excreted. And that can take a long time. So that's traumatic. Being out of your own environment in the hospital environment is very traumatic. So it is a trauma to your body. You might not register it that consciously, but your body registers it subconsciously as a trauma, meaning your cortisol is triggered and activated in huge extreme ways, nevermind the blood flow changes.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (05:56):

There's so many changes that your body undergoes when you are having an organ removed. We've come to normalize it in mainstream western society. Oh, I just had surgery. I just had a hysterectomy. Right? In fact, it's the most common surgery, probably second only to cesarean section is hysterectomy in the United States anyway, and in most westernized countries. So we've normalized it that this traumatic experience, it's just a normal everyday thing, and it is not to your body. So you need to be looking may at your cortisol. Cortisol probably has taken a hit when your cortisol takes a hit, your insulin takes a hit and insulin regulates your blood sugar. Hence the I ate the whole large brownie batter, extreme blizzard that's gonna make you crave sugar. And both of cortisol and insulin being out of balance are going to pull on your thyroid and pull your thyroid off too.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (06:58):

Even if you don't have a thyroid problem, it can pull it off just enough so that you become extremely exhausted. You mentioned irritability, making mistakes at work. You still feel tired after sleep. Sleep is not restorative. So you've got to look at all the seven main metabolic hormones is what it's to say, right? Hormone poverty is not just about your sex hormones, estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, and this is for all of you with fatigue. If you're over 40, even those of you younger than 40, you need to discover are you in hormonal poverty? And if so, which hormones are involved and address all of the problems. So I'm glad you have an appointment with your doctor to talk about HRT, that's one component. But most likely, if your doctor is traditionally trained in mainstream corporate medicine, they're not going to look at your cortisol and they're not gonna look at your insulin or your thyroid.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (07:53):

So you're, there are myriad aspects that go into informing your body if you're in hormonal poverty or not, and programming you for energy and vitality or exhaustion and fatigue. Thank you so much for the question. Mei. I think you're on the right track. You can take the quiz. This will give you an idea if it's about more than just your sex hormones. You can click the link in the show notes. It takes less than 60 seconds. And I'll also send you information on the path that I've taken thousands of women through the step, exact steps to take to get out of hormonal poverty, into hormonal prosperity, because that's where everything that you want happens. Vitality, energy, good mood, <laugh> good memory, cognitive function, hair, skin, nails, digestive function, all the things, disease prevention. So I hope you'll consider taking that and that it helps you and you can follow that blueprint to where you wanna be. Thanks so much for the question, may thanks for all of you for joining me, and I'll see you next time. Until then, peace, love, and hormones, y'all,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (09:13):

Thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about, love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering woman to another. I thank you. See you next week.

 

Dr. Kyrin Dunston: Goodbye Sagging Labia & Hello Energy Boost! Reclaim Your Vitality with Pelvic Health

Is sagging labia holding you back? You’re not alone—and there’s hope.

Aging brings unexpected changes, including to our pelvic floor health. But here’s the good news—today’s episode of The Hormone Prosperity Podcast dives into accessible ways to reclaim your confidence, energy, and vitality.

Dr. Kyrin breaks down the surprising reasons why pelvic floor muscles weaken as we age, how it impacts your labia, energy, intimacy, and yes—even urinary incontinence. She also sheds light on how addressing these issues can elevate your sense of power and well-being.

Discover the magical potential of the jade egg practice (spoiler alert: it’s more than just a gemstone!) and other simple exercises that can help restore muscle strength, energy flow, and that sense of you that may have felt lost.

💡 What you’ll learn in this episode:

• Why 3 in 4 midlife women experience pelvic health and energy issues—and what to do about it.
• How pelvic floor exercises can address sagging labia, improve arousal, and even reduce pelvic pain.
• How sexual energy is your body's most powerful resource for total vitality.
• What the jade egg practice is and why it could be a game changer for your health.
• The importance of asking empowering questions like, What would hormonal prosperity do?

✨ Don’t miss this empowering discussion where science meets self-discovery.

Your Call to Action

Take the Free Hormonal Poverty Quiz

Could you be in hormonal poverty? Find out in just 90 seconds!

👉 CLICK HERE to take the quiz and assess where you stand.

 

Help Other Women Get Their Bliss Back

Enjoyed this episode? Please share it with a friend who’s also struggling with hormonal imbalance or midlife metabolic mayhem. Together, we can help more women reclaim their vitality and health. Don’t forget to leave us a review or rating—your support helps build this empowering community!

 

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No one deserves to live in hormonal poverty. 🛑 Drop the disempowering question, “What’s wrong with me?” and start asking, “What would hormonal prosperity do?” (#WWPD)

Catch the full episode now and start crafting the vibrant, healthy life you deserve.

✨ Listen Now ✨

 

Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

Erin says, what about her sagging labia as she's aging, what is going on? Find out how this little device might help with that, and also with your energy too. Greetings friend. Welcome to the Hormone Prosperity podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin. Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me? To asking empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag wwhpd, join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your genes and back into life because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there. Welcome. Let's get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:07):

So Jean asks, says, good grief. What has my life come to that? I'm typing this on the internet. Anyone else finding their outer labia sagging? I'm on estrogen, prometrium, alpha femme, loving it, but just the last month or so, it's like my outer labia are just drooping to the point. If I sit down, suddenly there's a vague sound of clapping flesh. If I walk around the house without undies, I can literally feel them. She says, with five E's. And not in a good way anyone. I'm not general generally concerned about the appearance, but rather the unexpected feeling and change. So Erin, I love this question because you're not alone and it speaks to the pelvic floor sagging, which can actually happen in women as we age if we don't do something to strengthen it. And this actually helps to boost your energy because your main power source is your dantian down here in your belly and your lower belly, which includes your pelvic area.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:15):

And if you're not doing something to work those muscles in that area, guess what happens? Droop, sagging, drooping, labia, the sound of flesh, the uncomfortable feeling. And then also when it comes to sexual intimacy, a lot of women will complain about they feel inhibited sexually because they feel self-conscious about how their labia are appearing. Maybe that's you. So it's a common thing. I'm going to be teaching soon about how you use this magical device gem to work the muscles in the pelvic floor to help bring muscular integrity back to those tissues so that you can resolve that sagging labia. And maybe you've got urinary incontinence, which is contributed to by the same problem. Maybe you have difficulties with pelvic pain. Maybe you have difficulties with becoming aroused, achieving orgasm. Maybe you're having difficulties just with your energy. Really, three out of four women as they age, have that, well, yes, it's about your mitochondria and it's about your hormones, but it's also about your energy source that you're given.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:30):

When you're born, you're given a certain amount of energy. And when all that energy is gone, that's your end of game time up. And so you can actually work to replenish that energy, particularly by using the sexual energy, which is the most powerful form of human energy that we've got. We can tap into that and we can use it to replenish our physical energy that we have for everything that we wanna do in life, right? We wanna go travel, we want to learn how to salsa dance. We want to learn how to knit. We wanna go be with our families and friends. We wanna do all the things on our bucket list. So I'm gonna be teaching you in the coming weeks and months how to harness that energy using various practices, one of which is with this beautiful egg, it's called the jade egg practice.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (04:25):

But this one's not jade. It's actually a different gemstone. You can use different gemstones that have certain powers that will imbue to you. And I can help you how to know how to pick the right gemstone to use for you, the right size egg, how to use it. That's a big question. I know a lot of people aren't using it correctly. I wasn't initially told how to use it correctly. And maybe you have never heard of it and you're like, what ki I don't know what you're talking about. So I'll teach you for all different levels how to use this effectively to work on your energy in your dentin, support the muscles help your labia stop from drooping. Thanks so much for the question, Erin. It's a fabulous, fabulous question. Look forward to hearing more from you and submitting your questions. I love answering them. Thanks so much for joining me. It's Dr. Kieran.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (05:30):

Thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about, love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering woman to another. I thank you. See you next week.

 

Dr. John Lewis | How Polysaccharides Can Help Your Health

This week on The Hormone Prosperity Podcast, Dr. Kyrin welcomes renowned researcher and nutrition expert Dr. John E. Lewis for a riveting, science-backed (but totally relatable) conversation about how polysaccharides—complex plant sugars—could be the key to reducing inflammation, boosting brain health, and reclaiming your vitality in midlife.

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💡What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• Why “all sugar is bad” is a myth—and a harmful one

• How plant-based polysaccharides from aloe vera and rice bran act as supercharged cell communicators

• The shocking lack of nutrition research (and why Big Pharma wants to keep it that way)

• What “food as medicine” really means in a toxic, overly processed food system

• The difference between eating for taste vs eating for health (and how most of us are doing it wrong)

• How Daily Brain Care, Dr. Lewis’s polysaccharide-powered supplement, has helped improve sleep, energy, immune balance, and mental clarity—even in Alzheimer’s patients

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👩‍⚕️Why This Matters for Midlife Women:

If you’re experiencing:

• Mysterious weight gain (hello, “menopot”)

• Brain fog and fatigue that just won’t lift

• Reliance on caffeine to get going and wine to wind down...

You’re not alone, and you’re not broken. Dr. John and Dr. Kyrin break down how fueling your body with the right sugars—the kind that communicate with your cells, not sabotage them—can help you ditch hormonal poverty for good.

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🍽️Big Takeaway:

“You are what you eat, and if you eat garbage, your cells become garbage—and garbage cells can’t heal anything.”
—Dr. John E. Lewis

Whether you lean toward a carnivore, vegan, or somewhere-in-between diet, Dr. John’s message is clear: the key is quality, not dogma. And yes—your health can dramatically improve when you start eating what your genes, cells, and immune system actually recognize as real food.

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🔬About Our Guest:

Dr. John E. Lewis, PhD, is the founder of Dr. Lewis Nutrition and an internationally recognized clinical researcher with decades of experience in physiology and plant-based nutrition. His breakthrough studies on polysaccharides have shown powerful results in chronic diseases like Alzheimer’s, MS, HIV, and more.

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Tune in Now and Take the First Step 

Your health deserves clarity, truth, and transformation. Don’t miss this empowering episode of the Hormone Prosperity Podcast! Click play to listen, learn, and discover how this unconventional approach may be the missing key to your midlife health.

👉 Subscribe and listen on your favorite podcast platform now!

 

► Daily Brain Care supplement by Dr. Lewis Nutrition → www.drlewisnutrition.com

 

👉 Subscribe to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast and the Hormone Prosperity Coach YouTube channel for more inspiring content and actionable advice.

Hormone Prosperity Coach
https://www.youtube.com/c/KyrinDunstonMD

Hormone Prosperity Podcast
https://bit.ly/thehormoneprescriptionpodcast

 

Together, we’ll empower each other to ask the right questions and find answers that lead to lasting health and happiness. Let's stop the madness and start a movement towards hormonal prosperity! 🌟

 

❓HAVE A QUESTION and want my advice? You're invited to write to me at hello@kyrindunstonmd.com.  

I select e-mails with a clear question around hormone poverty (such as symptoms of Midlife Metabolic Mayhem, diseases caused or exacerbated by hormonal poverty, accelerated aging, early death, etc.) and achieving hormone prosperity using the two hormone prescriptions needed (one written and the other not) that are of reasonable length and detail and of interest to significant numbers of the audience. I regret I'm not able to answer all messages sent.  I appreciate your willingness to contribute to the community.

 

Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

What does it really mean to let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food? How do you navigate that in this day and age with all the complex dietary information? My guest today is gonna help shed some light on your dietary quandaries. Are all Sugars bad? GRE greetings, friend. Welcome to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin. Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me, to asking empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag ww HPD. Join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your genes and back into life, because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:05):

Welcome. Let's get started. Hi everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the Hormone Prosperity Coach. Thank you so much for joining me today. As we dive into another episode, talking about your nutritional inputs. There is so much nutritional information out there in this day and age, many of it conflicting, and you are probably confused about which path to go on for your nutritional needs. And I know you're probably not getting supported by your HMO providers because that's not a part of our education. Nutrition really isn't. We're basically taught in, I was as a board certified, O-B-G-Y-N, you get enough calories and you don't want, it's all about calories. And you just want a variety of foods in the sad diet, standard American diet. So that's what I taught for many decades, and that ended me up with midlife metabolic many, he 243 pounds, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, depression, anxiety, hair falling out, no sex drive, brain foggy, you know, all the symptoms because many of you have them too.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:18):

And so I've been on a journey for over a decade to heal myself, which has happened and I have lost a hundred pounds and kept it off for over a decade. So I like to bring you guests who can help inform your journey. I don't really believe there's one diet that's right for everyone. We're gonna talk about that during this episode. We're gonna talk about why all sugars are not bad, why you actually need sugar, and what to do about it. We're gonna even touch on the carnivore diet some more, and something called polysaccharides, which you may or may not be familiar with. So we're gonna talk about this in detail to give you some more inputs into your hormone prosperity journey so you can get to the hormone prosperity that you deserve. I'll tell you a little bit about Dr. John Lewis and then we'll get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:08):

So, John E. Lewis PhD is the founder and president of Dr. Lewis Nutrition. He has a long track record as a scientist, author, speaker at events all over the world. He has a passion for educating others about the value of nutrition, exercise, and health through his own experiences and knowledge of eating a whole food plant-based diet for over 27 years, taking certain key dietary supplements and a rigorous daily exercise training program. He's done lots of research in the area of nutrition, which is kind of rare these days. We're gonna talk about why that is. You need to understand that. And please help me welcome Dr. John E. Lewis to the

Dr. John Lewis (03:49):

Show. Thank you for having me. It's my pleasure to be here.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:52):

So I'd love to talk about nutrition for women over 40. We do, women over 40 are very interested in that because we know that it contributes to our hormonal poverty and our symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem. So always interested in learning about new perspectives, helping everybody understand the different options available for diet. I am of the belief that there might not be one diet that's right for everyone. We have very unique biochemical individuality, so I like to give people more information to help them put it in their bodies and decide what resonates as being right for them. And you come Dr. John from a physiology background, and now you're very passionate about teaching others about nutrition and kind of a whole foods plant-based diet. How did you become so interested in nutrition as a physiologist?

Dr. John Lewis (04:51):

That would go all the way back to my bodybuilding days. I got into drug-free competitive bodybuilding as a college student. I was looking for something else to do after high school to do something competitive and bodybuilding. I mean, some people refer to it as a sport. I don't, to me it's more of a physical activity that has sort of an artistic component to it. But to me it's not a sport. It doesn't matter how strong you are or how fast you run or how high you can jump, it's about what you look like on a stage if you take it to that level. But I didn't really appreciate nutrition up to that point in my life, quite frankly. I ate for, for taste lit, which I think most Americans, if not most, every person on the whole planet does. Most people don't eat for health.

Dr. John Lewis (05:35):

And I came from a family that, again, I, I had no health role models at all. We just all ate for, you know, taste. But when I got into bodybuilding, it, regardless of whether you take drugs or not, which I didn't, you still have to be very systematic and really take it as, as like a professional approach, if you will, even if you don't make any money on it, which <laugh>, I didn't do that either. And that was part of the reason why I decided to to not do that very long. But it, it, I always credit bodybuilding for shifting my mindset from just eating, you know, basically just for taste, for eating for a purpose. And once I realized pretty quickly that I was never gonna make a living as a bodybuilder. I was never gonna take drugs. I didn't wanna take those long-term risks that I shifted my focus more from a, let's call it a physical sports performance perspective, to a health perspective.

Dr. John Lewis (06:31):

And I still, my exercise training is still like a bodybuilder. I, that's the type of exercise training I prefer. I I've always loved strength training, but the, the, you know, the number of people that have, I would say the perspective on nutrition for a, for a physical performance purpose is what I mean. It's, it's not even 1% of the population, right? It's a very, very small number of people that have genetic blessings to play sports, to make a living. So that was also part of the reason that I shifted my focus was I felt like working with athletes or people in, in that world was not really my interest. But everyone else, you know, should, even athletes, you should still prioritize your health, which as you know as well as I do, that's what people are not doing today. That's why we're overrun and overridden with chronic disease.

Dr. John Lewis (07:22):

But I, I really started in my training in physiology and looking at how the cells respond to any, any type of, let's call it input, whether it's from exercise or physical activity or nutrition or whatever the case may be, was just very fascinating to me. And so kind of my personal and professional interest melded together, and I had no clue at that point as a student, as a grad student, whether I would do research as a living. I, I was still kind of forming myself in terms of what I wanted to do. And I just sort of stumbled into research. I, at that point in my life, I enjoyed the academic environment. It was laid back in the sense of not being so rigid, like going, you know, like the complete opposite of, say working for a bank where you have to be there at eight 30 in the morning, and then that's all you do till five o'clock and then you go home.

Dr. John Lewis (08:14):

Academics, obviously, you're very flexible. You come and go as you please, as long as you're doing your work and bringing in money to the university, you really can just set your own schedule, which is always what I preferred. So I was also able, even though the University of Miami does and still today does not have any kind of department or center or school of nutrition or dietetics, I was able, because of my personal interests and through just making connections with people and, and just sort, sort of building my own little niche within the university, I was able to carve out this niche for myself. Where at that time, at my peak of my academic career, I was literally one of you could not count all of us on more than two hands, the number of people doing nutrition research at the University of Miami. It was a very, very small number of people. But where it really took,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (09:06):

I would imagine that the, it's not a, a very prolific field because humans in the west generally aren't interested in nutrition. And even all the nutrition information we have is mostly ignored by the lay public, and that's right. The FDA and big food. And so nobody's doing it. And I, I wanna highlight this because everybody listening needs to be made aware that we are not researching nutrition in a very meaningful, impactful way because there's no funding for it. And you could maybe could speak to this, this no funding for it. So that's right. This is why you're gonna get kind of antiquated, outdated nutritional information. I also wanna highlight what you said about people eating for taste. You know, it's, I guess it goes without saying that we don't want to eat things that don't taste good. But it's funny, I grew up my mom's name is Jerry.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (10:07):

We call her granola Jerry, because she was always all about the taste and the nutrition. So I, I was raised and kind of nurtured in an environment that taught me that nutrition was important as a foundational function of the food, not just taste. And I didn't realize that until you just said that people eat for taste. And I thought, well, of course they do, but don't they eat for nutrition too, <laugh>? No, no. Most people don't. So I'm very grateful for that. But yeah. Can you, you talk a little bit about that nutrition science and why isn't there so much research and how does that impact us?

Dr. John Lewis (10:48):

Well, it's huge. And to your point of having so little money devoted or directed toward nutrition research compared to pharmacology and genetics, that was ultimately the reason why I left academics. I had the opportunity with our polysaccharide research only because of the generosity of a family member who had heard my colleague, Dr. Reg McDaniel, give a lecture about his work with polysaccharides. And then we ended up running the Alzheimer's and multiple sclerosis studies with, with this family's generosity, with their gift. And then on the other side, on the Rice brand side, it was with a company in Japan that has put their money where their mouth is. They're a small dietary supplement company who funds research on their flagship material. But when we made some really profound discoveries from our Alzheimer's study, including improved cognitive function in people with moderate to severe Alzheimer's, I tried twice with NIH and TR twice with the Alzheimer's Association to get these so-called experts in health or whatever they call themselves to recognize the value of what we had on our hands.

Dr. John Lewis (11:55):

And I got zero crickets, not a zilch, nothing in return. And so for me, that was like the beginning of the end of my academic career. I didn't realize it at that time, but it really was an eye-opener for me. So nobody can tell me otherwise. I mean, you only have to look at the budget of NIH. It's the largest, as, you know, the largest science budget on the planet of any organization. And almost the vast majority of it is going to pharmacology. And I guess, you know, some percentage to genetics research. So very little to your point, is going to nutrition and, and essentially drove me out of academics. I refused to spin another 2030, how many more every years of life I have left, banging my head against the wall, making it bleed, trying to get people to recognize the value of nutrition.

Dr. John Lewis (12:39):

And they're, you know, they may talk publicly all they want, but it's a, it's a, it's has been a farce maybe with assuming RFK gets appointed as the director of DHHS, maybe things will change. And I'm optimistic they will. But I mean, my, my time has, unfortunately, if that does align, my time has essentially come and gone in terms of academics. I mean, I'm, I'm still affiliated with the university on a part-time. I still have a part-time faculty position. I do some little bit of teaching, a little bit of work with some students, but I don't have any interest in being in the trenches anymore, running clinical trials. Man, that is a really brutal way to make a living, dealing with human beings and expecting them to participate in your study and, you know, be compliant with the protocol and all these other things that you have to do that is just not, at the end of the day, not a fun way to make a living unless you have a mm-hmm <affirmative>. I mean, if you're operating with, you know, a big pharma budget where you can hire a bunch of people and Right. You know, you, you've got a lucrative, you've got a lucrative budget behind you. But I never had that. I

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (13:44):

Think it's, it's super important. Thank you for highlighting that. Just for, I want everyone listening to, to understand, you're probably listening thinking, well, I don't wanna know about the politics, about nutrition and medicine, but you need to understand it because it is directly impacting what you have access to and what you don't have access to. That's right. And this is why most of the nutritional supplementation that you're going to encounter is gonna be from smaller private label companies. And you're gonna complain. Sometimes I hear people, I've been doing this, you know, in this sector for over a decade now, oh, but they're so expensive, my nutritional supplements, and I, and why do I have to take this and I shouldn't need it? And your regular doctors are gonna tell you, you can get everything you need from food. I know, because I told my patients that for decades because that's what I was taught.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (14:33):

But then when you know better, you do better says Oprah. And it's true that you're, it's just gonna impact what you have access to. So due to certain cons, constraints, Dr. Lewis and many others have to go their own route. And you've actually done a lot of research and provide a lot of supplementation that can be very beneficial for patients. You mentioned polysaccharides, so why don't we start there because I think some people know what they are, but some people don't. And so can you talk a little bit about what they are, why they're important for health?

Dr. John Lewis (15:08):

Absolutely. Well, up until meeting Dr. Reg McDaniel, who shared with me his story, and this is almost 20 years ago, about allo the polysaccharides from aloe vera, I was like, most people that had no clue really what they would do other than be a source of fuel for the cells. That was really, you know, my whole appreciation of saccharides. And of course, as you know, saccharide, carbohydrate, sugar, those are all synonyms. And so we, as Americans, especially what we've been so conditioned for at least the last half century to think, oh, sugar is bad. Oh, no, you can't eat sugar. But Ed, I, to me, that that just, that statement drives me up a wall. I cannot stand anytime somebody makes that statement, number one, is ignorant. And number two, it's factually incorrect because there are lots of different sugars that Mother Nature provides for us, and they have lots of different biochemical structures.

Dr. John Lewis (16:00):

So a monosaccharide, a one molecule sugar, like high fructose corn syrup, if you're eating that stuff every day, it's probably not your best strategy. You're probably gonna end up suffering some effects from that, that won't be positive. But these polysaccharides from aloe vera and Rice brand that my colleagues and I have studied, I would put these up against anything that Mother Nature provides for us for a healing effect or a healing benefit. They are so complex in design, they cannot even be drawn on a piece of paper. They are literally hundreds of glucose units attached together by these very sophisticated structural bonds. And so the, i, the amount of information that is coded within all of that structure that our genes interpret and then instruct our cells in how to function, that is where the magic happens, because you get more information from these polysaccharides than you do from amino acids, fatty acids, certainly vitamins and minerals, very simple structures.

Dr. John Lewis (16:54):

And so these things are just something, you know, it's no wonder humans have been using aloe vera for thousands of years. It's no wonder most of the world eats rice as a staple, although unfortunately they're eating usually white rice. They've had the rice brand stripped off of it, which is the most beneficial part of that plant. But again, these two, these two materials are just incredible. I mean, that they do so many amazing things for us. And this is not talking about treating disease, right? This is not the pharmacological model. This is the nutritional natural model, talking about providing the raw materials that mother nature provides to us, that then again, allows ourselves to function properly as guided by the genes. And then whether that's some sort of process of restoring homeostasis, repair, healing, correction, whatever you wanna call it, that's the nutritional model. And that's why these things are so powerful.

Dr. John Lewis (17:42):

And we've published so many papers from all of our studies, whether it's from Alzheimer's, Ms HIV, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, healthy people. I mean, we've got a massive amount of information that we've published of this work that I'm just so proud of and all of my colleagues who I'm so grateful for and being part of my life and, and this message that I can share with people about how these polysaccharides can really be so beneficial and so helpful. But you really do have to get them from a dietary supplement. I don't know about you. We have here in Miami, we have aloe vera growing in our backyard, but I'm not snipping off the leaves every day sucking that gel down, it tastes nasty. It's 99% water, so you couldn't possibly get enough polysaccharide content from it anyway. But we've done all the hard work for the average person. We've taken the polysaccharides from the aloe vera and the rice brand concentrated into a powder. And that's what we, you know, I'm going out around the world kind of as the, the sugar man, you might, you might say the complex sugar man helping people understand, well, this,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (18:43):

Here comes the sugar man, <laugh>

Dr. John Lewis (18:44):

<Laugh>, that all sugars are bad for you, is just complete garbage. That's a nonsense statement.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (18:49):

Okay? So I'm one of those sugar is bad. I'm just gonna be honest with you. I'm one of those sugar, right.

Dr. John Lewis (18:55):

Okay. Well,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (18:56):

And

Dr. John Lewis (18:56):

In fact, it's like everything else. It has to be taken into context things,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (18:59):

Right? And we cannot live without it, right? So sugar is essential, but too much is the problem and the glycosylation of all of our cells that causes the inflammation. So, and I think that most people listening also are in that camp because just like, you know, a couple few decades ago in the eighties, it was drilled into us. Fat is bad, fat is bad. Well, then they come say, oh, our bad, no fat is good. You need it. All your cells are made in of fat, coated in fat, your brain is fat. And now it's, oh, sugar is bad. So that is the bandwagon that most people are on. So can you help educate our listeners as to, okay, you mentioned rice and you mentioned aloe vera as naturally occurring sources of polysaccharides. Where else might they be getting these? And can you help them understand why these aren't turned into simple sugars in their body readily and then glycosylated their cells and causing inflammation and damage? Can you help everybody understand that?

Dr. John Lewis (20:01):

Well, there are polysaccharides in lots of different plants in the plant kingdom, and, and I don't, one thing about me is I don't profess to be an expert in everything related to nutrition. I, I, anybody who comes off as that way to me is a bit of a charlatan or a show person. I just don't think you're, even if you're the smartest person on the planet, you don't have enough hours in the day to study everything about nutrition. So when it comes to things like all the different mushrooms, seaweed, all the different tubers, I mean, there are grains, there are just so many plants that have these polysaccharides in them. But one of the arguments that my colleagues and I have been making for years is that because of the way the food has food production process has changed. Now, if you're a, if you're your own farmer, you're a different category, which those are very few people today, but you, you have all of this genetic modification of our plants, of our crops.

Dr. John Lewis (20:51):

You have the inputs of all these chemicals into the soil. You have polluted air, polluted water. So all of these things have degraded. Ultimately, the end of the day, all of these changes over the last a hundred years have degraded the quality of our food. So people are not getting even in, you know, just pick anything A tomato from a hundred years ago is a very different plant than it is today. And so you're not getting enough nutrition content. I, again, I can't compare the polysaccharides and aloe vera and rice brand to some of these others. I have a little bit of knowledge about some of the, the different mushrooms, like lion's mane. But what I can say is, based on my review of the literature, just looking at some of these other different types of plants, our research, and not just from the University of Miami, I, I, you could look at some of the research that's been con conducted from other labs and other universities around the world.

Dr. John Lewis (21:40):

Collectively, when you put all this information together, when you talk about inflammation, well, that's exactly where these polysaccharides make as big of an impact as anything. I mean, we've showed time and time again that these, these polysaccharides help to regulate the immune system. So what does that mean? Well, as you know, the immune system has lots of different components to it. So you can look at different things, whether it's, you know, your CD fours, your CD eights, your B cells, your natural killer cells, your dendritic cells. I mean, there's just a whole, you know, it's like a panoply of different subsets within the immune system that helps to regulate not just keeping us protected against infection, but regulating and helping to keep and balance all of our other major organ systems. So classically, what we have determined over this, you know, just for me personally, over this almost 20 year period now, is these polysaccharides essentially function as signaling mechanisms to the immune system.

Dr. John Lewis (22:35):

Again, whether it's, you know, your CD fours or your CD eights or your natural killer cells, we've published a lot of that information, and I'm happy to share those articles with you. And so they just have such a different dynamic effect. And again, we contributed back to the fact that they have this very complex nature that for whatever reason, our inherent intelligence, and I don't know what that means, really, it's the spark of life, if you will, but something within ourselves have this ability to say, okay, this is information that I need, or this is material that I need to function. And again, guided by our genes, everything that we, you know, do is in terms of what we put into our system is guided by our genetic structure. So that's what we've showed time and time again. I mean, when you talk about, you know, high fructose corn syrup, this modified corn saccharide compared to the, the polysaccharide, the complex polysaccharide complex sugar from the aloe vera or the rice brand, they're just completely, entirely different materials.

Dr. John Lewis (23:34):

There's no amount of the polysaccharide that we're aware of that will cause you to have insulin resistance or any of these other things. In fact, even for people who have had like life, you know, altering end stage cancers, very serious forms of neurodegeneration. I have a friend here in town who had very serious cardiomyopathy from taking messenger RNA injections and got him back on his feet. I mean, there are all sorts of different things that, that we have showed beyond just our clinical trials. But anecdotally, in terms of how these polysaccharides, number one, lower inflammation, number two, modulate immune function, number three increase adult stem cell production. Number four, enhance your natural killer cell cytotoxicity number five, balance th one, th two components of the immune system. I mean, it just goes on and on and on. And this is, again, not just one article or, you know, one study from, from our lab.

Dr. John Lewis (24:31):

This is around the world. This is an entirely complex amount of information that's been published over the last, well, several decades anyway. So I don't, I mean, it's, you know, it's, it's difficult to put all this down into very simple terms. You can only dumb scientific language down, you know, to such a degree where it doesn't even make sense. But it's, it's basically just that these materials, I, the best way I can put it for a lay person is that these materials are recognized by our immune system, and they either, you know, they're almost like adaptogenic, if you wanna look at it from that perspective. Like they have this capacity to either turn things on that should be on to a higher level, or they turn things off that have been dysregulated and are chronically out of control to tamper those things down too. And again, regulating and balancing and cr returning things to homeostasis.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (25:27):

You know, it, it's interesting, I recently interviewed a doctor who is a proponent of the carnivore diet and teaches about that. And so it's interesting that that interview, and this one came kind of back to back because, you know, he really opened my eyes. He was talking about our belief system and how that really is a huge part of what informs our so-called quote unquote nutritional science in the West. They're really about beliefs, but none of the information that was put into the sad diet, standard American diet, actually a lot of that information was never properly researched, but it just became common beliefs among nutritionists. And so they put forth this dogma about what a quote unquote healthy diet was without it being properly researched. And now when people are coming along with these various diets, you know, vegan, vegetarian, ovo, pesco, lacto, vegetarian, carnivorous, paleo, keto, all of these things, now people are starting to really do the research and going back and looking at the original sad diet and saying, yeah, this stuff wasn't researched.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (26:46):

So all that to say, he really helped me confront my own belief system because this idea of I'm going to eat three and a half pounds of meat all day, and that that's a balanced diet, I have a visceral or negative reaction to that when he told me how much steak he eats in a day. But then he was just sharing with me a lot of the data about beef has 70,000 phytochemicals in it. Everybody says animal protein doesn't have phytochemicals. It does. So we have these, these very strong beliefs. So he really opened my eyes and then all the research. But then also what's interesting is I think that <laugh>, to your point that we started with, a lot of people eat for taste, not for nutritional content. Really, most of us in the west are eating a very refined diet full of chemicals, heavily laden with chemicals and not so much a, a natural diet at all.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (27:47):

So, and my question to the doctor who was talking about the carnivorous diet was isn't it really that if we put people to a diet that they're eating just naturally occurring substances, <laugh>, maybe they're gonna get improvement anyway. If everyone's eating high fructose corn syrup, bladen products, if we put them on a carnivore diet, if we put 'em on a plant-based diet, polysaccharide, whatever it is, aren't they going to improve in all these measures anyway? Because those chemical derivatives of protein-like substances have, like you said, the switches that turn off our immune system, turn off our T-cell natural killer cell, all of these, this different cellular differentiation turn off our stem cell production. So does it really matter? And so I wanna kind of put that to you because he kind of said, yeah, you might be right, <laugh>. So I'm wondering what your thoughts are on that.

Dr. John Lewis (28:44):

I, you know, I look at these carnivore movement, to me, this is kind of just another iteration of what Atkins started with his first book back in, what was it, 72? I mean, it's a, it's hard to believe that started that long ago. And then ironically enough, that guy died of some version of cardiovascular disease. But I don't really, I mean to, to me, I just don't, I don't align it all. I mean, of course, I've been eating a plant-based diet for 27 years, so I wouldn't align with the carnivore diet. It makes no sense to me. I can't wrap my mind around the idea that the core of humanity needed to be a carnivore at any point in our existence, in our evolution. It doesn't make any sense to me. I, I mean, if you just look at our teeth, if you look at our gut, we look much more like herbivores than we do a true carnivore in the animal kingdom. So to me, I don't, it just doesn't, I don't understand this movement. I mean, to your point, yeah, if somebody's, if somebody's just seeing

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (29:39):

Data is amazing, the data on disease is just absolutely, it, it, it was jaw dropping to hear about all the research that's being done and really the outcomes they're getting. But I'm with you. You, there's nothing in our body that says we sure we've got the canine. So we are somewhat carnivorous, but certainly not only that. So I'm with you on that, but I'm starting to question after hearing all that research question, my belief system. And so I'm sorry to interrupt.

Dr. John Lewis (30:09):

Oh, no, that's okay. I mean, I grew, look, I'm, I'm, again, I grew up eating for taste. So my dad thought a meal was not a meal if it didn't have three things, a glass of milk, a piece of bread, and some kind of meat. It could have any other vegetables, grains, fruit along with it. And we ate a lot of fruits and vegetables. So I don't want to dismiss that. My parents were just completely negligent of eating, you know, good nutritious food. It was just that, again, if it didn't taste good, it didn't matter. If it was the healthiest thing on the planet, they weren't gonna eat it. But, so I grew up eating beef pretty much every day up until I was 20 something. And then in my early twenties, I cut down to maybe two times per year eating beef. And this was way before I decided to go plant-based.

Dr. John Lewis (30:52):

I just, I don't know, I was eating beef so much that it didn't, it, it didn't resonate. It didn't seem to continue resonating with my system. And I ate a lot of dairy growing up, and I was, I don't know, you know, just constantly constipated. I mean, I didn't know what a bowel movement was without being constipated. And as soon as I gave up dairy, literally within a few days, I was pooping like a champ. I mean, it completely changed my gut. So I knew for a fact from just that own, just that one little personal anecdote, eliminating dairy food outta my life made a huge difference in the way I felt. And, you know, who wants to sit on the toilet for 45 minutes doing his or her business? I don't think anybody does. But that <laugh> that that was my routine for my entire life until I gave up dairy.

Dr. John Lewis (31:39):

And so that for me was a very profound moment in my own little journey of life. But I just, for me, this carnivore stuff just doesn't make any sense. I mean, I, you know, to each his own, I mean, if you feel like that's what you should do and you think your body resonates with it, go for it. I just, to me, it, it's a very difficult bridge. I mean, it's one thing to be, you know, paleo or keto and say, well, I'm still gonna eat some vegetables and maybe some, you know, brown rice or something, and maybe a little bit of berries here and there, but just to say, oh, no, there's no plant that should be part of the human diet. That just doesn't make any sense to me. I, I mean, where does all of the, where do the, the other animals that are being eaten, where do they get their energy and their nutrition from? They get them from plants. No animal makes plants.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (32:30):

We're all parasitic on plants.

Dr. John Lewis (32:32):

That's right. I mean, animal,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (32:33):

We all paraic on plants. Every, every living thing.

Dr. John Lewis (32:35):

There's, there's not one animal on the planet that makes Omega-3 fatty acid. Every Omega-3 fatty acid comes from plants. So, you know, it's like, what are you talking about? I mean, it just doesn't, that whole notion of carnivore just makes zero sense.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (32:49):

I know I'm with you. But then the research is fascinating. But, you know, again, they don't have long-term data. And so I, I think that at some point, you know, I I I, I saw a friend a couple years ago, and I hadn't seen him for a while, and he looked emaciated. He had lost so much weight. He, he looked like he had no body fat. And he said he was doing this fruitarian diet that somebody was a proponent of to decrease his inflammation and reboot his immune system and all of this. And I mean, he looked like he was towards death to me, <laugh>.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (33:27):

But it, it's to my point that, you know, he said, well, his doctor's checking all his numbers and everything looks better than it has in decades, right. His cholesterol, his inflammatory parameters, everything. So he reassured me, but I think it's to the point that most people are eating a very unhealthy diet. So if you make any type of radical change to naturally occurring foods, you're going to get improvement. I think that's that's right. And so he said he was only gonna do it for six months, but then what next? And I also don't have this belief that the right, the diet is correct for each one of us. I mean, we come from very diverse areas all over the globe with na, natural habitats in our DNA kind of involved human DNA evolved in many places in concert with the plants that were locally available and the animals that were locally available. So I think there's something to be said for nature's magnificence and brilliance and understanding and orchestrating and engineering, oh, I'm gonna put these people here with these plants and animals because this is what they need and this type of environment.

Dr. John Lewis (34:35):

That's right. So

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (34:36):

Are you a proponent that people talk about what kind of diet in the work you're doing, you've found to be most healthy and beneficial for women, particularly women over 40 with midlife metabolic may mayhem, because that's what we're here talking about mostly. Well,

Dr. John Lewis (34:53):

I, I, again, I, this is my, somewhere between 27 and 28th year of eating a plant-based diet. So that's, I mean, I don't typically, I, I, I don't consider myself much of a preacher <laugh>. I'm more focused on, you know, spreading the message on my polysaccharide research, just because I think it's so profound and potentially beneficial regardless of your diet. And you, and again, you, you're not gonna get these polysaccharides from the diet. You really have to supplement with them. And it doesn't take a lot to, to have major benefit. But I think in general, I mean, if you talk about really just what you've said, eating real food, right? I mean, eating, trying to eat as much real food as possible, the way it looked like it came from Mother Nature. And of course, there, you know, there's processing. I mean, I, before I was on this baby duty night shift, I, I was eating a smoothie as my first meal a day.

Dr. John Lewis (35:41):

So you could argue that using a smoothie, using a blender is processing, right? I mean, it, I'm putting all these different ingredients into my Vitamix, and then I'm blending it up and that's my meal. Well, that's processed, you know, so like, that's another word that drives me crazy. I think people tend to get too outta control with the word processing, because how do you, there's, you know, it's like, it's, it's a continuum. It's not, there's no dichotomy there. So it's, and most of life is a continuum to some degree, but I just think that if you're mm-hmm <affirmative>. Predominantly eating mostly whole foods, and if you buy things that are in boxes or cans or whatever other package, just make sure that you understand what the ingredients are. I mean, that is definitely one thing for people to understand and learn is if you're reading a, an ingredient list, and that's not just the nutrition facts panel, that's everything underneath it.

Dr. John Lewis (36:34):

Make sure that you understand what those words are, and if you're confused or some of those words are just so chemical sounding that you don't even know what the heck they are, I would, my recommendation is put that thing back on the shelf. Like I wouldn't even buy it. Just stick to the, that, you know, as a lot of people advocate for, stick to the, the outer REM of the grocery store. And anytime you continue going deeper and deeper into the store, you're typically in the aisles where it's a lot of stuff that has had so much added to it that it's no longer food. It's more like food like substance.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (37:06):

Yes. I like the use the word refined. I agree with you. Processed can be, it's a spectrum. And putting something in your blender doesn't necessarily mean it's processed in the way we talk about when we talk about processed foods, but maybe refined foods is a better statement to use or, or right. Term to use. And when you look at the extracts, how people have taken food, real whole food, and then they break it down into component parts and put that in food, and then call it food. But it really is a food like product. It's not, it's like particle board in your right house.

Dr. John Lewis (37:45):

And it's the, it's the same with animal food too. I mean, you know, you look at a, you look at a chicken breast and you think, oh, that's real food. But wait a minute, that chicken was given drugs. It was given genetically modified corn and feed and everything else. It was treated in a way that, you know, completely disrespected that poor creature's life. Then once it was killed and, and processed, it was treated with all kinds of chemicals to keep it fresh. I mean, what's clean about that? Please tell me what is clean about all those chemicals that go into, to raising that bird and then turning it into something that's sitting at your grocery store that you then take home and cook. What is clean about that?

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (38:27):

Yeah, it's, it's really an engineered chicken. And so it looks like a chicken. It might, that's right. Quack like a chicken. It walks like a chicken. It tastes like a chicken, but it's really not a chicken. And, and I think that really gets to something else I love to talk about. I'll just go on a little mini tangent, which is our compulsive avoidance of the things that we can't see with our five senses we don't think are real, when really the things that we can't see here, taste, touch, feel, smell, all the things that we can't detect with our five senses are really what's essential for our health and our wellbeing, and also make our lives meaningful. I mean, love is the thing, the example that I use, you can't put it in a box, you can't take a picture of it, but everybody knows it's one of the most powerful, if not the most powerful forces on the face of this earth.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (39:17):

You can't see it. You can't experience it with your five senses, but you know it, and it has the power to give life, take life away. And so it's the same with our nutrition. People need to really get out of this fat, well, it looks okay and it tastes okay, right? Right. So it must be healthy. Really, we've gone beyond that. You need to get really granular on the microscopic and even sub subatomic, like, what's happening with this food. So you mentioned earlier you can't, you're going to need to take a, a supplement that you, you can't take enough aloe vera or rice pan. Can you talk a little bit about that? Just because you would have to consume so many calories of these foods that contain polysaccharides, that you can't consume enough to get these health benefits. So where does that statement come from? And so how can people know what they need to do to start incorporating the benefits of polysaccharides into their life?

Dr. John Lewis (40:14):

Well, that's a great question. So again, I mean, if you have, you know, stage four cancer or advanced neurodegeneration, or some very serious cardiomyopathy or something like that, you might need a couple of grams per day. So we're talking what, eight calories. I mean, we're <laugh>, you know, compared to eating whatever the average American Eats today, 2,500, 3000 calories, we are talking about a very, very, very, very small fraction of the amount of macro nutrition that people are consuming, or macro energy, I guess is a better word. So for most people, you get a couple of hundred milligrams per day of these polysaccharides, and you're in good shape. So we're not even talking, I mean, you're more people are spending more money on their favorite Starbucks drink every day than they would be on taking these polysaccharides that have a completely different effect on the body.

Dr. John Lewis (41:05):

So let's not, I don't want anybody to leave this conversation confused that they've gotta, you know, consume just, you know, bucket loads of these polysaccharides every day to, to have any kind of a benefit. We're talking, again, a very, very small amount compared to your food intake. And again, I would just say that, you know, we've done the hard work for you. I mean, we've conducted all these clinical trials, we've validated this stuff. I mean, this is, this is my life's work. I put my name on the label. I mean, I'm not, there's no deception here. This is, this is my life's work, and I'm very proud of this work. You know, Dr. Lewis Nutrition, the brand Daily Brain Care, the flagship product that we created out of out of these clinical trials in Alzheimer's and multiple sclerosis. But again, I, you know, anybody can benefit from this.

Dr. John Lewis (41:48):

It doesn't have to be somebody with neurodegeneration. I've been on my own formula for 10 years. My mother, who's elderly, she's been on it a little over that. My wife started taking it over five years ago when she was pregnant with our first child. When our first child turned six months of age, when we started introducing solid food to her, I started giving her the polysaccharides. We'll do the same thing with my son when he turns six months old. So these are literally, you know, oxygen obviously is our first nutrient. And then after that we need vitamins and minerals and other essential things. But again, I would put these polysaccharides up against anything else that I'm aware of that Mother Nature provides for us for health and healing benefits. And, and, you know, we don't, we just talk so little about prevention. It's always about, oh gosh, I have this issue.

Dr. John Lewis (42:32):

What do I do about it? Well, how about we prevent things in the first place? Like, let's try to prevent things from happening to us <laugh> in the first place. Let's not get in a state of sickness and then have to figure out what to do about it. Let's not get there in the first place. So take your polysaccharide, your vitamin D, your calcium, your magnesium. You know, there are several things that people are insufficient or deficient in today, but I would put these polysaccharides at, I mean, they're at the top of my list. And for anybody who knows me, the,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (43:00):

So I'm to say I am a, a 52-year-old woman, and I'm having the symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem. Number one, weight gain, right? 50 half of us, 50% of us overweight are obese by the time we're 53 quarters of us overweight or obese by the time we're 60. So I've got a weight problem. I am tired, I am caffeine dependent, and I'm having to drink coffee to wind up in the morning. And then I'm so irritable, <laugh>, restless, irritable, and discontent. I gotta have wine to wind down. And then my brain, my thinking function is just foggy and not right. Top 1, 2, 3 symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem. So you tell me, I'm gonna add these polysaccharides, Dr. John, to my diet, and then what am I gonna notice with those top three symptoms? What's gonna change first?

Dr. John Lewis (43:48):

Well, so that is, that's a great question. So, number one, one of the things that people always report better about is sleep. And as you well know, we have millions of people, they don't even necessarily have to have insomnia, but they have, let's call it disrupted or just not refreshing sleep. So sleep is a big thing that re that people report to us. So sleeping obviously cures a lot of ills, and so that'll be one thing that will happen. Number two, you mentioned energy or feeling fatigued. I've got a lot of people that swear by it in terms of their energy levels. I've, I even have some people that say they cannot take it too late in the day because they get such a boost that it will actually keep them awake. Now, daily brain care has no caffeine in it. It has literally zero caffeine in it.

Dr. John Lewis (44:31):

So this is not working as a stimulant like coffee is it's a completely different mechanism, if you will. This is, again, enabling the cells to function properly guided by this material that the genes recognize. So favorably weight, I mean, obviously that's a huge issue. I would not say that daily brain care is like some fat burner that people like to throw around that term. It's not, it's not necessarily that. But in conjunction with, you know, starting to get back to a more regular diet or a not regular a whole food diet and exercise, of course there is an, there is part of the equation that we have to address with exercise and physical activity. Unfortunately, most people are never gonna exercise their weight to weight loss. It's just not gonna happen. So it really has to come down to nutrition. But I would say that the way the daily brain care works in terms of helping to tamper down chronic inflammation, boost your adult stem cell production and regulate some of these different components of your immune system, all of that is gonna help you to get less inflamed over time, which is obviously huge.

Dr. John Lewis (45:39):

And then when you combine that with the adult stem cell production increase, now you're sending out these amazing stem cells that your own body creates to address areas of, let's call them again, trauma damage, you know, whatever term you'd like to prefer. This could be something like, you know, a joint issue or, you know, something that just continues to nag at you that you can't really figure out. But that would be so important too, to help that person with, you know, the fatigue. And again, I, I don't wanna go too far down the road of, of helping to manage weight, but it's certainly there is a role for all that. I mean, obviously we can't talk about overweight or obesity without addressing the inflammatory component to that. So the way the, the, that this, this formula will help with addressing some of these different issues, I think for the, the woman out there who's in her early fifties and really struggling, it's gonna help her with, with getting to a better you know, better state of health.

Dr. John Lewis (46:38):

I mean, and some people, it actually happens like very quickly. I, there is a group of people I refer to as super responders. It's probably about 20 or 30% of the people who take this formula. They will literally start noticing the, these effects within just a couple of days. That's, again, a smaller number of people. The majority of people will take usually 30 to 60 days, but it's, it's really incredible what these polysaccharides will do. I I just, I don't know of anything else like them in terms of how these effects work and, and just how amazing I, I've just, it is been an incredible ride for me over this nearly last 20 years. And I, I have so much more work to do and mm-hmm <affirmative>. And so much more hopefully lives to touch, but it's, it's just incredible. And even for you, you know, you folks in the carnivore movement, don't be so close-minded that you think you can't enjoy the benefit of these plants just because you're taking, you know, 500 milligrams or a couple of grams a day, that's not gonna throw off your cana your carnivore movement. It's <laugh> it really isn't

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (47:37):

<Laugh>. Yeah. So thank you so much Dr. John for the work you're doing for your passion about helping people get healthier. I am passionate about that as well. Thank you, Dr. Karen. I wanna wrap up. I love these quotes that you shared, <laugh> you shared with me before we started recording that I just wanna share with everyone. You, you literally are what you eat. I once saw a posting on social media and it was a person looking in the mirror. And in the mirror what they saw was the, you know, one cheek was broccoli, the other cheek was cauliflower. There was, you know, a chicken wing on their forehead. And so their whole body was everything they had eaten. And you are what you eat <laugh>. You really, and Dr. John also shared this garbage in, garbage out. So if you're eating garbage, guess what?

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (48:23):

Your cells are gonna be made of garbage. And that's right. Cells that are made of garbage can't run a proper properly functioning immune system. That's right. Cells that are garbage just can't heal your eyes, can't heal everything that needs to be healed and fixed in your body. And I think it was Hippocrates originally who said, let food be thy medicine and medicine. Yes. Be th food. It really is next to oxygen. Thank you for pointing that out, Dr. John, our number one nutrient. Right? That's right. You're deprived of oxygen for a few minutes, you don't have a life anymore. So it is our number one nutrient and food would be, and water our number two and three nutrients. That's right. So make it the best. Optimize that input for yourself. Dr. John, thank you so much. Do you wanna share with everyone where they can reach out to you, find you online and find out more about you and connect with you and maybe even try your products if they're interested?

Dr. John Lewis (49:19):

Sure. Dr. Thank you so much for having me. I've really enjoyed our conversation. I'd be happy to come back anytime. If if anyone would like to learn more, please go to Dr. Lewis nutrition.com. DR lewis, L-E-W-I-S nutrition.com. That's our primary website where we have just tons of really good information. I think people will feel inspired by reading a lot of the information, watching a lot of the videos there. And we're under Dr. Lewis Nutrition on, on all the typical social media channels as well. Although those are mostly just short videos, but you can reach us by email, phone any way you'd like. Daily Brain Care is our flagship product from all of this research from my academic career at the University of Miami. And I'm just, again, I'm grateful for the opportunity to talk to you and your listeners today, and if anyone has any issues they think that they might wanna reach out to me about, I'd be more than happy to help. So thank you again for this time. I really am grateful.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (50:15):

Awesome. Thank you. We're so grateful to have you on as well. Good luck with your seven week old. Hopefully the sleep schedule and the witching hour gets a little bit better. I know how challenging, remember how challenging that can be. So thank you so much for taking time out of your schedule to speak with us. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you all for joining us for another episode of the Hormone Prosperity Podcast, where we teach you how to get out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity so that you can get off the couch into your genes and back into life. I look forward to hearing your thoughts about this episode, especially since we've been talking about the carnivore diet. And now we're talking about this. What are your thoughts on the proper diet and nutrition? So reach out to me on social media and let me know and we'll have a conversation about it. I'll see you again next week. Until then, peace, love, and hormones, y'all,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (51:14):

Thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about, love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty with without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering woman to another. I thank you. See you next week.

Dr. Shawn Baker | Could Eating Plants Be Hurting Your Health? How The Carnivore Diet Is Reversing Chronic Disease

Have you been told to eat more plants to be healthy, only to feel worse, not better? What if the advice you’ve been following isn’t serving you at all—in fact, what if it’s actually harming your health? It’s a bold idea, but one that today’s guest, Dr. Shawn Baker, breaks down with science, expertise, and real-life transformations.

Dr. Shawn Baker isn’t just anyone. He’s the Co-Founder of Revero, an orthopedic surgeon, a world-renowned expert in treating chronic disease through medical nutritional therapy, an Amazon best-selling author, world champion athlete, international speaker, podcast host, and a trusted consultant. Oh, and did we mention? He’s one of the world’s leading advocates for the carnivore diet—a way of eating that’s helping reset health for so many, particularly midlife women like you.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• Are plants what they seem? Dr. Baker dives into the surprising ways plant-based diets can trigger inflammation and other health challenges—especially in midlife women. 
• The carnivore diet explained—what it is, how it works, and the science behind why it’s reversing chronic disease and reigniting the health of so many.  
• Real stories, real results—hear inspiring stories of women who’ve transformed their health by adopting a carnivore lifestyle. 
• Hormones, weight, and energy—discover how this diet can support hormonal balance, sustainable weight management, and vitality in your middle years.  
• Practical advice just for you—Dr. Kyrin and Dr. Baker offer actionable tips to help you start implementing the carnivore diet today with confidence.

Why This Episode is a Game-Changer for Midlife Women

Struggling with chronic inflammation, weight changes, or hormonal imbalance? Feel like nothing works, no matter how “healthy” you eat? This episode might just be the light at the end of the tunnel. Dr. Kyrin and Dr. Baker explore how the carnivore diet restores health through simplicity and science, challenging conventional “healthy eating” norms. Wondering if cutting plants from your diet could actually be the answer? You’re not alone, and you’re about to find out why this approach is turning heads—and changing lives.

Tune in Now and Take the First Step 

Your health deserves clarity, truth, and transformation. Don’t miss this empowering episode of the Hormone Prosperity Podcast! Click play to listen, learn, and discover how this unconventional approach may be the missing key to your midlife health.

👉 Subscribe and listen on your favorite podcast platform now!

 

► Revero & Carnivore Diet by Dr. Shawn Baker

 

👉 Subscribe to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast and the Hormone Prosperity Coach YouTube channel for more inspiring content and actionable advice.

Hormone Prosperity Coach
https://www.youtube.com/c/KyrinDunstonMD

Hormone Prosperity Podcast
https://bit.ly/thehormoneprescriptionpodcast

 

Together, we’ll empower each other to ask the right questions and find answers that lead to lasting health and happiness. Let's stop the madness and start a movement towards hormonal prosperity! 🌟

 

❓HAVE A QUESTION and want my advice? You're invited to write to me at hello@kyrindunstonmd.com.  

I select e-mails with a clear question around hormone poverty (such as symptoms of Midlife Metabolic Mayhem, diseases caused or exacerbated by hormonal poverty, accelerated aging, early death, etc.) and achieving hormone prosperity using the two hormone prescriptions needed (one written and the other not) that are of reasonable length and detail and of interest to significant numbers of the audience. I regret I'm not able to answer all messages sent.  I appreciate your willingness to contribute to the community.

 

Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

Would you follow the advice of a doctor who said you should only eat meat in order to be healthier? Here's one who's got the data indicating that you should consider doing just that.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:12):

Greetings friend, welcome to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin. Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me? To ask empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag WW HPD. Join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your genes and back into life because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there. Welcome. Let's get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:01):

Hi everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the Hormone Prosperity Podcast. Thank you so much for joining me today as we talk to Dr. Shawn Baker about a very interesting and controversial topic. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this about the carnivore diet. Dr. Baker is an orthopedic surgeon. He is a champion athlete, international speaker, author, podcast host consultant. He's got a huge social media following where he primarily teaches and is a proponent of the carnivore diet. He has an upcoming company getting ready to launch that will assist people in reversing chronic disease and inflammation, partly using the carnivore diet and other tools. And he'll tell you a little bit about that. And on the show he's joining me today because I had heard about the carnivore diet, but I really hadn't had anyone on the show to talk about it. Some of you have asked me about it and I've just said I'm not an expert in it.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:08):

I can't, I can't comment. But it did kind of go against my sense of being correct and it just sounded not correct. But we talk about in the episode how your belief system is really something pretty solid. It can prevent you from being open to new, particularly around your health, but new information that might benefit you. So I'm a big proponent of having an open mind in every area. I wanted to have Dr. Shawn on to open my eyes and my ears to the truth and he cites on a really powerful studies that have been done, including at Harvard, that have documented the wow extreme strength of the carnivore diet in reversing chronic disease and inflammation in very impactful ways. Individual and collective societal level. I think you're gonna wanna hear about this because he is probably speaking to you too. We all in the list have some degree of chronic inflammation and disease or we're working on it whether we know it or not.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:19):

Hopefully you are taking steps to get yourself tested and not guessing and just thinking because your mainstream doctor pokes you and listens to your lungs every year and does some blood week work and says you're fine, that you're actually means you're optimally healthy. 'cause It doesn't mean that. And if you have been listening to me long enough, you know that's a fact. So I'll tell you a little bit about Dr. Baker and then we will jump in with him. He's a medical doctor and like I said, orthopedic surgeon, world-leading authority on treating disease with medical nutritional therapy. Amazon bestselling author, world champion athlete, international speaker podcast host consultant and his company is Rivero. He'll tell you a little bit more about that. He's a proponent of the carnivore diet and educates people on social media about this powerful tool to reverse and heal chronic inflammation and disease. Welcome Dr. Shawn to the show.

Dr. Shawn Baker (04:11):

Thank you for letting you have the opportunity to speak to your audience. Appreciate it.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (04:14):

You have so much experience in so many areas that you could speak to. But what really intrigued me about having you on the show was to talk about a topic that I heard you talking on J'S podcast about, which is the carnivore diet. I have a lot of women who ask me about the carnivore diet and I'm not an expert in why people are proponents of, well I know they say decrease inflammation is one of the biggest things. And I actually know a woman who killed herself. She has a very famous TED talk that they didn't publish <laugh> where she talked about healing herself. I believe it was an autoimmune disease using the carnivore diet and they did not publish it, but she was able to get a copy and publish it and it's very popular and helped a lot of people. So there is I think, some validity to it and I'd like to dive in with you because women have the question, well, why might I consider a carnivore diet? What would I get out of that as a physician, it's not really something that we are taught as physicians as being a healthy, balanced, rounded diet in this what I call the sad diet standard American diet. So how did you come to be a proponent of the carnivore diet and see that it had usefulness?

Dr. Shawn Baker (05:31):

Yeah, first I think the person referring to is named Mikala Fields. She had ju juvenile, rheumatoid arthritis, ended up with a hip replacement of knee report or an ankle replacement like as a teenager. She clearly had issues and, and she was having some depression and anxiety and used the diet to put that into remission. Basically, she saw me on Joe Rogan's podcast way back about seven, eight years ago and then I inspired her and so on and so forth. But my own personal experience was, I'm almost 60 now and when I was in my forties, my health was not quite where I wanted it to be. Sorry, I was an athlete. I've been a world champion athlete, I've been a world champion in three different sports now. So I've been athletic my whole life and pet competed, trained. Even while I was practicing as a surgeon, I still made the time to to train, but my health was not where I wanted it to be.

Dr. Shawn Baker (06:16):

And so I said, lemme just play more with nutrition. And I went on this low fat calorie restricted diet, lean protein, lots of vegetables thing that you might normally hear people say. And I was able to get leaner. I was at that time I was the world champion in Highland games and you have to big guy. I'm, I'm six foot five, about 2 85 at that time. And I dropped down about 2 35, got really lean, this really lean, I was hungry. <Laugh> tired, hurts the hospital. Like we like the fat doctor better make it way, way better. 'cause You're, as I, I did not like being that hungry all the time. So I knew that wasn't sustainable. So then I just delved into different sort of diets. I got into Pale Paleolithic Diet for a while, started, you know, reading some of the low carb literature and then started to adopt that.

Dr. Shawn Baker (07:02):

I noted for my own personal self that I did really well on a low, low carb hydro diet. My appetite was much better regulated, wasn't hungry. And then the interesting thing was we were challenged with as an orthopedic surgeon was replacing a lot of people's knees and one of the populations we were replaced were a lot of O obese patients. And so the obese patients had higher risks for blood clots, infections or healing, slow healing and on. We were trying to see if we could get these patients to lose weight before going to the operating room. And there was no real guidance. It was like, hey, do your patients are in your BM 35 20 <inaudible> the or. And so you could send to a tric surgeon, have a get bypass, which was practical. There was no way he could keep up the demand. So I had said, Hey look, why don't you guys try a lower carb ketogenic cell diet, see how it goes.

Dr. Shawn Baker (07:49):

And not everybody would do it. Maybe 20, 25% of people would actually try it. But the interesting thing for me was that people would come back a couple weeks later because I would, you know, have come back in a couple weeks, see how, how things were going with weight loss. And very commonly they would report that the knee that I was gonna operate on because of severe pain didn't hurt anymore. Which was really just mind blowing to me. I was like, wait a minute, you've got an x-ray that literally looks like it took your knee and fed it to a dog and let chew on it for a couple days and stick it back in there. It was a horrible x-ray, but they said the knee doesn't hurt. I'm like, well you know what, if your knee doesn't hurt and you don't mind staying on the diet, then there's no reason to to do the surgery right now.

Dr. Shawn Baker (08:22):

So I end up canceling a lot of surgeries. Believe it or not, the hospital was not thrilled about that <laugh> they liked, they liked the high volume, just crank that, cranked that wheel and like that. So it got me a little bit jaded around how medicine is practiced in general. I was doing this low carb diet and I came across this group of people that were just eating all meat. I thought they were literally crazy. It just makes no sense. You gonna be, where's your fiber? Where's all this? You're clearly gonna flog your arteries up and die. But I had a more of a curiosity that I was following, but I was seeing these pretty incredible transformations. Yeah, it was a group of 2000 people. It wasn't what it is today where there are the last a hundred, 2000 people have now done this. I was, they had some pretty legitimate science backed research that they could point to and up to the point where I said, we're just gonna try it, see what happens already.

Dr. Shawn Baker (09:06):

A little car, no big deal. And I did it. This is back in 2016, so I do it and 30 days. And I was like, this is the best I've felt since maybe my thirties. And I was 50 at the top and I was like, this is pretty darn impressive how, how little inflammation I have. The chronic knee pain that I had had gone away. My gut was so like there was no issue with my digestion. You know, I, I had come to accept normal, a little bit of bloating, a little bit of discomfort was normal digestion. Most people accept it and it just went away. It's like nothing. If you have, God forbid you have heart pain and then there's something wrong or if you have back pain, there's something wrong. But if you have gut pain, <inaudible> a little bit of food, no big deal.

Dr. Shawn Baker (09:42):

That's how it's supposed to be. I would argue that's not how it's supposed to be. You shouldn't have bloating, discomfort, pain with digestion. If you do one or two things is going gut is broken or you're eating wrong food. So I think most of the people is just eating wrong food. So I did this and I was a little bit on social media and I had a Twitter account at the time, a few thousand followers. And I convinced a hundred people to try it. Let's do it for 90 days, see what happens. And we recorded all their data and we found that the average person within 90 days, a hundred people, the average person lost about 30 pounds. The resting heart rate went down by about 10 beats, eight centimeters off of the waist. We had them track their heart rate. We had them subjectively rate, how's your sleep?

Dr. Shawn Baker (10:20):

How's your cognition? How's your mood? How's your libido? How's your digestion? All of it got better. And I was like, this is neat, this is cool. So I was putting this out there and, and then I got picked up on the Joe Rogan podcast, go do this. Back in 2017 that led to a lot of eyes on what I was doing. I was asked to write, write a book by the publisher and it was called a zero carb Diet at the time. To me that wasn't a very good name. It's called the carnivore 'cause you're basically a bunch of meat like a carnivore. And that's what stuck. And then it became very popular. And so now I've been advocating for this really as a therapeutic tool. I don't necessarily say you need to eat three for the rest of your life. Humans are carnivore. I think that's a little bit over the top when it comes to disease mitigation. It has been incredibly powerful. And we're talking like things from diabetes to obesity to all kinds of autoimmune disease, to mental health disorders, to all kinds of inflammatory issues. Just really tremendously effective at that stuff. And that's where I'm at today.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (11:15):

Okay, great. And what would be the big difference between a paleo diet, which has a lot of meat and a carnivore diet?

Dr. Shawn Baker (11:24):

If you eat some eggs, there's a little bit of carbohydrate and an ago egg and it's half a gram of carbohydrates. Do you have any dairy products which variably some people can tolerate? Some can't. That can be a little bit of carbohydrate there, but it's very low carbohydrate. But I think the biggest differentiator is really the lack of vegetables and fruits and things like that. There's no fruits and vegetables. So people are horrified when they hear that, oh my God, how do you live without phytonutrients? And all the fiber is so important, believe it or not, you don't need fiber to be healthy. You don't, I think fiber is conditionally beneficial. I think when we look at all the, the mountains of epidemiologic data that shows that higher fiber diets are associated with less heart disease and less cancer and all. I think it's all basically compared to what it's like, what is the fiber replacing?

Dr. Shawn Baker (12:03):

Often it's replacing refining processed foods and therefore you have an overall better diet quality score. But it's not essential. You don't need it to survive. Clearly if you did, I'd long be dead because I don't consume any. It's, it's like we have so much, I don't know, just this preconceived bias on what we think is healthy. And then when you step far outside of that paradigm, it's very upsetting to people. It 'em off. They believe in what we've been taught and and they believe the science and it's, there's some holes from the science. We haven't really asked the questions that would really be germane to what we're talking about here. This upsets a lot of people. There's no doubt about it. We hear red meat is bad for us. The average American eats around, and this is not an exaggeration. The average American eats around one ounce of unprocessed red meat today, one ounce.

Dr. Shawn Baker (12:49):

I consume anywhere between two and a half to four pounds of it a day. I'm a big guy, 250 pounds. I'm a big man, but wow, I eat literally a hundred times more than the average person. And if red meat were killing us, then I should be a beast. I should be diabetic, I should cardiovascular disease, I'm almost 60 years of age and instead I'm breaking world records. I'm pretty darn fit. This doesn't, and it's not just me, it's I'm some genetic outlier. There are now thousands and thousands of these testimonials over and over again. We've published a number of studies now. We've had Harvard University published a study in 2021 looking at 2000 people in their diet. Universally, everyone got better. We had diabetics, we had two, oh I think it was 226 or 229 diabetics in that cohort. A hundred percent of 'em came off all injectable medications excluding insulin.

Dr. Shawn Baker (13:33):

92% came off all their insulin. 84% came off all their oral medications. This is like a a, a big lever. It's not common to just see that they're coming off the GLP ones and the SGLT two inhibitors and <inaudible>. But they were coming off all these medications. We've had a case series published on inflammatory bowel disease. So Crohn's and Ulcer colitis completely cured off all meds. We've got case series on anorexia published on this. We've got case series on mental health disorders, anxiety and depression published on this. We are in the middle of publishing a series on multiple sclerosis that's coming out. We'll have some intervention trials primarily starting with diabetes. So we've got a lot of research that's that's evolving this stuff. And it's, it's just something that I think we should consider as a therapeutic intervention three to six months for most people.

Dr. Shawn Baker (14:16):

Most people get better. It helps with food addiction because we have a lot of people who are food addicts. I think if you're treating a chronic medical disease, probably in some form or fashion have you need to be treating the nutrition. And a lot of times there's this psychological addictive stuff, sub behavior. And our food system is such a horrible situation that we have food companies that have intentionally made food addictive. And I've talked to the two chemists that have done this. They've literally told me that my job is really to make people addicted to these products. Yeah. And they know how to tickle our neurons to, we can't get enough of them. It's really challenging for somebody to moderate. So Shawn Yeah, go ahead. You brought up so many great

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (14:50):

Points. I wanna just ask you to go a little deeper on this. You cited many studies that have pretty profound outcomes of improvement, but you said you think it's best used as a therapeutic intervention for three to six months. Where, so that people should use it for therapy for three to six months and then go to what and what informs that opinion?

Dr. Shawn Baker (15:12):

Certainly, like I'll mention our company Rivera. So we do this, we bring people, we bring them to the level of elimination. Not everybody goes carver, some people do. And then we, because we've got data on thousands and thousands of patients with disease x, disease Y and we know that these patients tend to do better with these types of food. This is stuff that nobody really has studied until now. We've been looking at this stuff pretty intensely. No one's gonna go back to eating a pure junk food diet. That's just not even human food. That that's literally human pet chow. It's recreational drugs is really what these foods are. I mean, so we just, you don't do that. But you can go back to some form of whole food diet. So it might be that you include some fruits and vegetables and things like that back into your diet.

Dr. Shawn Baker (15:47):

Typically the, it's reintroduction phase where you, let's say, you know, I like strawberries, I don't see how strawberries do. And you just reintroduce 'em. You do a couple trials to see how you do. And if you consistently get no negative response, then that's pretty safe to say that you can probably tolerate that food. You just build your diet back. Some people, a lot of people honestly like myself and hey, I like the simplicity. I just like eating steak and I don't really care. I don't miss that stuff very much. It's, it's a real concept to have because we have grown up in a, in in such a environment of sobriety and surplus that that never really existed. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> in humanity. I mean if you look at even 150 years ago before there was refrigerator, before there was mass transport, you couldn't get a banana in January in, in Minnesota like you can today.

Dr. Shawn Baker (16:28):

But today we've got all this stuff in not that long ago mean it would be like what grows locally? What can I kill? And that was the food supply. Right? Going back to something along that is probably the most effective for many people. I've seen people, like I said, even with Crohn's disease where they, they come off their meds, they come off their biologics, they, they completely go asymptomatic. All their markers are normalized. They do it for maybe six months a year and then they start adding a few things back in there. And this is how most people say they're still eating a lot of meat. They don't go to a vegetarian diet after they typically are, you would call it an animal base or a meat based diet. But majority of the nutritionists come from meat. And if you think about we, what is a physiological necessity for us to eat, we need essential amino acids, we need essential fats, we need a source of energy, vitamins and minerals.

Dr. Shawn Baker (17:10):

And you get that in very good efficiency with me. I know it's what about phytonutrients? Most people don't realize that beef has phytonutrients and beef has something like 70,000 nutrients. And there was a nice study that the Stefan Van Lee at a Duke University did back in 2021 where they compared the phytonutrient content of beef. And they said basically, certainly depending on how the animal is, is finished the phytonutrient content of beef rivals that of plant foods and it's more bio available. So it's not like you're missing out on polyphenols and all these things that you think I gotta eat my blueberries and cranberries, whatever the antioxidant foods. It's just not something that you miss. And I guess the proof is in the pudding. But we've got people that have been doing this diet for as long as 65 years when there was an 82-year-old woman, this rancher up in Canada, she's been doing this for 82 years.

Dr. Shawn Baker (17:54):

She's 82 years old. She looks like she's in her fifties. She's jacked, you know, <laugh>, she's still learning Spanish at 82. She still works the cattle. She's pretty amazing. I've seen people 20, 30 years I've been doing this, I'm in my eighth year. But my main interest as a physician is let's get people that are sick and make them much sick anymore. A lot of people are like, we're gonna talk about longevity. That's nice to talk about. But the practicality of it is, who knows? There's not a single longevity guru or proponent that's ever produced 150 year old healthy human. This doesn't happen. So I'm like, that's nice to speculate about, but what about we take these sick people, we got plenty of them. Well let's get healthy. Yes, you can do that and that's a good goal.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (18:34):

Yeah. And I all the time talk to women I work with about their belief system and what they believe, how health is created and what a healthy diet is. Some of my beliefs. And when you're saying that beef contains all these phytochemicals phytonutrients, 70,000 of them and inside I'm my, my brain is going, no, that can't be true. So we all have these ingrained biases and I think you're right. Nutritional science with the sad standard American diet really has been a proponent of, oh, what a healthy quote unquote diet is. And we know where that's gotten us. But I almost wonder if maybe part of the problem is that the majority of Americans, the majority of westerners really are eating a lot of junk in general. So it almost doesn't matter if you made them eat all fruit. 'cause I've heard of people who are fruitarians and they get healthier and if you made them eat only vegetables, vegetarian, they get healthier. If you eat anything that's a real food as opposed to the crap that is put forth as food in our Western society, aren't you gonna get better <laugh> is my question.

Dr. Shawn Baker (19:47):

Yeah. We do have, if you look at the so-called standard American Western diet, it's 60, 70% ultra process food. We have a lot of people that are suffering with obesity. They're actually malnourished. They got plenty of calories, but they don't have any nutrients in bodies. They have this un insatiable hunger. If you eliminate these ultra processed junk foods, which they're ubiquitous, then you're gonna improve your health. There's no doubt about it. Now the question becomes like, for instance, if you go to a plant-based diet and a lot of people are advocates of a, you know, wholely, plant-based diet and you do see people that lose weight. And the reason for that really is that yes, you've eliminated all this junk, which is clearly a good step. I think everybody should do that re regardless of what diet you end up on, then you're on this plant-based diet and you have a harder time absorbing nutrition.

Dr. Shawn Baker (20:28):

Fiber binds up certain nutrients that you end. It just ends up in the toilet. You have bigger bowel movements, more frequent bowel movements, you lose a lot of nutrition in the toilet. Things like phytic acid phytates and things like that you find in grains and legroom and so on. And so again, binds up all these nutrients. There was a study out back in, I don't know when it was seventies, eighties, but they were looking at stool composition and looking at macronutrients in the stool, they found that people on a high fiber diet double the amount of fat, carbohydrates and protein that they excrete, which means they didn't absorb it. So again, it goes back to why, why do I eat in the first place, which presumably to get nutrition into my body 'cause my cells need them. If I'm on a plant-based diet, that process is hindered significantly.

Dr. Shawn Baker (21:06):

So I I maybe I can eat more, I can just shove more roughage into my gut. For instance, a gorilla who is about the same size as me eating some gorilla anyway, but that gorilla is going to eat something like 40 or 50 pounds of roughage a day, all these plants and leaves. Whereas I'm eating three or four pounds for the same amount. And so it's much more efficient way to be nourished. A lot of people that go on these plant-based diet talk about the fact that they are eating all the time and they're often hungry. 'cause They're constantly trying, trying to just eat to get nutrition. I eat once or twice a day and I'm good. I don't, I'm not eat, I'm not hungry at all. It's, it's a very different experience in many ways. I think in my view, as someone who's approaching his sixties, it's important to have a decent of muscle mass.

Dr. Shawn Baker (21:46):

I think it's incredibly important for men, women, doesn't matter. Functional. You wanna be able to run, jump, sprint, pick up heavy things, high, higher quality protein certainly lends itself to that. It's not that you can't get protein on a plant-based diet, but I use the analogy of let's say you wanted to build a brick house. You had over here you got a big pile of bricks and over here you got a bunch of straw and mud. You'd rather have bricks make it life a lot easier. And that's, that's really the difference. You can still do it outta straw and mud, but it's gonna take more work, more effort. Of all the animals that have ever been on planet earth, about 80% of them have been carnivorous just because it's more efficient, so much more efficient to assimilate. Like you said, if every one of my cells is an animal cell, what do animal cells need to grow and, and, and, and maintain themselves from animal cell products?

Dr. Shawn Baker (22:28):

We, we get 'em from an analyst, not a coincidence that every essential amino acid that we need is found in the exact ratios. We need them in meat. It's not coincidental. It's I think by design by the way. And so it's just more efficient. Like I said, you can do it, but it takes supplementation and eating a lot and a lot of people develop digestive issues. You see a lot, particularly women, they're shoving all these salads down there and then they got IBS or they're starving all the time and then they're binging at night on ice cream because they're starving all day. It's just not, it's not a pleasant experience.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (22:57):

So I there are about three things that come to mind, but I know our time is limited. The first, I don't know if this is something you've considered or thought about or talked about, is the, the chi or life force in food. So I'm here in Thailand studying at the Dallas retreat about life force energy, which is the energy that innervates us. We're given a certain amount when we're born and then when it's depleted, we're gone. There are things that we can do to improve it and that can increase it or decrease it. Dead animal protein really doesn't have a lot of life force energy where live plants do. Part of the argument I've heard for consuming more vegetables and fruits and live foods is this life force that you get from them, is that something that you've thought about or talked about?

Dr. Shawn Baker (23:46):

I've certainly heard that argument before and I'm just wondering how you quantify that. I wouldn't be a accept socially accepted thing. I mean, but again, to me, I hear people have vibration levels and energy and things like that. And I have not seen where that has panned out in, in way that I, I I can verify it might be there are some people will feel better. A lot of times it becomes a, I think in many ways some of that is I just feel better ethically. I I have a moral belief system and when I feel better what I'm doing, I might get a positive effect. 'cause It's a mental state thing. But then you ignore the fact that if I eat a bunch of tomatoes, there were probably thousands of small critters that were killed for this. And what happens to their life force. Is that somehow transferred into the plan or is it just somehow immune from that? I don't know. So I can't say that I've seen anything in my view that is mm-hmm. Shown a significant impact one way or the other with that stuff. But it might be maybe mm-hmm. It'll be something that comes out with this, but I don't know how to say that everything I eat has recently died. That's just the way it is. Or relatively recent Right. Food. So it's hard to, hard to get on now. Yeah. To eat live stuff.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (24:53):

And the, the other thought, two other things come to mind. One is about the environmental impact. There's a lot of discussion about trying to reduce the amount of animal protein consumed because it has a huge carbon footprint. I think it's that there is no right diet for all of us. It's very individual. If you do almost any intervention better than what most people are eating, they're gonna get better in three, six months, 12 months. But that long term sustainably, it's most probable that the majority of humans need something different. And that it's not that we all will do well with a carnivore diet or a paleo diet or a vegetarian, probably there's a lot more biochemical individuality than we would like to admit. Certainly

Dr. Shawn Baker (25:41):

It's fortunately we live, most of us live in free societies where have our choose, you know, forced to give a meal Korean or something like that and forced to eat whatever gonna give you, but, or in a prison or something like that. So we have, we certainly have choice. I know there are other people that, that are proponents that will make the argument that we think humans are carnivorous and that's a preferred diet. I'm not here to make that argument. I'm here to say this is a therapeutic invention. I've seen some very good results with this that, that probably exceed any other medical invention that I've seen as a, as a surgeon, as a physician over the, over these last several decades. And so the environmental argument is certainly one that I'm very familiar with. I'm certainly very familiar with the counter arguments to that because we, a lot of the arguments have come from animal activists that feel that we should not be eating animals.

Dr. Shawn Baker (26:24):

They think that's horrible and they're, it's an, it's an equivalent to a animal slavery or a holocaust or something along those lines. We use that language quite a bit. And then what I see is that when we look at how most of our food is produced throughout the world, whether it's the United States or Europe or probably even Asia, a lot of of it has to do with massive industrial chemical inputs which are causing complete ecosystem destruction. When you grow a field of strawberries, you've literally killed every animal that could possibly live there. Any animal that could live in that area is dead. Any animal that gets in there is gonna be killed. So we have tremendous animal death, death and suffering from an ethical standpoint, not from the sort of the greenhouse gas emissions. We're seeing a lot of people now understanding that a lot of these arguments have been made, like, let's say, how many calories can I get for, for each greenhouse gas output?

Dr. Shawn Baker (27:14):

How much car carbon equivalent or carbon dioxide equivalent. Right? And part of that argument falls apart when you say, when we talk about calories, one of the most environmentally friendly things to grow is gonna be sugar. Sugar provides tremendous amount of calories for very little input. So we said we should all be much of sugar when we start looking at nutrition. What about qual? What about indispensable amino acids and proteins and things like that? What about things like zinc and lysing, things that we can't live without? Then we start to see that beef becomes much more efficient. And then we start talking about, we often hear about water. It takes a swim swimming pool of water to, to get a pound of beef. You always hear that when you look at the reality, is it like 95% of that which falls regardless if the cows there.

Dr. Shawn Baker (27:54):

Most of the cows water comes from the grass it eats and then it urinates it all out. And so it's not like it's disappearing. It goes back into the water table. They fail to make those calculations. We're also seeing particularly multi-species grazing and and regenerative style ranching. That's, that's growing in popularity that not only is not producing excess CO2, it's actually sequestering quite a bit. And so you can actually, there's a guy named Alan Williams who is at out of a university. He's in Alabama at Joyce Farms. He's done calculations saying if we can convert around 40% of the US grazing area into more of a regenerative south, you can offset all the carbon, not just the carbon from the agricultural sector, but the transportation sector. The energy sector can all be offset just by cows on the ground. It can be the solution.

Dr. Shawn Baker (28:39):

Now if we continue with high intensity industrial agriculture irrespective animal or plant, then that's the real problem here. So we have to come to this realization that no, we can't have strawberries in January Chicago because it's gonna require intensive gr growth in South America, wherever it's grown or Africa, wherever it ist reported. We've gotta get away from that. And the, and the other factors is we waste, 40% of the food we produce gets wasted. Most of it's fruit and vegetables and, and baked goods, typically that's what happens. It ends up in a landfill. It doesn't survive the transportation process. How many times are you taking these organic fruits and vegetables do you buy at the store and then they get mold on 'em? So the solution really is not everybody goes vegan or goes plant based. The solution really is let's stop wasting so much food, let's stop trying to have everything everywhere because that is just not practical.

Dr. Shawn Baker (29:27):

It may be that you just eat seasonally, I gotta eat that you're in Thailand where it's tropical. There's a lot of tropical fruits and stuff there, but most of us aren't there. I'm in Washington, there's some berries in the fall, a lot of animals running around. I get deer and stuff like that. But as far as what is locally grown and available, it's not mangoes and grapes and things like that, which are, are very seasonal. So I think that's really the discussion that needs to be had. And there's a lot more people having it. I know that Elon Musk recently came out and said, the cows are not the problem. He's got a big platform, obviously richest guy in the world, control of a lot of social media. So, so more and more people are realizing that this sort of vegan argument, which was really, by the way, it was propped up a lot by Silicon Valley.

Dr. Shawn Baker (30:05):

It was 20, 30, 40, $50 billion that were poured into fake meats and so on and forth. And what's happening is it all went belly up. Most of these companies have failed. They went under most all these venture capitalists lost a bunch of money on it, so there's less appetite to push that narrative. And that narrative was really, it wasn't so much a grassroots movement, it was more of an, we call an astro turf movement. So it's corporations that were driving this, we're gonna be altruistic and save the planet by having you eat ground up soybeans and dependence beef. That narrative has fallen apart. People are really picking on apart and looking into that. And a lot of studies have come out that showing that if we want to consider the environmental input pack of our food, then it's more not animals versus plants. It's just how we raise that stuff. Mm-Hmm

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (30:44):

<Affirmative>. I do wanna give you the opportunity to share with everyone how they can connect with you going forward.

Dr. Shawn Baker (30:49):

Yeah. So like I mentioned, if you're interested in physicians that will not just giving other pill or pills, potions and procedures and, and treat root cause and provide daily support rivera.com, we're open it all. We'll be soon, be open all, we're in about 40 states right now. We'll be in the last 10 shortly. So we're R-E-V-E-R-O rivera.com. I'm on social media, I'm at on YouTube, I'm on Shawn Baker, md. So S-H-A-W-N. Same thing on TikTok, same thing on Facebook on my Instagram. I'm Shawn Baker, 1967 for the year I was born. And then on Twitter, it's s Baker md. So that, that's where you'll find me. And I talk about this every day.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (31:27):

<Laugh>, thank you so much Dr. Shawn for joining me. It's been very enlightening. You certainly have looked at all the aspects of this diet. I always try to stay open and to understanding new information, new perspectives and learning. And it sounds like you're a lifelong learner as well as a teacher. So thank you so much for the wonderful work that you're doing for having me. And thank you for joining me for another episode of The Hormone Prescription. So glad to have you join me here today. Would love to hear your thoughts about carnivore diet. Is this something that you are game to try? What are your thoughts? What do you think about that in terms of sustainability and health promotion? You know that I'm always interested in hearing your thoughts, so reach out to me on social media until next week, I'll see you then. Peace, love,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (32:16):

And hormones, y'all, thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about. Love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering woman to another. I thank you. See you next week.

 

Dr. Kyrin Dunston | High Blood Pressure & Hormonal Poverty: The Real Solutions Your Doctor Didn’t Tell You

Hey there, fabulous midlife women! Have you been feeling like your health questions are met with band-aid solutions that just don’t cut it? You’re not alone. High blood pressure and its “quick fixes” are just one of the many symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem that are holding back so many women like you from living a vibrant life filled with joy.

On this episode of the Hormone Prosperity Podcast, Dr. Kyrin tackles a relatable question from Madison—one that could be your very own. Madison’s high blood pressure is “sort of managed” by medication, but poor sleep, anxiety, weight gain (oh, the weight gain!), and other pesky perimenopause symptoms just won’t back down. Sound familiar?

Dr. Kyrin takes you on a deep and empowering dive into exactly what’s behind high blood pressure—not just what mainstream medicine says, but what functional, energetic, and hormonal perspectives reveal. She covers everything from how stress and your sympathetic nervous system wreak havoc to how unresolved emotions like frustration and resentment could be physically impacting your heart health.

Spoiler alert? It’s not just about salt or genetics. And no, more meds aren’t the only answer. Let's rewrite your health story from the root cause upward, together.

If you’re tired of temporary fixes and ready to understand how to unlock real hormonal prosperity, this episode is for you.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

• Why mainstream medicine focuses on genetics and sodium for hypertension but misses the bigger picture.
• How your sympathetic nervous system amplifies high blood pressure—and how to calm it down.
• The connection between high blood pressure, hormonal imbalance, and symptoms like poor sleep, anxiety, and weight gain.
• The energetic perspective behind heart health—hint, it’s not just about the numbers on the BP monitor.

Key Takeaways

• High blood pressure is often driven by stress and an overactive sympathetic nervous system—aka, your fight-or-flight response—not just your salt intake.
• Functional medicine focuses on why your body is sounding the alarm, not just masking symptoms with medications.
• Emotional imbalances like frustration and resentment could be straining your heart—literally. Addressing unresolved emotions may be just as important as addressing physical symptoms.
• Hormonal imbalances during perimenopause can create a vicious cycle of symptoms that make high blood pressure worse, but you can break the loop!

 

Your Call to Action

Take the Free Hormonal Poverty Quiz

Could you be in hormonal poverty? Find out in just 90 seconds!

👉 CLICK HERE to take the quiz and assess where you stand.

 

Help Other Women Get Their Bliss Back

Enjoyed this episode? Please share it with a friend who’s also struggling with hormonal imbalance or midlife metabolic mayhem. Together, we can help more women reclaim their vitality and health. Don’t forget to leave us a review or rating—your support helps build this empowering community!

 

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No one deserves to live in hormonal poverty. 🛑 Drop the disempowering question, “What’s wrong with me?” and start asking, “What would hormonal prosperity do?” (#WWPD)

Catch the full episode now and start crafting the vibrant, healthy life you deserve.

✨ Listen Now ✨

 

Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

Coming up, what is high blood pressure really, and should it be treated with a medication? Or what would it look like if we treated the underlying cause of it and didn't take the medication as a part of treating our hormonal poverty? Stay tuned next as we unpack this important topic.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:20):

Greetings friend. Welcome to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin . Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me? To asking empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag ww HPD. Join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your genes and back into life because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there. Welcome. Let's get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:12):

Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode of the Hormone Prosperity Couch. Thank you so much for joining me. As we dive into talking about Madison's question about high blood pressure and perimenopause and hormone therapy, she says, Hey folks, is there anybody here who had high blood pressure and went on HRT? My blood pressure is sort of, sort of managed by meds, but not super great. So she has uncontrolled hypertension, but my peri symptoms like poor sleeping and anxiety, can't be making it any better. Oh, and weight gain. The weight gain. And now I know a lot of you can relate. Weight gain is the symptom that makes women crazy more than anything else. It was true for me when I was in the perimenopause, and I know it's true for about 60% of you. By the time we're 50, 60% of us are overweight or obese by the time we're 60, it's three out of four of us.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:05):

Maybe you can relate. And other symptoms she mentioned, a midlife metabolic mayhem, peri symptoms, poor sleeping and anxiety, very common. Definitely in the top five, the poor sleeping, the lack of energy, the anxiety sometimes depression also. So this is a great question, Madison. So let's dive into this. So number one, let's talk about high blood pressure from a mainstream perspective and from a functional, energetic perspective. So blood pressure is determined by the force with which your heart pumps blood out of it to make it all circulate through your circulatory system, all the way around your body, to your toes, to your brain cells, to your eyeballs, to your stomach, everywhere, right? That's what determines your blood pressure, the pumping force of your heart. If your heart stops pumping, you stop living, you un alive, right? So it's crucial. Now, what causes high blood pressure in a perfectly healthy human being, we need to go back to the beginning because mainstream medicine would have you believe pretty much that it's genetic or it's, it's the amount of salt that you're consuming.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:21):

Those are the two reasons that mainstream medicine says for most cases of high blood pressure or hypertension. And they're gonna counsel you to avoid salt in your diet. Now, mind you, they're talking about NACL sodium chloride, which is table salt. They are not talking about sea salt, which is potassium has potassium, not sodium. So it's sodium. That's the culprit, not potassium. You need potassium and you need chloride. Also. You need sodium too, just not too much of it. And the way we eat these days, a lot of processed foods have so much of the sodium in them that that's what makes us sick with high blood pressure. So they're gonna counsel you to change your diet, cut the salt, but if that doesn't work, they're going to put you on a medication, a first line anti-hypertensive medication to drop your blood pressure, which has variable success.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (04:19):

Usually people have progressively worse hypertension and they have to go on stronger and stronger medications, multiple medications, and they get monitored for the consequences of high blood pressure, which can include damage to your eyes, to your brain, to your heart, to all the organs in your body because every organ is supplied by blood vessels. So if they're getting too much blood pressure coming in, it's damaging them. Think of like you use your water, pick in your mouth to clean your teeth. It's very gentle sprout. If you took a fire hose and trying to clean your teeth, well, you would blow your head off with a fire hose, right? So you understand what I'm talking about. Now you say so from a mainstream perspective, that's what's going on. But from a functional perspective, we actually know and, and from an energetic, I'll get to that in a second.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (05:12):

We know that what makes your blood pressure go up naturally in your body, the sig signal to your heart to increase the pressure is your sympathetic nervous system. So your sympathetic nervous system is part of your autonomic nervous system. Think automatic that has your sympathetic nervous system. Parasympathetic two branches, your sympathetic, think of, I call it the halt, big, strong, run, fast, lift, hard, do hard things, fights, right? So all the blood goes to your arms and legs, your periphery, you're not thinking you're in survival mode. Fight, flight, freeze spa is another one of those four Fs. That's the whole that's sympathetic nervous system raises blood pressure raises, respiratory rate raises, all these things. Parasympathetic nervous system is the opposite. Think of the Buddha. Mm, parasympathetic is lower blood pressure, lower respiratory rate, blood to the center, to your heart and lungs, abdomen and organs to nourish, digest your food, nourish your organs, heal you healing open only happens in a parasympathetic dominant state.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (06:26):

So in order to have hypertension, you have a supertone hyper tone sympathetic nervous system that's on alert. This means stress. Sympathetic nervous system triggers when your cortisol stress hormone triggers. So it means you have a lot of unresolved stress in your body that is causing the tone of your heart and your blood vessels to be hypertonic, pump fat, blood fast, hard, and damage all the other arteries in your body. So the really, the correct way from a functional perspective to fix your blood pressure is not to give you a drug that stops your blood vessels from clamping down and make forces them to relax. But it's to find the reason why your sympathetic nervous system is so hypertonic and calm it down. Doesn't that make sense? <Laugh>, you find the cause you don't treat the symptom. We've talked about that in many other videos. You find the cause. So you have to find why and calm your cardiovascular system down. And it could be many other many reasons. We don't. We're not gonna go into that now, but you fix the reason why that happens and you don't take a medication, you fix the why and it goes away. Now, from an energetic perspective, your heart and cardiovascular system, your heart is your center of love. Join kindness, happiness. It is the creative force in the world. It is one of your storehouses of this qi life force energy.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (08:05):

So if you have a problem with the outflow of your heart organ not working well, it means that there's an imbalance in the emotions in the organs. And we'll be talking more about this. Each of the major organs in the abdominal cavity and chest cavity has emotions associated with it, some positive, some negative, and they need to be imbalance when they get out of balance. And the negative emotion outstrips the positive that organ will start to first have energetic problems and then to have functional problems and then to have anatomic problems. This is where all disease comes from. And Einstein proved this when he proved e equals mc squared. They took the atom, which was a physical object, and they split it. And what did it turn into? Energy? And Einstein proved that energy is matter and matter is energy. So even though you look solid, right, you are nothing but energy.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (09:09):

And if you have a high enough powered microscope to look that closely, you actually would see yourself as all the stars in the sky. You are mostly space and very little solid matter. You're just energy at your core. So are all your organs and so is your health. And so is everything you do and everything in your life, your car, your home, everything. And I know that's a hard concept for some people to get, but science has now really come to the conclusion starting with Einstein, with quantum physics and some other research that's been done on all of these, but it hasn't made it into mainstream medicine. But I'm teaching you now, you don't have to wait for it to make it there. So if you are in hatred, frustration in these negative emotions that is conditioning your heart to function suboptimally and to make your blood pressure not function optimally, optimally, maybe predisposing you to heart disease, heart attacks.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (10:13):

And so from an energetic perspective, we've got to address the emotion in the organ, do things to detoxify and tonify it. I'm gonna be working on some programs to be teaching you these things. So I say you treat on all levels, right? Is there something anatomic, biochemical you've got to address with mainstream medicine? By all means, do it. Is there something functional you've got to address physiological? Definitely do it. And looking at are you in hormonal poverty as part of that? And is there something energetic? Look at that and address it. So gotta look on all three levels. If you're not sure if you're in hormonal poverty, I invite you to take the hormonal poverty quiz. It takes less than 60 seconds to give you a good idea. I will give you free my guide, my blueprint to get out of hormonal poverty into hormonal prosperity.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (11:02):

When you take that quiz, and I hope you'll consider joining me. If you are having questions like Madison had about high blood pressure and perimenopause and hormone therapy to join me for the hormone bliss challenge, which will be starting up right around Valentine's Day to get your questions answered live and really get, I'm gonna go deep with you on what you need to do to get to hormonal prosperity. Let me see if there's anything else. So you did have, as part of your question that you went on HRT and your yes and your I agree. Madison, your poor sleeping and anxiety are not making your blood pressure any better, right? Because it's a feedback loop and they start disrupting and causing worse hormonal poverty. When you don't sleep well, when you're having anxiety, it means your neurotransmitters are out of balance and that feeds back more symptoms of midlife, metabolic mayhem, more causes of hormonal poverty, more symptoms, and it just becomes this positive feedback loop, although you feel it is negative symptoms.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (12:01):

It what I mean by positive is the symptoms cause more derangement in the causes, cause more derangement in the symptoms cause more derangement and the pauses. So if that is the positive feedback loop so you definitely wanna find out oh, and weight gain and that's all a part of it and we'll be talking about that in another video. So thank you so much for the question. Madison, thank you all for joining me. Hopefully you learn something here that can serve you on your journey, getting out of hormonal poverty into hormonal prosperity so that you can get off the couch into your genes and back into life. I'll talk to you next time. Until then, peace, love, and hormones. Y'all,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (12:52):

Thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about, love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering woman to another. I thank you. See you next week.

 

Dr. Kyrin Dunston | From Hormonal Poverty to Passionate Prosperity: Reclaiming Libido, Vitality, and Intimacy in Midlife

Are you finding yourself avoiding kisses, hugs, or even the thought of intimacy with your partner? Do you feel like your personality has shifted since menopause, making you more independent but less connected?

You’re not alone, and you’re not imagining things. But here’s the truth—it doesn’t have to be this way.

Welcome back to The Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, Dr. Kyrin, your trusted hormone prosperity coach. In this empowering episode, we’re answering a candid and relatable question from Tiffany about losing that spark of intimacy and connection in midlife. Together, we’ll unpack myths, reveal truths, and equip you with the guidance you need to not just survive this stage of life—but thrive.

 

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• Why libido is essential, not optional: Discover why your sex drive is one of the most powerful indicators of your overall health and vitality.
• The myths we’ve been sold: Find out why the belief that losing your sex drive is “normal” after 40 is a damaging lie—and how societal norms perpetuate this misconception.
• The secrets of cultivating vitality: Learn about Master Mantak Chia’s teachings on preserving and transforming sexual energy (Jing) into Qi—a powerful force to rejuvenate your body, mind, and spirit.
• Unpacking "common vs. normal": Just because many women experience midlife symptoms like low libido, hair loss, weight gain, and exhaustion doesn’t mean it’s something you have to accept.
• Empowering questions, powerful results: Shift from asking “What’s wrong with me?” to “What would hormonal prosperity do?” (#WWHPD).
• Practical steps to finding your spark: Identify what’s holding you back, learn how to address unresolved health issues, and explore the energetic and functional practices to reclaim your vitality.
• The ripple effect of intimacy: How rediscovering passion with your partner can increase love and positive energy in your family, community, and even the world.

 

Episode Highlights:

This episode is packed with game-changing insights and practical solutions tailored to empower midlife women. You'll feel understood, inspired, and equipped with supportive tools to reclaim the passion and intimacy that’s your birthright.

From Master Mantak Chia’s wisdom on multiple orgasms (yes, really!) to understanding how healing your Jing benefits your entire life, you’ll leave this episode ready to take action.

 

Your Call to Action

Take the Free Hormonal Poverty Quiz

Could you be in hormonal poverty? Find out in just 90 seconds!

👉 CLICK HERE to take the quiz and assess where you stand.

 

Help Other Women Get Their Bliss Back

Enjoyed this episode? Please share it with a friend who’s also struggling with hormonal imbalance or midlife metabolic mayhem. Together, we can help more women reclaim their vitality and health. Don’t forget to leave us a review or rating—your support helps build this empowering community!

 

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No one deserves to live in hormonal poverty. 🛑 Drop the disempowering question, “What’s wrong with me?” and start asking, “What would hormonal prosperity do?” (#WWPD)

Catch the full episode now and start crafting the vibrant, healthy life you deserve.

✨ Listen Now ✨

 

Words to Keep Close to Heart:

“Just because something is common, doesn’t mean it’s normal. You don’t have to settle. Bliss, vitality, and intimacy are your birthright—go reclaim them!”

 

Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

Are you hating, kissing and other sexual things with your partner right about now? If so, this is definitely part of hormonal poverty and we need to have a serious talk. The health consequences are devastating of having no libido and what this means for your health and your vitality and your life. Up next,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:24):

Greetings friend. Welcome to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin. Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me, to asking empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag ww HPD. Join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your gene and back into life, because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there. Welcome. Let's get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:16):

Hey everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the Hormone Prosperity Coach. We're gonna answer Tiffany's question today about, she says, fully in menopause now, hate kissing. Anyone else moods. Just curious. Have heard others complain about zero interest in sex? Definitely have that issue. Poor husband kissing now just completely grosses me out and hubby kisses a lot. His dental health is excellent, takes great care of his teeth slash gums. It's just gross. It's so surprising how much my personality has changed since menopause arrived. I'm not snugly where I used to hold hands. Sit next to hug, touch all the time now. No thanks. Please give me space. I've talked to hubby about how I've changed since and he understands, but I do miss how I was in that way. I do like now how I feel way more independent and give less about what others think.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:10):

I was a people pleaser for sure before. Anyway, just wondering if anyone else is grossed out by certain things. Now, I love this question, Tiffany <laugh>. I absolutely love this question. So this was me back in my forties when I was going through the change. And here I am ob, GYN and midlife and all my patients are at midlife with the same problems. And I didn't, I felt the same way. I didn't wanna kiss, I didn't wanna, I didn't want anything to do with sex. I didn't wanna ever have sex again. In fact, I told my husband, maybe you can relate. Go get a girlfriend. I'm not doing that <laugh>, it's not funny really. But I did say that. And every woman who would come see me in their forties and fifties and beyond would say the same thing. I don't care if I ever have sex again.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:58):

And maybe you're there. So let's talk about this. I love this question. So why is this so vital in the West? We very much take it for granted as a fact of life that we are going to lose our sex drive as we age. Whether you believe it or not, there is a part of you, whether you admit it or not, that probably believes this. And we foster this belief among each other as women by believing that there are no answers. There was menopause the musical a a few years ago where they had musical numbers. It did traveled all around the world, I think musical numbers about menopause. And I didn't see it, but a friend of mine who's a colleague also went and saw it and she said, Kyrin, all these women were in this theater with their friends. They give you a fan when you walk in the door before you go to your seat.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:54):

And they're fanning themselves and they have songs about how we're just fat and sexless and we wind up with coffee and wind down with wine. And we, we just, that's all we have to look forward to in life. And we just make the best of it. And chocolate makes us happy. And we fan ourselves. And she said, they're all laughing. And I, I'm crying tears. Were rolling down my face. And I would've been crying too if I had been there because it's insanity. What we women have been told to accept as the truth about our health that is nothing but pure lies. We can and should have an excellent, healthy sex drive and sex life throughout our lifespan. In fact, our sex drive is in my opinion, one of the best, if not the best barometers of our overall health. Don't tell me your temperature, your blood pressure, your weight to your pulses, your respiratory rate, all these things.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (04:52):

That's nice. Tell me what your sex drive is doing and I'll tell you how healthy you are. And it really should be va vavo at every age. And in fact, so I'm here at Dow Garden at a DAOs retreat learning from Master Montauk Chia, and I've now become a certified associate instructor to start teaching the practices. Why is this important? He is one of the teachers of these philosophies and practices that help women to preserve and cultivate their life force energy that heals their body, their chi, but their jing also, which is their sexual force energy. And how to turn that into q that helps and nourishes your body. You have a fountain ever giving fountain of this coming to you. So if you're not experiencing it as a drive to sexuality, something is wrong. And it means that you're losing Qi life force.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (05:54):

And when all your qi life force is gone, guess what time's up. And that is the ending date on your tombstone. The day that you die when you have no more chi life force. So this is crucial. It is vital. And and master chia says menopausal women, super woman super superwoman. We shouldn't only be having one orgasm, we should be having multiple orgasm. That's one of the things that he teaches, is the techniques for how do women do that with or without a partner. So within the next year, I'll be rolling out programs to teach you how to do these things. Yay. along with other energy practices we should be having multiple orgasms and how these orgasms take this jing sexual energy and you can create she vital life force energy to heal your brain and your body and your organs and store it to use for energy.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (06:50):

How does that sound to go do all the things you wanna do. Like go to musicals and go to plays and hang out with your friends and travel. So menopausal woman superwoman and you should be hot superwoman, really, Tiffany. So this is something that we women in the west really take for granted that we're going to lose our sex drive and then we think it's no big deal 'cause all our friends are experiencing that. So we think it's quote unquote normal. So what I want to key you in, in this video too, there's always the answer to the question and then there's some adjunct that is important for you to understand about why that question is important and how you are understanding and going about answering that question that will help inform you to make, ask better questions about your health so you can get better results.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (07:44):

And here it, it has to do with what we come to believe is normal. We believe that the 60 plus symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem are quote unquote normal because we look around and all our friends are having the same things. We go to book club, we go to church, we go to luncheons, we go to family reunions. Every woman over 40 is talking about the 60 plus symptoms of midlife metabolic. Ma'am, oh, my hair's falling out. Oh, I have no sex drop. Oh, I can't lose this weight. Oh, I I have this rash that won't go away. Oh, my eyelashes won't grow. Oh, my gut is crazy. I don't know what's happening. You name the symptoms. Oh, I got this autoimmune condition. My doctor doesn't know what it is. It's some non-specific autoimmune marker. They're gonna recheck it in six months, right? It's all these health things that we don't have answers to that make our life difficult to live.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (08:38):

We think it's normal. It is not normal. It is not normal to have any of this. It's common, but it is not normal. Common does not equal normal. Stop believing that they are different. Just because something's common doesn't mean that it's normal and you shouldn't have to, to put up with it. There is always a reason I say there is always, always, always a reason. If you have symptoms that with your health that remain unresolved, there is always a reason. And if the healthcare providers that you're going to don't have explanations for you and can't help you reverse it, you're going to the raw, you're going to the hardware store for milk. So stop going to the hardware store for milk. They don't sell milk, they never will. And drive your car on over to your computer like where I do my work right online or find another provider who can help you with these energetic practices and the functional practices.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (09:37):

It is absolutely vital. So Tiffany, you and your husband deserve, and this is for Tiffany and everybody else with this question and this difficulty. Some of you are living as a roommate with your spouse of decades whom you have shared a home with, built a life with foster, had children, with birth children, with raised them. You have all these rich, beautiful life experiences together. Did you really go through all of that to get to this stage of life where you don't even wanna kiss your partner and hold hands with them and cuddle with them and make sweet, passionate, hot stank, sexy love with them and enjoy their company and have that close physical emotional intimacy that can occur for you? Did you really go through all of that to just be like me? Meh, it's normal. I don't want it. No, you didn't. You're just giving up because you don't think you can have anything different.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (10:39):

And that's a whole other meta called lured helplessness, which is very common among women in Western countries. We are taught at a very young age that we have to accept what is given to us and only ask the questions and get the answer, receive the answers to the questions that we're told we can ask. And what I'm telling you is it's time to break out of that crap and start asking the empowering questions that are gonna get you what you really want, not what you think you can have to settle for. When you start demanding what is yours for your health, you start saying, I will not put up with a sexless marriage.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (11:22):

You'll start, they say when the student is ready, the teacher appears. So when you are really ready to receive that, the teacher will appear me or someone like me who can help you with the energetic pieces, the g the jing, all of it, and the functional pieces. And then you'll watch the miracles that happen and what is restored for you, for your body, your hormonal prosperity, your life, your marriage, your family. This doesn't only affect you by the way, that's another thing I wanna point out. You think that it's just you and your husband, it affects him. I find the men more than they say they don't like to say. But it also affects your whole family and your friends and your community because love is probably the most powerful force there is. Sexual love being one of those forms. And the sexual love fosters the love between a couple and that ripples out into everybody else in your environment.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (12:29):

And energetically it ripples out actually to the whole world. So being in love with your husband and wanting to be close and physically close and sexual with him actually is your duty not only to yourself, but to the globe to increase the level of love. The the energy will go out as free radicals to the environment to counteract all of the negative hateful energy that we're encountering in our globe right now. Do your part, Tiffany <laugh>, do your part. You gotta do your part. So get this fixed so you and your husband can get right and then you're doing everybody a service. So I love this question, Tiffany, thank you so much for that. So much more to learn. If you're not sure, if you're in hormonal poverty, please take the quiz. It will really help you. I created it free to help you.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (13:22):

You can find the link in the show notes. It takes less than 60 seconds. I'll give you free my blueprint from hormonal poverty to hormonal prosperity. And consider joining me for the Hormonal BLIS challenge where I really dive in with you one-on-one face-to-face. We do it as a group all your questions and really help you understand what are all the pieces, what are the anatomic, biochemical, physiological, functional, energetic pieces that I need to address to get the hormone prosperity that I want. So I look forward to seeing you there. Thanks so much for joining me. Welcome your questions. I really love answering them. Until next time, peace, love, and hormones. Y'all,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (14:14):

Thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about, love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering woman to another. I thank you. See you next week.

 

Dr.Kyrin Dunston | Menopause & Irregular Heartbeats: Is Your Heart Asking for Hormonal Prosperity?

Ever find yourself lying awake at night, heart racing for no reason? Or maybe you’ve noticed your heart skipping beats out of the blue? If you’re in midlife or menopause, this episode is for you. 💗

Join Dr. Kyrin as she tackles Trina’s important question about irregular heartbeats during menopause. Could these unsettling symptoms be connected to low hormone levels? And more importantly, are they warning signs of something bigger?

Here’s What You’ll Learn in Today’s Episode:

1. Why irregular heartbeats during menopause deserve your full attention—not just your worry.
2. The role estrogen and other key hormones play in protecting your heart (and how hormonal imbalances could be contributing to your symptoms).
3. Why mainstream medicine might dismiss your symptoms and how to advocate for yourself.
4. The “hidden” dangers of hormonal poverty and the steps you can take to shift into hormonal prosperity.

 

Dr. Kyrin shares her own story of struggling with irregular heartbeats, how mainstream medicine failed to provide answers, and the holistic steps she took to restore her vibrant health. Spoiler alert—it’s not about masking symptoms; it’s about addressing the root cause. 💡

Key Takeaways:

• Hormones matter: Did you know low estrogen during menopause can alter how your heart functions?
• Mainstream medicine isn’t enough: Traditional tests may miss functional issues that could jeopardize your heart health.
• Empower your health: Make proactive choices to move out of hormonal poverty and unlock hormonal prosperity.

This episode is packed with actionable advice to help you tune into your body, identify red flags, and take the steps you need to thrive.

 

Your Call to Action

Take the Free Hormonal Poverty Quiz

Could you be in hormonal poverty? Find out in just 90 seconds!

👉 CLICK HERE to take the quiz and assess where you stand.

 

Help Other Women Get Their Bliss Back

Enjoyed this episode? Please share it with a friend who’s also struggling with hormonal imbalance or midlife metabolic mayhem. Together, we can help more women reclaim their vitality and health. Don’t forget to leave us a review or rating—your support helps build this empowering community!

 

---

 

No one deserves to live in hormonal poverty. 🛑 Drop the disempowering question, “What’s wrong with me?” and start asking, “What would hormonal prosperity do?” (#WWPD)

Catch the full episode now and start crafting the vibrant, healthy life you deserve.

✨ Listen Now ✨

 

Podcast Episode Transcript: 

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

Coming up next. Irregular heartbeat in menopause. Are they related? And could this be signs of bigger trouble to come find out Next.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

Greetings friend. Welcome to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin. Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me? To asking empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag ww PD. Join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your genes and back into life, because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there. Welcome. Let's get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

Hey everybody, it's Dr. Kyrin. Welcome back to another episode of the Hormone Prosperity Coach. So glad that you're joining me today as we dive into a question from Trina who says another symptom post menopause. Anyone else experience irregular heartbeat with menopause? It scares me. It should scare you, Trina. This is big, huge problem. It's not uncommon though, one of those 60 plus symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem that we women might have to contend with. So with estrogen dropping progesterone, dropping testosterone, dropping oftentimes cortisol dysfunction, insulin dysfunction, thyroid, DHEA, right? These are the seven main metabolic hormones we've got to contend with that inform hormonal poverty or hormonal prosperity and inform all our cells and all our systems to be healthy and thriving and growing and healing or deteriorating and cause getting ready to cause us problems that we may not know about it yet. So estrogen in particular, but all of these hormones have a role in every cell, in every system in your body, including your arteries that carry the blood throughout your body, from your heart to every cell in your brain, to every cell in your feet, to every cell in your precious abdominal cavity, chest cavity, everywhere, very intimately involved with artery function.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

This is why menopause is associated. So lack of estrogen is associated with increased risk of the number one cause of death of women over 50, which is heart disease and heart attack. We're all worrying about breast cancer over here. Meanwhile, our body is like, Hey, pay attention to your heart and you're having an irregular heartbeat. So this could be a sign, Trina, that your arteries around your heart are being affected and it could be affecting the conduction system in your heart. Your heart is an electrical apparatus. Yep, it's electrical and that's why it has this internal electrical system that causes it to pump, pump, pump every day of your life. It pumps from about five weeks of birth. We can see it on an ultrasound all the way till you take your last breath, and then usually even a little bit farther if you haven't died from a heart attack, it still will pump depending on the cause of death.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

It does its job. Sun, moon, shine. It doesn't care rainy, sunny deadlines. It doesn't. It just pumps. It does its job well, it needs to be nourished properly. And one of the things it needs is estrogen, but it also needs all the other hormones probably that your doctor isn't talking to you about that I wanna make sure you know about your insulin, thyroid, cortisol, DHEA, progesterone, testosterone. Your heart depends on all of these. So you need to go to your doctor. You need to start at least probably with an EKG. Now, I'm not your doctor. And this is just for educational purposes. So anything that you have a health concern about, please go see your doctor. What we do here is not, does not replace medical advice. So you need to talk with your doctor about what you're having. They probably will start with your evaluation with an EKG electrocardiogram to see if there are any abnormalities.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

But if not, they'll probably put you on a Holter monitor to track your heartbeats over a 24 hour period and then have a reading to see if maybe there's something they missed on the EKG. 'cause The EKG is only for a few seconds in time. The Holter monitor is about 24 hour period, or they might do a echocardiogram to look at how your heart is functioning, how the ventricles are emptying, are they emptying properly? Is the blood flowing through your heart properly? Or they might do other imaging tests depending on what they find might send you to a cardiologist. But this is something that should scare you, Trina. Thank you for sharing it. So if you haven't already, you need to talk to your doctor about this as quickly as possible and get it evaluated. Now, let's say they evaluate you and they don't find anything and they say, we're going to check you again in six months, Trina, you're good and you're still feeling this <inaudible>.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

I have to say that I had that too <laugh> when I was in the perimenopause and weighed 243 pounds, had chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, depression, anxiety, irritable bowel gastritis. I had so many things, my health was a mess. And I had that too. And I told my doctor and they sent me for the Holter and the cardiogram and all this, and they didn't find anything. And when I realized that I was in hormonal poverty and I had so many inputs causing my body to be in hormonal poverty that I teach you about in my hormone bliss challenge when I corrected them all, it went away. It went away naturally because nothing happens in your body without a reason. But when you don't look at your health from a functional or energetic perspective, which are higher levels, I'll say energetic is up here, then there's functional anatomic is down here, and mainstream medicine is really looking for have you had a heart attack that we missed and did, did part of your ventricle wall die?

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

So now you're having a car anatomic cardiac problem, or maybe it's disrupted the electrical conduction system in your heart. So they're looking for anatomic problems or they're looking for, do you have a partial occlusion of one of the arteries feeding blood to your heart, another anatomic problem? And pretty much if it's not an anatomic problem or a conduction problem in that electrical system, which is usually due to an anatomic problem, then they're gonna say, we don't know. We don't know why you have it. And that was the case for me. And when I fixed my hormonal poverty, I stopped having that. Now, I'm not gonna say that that's gonna happen for you. I'm not your doctor. You need to go to your doctor and talk about that. But yes, Trina, thanks for the question. Anybody else? Irregular heartbeat, talk to your doctor about it, get it checked out.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

But if they tell you it's nothing what they're really saying, you need to understand what mainstream doctors are saying to you. It's nothing that we can find with the tests that we have to look for anatomic problems. We don't look for a lot of the functional problems that could be contributing to this bi hormonal poverty. So you might have a problem there. Go find a doctor who can help you with that, like me and my colleagues who have done training in anti-aging, metabolic and functional medicine and energy medicine also. So start to listen, really listen to what your $30 H-M-O-P-P-O copay doctors are telling you, because if you take what they're telling you as the gospel and meaning that we don't find anything wrong, and you take that to mean that I'm in perfect health, you are going to be very misguided and confused when the boulder drops into your life.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

The big fat boulder health problem drops into your life and you're gonna go. But my doctor said I was fine, but my doctor did blood work. But my doctor listened to my heart, but my doctor did an EKG, but my doctor said I was fine. So I like to say that health problems don't come out of the blue. She didn't get ca breast cancer out of the blue. She didn't get a heart attack and die out of the blue. She didn't get a stroke out of the blue. She didn't get multiple sclerosis. You think of the disease, she didn't get it out of the blue. She got it out of the oblivious. That is where disease or dis disease comes from in the body out of the oblivious. We are not getting all the information that we need to inform us from mainstream medicine. We never will.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

That's not what it's designed for. It is about disease management. It's going to wait till you get sick, and then they're gonna manage that disease for you. That is mainstream medicine. If you, on a higher level of healthcare, it requires you, yes, requires you to go to different type of practitioner who has functional and energetic health training, and look for the things that mainstream medicine isn't looking for, the functional problems, the energetic problems, and address those so that you are no longer oblivious. That means you've gotta get out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity. Mainstream medicine will never get you completely out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity. So you've been warned, <laugh>, discredit this advice at your own risk. I want you to have all the health and vitality that you deserve in this lifetime. You deserve to have the best vitality, health, joy, connection, self-expression in this life.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

Thank you so much, Trina for the question. I hope you'll take this seriously and get some answers that can really take your health to the next level and get you to the hormonal prosperity that you deserve. If you're not sure if you're in hormonal poverty, look at the show notes and look for the quiz link. You can take the quiz in less than 60 seconds. It'll give you a good idea. I'll give you a free program that I have outlining the blueprint steps that I've taken thousands of women through to help them on the path, the journey from hormonal poverty to hormonal prosperity for free, and consider joining my Hormone Bliss challenge, which will be starting up right before Valentine's Day. Thanks so much for joining me. I look forward to answering more of your questions. Until next time, peace, love, and hormones. Y'all,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston

Thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about. Love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering women to another. I thank you. See you next week.

 

Dr. Kyrin Dunston | HRT 101: Is Your Hormone Dosing Method Helping You or Harming You?

Welcome to another energizing and empowering episode of The Hormone Prosperity Podcast with Dr. Kyrin! This week, we’re tackling a pressing question from our listener, Mavic, who’s confused about the various ways to dose Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT).

Are you wondering if that HRT pill, patch, or cream is the best choice for your body? Curious about the hidden risks of oral estradiol or why your patch might be causing skin irritation? Dr. Kyrin breaks it all down with heartfelt clarity and solid science, as she explains why the method you use to dose hormones can spell the difference between prosperity or problems for your body.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• The First Pass Effect: Find out why oral estradiol and testosterone are problematic—hint, it’s harming more than helping by overloading your liver.
• Better Dosing Methods: Discover why transdermal creams are the healthier alternative to patches, and how compounded bioidentical hormones can open up new possibilities for vitality.
• Progesterone Done Right: Why oral progesterone is Dr. Kyrin’s go-to method for stress relief and sleep enhancement—but only when it’s crafted properly!
• Myth-Busting Mainstream HRT: Are you still trusting the advice of a general physician or weekend-trained bioidentical hormone practitioner? Learn what to look for in a credentialed HRT expert.
• The all-important balance of estradiol and estriol to protect your health and happiness.

Why This Episode Matters

Hormones hold the key to midlife joy, vitality, and a stronger, healthier you—yet too many women are left confused by mainstream advice or trapped in hormonal poverty. Dr. Kyrin’s insights will help you leave behind one-size-fits-all solutions and make confident, informed decisions about your HRT treatment.

Empower Your Journey

Dr. Kyrin invites every intelligent woman to stop settling for "good enough." This episode gives you the knowledge to question your current treatments, explore more effective options, and step into the hormonal prosperity you deserve!

 

Your Call to Action

Take the Free Hormonal Poverty Quiz

Could you be in hormonal poverty? Find out in just 90 seconds!

👉 CLICK HERE to take the quiz and assess where you stand.

 

Help Other Women Get Their Bliss Back

Enjoyed this episode? Please share it with a friend who’s also struggling with hormonal imbalance or midlife metabolic mayhem. Together, we can help more women reclaim their vitality and health. Don’t forget to leave us a review or rating—your support helps build this empowering community!

 

Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

Coming up next, could your hormone dosing route be putting you at risk for greater problems? Find out next.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:11):

Greetings friend. Welcome to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin. Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me? To asking empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag WW HPD. Join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your genes and back into life because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there. Welcome. Let's get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:01):

Welcome back to another episode of the Hormone Prosperity Coach. As we dive into talking about a question from Mavic, who wants to know about different dosing routes for HRT, which is a question that I see often, a lot of you are confused about. Should using a patch, should I be using a cream, a pill, a shot? Oh, like a pellet? What should I be doing? So let's dive into this question that Mavic proposed. She says, what's the latest on oral versus patches versus gels? For HRTI was initially prescribed patches, but that horribly irritated my skin. The adhesive question mark. So I'm on oral estradiol and progesterone, but are these oral pills less effective? I'm wondering about trying gels or spray that I've read a bit about in case the oral isn't as helpful pro slash protective. So thank you for this question, Mavic, I love it.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:55):

There is so much to dive into here for all of you, hormone seekers, hormone finders, hormone users because oh, so much to dive into. So the first thing I'm gonna like circle with my red pen, the things that really catch my attention that are crucial alerts that need to be addressed. So number one is you say, I'm on oral estradiol and progesterone, oral progesterone, no problem. Cool. That's my favorite way, way to dose it for women, because it help can help with anxiety. When it goes through the gastrointestinal tract, it stimulates the nerves and neurotransmitters that go directly to your brain. Your gut is your second brain and it helps your GABA nerve neurotransmitter, which is your calm anti-anxiety, and it helps with sleep, love, progesterone, orally. Now estradiol or any estrogen orally or testosterone, no step away from the oral estradiol, the oral testosterone.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:02):

Why? Because when you take estradiol or testosterone orally and it goes into your gastrointestinal tract, there's something that happens called the first pass effect. First pass effect, where these hormones go into the bloodstream that go right to your liver through the portal vein. They go from the gastrointestinal tract, collects the blood in the veins, and then it goes right up to your liver, the portal vein into your liver. Now your liver is the main sanitation department or detox central for almost everything in your body, most things, and especially your sex hormones. So you have a flood of sex hormones, estradiol and testosterone coming to the liver. And what that does is it overloads your detox profile and it causes biochemical changes that can actually increase your risk for well heart disease for one, but other health problems as well. And we call that the first pass effect you do.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (04:10):

It doesn't happen with progesterone. So you do not want to take estrogen or testosterone in an oral capsule. Why? It's still on the market. I don't know. Now I say I don't know, but why? If you wanna ask anything about the pharmaceutical industry and why it's allowed, it's always a for-profit motive <laugh>, because a lot of women are not comfortable with the idea of using a patch. And that's really the only other route that we have right now for estrogen, for women that's commercially prepared by one of the big pharma companies. So that's an aside. You wanna step away from the oral estrogen and testosterone. It can contribute to all kinds of hepatic and systemic problems. So one thing you said is you were horribly irritated with the patches by your skin. The adhesive. Yes. The adhesive is made up of chemicals, primarily petrochemicals that come from fuel.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (05:09):

Most of the medical industry's products, even the medications that we take are made and synthesized from petrochemical byproducts. You probably didn't know that. And that actually was part of the inception of the big pharma industry many decades ago was Rockefeller and a bunch of these other wealthy magnets had all this petroleum leftover byproducts and they were wondering what to do with it. And some genius scientists came up with, oh, we can use it to manufacture pharmaceuticals, <laugh>. And so that was one of the reasons why the pharmaceutical industry at its inception grew so rapidly because they had to use up these very cheap products. So anyway, I'm off on a tangent back to the estradiol. So adhesive, using the patches, the adhesive can be irritating to people and probably to more people than admit or realize it. They tell you to rotate the location of your patch every time you place it.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (06:14):

So that probably is to minimize the chemical sensitivity reaction of your skin. A healthy normal reaction to a toxic substance, albeit a mildly toxic substance for most people, most people will react to some type of bandage that has a petrochemical byproduct in it. It's not a naturally occurring substance. So I'm not surprised that you had that. I've had that with a lot of patients too. I love the transdermal creams. That's my first choice for estradiol for women. Because usually there is no sensitivity. They put it in an organic hypoallergenic base without perfumes, dyes, or petrochemical additives. So I, it's a rare, rare patient whoever has a reaction to the transdermal cream. Now it sounds like you're working with a mainstream doctor because they've put you on an estradiol pill and a progesterone pill that you're taking two of in the morning, that's for sure a mainstream medical prescription because that's what I used to prescribe when I didn't know what I know now.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (07:28):

So they're probably not comfortable or versed in prescribing transdermal cream. So you'll need to find a doctor who knows and is trained in prescribing dosing transdermal creams and the management and proper testing of it. You cannot follow cream dosing with blood tests. You can't follow any of these sex hormones dosing with blood tests. Let's just put it there. And the only way that mainstream doctors know to test anything if they know to test sex hormones is in blood tests and they will be incorrect. So you're going to need find someone who is trained, and I don't mean someone who went and took a weekend course. You need to actually check, did they do a fellowship in functional medicine, anti-aging medicine? Did they do on a naturopathic medicine? What is their training? You really gone are the days when you can just go to someone who says, oh, I do bioidenticals.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (08:24):

And you're, you're knowing that you're getting the highest level of care because there are so many of these little mom and pop courses that pop up just for a weekend. And doctors and nurse practitioners and physicians' assistants can go and take these and then they can hang out a shingle and say, I do bioidentical hormones. But you as the consumer don't know what you're getting. And you need to question, what is your training and how long have you been doing this? Make sure they've been doing it like I've been doing this 30 years working with women and their, their hormones as a board certified ob, GYN. They really should have that type of experience. And then they probably should have done an entire fellowship in anti-aging, metabolic and functional medicine like I have. So they don't only know this little sliver about hormones. They know about how the hormones interact with every cell and every system in your body.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (09:15):

Alright, so back I'm off on a tangent. So the reason why I'm pretty sure you're working with a mainstream doctor is 'cause you're on estradiol, orally nono, you are on two progesterone a day. So pretty much that's the commercially available a hundred milligram ones that are mixed in peanut oil. Note a lot of peanut oil is high, highly inflammatory. And there's a high allergen rate with that allergic reaction rate with people. So it can increase the inflammation in your body. So while you think you're doing something good for your hormones, you are actually causing inflammation in other areas that are hurting you in other areas. So I do not like that commercially available progesterone, but mainstream doctors prescribe it because it's inexpensive, it's covered by insurance and they don't really understand the bigger picture of hormonal poverty and getting to a hormonal prosperity. So, you know, and some is probably better than none, right?

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (10:11):

An oral progesterone, oral estradiol, and oral progesterone. Two of the over the counter is probably better than nothing. I'll say that. Yes, that's for sure. But it's kind of like there's bad and that's nothing. Doing nothing about your hormonal poverty. That's way bad. Don't do that. Big, big problem. You are looking for trouble. Then, you know, better is or good is use these mainstream pharma preparations better is go to a doctor who has training in bioidenticals and maybe they don't do the proper tests, but they're gonna do some type of treatment that's above that, like a transdermal cream and maybe an oral organic progesterone. But the best is do the proper tests, do the right test, breathe in the right way, and then give your body exactly what it needs. So not only estradiol, that's one of the types of estrogen, but there are three, there's estro, estradiol, and s trial.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (11:16):

We do not replace estro. It more often promotes breast cancer. So we replace estradiol and estriol. And estriol helps to prevent breast cancer. And most women feel their best when they have a certain amount of estriol. There is no estriol available in a commercially available big pharma preparation, whether oral or any other. It's just not available. But if you get a compounded prescription, you can get the estradiol along with the estriol compounded. It's called bi est by estrogen, bi for two estrogen, two types of estrogen, estriol and estradiol. So that's really the best gold standard of what you want, if you can. So we've talked about the estradiol, we've talked about the progesterone. So you would rather have one that's not big pharma company with peanut oil. It's also an immediate release progesterone, the big pharma one. And I find that women do much better myself and the women I work with, with a slow release preparation, which they can create in a compounded formulation at a compounding pharmacy for you so that it's not like you take consume it and then your level goes way up and peaks and then drops within a few hours.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (12:36):

I think the half-life of the commercially available progesterone is six hours. So it's pretty quickly out of your system. So the slow release, it builds up less rapidly and then it dissipates less rapidly. So it stays in your system longer. And if you're dosing once a day, six hours isn't enough. If that were an antibiotic, they would have you dosing four times a day for a six hour half-life. So you really want the slow release, which more likely has a about a 12 or more hour half-life. So that's the only other thing I would say. But again, you'll need to get that compounded and the prescription will need to be written by someone who has the expertise to know how to dose that. And is it appropriate for you and the drawbacks. All right. What other things did you bring up here? I, I'm wondering about trying gels or spray that I've read a bit about in case the oral isn't as helpful, protective spray.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (13:34):

I don't believe that there is a pharmacologic spray or gel for progesterone or estrogen or testosterone for women that is commercially readily available unless it's an over the counter preparation. That means it hasn't met FDA regulatory standards for potency and purity and all the regulations that companies have to meet to prove that their drug has in it, what they say it has in it, that it's pure and that it's effective because to my knowledge, there is no commercially available or even compounding farm formulary gel or spray. You will find it compounding pharmacies trophies, which look like little, remember the gum chiclets and it's a little wax chit and you stick it inside between your gum and the side of your mouth and it, it melts and dissolves. So that's one way you can dose them. And there are sublingual drops that you can put under your tongue.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (14:40):

And there are injectables. I don't ever recommend those. They used to be extremely popular back when I was a resident and came out of my residency and some of the older docs used to give their women this. But so these sex hormones, just briefly on this tangent, 'cause some of you might find this interesting, they are steroid hormones and they do stimulate the endogenous opiate system in your body. The opiates are like opium, right? We have natural receptors for that, and it makes us feel good. It makes us feel euphoric and it can make us addicted to something. So because testosterone and estrogen can stimulate these endogenous opiates, opiates you have in your own body, you can become addicted to them. And because the intramuscular injections are so direct and the peak, the levels go up so quickly, they stimulate your endogenous opiates so quickly that people typically get addicted and they need more and more of the hormone more frequently.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (15:44):

And they're coming in, they're supposed to get a shot every month and then they're coming in every two weeks and then every two weeks. And I want more. And can you raise my dose? And I once saw a woman early in my career who came in and she had this really low voice because she was on this huge dose of testosterone. Her estrogen was also way high because she had become addicted to them. So I don't like the injections and I forgot to mention the pellets. Those are also very valid ways of dosing these hormones. However, I am not a fan of, there's a certain branded type of pellets that the doctors are trained to follow blood levels and not do the proper urinary metabolite testing like the Dutch test that I recommend. And most all the colleagues that I respect use that test test too.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (16:29):

And they use blood tests and it's very inaccurate. And they also don't give progesterone because they'll tell women, oh, you don't have a uterus. You've had a hysterectomy. You don't need progesterone. No, yeah, you do. For instance, your breasts, they need not only estrogen, but your progesterone to balance it out. And when you don't have that balance and you only have the estrogen that's causing unbridled growth, which is going to increase your risk for breast cancer. All right. Great question. Maik, thank you so much for this. It's giving us a chance to dive in a little more deeply to these different dosing alternatives. We've talked about methods of testing, we've talked about a whole bunch. So thank you for this very fruitful question. Hopefully you all learn something that can help you on your journey from hormonal poverty to hormonal prosperity. Thanks so much for joining me. I welcome your questions. Until next time, peace, love, and hormones. Y'all,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (17:40):

Thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about, love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering woman to another. I thank you. See you next week.

 

Dr. Kyrin Dunston | Your Hormones and That Glass of Wine — A Conversation You Need to Hear

Is your favorite glass of wine doing more to your body than you think? It’s time to find out.

This week on the Hormone Prosperity Podcast, Dr. Kyrin dives into an often-overlooked yet essential topic for midlife women — the connection between wine consumption and hormonal health. Sparked by a brilliant question from Alicia, a 51-year-old listener navigating hormone replacement therapy (HRT), this episode unpacks the complex relationship between alcohol, gastrointestinal health, and hormonal balance.

Grab your favorite cup of tea (or rethink that Chardonnay 🤔) and join us as we explore how that glass of wine might be silently impacting your hormones.

---

 

Here’s what’s brewing in this episode:

• Alicia’s Story

What caused post-wine symptoms like diarrhea? Is it the wine, hormones, or something more? Dr. Kyrin uses Alicia's experience to address a question many of us have wondered about but were too unsure to ask.

• Hormonal Poverty and Prosperity

Why just focusing on estrogen and progesterone isn’t enough. Dr. Kyrin explains how hormonal balance is influenced by insulin, thyroid, cortisol, and even your digestive health.

• The Hidden Power of Your Gut

Did you know that your gastrointestinal health is the foundation of your hormone health? Learn how functional stool testing differs from the traditional approaches and why it’s key to unlocking hormonal prosperity.

• The Wine Dilemma

Does wine disrupt hormonal harmony? Discover how alcohol impacts your body’s ability to properly detoxify and balance your sex hormones.

• Practical Next Steps

Dr. Kyrin shares actionable advice on proper hormone testing, the importance of addressing your gut health, and how hormonal prosperity can help you regain control over your midlife well-being.

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This episode is for YOU if…

• You’re over 40 and navigating hormone imbalances.
• You enjoy a glass (or two) of wine but wonder if it’s doing more harm than good.
• You’re tired of “cookie-cutter” approaches to menopause and want a comprehensive plan tailored to your body.
• You’re ready to move from hormonal poverty to hormonal prosperity.

---

 

🎧 Tune in now to discover how your gut, your hormones, and that beloved glass of wine are interconnected. Don’t miss this eye-opening and empowering conversation with Dr. Kyrin, designed to help you take charge of your health!

 

Your Call to Action

1. Take the Free Hormonal Poverty Quiz

Could you be in hormonal poverty? Find out in just 90 seconds!

👉 CLICK HERE to take the quiz and assess where you stand.

2. Join the Hormone Bliss Challenge

Want step-by-step guidance from Dr. Kyrin? The Hormone Bliss Challenge will walk you through actionable steps to rebalance your body, reclaim your sleep, and say hello to vitality.

👉 CLICK HERE to join today.

 

Help Other Women Get Their Bliss Back

Enjoyed this episode? Please share it with a friend who’s also struggling with hormonal imbalance or midlife metabolic mayhem. Together, we can help more women reclaim their vitality and health. Don’t forget to leave us a review or rating—your support helps build this empowering community!

 

Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

It's Dr. Kyrin. And in this episode we're going to answer a question by Alicia who is wondering if wine is messing with her hormones. And I love this question because it can apply if you're not doing anything to try to address your hormonal poverty. Wine can mess with your hormones. We're gonna talk about why, and it can apply if you are doing something to manage your hormonal poverty and get to hormonal prosperity. So we're gonna talk about both of these and it definitely applies to you because a large majority of people in western nations actually consume alcohol. So it's an important question for us women over 40 to ask, is wine messing with our hormones? <Laugh>? Here's the answer. So Alicia writes, I'm 51-year-old female. I just started HRT. She's using an estradiol patch and a progesterone oral daily. She's sleeping better and has more energy and she thinks her mood is better overall.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:03):

She takes magnesium malate at night and she takes two progesterone at night. Last night she had two glasses of wine this morning she had diarrhea. Could this be caused by the wine? Is it common? Please help. I love this question. So let's talk first about somebody who's already addressing some of their hormonal poverty, poverty issues. So Alessia, if you're watching, you are addressing some, I heard you me mention estradiol and I heard you mention progesterone. So yay you. And there are other issues that go into creating hormonal poverty that you might not know about that could predispose you to having diarrhea when you consume wine and be contributing to your hormonal poverty. Because if you're only looking at two hormones, estrogen and progesterone, you're missing the point of hormonal poverty, which is not only about estrogen and progesterone. Mainstream medicine would have you believe that it's pretty much only about estrogen.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:58):

And a few select doctors who are in the know will know that progesterone is a part of that too. But the large majority of them won't know that insulin, thyroid, cortisol, DHEA, are involved with creating hormonal poverty and that these hormones like cortisol, are directly informed by other parts of your health, namely your gastrointestinal health. Yep, I said it. Most of you don't think that your GI tract has anything to do with your hormones. And what I wanna tell you is that your GI tract is the center of your body, literally and figuratively is the center of your hormonal health. It is the main pillar of health for women's hormones. So when you're talking about diarrhea, that's a gastrointestinal problem. What does it have to do with hormones? Well, part of what you need to have done as a proper evaluation for hormonal poverty is a functional gastrointestinal evaluation. That's not a regular

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:59):

Stool test that looks for specific parasites and bacteria and viruses that can infect humans that mainstream medicine would recognize and treat with antibiotic or an antiviral or an anti parasitic medication. But this includes a functional evaluation of your gastrointestinal tract. How much inflammation do you have going on in there? Or is your body overgrown with abnormal bacteria and undergrown with healthy bacteria? You might know as probiotics. Do you have enough prebiotics? How are your digestive enzymes doing? How are your bile acids doing? How is your body digesting food processing it? Is it not processing fats properly? Proteins, carbohydrates? It's really a functional evaluation. Mainstream medicine is very focused on anatomic problems in the gastrointestinal system. So if you have a functional problem like irritable bowel syndrome or IBS is the most common one I used to have that, then they're just gonna go based on symptoms.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (04:09):

They're not really going to do any other diagnostic tests 'cause they don't know about functional stool testing or food sensitivity testing. They're gonna skip over it. Then they're gonna go looking for an anatomic problem by doing a endoscopy or imaging study of the upper or lower gastrointestinal tract. Maybe you've had that. I had that and they put a scope down when I weighed 243 pounds and looked at my stomach and, oh, you have gastritis. Well, that's all they found. And they put me on high powered proton pump inhibitors. Maybe you're there too. Well that stops you from digesting your food. So it actually causes more problems downstream. But that's a whole other topic. So back to the functional stool testing. They might in mainstream medicine, scope you from the bottom. They did that to me looking for Crohn's, ulcerative colitis. They might do a biopsy and they might look for celiac disease a genetic sensitivity to gluten.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (05:07):

But if you don't have any of these anatomic problems, they might look for gallstones, right? Or fatty liver. They're pretty much gonna say, Hmm, well you have irritable bowel and they're gonna give you a medication that calms down the muscle of gastrointestinal tract. And when your bowel is less spastic, they're gonna claim victory. But what you need to know is that there are problems happening at a sub anatomic level, at a functional level that can predispose you to hormonal poverty, to immune system dysfunction, and to getting diarrhea whether or not you are taking hormones. So Alicia, I like this question because it's interesting that you, it sounds like you believe that you, your progesterone and estrogen have something to do with the diarrhea.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (05:57):

And what I'm here to tell you is it doesn't, okay? You have a gastrointestinal problem that is functional, right? That's pretty much most often what causes diarrhea less often. It's an anatomic problem like Crohn's or ulcerative colitis or diverticulitis. And the wine is a toxicant. It is a solvent that is a poison. If you drink enough, it will kill you and it doesn't actually take that much to kill a human being. So it's a poison. We just don't drink enough of it usually to kill us. We just drink little bits and then we wonder why we have a problem, which is kind of a conundrum, but it kills cells in the gastrointestinal lining. It clogs up your liver from processing these hormones. So here's where there can be an interaction between alcohol and estrogen, progesterone and other sex hormones is that your liver is the main processing plant or sanitation department for these sex hormones.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (07:02):

Meaning it has the job of packaging them up and getting rid of them through the stool. So alcohol actually is also metabolized by some of the same enzymes in the liver. So if your liver is busy detoxifying alcohol that you've drunk, and that's from wine, beer, hard alcohol, vodka, tequila, it doesn't matter what type of alcohol, it's all processed through the same system in the liver. If your liver is busy processing it, and you better believe that it prioritizes that because it recognizes it as a toxicant and says, oh my gosh, we've gotta get this out of here. It is not going to properly detoxify your sex hormones. So you drink a glass of wine at night and you think, oh, I'm good. Some people take it 'cause it helps them sleep, it's gonna help me sleep. And that's not usually the case. It actually disrupts your healthy restorative sleep.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (07:58):

But nonetheless, most people who do that think that they're sleeping well. So they're good. Then you wake up and you have diarrhea. And so yes, here is where the alcohol can be interfering with your estrogen and progesterone. So your body has been busy detoxifying the alcohol all night, not worrying about your hormones. So your hormonal prosperity and balance that you might have achieved before starts dropping and you go into a temporary state of hormonal poverty. So yes, it could be the alcohol, but most people don't get diarrhea when they drink alcohol, which tells me that you probably have a functional stool problem contributing to your hormonal poverty that's informing other hormones that you probably haven't looked at, like your cortisol, which needs a salivary test, checking it four times in a day, your insulin,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (08:55):

Your thyroid, most likely you'll have a cortisol problem. And that directly relates to your gastrointestinal problem. And that's a whole other video and a whole other topic. If you wanna hear about that, please let me know 'cause I'm happy to do a video about it. But your cortisol stress hormone and your gastrointestinal system hormone intimately involved with your sex hormones. So if you're not using any sex hormone replacement therapy, what are you waiting for is my question. Get your hormones properly checked, and if you are deficient and you're not able to make enough of your sex hormones, replace them after a certain age. Once we go through menopause, we lose the ability to make the majority of our estrogen, progesterone and testosterone. We lose the ability to make enough to keep us in hormonal prosperity, to keep us out of heart disease, heart attacks, osteoporosis, bone fractures, dementia, immune system dysfunction, autoimmune disease cancers.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (09:55):

We lose all of that. So

 if you're not taking care of that, go do that. But do not neglect all the other things, factors in your body that go into either keeping you in hormonal prosperity or putting you in hormonal PO poverty like your gastrointestinal health. Because this is where I see a lot of women and I say, yay you if you're dealing with your estrogen, your progesterone, and or your testosterone, yay. And there's more work to do. I see women like this all the time complaining that something about their health isn't right. Usually it's more than one thing. Those 60 plus symptoms of midlife, metabolic mayhem, and they keep scratching their head, I'm I on the right dosing route? Should I be using a pill or a shot or a transdermal cream or a patch, or sh should I go to trophies or should I use pellets?

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (10:49):

And they're thinking that the dosing is wrong or that the way they're dosing is wrong. And what I'm saying is you're look un looking under the wrong street light. You need to move into the dark corners where there's no street light shining where people aren't telling you to look that I'm telling you to look because I know to tell you to look professionally, personally is you need to look at these other factors that go into informing your health. And key for what you described, Alicia, is your gastrointestinal health. There's something going on there. Your regular doctor isn't gonna know how to evaluate this. They're just gonna do tests looking for anatomic problems, or take your symptoms and give you a drug. That's all they're gonna do. And I know I've been treated that way. It didn't fix my problem. You need functional testing and food sensitivity testing, and I teach you more about this in my hormone blist challenge. If you're not sure if you're in hormonal poverty or I could be talking about you and you're wondering, how would I know, go ahead and take my quiz. We'll have the link

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (11:53):

In the show notes and you can take, the quiz takes less than two minutes and that will give you a good idea. But ultimately there are specific tests and if you want to have dialogue with me about this personally, come join my challenge that will be launching in February for the Hormone Bliss Challenge to help you learn the exact steps that I've taken and that I have helped thousands of women take to get out of hormonal poverty into hormonal prosperity so that you can get off the couch into your genes and back into life. Thanks so much for joining me. I so welcome and enjoy answering your questions. Thank you for them. And until next time, peace, love, and hormones, y'all.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston | It’s Not “Just” a Hormone Problem—Here’s What You’re Missing

Have you been told your depression is random? That it just came out of nowhere?

Maybe your doctor prescribed synthetic hormones to manage your heavy periods or irregular cycles, and now… things just feel off. You're questioning, “What’s wrong with me?” even though your life looks great on paper.

This week on the Hormone Prosperity Podcast, Dr. Kyrin dives into why depression, anxiety, weight gain, and other midlife struggles often aren’t the isolated issues they seem to be—and why a simplistic approach to “hormone problems” might be actually making things worse.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• It’s Not Just About Sex Hormones

While estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone are critical to your physical and emotional wellbeing, they’re just one piece of a much bigger hormonal puzzle. Insulin, thyroid, cortisol, DHEA, and even oxytocin all play a role in your mood, energy, and vitality.

• Why Synthetic Hormones Fall Short

Mainstream solutions like progestin IUDs and birth control pills don’t address the root causes of hormonal poverty—in fact, they can suppress your body’s natural systems and create more problems like depression, low libido, or fatigue.

• Symptoms Are Signposts, Not Problems

Just like water on your bathroom floor isn’t the problem—it’s a sign of a leak—heavy periods or mood swings are symptoms, not root issues. Treating symptoms alone won’t bring you the health and joy you deserve.

• The Path to Hormonal Prosperity

With proper testing, a holistic approach, and the right guidance, you can uncover the deeper issues behind hormonal imbalances and take action to reclaim the vibrant, joy-filled life you’re meant to have.

 

Your Call to Action

1. Take the Free Hormonal Poverty Quiz

Could you be in hormonal poverty? Find out in just 90 seconds!

👉 CLICK HERE to take the quiz and assess where you stand.

2. Join the Hormone Bliss Challenge

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Podcast Episode Transcript:

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (00:00):

It's a sex hormone problem, but it is not just a sex hormone problem. And that's what I wanna educate you about so that you're not looking in the wrong place for the answers that you're never gonna find. Greetings friend. Welcome to the Hormone Prosperity Podcast with me, the hormone prosperity coach, Dr. Kyrin. Here's where intelligent women over 40 go to get credible guidance and inspiration on getting out of hormonal poverty and into hormonal prosperity and the joy and vitality that brings. Go from asking disempowering questions like, what's wrong with me? To asking empowering questions like, what would hormonal prosperity do? Hashtag wwp d, join me as we dive into today's episode and get started on your journey off the couch, into your genes and back into life because bliss is your birthright and a healthy body filled with hormonal prosperity is the vehicle that gets you there. Welcome. Let's get started.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (01:07):

Great question from Christine about use of the progestin IUD to control menstrual symptoms and it causing depression. Maybe you've had that problem. Maybe you can relate. When I practiced mainstream gynecology, progestin containing IUDs like the marina, were standard of care to use to help control women's abnormal bleeding with their menses, particularly in the perimenopausal period. So right before you go through menopause, one of the main symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem caused by hormonal poverty is irregular, prolonged pain, painful bleeding. And standard of care for that in mainstream medicine is some type of hormonal suppression using synthetic artificial hormones like the birth control pill or the maneuvering or implants or progestin containing IUD. So I used to use those as part of my mainstream practice routinely, but depression was often the side effect. And maybe you are on some type of hormonal suppression in the perimenopausal period, not realizing you are in hormonal poverty and you are experiencing depression too.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (02:26):

So I wanna talk to you about what exactly is happening that's causing the depression. No, you didn't all of a sudden get a mood disorder out of nowhere. Most of these women will tell me, I don't have any reason to be depressed. My life is actually pretty good. I have everything that I want and need. I have great relationships, I love my job, but I just feel depressed for no reason. I can't tell you how many times I have heard that complaint when I practice mainstream medicine. And so what is happening here is that these artificial synthetic hormones, whatever form they come in, are used to shut down the brain's signaling to the ovaries to make their naturally occurring hormones, right? Estrogen, progesterone, testosterone that keep you healthy, your neurotransmitters balanced, keep you happy, no anxiety, no depression, and feeling good and joyful in your life.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (03:27):

So if this is shut down, sure it stops your uterus, ovaries from functioning and your uterus. So the outward sign of that function, the bleeding goes away. And most women will become what we call amenorrheic, meaning no periods when they are suppressed with these medications that are given in a certain way, like continuous birth control pills or the implants or the ring or the progestin containing IUD. So your doctor suppresses your uterus from bleeding and then claims victory. Oh, you're not bleeding, symptom is gone and you actually claim victory too. You think it's great, but then, oh, what's wrong with me? I'm depressed. Well, I actually, when I practice, mainstream medicine would draw women's hormone levels just to see where they were. And a lot of these women that were experiencing depression using these hormonal methods were in the menopausal level. So I would sometimes have 20 and 30-year-old women with menopausal women's hormone levels and that what was causing was what was causing their depression.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (04:38):

So in perimenopause, if that's you that can be contributing to your depression and way better with a functional energetic approach, is to do the proper testing and look at what are your specific levels of your three types of estrogen, estro, estradiol, estriol, your naturally occurring progesterone, which is not in those medications and your testosterone because that's equally important for women, especially for their neurotransmitter function, for their dopamine, the get up and go drive initiative in life. Neurotransmitter is often primarily regulated by your testosterone levels. So super important for women too. Well, these synthetic hormones are suppressing all of that. You're going to get depressed. I'd say it's the rule rather than the exception. So if you do the proper test and you look at your specific levels of those sex hormones, that's one piece of the puzzle. But like I teach women in my hormone bliss challenge, it's not just about sex hormones.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (05:46):

We doctors teach women to hyperfocus on, oh, it's sex sex hormones. It's a sex hormone problem. But it is not just a sex hormone problem. And that's what I wanna educate you about so that you're not looking in the wrong place for the answers that you're never gonna find your whole life. Because that's actually what I see is most women never truly find the answers, never experience the health and life joy and vitality that's possible for them because they don't have the proper information. And it is my mission in life to make sure that you have the proper information. There are so many other hormones in your body. So namely, you probably have heard of insulin, thyroid, cortisol, DHEA, there's oxytocin, there are growth hormone. There's so many other hormones that go into making you hormonally prosperous or hormonally impoverished and causing depression, anxiety, or not causing joy and vitality.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (06:53):

So you need way more tests than just your sex hormones tested. And if you don't wanna have the side effects, like depression would just be one of them. Other side effects women will get when they have their menses suppressed with these synthetic hormones is no libido, difficulty to orgasm. These are some very common ones. Anxiety is another one. People will gain weight. That's huge. Brain fog fatigue. So 60 plus symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem caused by hormonal poverty might not be your naturally occurring hormonal poverty. It might be due to the treatment that you're getting from your mainstream doctor. So I love this question because it really highlights that if you go after symptom management for your symptoms of midlife metabolic mayhem using mainstream medicine and synthetic hormones, you actually might be causing more problems for yourself. Sure, your periods have stopped, but if you're experiencing depression, anxiety, weight gain, fatigue, then that's a problem for you living your life.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (08:07):

And also it's increasing your risk for other diseases. Seven out of 10 of the main causes of death are increased by being in hormonal poverty. So don't fall for the mainstream lie that just because you got rid of the symptom, you've created health, you have not created health or vitality, all you've done is gotten rid of the symptom. So I want you to stop looking at symptoms as if they are the problem themselves and start looking at symptoms as if they are the signpost pointing to the problem. You know, if you're a tourist and you go to a city, a lot of the cities, they'll have these signposts with all these different arrows attached to them saying how far you know catman do how far Kenya, how far? You know Lucerne is from there, right? This many kilometers. So is that sign pointing to that place actually that place?

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (09:11):

No. It's a signifier pointing to the place and telling you how to get there. It's the same with the symptoms in your body. The symptoms are not the problem themselves. So you need to stop claiming victory when the symptom goes away because you took a drug or did a surgery. And you need to start looking at the symptoms as the signifiers pointing to the problem and learn how to read the symptoms by doing the right tests so you can address the underlying root cause that is the problem. Thank you so much for this question, Christine. I'm gonna give you another example of that because it really highlights this. So if you come home from work one day and there's water on the bathroom floor, what do you do? You clean it up, right? Okay, well you come home the next day, there's water on the bathroom floor.

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (10:01):

What do you do? You clean it up after how many days coming home and there's water on the bathroom floor, do you do something different? Usually after 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 days, somebody's gonna say, what are you gonna do? You're gonna look for the cause of the water on the bathroom floor. You're gonna see did the toilet get clogged up and overflow? Did someone run a bath and didn't pay attention and it overflowed? Is the sink leaking? Did someone leave the window open? It rained and it came in. Did the dog come in and pee? Is the roof leaking? You're going to look for the cause of the leak water on the bathroom floor because is the water on the bathroom floor the problem? No, it's a symptom of the problem. Correct? Correct. So it's the same with your crazy crime scene periods that are irregular, prolonged heavy clotty, you know that you can get at any age, but especially after 40, when we start, most women start to go to into hormonal poverty. That is not the problem. It is a symptom of the problem. So stop treating symptoms. Your mainstream doctor's only gonna treat the symptoms. Start reading them like the tea leaves that they are pointing to the problem and start addressing the underlying root cause. I teach you all about how to do this in my Hormone Blist challenge, and if that can be a benefit to you, please, please join me. I welcome having you. Thanks so much for the question. I'll see you in the next video. Until then, peace, love, and hormones, y'all,

Dr. Kyrin Dunston (11:59):

Thank you so much for joining me on your journey from hormonal poverty into the promised land of hormonal prosperity. Loved today's episode. Share it with someone you care about, love the show. Consider writing a review and help other women find it too. Remember, we're all in this together right now. There are well over 100 million women suffering in hormonal poverty without answers. Please be of service by sharing, rating and reviewing the show. Help us reach at least 1 million of these women this coming year from one previously suffering woman to another. I thank you. See you next week.