Finding Your Way Through Therapy
E.156 Transforming Health: The Mind-Body Connection with Erin Todd
How can understanding the mind-body connection transform your health? Join us as we chat with Erin Todd, a health and performance coach with a background in psychology and functional health medicine. Erin shares her journey from working in hospitals with both children and adults to empowering women through perimenopause and beyond. We cover everything from emotional eating to fostering an optimistic mindset, all grounded in the critical interplay between mind and body.
Explore the nuanced world of positive psychology with Erin and discover how it transcends mere positivity. Learn how understanding your past experiences and mindsets can pave the way for lasting lifestyle changes. Our conversation also dives into the societal norms and gender biases that shape emotional expression, offering fresh insights on how these cultural factors impact women's health. Erin emphasizes the importance of processing negative emotions, giving you tools to foster self-compassion and emotional well-being.
Finally, we delve into the intricacies of women's health, discussing everything from optimizing gut health to navigating the challenges of perimenopause and menopause. Erin provides practical tips on managing allergies, mental health, and hormonal changes, all through a functional medicine lens. Together, we explore the critical role of supportive communities in trauma recovery and highlight Erin's upcoming group sessions on emotional eating. Join us for a heartfelt discussion that will leave you empowered to take control of your health journey.
To join her group or see all her work, please go to her website at https://www.findingyourflow.com.au/
You can also visit her Instagram at: https://www.instagram.com/findingyour_flow/
How can understanding the mind-body connection transform your health? Join us as we chat with Erin Todd, a health and performance coach with a background in psychology and functional health medicine. Erin shares her journey from working in hospitals with both children and adults to empowering women through perimenopause and beyond. We cover everything from emotional eating to fostering an optimistic mindset, all grounded in the critical interplay between mind and body.
Explore the nuanced world of positive psychology with Erin and discover how it transcends mere positivity. Learn how understanding your past experiences and mindsets can pave the way for lasting lifestyle changes. Our conversation also dives into the societal norms and gender biases that shape emotional expression, offering fresh insights on how these cultural factors impact women's health. Erin emphasizes the importance of processing negative emotions, giving you tools to foster self-compassion and emotional well-being.
Finally, we delve into the intricacies of women's health, discussing everything from optimizing gut health to navigating the challenges of perimenopause and menopause. Erin provides practical tips on managing allergies, mental health, and hormonal changes, all through a functional medicine lens. Together, we explore the critical role of supportive communities in trauma recovery and highlight Erin's upcoming group sessions on emotional eating. Join us for a heartfelt discussion that will leave you empowered to take control of your health journey.
To join her group or see all her work, please go to her website at https://www.findingyourflow.com.au/
You can also visit her Instagram at: https://www.instagram.com/findingyour_flow/
Hi and welcome to Finding your Way Through Therapy. A proud member of the PsychCraft Network, the goal of this podcast is to demystify therapy, what can happen in therapy and the wide array of conversations you can have in and about therapy Through personal experiences. Guests will talk about therapy, their experiences with it and how psychology and therapy are present in many places in their lives, with lots of authenticity and a touch of humor. Here is your host, steve Bisson.
Speaker 2:Alors, salut tout le monde and hi everyone. Welcome to episode 156. If you haven't listened to episode 155 yet, go back and listen to it. Keith Hanks is an amazing guest. I have the second time His book, alan. The book, essentially, is out and going by it. And remember, there's a little contest going on, so leave me a message, a direct message, whatever you want to be eligible for the giveaway.
Speaker 2:But episode 156 will be with Erin Todd. Erin Todd is a friend of a friend, very happy to have her. Kind of interesting to be interviewing someone in Australia. But Erin Todd is a health and performance coach with special interests in emotional eating, perimenopause and wants to get people to have more of an optimist mindset and talk about their nervous system health. As a qualified functional health medicine coach, coupled with 19 years in the background as a psychologist, she guides women through transformative journeys and she talks about the relationship with food, mental health and thriving in general. Really looking forward to this interview. And here is the interview, right after this word from freedai Get freedai, yes, you've heard me talk about it previously in other episodes, but I'm going to talk about it again because get freedai is just a great service.
Speaker 2:Imagine being able to pay attention to your clients all the time instead of writing notes and making sure that the note's going to sound good and how are you going to write that note, and things like that. Getfreeai liberates you from making sure that you're writing what the client is saying, because it is keeping track of what you're saying and will create, after the end of every session, a progress note. But it goes above and beyond that. Not only does it create a progress note, it also gives you suggestions for goals, gives you even a mental status if you've asked questions around that, as well as being able to write a letter for your client to know what you talked about. So that's the great, great thing. It saves me time, it saves me a lot of aggravation and it just speeds up the progress note process so well, and for $99 a month. I know that that's nothing. That's worth my time, that's worth my money, you know. The best part of it too is that if you want to go and put in the code Steve 50 when you get the service at the checkout, code is Steve50. You get $50 off your first month and if you get a whole year, you save a whole 10% for the whole year. So again, steve50 at checkout for GetFreeai will get you $50 off for the first month and, like I said, get a full year, get 10% off, get freed from writing notes, get freed from always scribbling while you're talking to a client and just paying attention to your clients. So they went out, you went out, everybody wins and I think that this is the greatest thing. And if you're up to a point where you got to change the treatment plan, well, the goals are generated for you. So get freeai code STEVE50 to save $50 on your first month.
Speaker 2:Well, hi everyone and welcome to episode 156. If I sound hoarse, thank the allergies and the season here. But you know what's interesting is with my guests. You see all the lights. It looks really light. So go on YouTube and you'll see it. It feels like it's the day here. It's almost like it's past 10 o'clock at night Because my guests, who I really want to have on a podcast and no, not just because of Tracy, but because I find her interesting and Tracy that was a shout out to you, just for the record. And Tracy that was a shout out to you, just for the record is someone who is in Australia Melbourne, she said, and she's a Kiwi, which is you know. She feels my pain of being called an American when I'm Canadian first. So she feels my pain and but she's going to talk about great stuff. I don't. I just don't want to make it just comedy, but it's always good to have this going. Erin Todd, welcome to finding your way through therapy.
Speaker 3:Oh, steve, it's great to be here. Yes, it's midday here today, but it's heading into winter, so I myself have got a bit of a cold, so I sound a bit different too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and we're hitting the summer season and all the pollen decided to show up this week, so it's awesome, you know when you have allergies and all that, and you're catching me right before my summer break. So this is great. You're one of the last. I think you are the last. No, there's no. There's the last interview before I go to my summer break.
Speaker 2:So but you know, I'm very happy to meet you. So someone who connected us, Tracy coffee is someone I worked with at another company and Tracy and I never really met and we have a great connection. I always enjoyed her and she's like. You know, you got to meet Aaron and I'm like, of course, anything for.
Speaker 3:Tracy, she's great Love her.
Speaker 2:I love Tracy, so now that I've given you a little bit of intro, I'm sure you have a lot more than just being Tracy's friend as your bio. Can you tell me more about yourself?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so my background is a psychologist. I've worked in psychology for a long time about 20 years mainly sort of in hospitals with kids and adults who are unwell and going through crises. But more recently I really wanted to combine the mind-body connection so I did more study in particular around women's health and hormones and so to try and get that background of a much more holistic approach to managing difficulties and crises and, I guess, my switch to really trying to optimize our health and perform at our best with a focus on women's health.
Speaker 2:And I think that's needed too. I think that for me I could talk about the mind-body spirit, so it's very close to that. And we also worked on a crisis team basically us too, because I worked on a crisis team for about 15 years here trying to keep people out of the hospital, putting them in the hospital as needed. So I think we have that in common too, which really cool when you talk about a little bit about being a psychologist. Were you a psychologist like? Were you like bachelor, master, phd, or did you kind of like take time between the two or whatever?
Speaker 3:yeah, it's probably a little bit different over here, but I did a doctorate which is sort of in between a master's and a PhD, where you do some research as well as placements and coursework, and that was here at the University of Melbourne. So slightly I think it is a little bit different.
Speaker 2:This the study pathways, but probably getting to similar places and when you say, like you know, and I left you, I left there wide open, you didn't take the shot, so you're from New. Zealand. What part of New? Zealand?
Speaker 3:I'm from New Zealand, I am from Auckland, but I have lived in Australia for over I don't know 24 years or something like that. I had some time in London as well and didn't sort of OE that we often do, but yeah, have come back and sort of, I guess, made australia my home now no, and you enjoy australia, as you told me prior to the interview, if australia is playing any team you are pulling for well, usually new zealand.
Speaker 3:So I definitely go for new zealand. Um does depend a bit on what sport, but yes, I am an Australian citizen, so I should own that too all right, canada plays the United States in hockey.
Speaker 2:Guess who? I'm pulling for Canada every single time. I don't care about my American citizenship yes, if you're offended, please write to me. I'm fine. Um one of the questions that a standard question on finding your way through therapy because we talk about therapy is have you ever been in?
Speaker 3:therapy I have when I was a bit younger. So I lost my father when I was very young and at some point in around my early 20s I went to a therapist and mainly focused on that. I guess the other thing is some of the therapeutic techniques that you learn as well throughout the ongoing study that we do. Often some of them recommend having your own therapy, particularly in that sort of modality. So I have done. More recently, I've studied a technique called brain spotting, which is yeah, it's, it's from, I guess, the. The person who created it was an EMDR specialist, and so I do actually a lot of brain spotting as well, whether it be in a group or I do my own brain spotting or with someone individually. So I think I really love that. I find that's been really useful for me as well.
Speaker 2:And for those of us who don't know what brains I obviously was nodding because I'm a big fan, but if you can explain it in like a sentence or two for people who may not know what brain spotting is, what is it?
Speaker 3:In a sentence or two. Okay, it essentially looks at the premise. Behind it is um where we look, impacts how we feel, and it really was developed as a um, a therapeutic approach that is, processing of trauma, but it's also often used to enhance sports performance. I use it in my emotional eating program, sometimes it's used for addiction and and so it's really versatile and can be used in many ways. And it is the thing I really like about it. It's not just a cognitive level, it's not just about thinking about changing your thoughts. It sort of also brings your body and your felt sense and really connects the unconscious processing as well in terms to support you to move forward or to process what you need to process I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:I think that brain spotting is you know, I'm an emdr clinician myself and to be an emdr clinician you have to have go through emdr. Uh, so I I know what you mean about that and eye movement, desensitization and reprocessing has changed a lot of my clients lives. I frankly think that it helped me work on a couple of things too. So brain spotting, I think, is right up there with I think it's cognitive process therapy. That's another one that they use in the military up here in the United States. All good stuff for trauma in particular, but you can use it for just about anything. But I'm a purist in the sense that if you tell me we're going to do psychoanalytic, you better lie on the couch and do it three times a week and pay out of pocket. But obviously I know that you can be used for other things, including brain spotting. Mdr has been used for other stuff too, but brain spotting is one of my favorites and one that I'm studying right now actively. So I appreciate you explaining it to the audience.
Speaker 3:Amazing. I've been using it to try and help my husband improve his golf, so we'll see how that goes. We need to talk afterwards.
Speaker 2:My golf is terrible, so we got to talk afterwards. You know, one of the things is you talked about a transition in your intro. You know you talked about, you know going into transitions in your life and talking about. You know the mind body connection and stuff like that. So how do you integrate those principles of therapy and psychology into the coaching approach that you're doing now?
Speaker 3:I mean it is really interesting because I think, um, I think there's lots of people that just focus on one or the other. Like I feel like I can use a lot of the skills that I have learned through psychology, even sort of basic counseling skills and listening skills and sort of helping integrate the things that people are telling me with their past experiences as well. So I think we bring with us our past experiences, our childhood, how we interact and how we learned about relationships, and we bring with us our past experiences, our childhood, how we interact and how we learned about relationships, and we bring with us in our everyday life. And so a big part of making change is to really support people to understand their mindset as well, as well as the physical side of things. So you know, there's a lot of things that we know that we should do differently and do better. Like you know, we know we all should exercise and we know we all should eat healthy, but actually doing that sometimes isn't information, isn't enough.
Speaker 3:So supporting that behavior change, using things like positive psychology, brain spotting, things like that, I sort of really integrate it into my coaching to sort of support people to help make those changes, even though it can be really hard and also to stop being hard on themselves, like I think it's a really common thing that comes through going oh why can't I do this? There must be something wrong with me. Versus oh why can't I do this? Well, I didn't learn to do this when I was younger, or there's some barrier that's blocking me. That's maybe not as conscious, and so how do we get through that or around that? And so I think that self-compassion work is a really huge thing as well, but just really integrating all the skills that I've learned to bring to the person in front of me or the group of people in front of me, I think it's really, it's been really helpful.
Speaker 2:it's made a huge difference, I think well as a you know again, we in the finding your way through therapy podcast, we want to enter in like really educate as well as talk about stuff. About five years ago, before covid, I just thought positive psychology was a lot of bullshit and what I meant by that is I never read it, so I thought it was like, just be positive, and it's far from the truth. That that's what positive psychology is. But since you brought it up and yes, for those of you who listened for 156 plus episodes or know me, you will be shocked that I'm a huge fan of positive psychology. But if you could explain it to people what positive psychology does, and how you could explain it to people what positive psychology does and how you integrate that into your coaching, because I think it's fascinating, I think it's a great idea, by the way. But I just want you to talk a little bit about positive psychology.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I think that is a common mistake people make when they talk about I just have to be positive and in a way, if you do that too much, it sort of ventures into that toxic positivity, like I have to be happy all the time. But I think it's more about sort of that positive psychology, is more about looking at how can we optimize ourselves, what brings us happiness, how we talk to ourselves again related to some of that self-compassion, but using it to sort of create like a strength approach as well what am I good at, how do we get there, and sort of that bringing that problem solving as well. But I do think people find it hard to really talk about emotions, and particularly the, the emotions that are negative, whereas I think there's a, there is a real place for them and to process them, and you don't have to be happy or positive all the time, which I think is a really key thing there's so many things I want to say because I agree with you.
Speaker 2:Um, well, I'm going to go on a gender bias perspective here. First and foremost, if men are negative, it's almost accepted, but women who are not positive are somehow frowned upon because women have to be positive, and I could be wrong. But that's just my personal experience of societal norms and you can correct me if I'm wrong. If it's way different in Australia, I'm very interested, by the way, and you can correct me if I'm wrong if it's way different in Australia. I'm very interested, by the way.
Speaker 2:But I think that from my perspective you know we talked about women's health and how important it is to look at it from a different perspective Does that stuff actually play a factor? When you talk about women's health? And you know, because it's hard to talk about emotions women are allowed to cry and be happy, but they're not allowed to be mad or angry because that's not ladylike and all that crap. And I yes, I said crap because it is because I cry regularly and I have no problem with that and I tell my men to cry regularly because it's important. But can you tell me more about that?
Speaker 2:Because the emotional health of women is so different than men and I think that that plays a factor, because women are seen as the nurturer, so they have to be more positive. That's just my experience, but you can tell me if I'm wrong.
Speaker 3:I mean there's so many ways things to go from that conversation. Look, I think I think the key thing is that women and men are different. I think there's there's a biological difference and also there's been a cultural upbringing difference, like, as you say, you know girls and are much more likely to be okay, to cry, whereas boys are often told to toughen up. So I think we again, I think it's bringing both those things together um, we also think about women have more estrogen. Estrogen is sort of known as the mother hormone as well, so maybe they, um, naturally, are a bit more mothering. There is a um, a tendency for women. You know when they're, when, when they come across stress, sometimes they have a risk. Um, it's not just fight flight. Women have this tendency to tend and befriend, and so they they look for support, they look to protect their young ones. I think I guess, if we're talking about so, we also have different ways in which we respond. But unfortunately, in the history of health and probably a lot of research, the research is usually being done on middle-aged college men, and so a lot of the research that was done was then just extrapolated to women and said well, if it works for this cohort, it's going to work for women, but that's changing. So there's a lot more research being done on women and supporting that, the hormone cycles and what's actually happening and how that's impacting as well.
Speaker 3:I guess I haven't I your comment about. You know men are allowed to be a bit more grumpy. I guess I haven't. It's probably, it's probably okay, it's probably true. It's probably something that I just haven't taken a lot of notice of. But I do think there's things that, like women and men are responded to differently based on how they respond. So if women are a bit more angry, they can often be called just grumpy or or not listened to or things like that, whereas I think men can be listened to a lot more and they're allowed to be more angry than women. So it is very cultural. But I think there's also a physical, hormonal type thing going on as well. I think it's that combined, that mind, body type thing combined.
Speaker 2:I mean, I agree, I mean testosterone in men. You know, testosterone is based, you know, is more prevalent in men, but it's also what kind of more of the aggressive type of hormones. So I get that, but I think that if I punched a wall and you punched a wall, we would be treated way differently.
Speaker 3:I can agree on that. Incredibly. Neither of us have branching all.
Speaker 2:I mean, the interview is early, so who knows what's going to happen in the next few minutes, but I have no intention of doing so if that helps you.
Speaker 3:Me neither.
Speaker 2:All right, that's great, and I think that you know we're talking a little bit more about women, and I think that it's important. You know, I've I had someone a few months ago that talked about women's health being different than men's health too, and it's absolutely true. There's a difference, and it's not strictly perimenopause or menopause or postmenopause, it's so much more so. I wonder if, is that part of what motivated you to change your career to more uh, to paying focus more in women's health, women's uh bodies, women's coaching and all that? Is that part of it, or is it something else?
Speaker 3:yeah, that's definitely part of it. I guess you know learning much more about myself as well. Obviously I'm a woman going through the various, I am going through the various changes, um, that I mean in essence as well. Like men also again have particular things that they need support with, and you know a very good friend of mine is a men's coach as well, and so she, she deals with that. But I guess the, the, the woman stuff really interested me, and some of it that has really interested me is because, um, because of this, I guess, unfairness, this inequality that came with it as well, um, particularly around the research and and just finding out one more about myself, and sort of wishing going, oh, I wish I'd known some of the stuff when I was a teenager and then adolescent, but either we weren't talking about it or the stuff wasn't known. So I think it's just being interested in what I'm going through, what my friends are going through, how we really bring it together to even reach out for some of that more ancient knowledge that maybe our ancestors had, and also trying to live within our cycles not just the cycle of the day and the culture as well, just to create that real optimizing, I guess, is the key thing.
Speaker 3:How do I optimize my health? Optimizing, I guess, is the key thing. How do I optimize my health? I really got interested. I had periods of time where I had really low energy for a long, long time and just general medicine. Going to the GP, they'd test you do your blood tests, you're going, oh, everything's normal, it's not a problem, and you'd be sent away. And I encountered and got interested in functional medicine it's probably called integrative medicine more here and that really looked at the systems within the body and, rather than just going on everything's in the normal, it started to go well, this isn't. This is normal, but it's not optimal.
Speaker 3:How do you optimize? What do you need to do? How can you create those lifestyle changes? What other supplements do you need? What is your based on your genetic profile? What is not working, as well as something else. And I think just that empowering myself in terms of there is a lot that I can do to create more energy, more vitality in myself, just on a day-to-day basis, like what I do every day, matters. And when I have more energy, then I have more energy to give other people more, more things to follow and much more enjoyment. So I think it sort of came from like I love to learn, so that sort of that also. I'm sorry to try and get energy and it's my health I'm still going, I'm not there. It and get in a gym instead of my health I'm still going, I'm not there. It's a work in progress, but definitely much better than it was, that's for sure.
Speaker 2:There's so many questions that came up when you were talking about this, and in a good way. You know, for good old Canadians and American friends, gp is a general practitioner which we would call a primary care physician here in Massachusetts or in the United States. Just want to throw that out, just to keep all the language. Really I try to keep as many acronyms out of my mouth. So uh, especially for this podcast, which I really hope that people listen to get educated. That's number one. Number two, the other thing that you know you mentioned. You say you know things that you wish you didn't talk about when you were a teenage girl. That'd be my first question. I have a few follow-up questions, but that's the first one that comes up If you were going to talk to teenage girls I know that's not your concentration now, but what would you want teenage girls to know that you didn't?
Speaker 3:know, yes, okay, so I do mainly work with women in the perimenopausal phase, but I guess, thinking back, like when I was an adolescent, um, and it probably still happens a bit now like if you, if you had something wrong with your periods, or you had heavy periods or something happened, you'd get put straight on on the pill and still the case here in north america and the pill is a great contraception.
Speaker 3:There's no doubt about that, but it's often used for everything other than contraception and there's even things now like what one of the things does with the pill is it means that a lot of your nutrients are depleted. So really, if you're on the pill, you should be taking extra supplements as well to support that nutrient imbalance, which you're never really told about. There is a book by Sarah Hill, I think, called the Pill Changes Everything, and it just talks about some more research around the contraceptive pill and actually what it does. And if we think about it, it actually changes. It changes our hormones and our hormones are our chemical messengers in our body, is it changes our hormones and our hormones are our chemical messengers in our body. So it's it can change a little bit of of who we are, um, and so there's more and more study getting done on it and I think again, I think the pill is a great contraception, but I just think there's not a lot of informed consent and really clear knowledge about when you're taking something like that, what it does and impact it may have. Um, and the other thing is that psychical nature of when we're taking something like that, what it does and impact it may have. And the other thing is that cyclical nature of when we're.
Speaker 3:The other thing I wish I'd sort of known about is when we go through the our cycles, our monthly cycles. We have peaks in our cycle where we have lots more energy. We're sort of, you know, we're ovulating, there's lots of estrogen in our body, but then we go through cycles when our hormones are quite low and we have lower energy as well, and as a woman, we're just expected to function the same way, even those different cycles where I think sometimes, if we're maybe about to have our periods or we have low hormones, it can be okay to go I'm going to have a really slow day and not feel guilty about it, or, you know, sometimes you can't, but if you can, it's like giving your body a rest and being okay and knowing you're doing the right thing, rather than going oh, why can't I function? Or I shouldn't be doing this, and so just just having permission to be with our cycles and our energy as well. I think that it probably the two main things I would have liked to have known when I was younger.
Speaker 2:I hope that the teenage and young girls and young adult women who are listening to this will get a little hint about it. That's very important to me. I have educated my own daughters on that stuff.
Speaker 3:Amazing.
Speaker 2:Because, again, maybe it's a male bias, but for me, putting hormones in your body to change how it reacts, how can it not fuck up other stuff? It's just not. It's just to me, it's just. I don't know, maybe it's my own thoughts, but that's how I feel, which brings me to my other point that I want to talk about. You talk about health and nutrition and how things change, and one of the things that I concentrate with my perimenopausal, menopausal women in particular is I talk about gut health as a balance. So I don't know if you have any ideas on that, because you talked about gut health very quickly and I'm like, wow, that's one of my wheelhouses, so I want to hear more about that.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, there's so much and I guess this this is the other thing like even five years ago or something, we didn't know how much the gut impacted the brain and how the brain. You know that, all that communication, so there's so much knowledge and stuff coming out at the moment that I, I just imagine, you know, even in another five years we'll feel like we knew nothing now. But there is a lot of, there's a lot of stuff about gut health and how that impacts us and how, you know, leaky gut is a common thing and things getting into our bodies that shouldn't be there. I mean, I think it's imperative. And I think it's even more imperative when we're going through perimenopause, because we have much more stress at that time. That hormonal changes, that that we have to manage and having our gut function and our metabolism functioning well is going to make going through that process a lot easier.
Speaker 3:And I do see it in my clients, the ones that are eating not well and their metabolism's not great and their gut health isn't great. Often they're having some really tough times as well. So I mean, if you can fix your gut, that's great, whether that's through a gut health specialist or, you know, doing a little bit of elimination diet type thing to see what's supporting you in the moment. But I think it's really important to be able to see a practitioner that can help you support your gut as well.
Speaker 2:You know, I think we talk about menopause, perimenopause but I also talk about mental health because it is finding your way through therapy. I've talked about this, I think, on my podcast before, so if you missed it, that's fine, because I'm going to repeat the story because I think it's important. A good friend of mine shout out Helen. You know we've been friends since high school and she unfortunately had a lot of mental health issues, particularly bipolar, and she had difficulties with that. And she started reading a book by Kelly Brogan and I wish I could remember the name, but I cannot remember the name of the book and she changed her diet and over time, with changing that diet, she was able to remove most of her medication. I think she takes one now and that's from her gut biome and how she moved, like she didn't.
Speaker 2:By the way, for the record in case anyone's thinking that me or Aaron are sitting here going don't eat. That's going to keep your gut going strong. No, it's putting the right stuff in your gut. That's so important. And yes, you know I sit down and my gut's pretty big and all that.
Speaker 2:But I really, truly believe that part of me, not struggling as much as I use usually do with these allergies, has to do a little bit of my gut bile and avoiding certain foods, and I mean there's no, I don't have a formula for you, but being you know I talk about Kelly Brogan, but you need to pay attention to your gut and I feel that women who do pay attention to their nutrition. I don't like to talk about diet, I'd like to talk about nutrition because it's much more positive in some ways and yes, I have been positive but I think that that's what I talk about with the women I work with. It's get your gut biome balance. It's not going to take away all the symptoms I don't claim that by any stretch but it definitely helps.
Speaker 3:And I don't know if that makes sense to you or you think I'm crazy, but I think, from both mental health perspective, as well as menopause, perimenopause, it's so important to manage your gut bile it is really important, like it's the gut, it's the exercise, it's the sleep, it's the community and sort of stress management, like if we think about some, all those lifestyle factors that they're, they're so important. And I do think it can be really hard to nourish our bodies in this day and age because we go into all the stores and the supermarkets and there's so much food that isn't isn't good for us, so much processed stuff that just isn't helpful, um and so sometimes, being the one that is eating the fresh food, you can feel like the one that's a bit of the odd one out and it makes it harder, I think, which is really unfortunate yeah, you know in, uh, north America, and I don't want to speak for every country in the world, but I'll just talk about my experience with North America and Kelly Brogan talks about that in her book.
Speaker 2:Buy your food on the outside of the supermarket, because usually that's where all the fresh stuff is. The periphery is much more important than the aisles and I keep that in mind. My friend Helen talked about that to me a couple of times and I think it's very important to think about that and but be curious and learn how to balance it out.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so, and the other thing about the supermarket aisles like all the a lot of the cleaning products, a lot of the stuff we put in our face and our skin, a lot of them have endocrine disruptors that impact our hormones as well, and so I've had experience with women, particularly through the perimenopause phase, when they clear out their products and they put better products on their skin. It can actually also help their symptoms as well. So it's not just through the gut, it's also what we put on our skin and what we clean the house with, and all that stuff which I think is really important too.
Speaker 2:And I think it's also making sure that you know the gut biome is not also just nutrition, it's also about the exercise and you keep your body moving. That's also very important.
Speaker 3:There's so much we can do to help ourselves. We don't, so I guess that's some of the key messages that I really want to sort of share is that sense of empowerment. It's like you know, I know there are times where we feel that, where we can't do anything, but, you know, even getting up and getting a bit of sunshine in the morning Andrew Huberman talks a lot about the light at night and the light in the morning, like these are things that we can do, and we can do on a regular basis. That can help shift how we're feeling too, especially if we're really struggling you know my um, I had an.
Speaker 2:I had an interview with someone else on sleep. I think it was like episode 141 roughly, and she talked about the lux and the lights. And even if you do like we're, I'm pretty bright. It's a studio here, so you know, you can, you can see that it's fairly bright in here, but this only brings my lux level to maybe 50 to 60. You go outside on a cloudy day it's 250. And you know she talked about the importance of getting that light and I think that that also helps with perimenopause menopause. I think it helps everyone, frankly. But I also think that getting that cycle in so that you feel a little more normal, you get a little bit of that sunshine. You can talk about vitamin d and vitamin c and all that and I'm fine and I'll go with that too. But I really think that you know, historically, until about 100 or 150 years or so, give or take, we didn't live in buildings with this and electricity and fake light. We went outside and when the light went out we went to bed.
Speaker 3:Yep.
Speaker 2:Yep. So I would also add that for me, when you talk about women's health and particular perimenopause and menopause, I say get your sleep, get in a regular cycle of sleep. The eight hours is a myth in my opinion. I know my guests would disagree that I had a few weeks ago, but I think that it's important to get some sleep and as we grow older, I'd like to tell you that I sleep eight hours. As I get older, I don't sleep eight hours and I don't think I'll be able to get there anymore, but this is a hard thing, I think, particularly when you're going into perimenopause.
Speaker 3:This is the thing that has often disrupted the first. It's people and women are talking about. I just can't get the sleep that I used to, and part of that is because one of the hormones that starts to reduce first is the progesterone, and so that's the hormone that is the chill-out hormone, that helps us feel more sleepy, that helps us feel less anxious, and so, suddenly, without changing anything, people's sleep is changing, and so, therefore, it's really unfair. But it's about then what do I need to do? And so sometimes you really need to up the sleep hygiene, or even think about going to a doctor, maybe getting some sort of additional hormones or finding stuff that really supports our sleep in a different way too.
Speaker 2:The sleep hygiene. I know we're talking about women's health, but I do this with all my clients. I say, what's your sleep hygiene? And most people look at me like this, so go to YouTube if you want to see what I did. But I'm like, yeah, sleep hygiene, what is your routine? 30 minutes to an hour prior to sleep? I don't know, and I'm like that's probably why your sleep is shitty and I think that that I don't know if you talk about sleep hygiene, but to me, that's another key for most human beings to be functional.
Speaker 3:Yes, yeah, yes, well, I think it impacts, because if you're getting bad sleep, then you often make bad food choices about bad choices about what to eat, and then that impacts how you're feeling and then you probably get worse sleep, and if you're getting bad sleep, you're probably less likely to exercise. So there's a lot of again. It's the body, is the system. You're not just looking at one thing. It's just so interrelated what we do, how we sleep, what we eat, how we move during the day. It just impacts us in so many ways and it really is a system, rather than focusing on different separate parts.
Speaker 2:Fighting these allergies right now and having trouble sleeping because I'm coughing every other minute. My girlfriend would say every second. I get it and I certainly know that it affects my crankiness. You know, I don't think my baba or my juice is going to help me. I'm just cranky because I didn't sleep and it's so important to keep that in mind. I think that, with women's health in general, it's something that you know we don't talk enough about, you know, and that's important to bring up.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think it's, I think, yeah, I think it's so important.
Speaker 2:One of the things that I would talk about is that you know, when you think about women's health and all the work that you're doing right now, which is fabulous I'd like to hear more about the projects you're on, but maybe it's important to think about, maybe the future. What's your vision of the future for your work, especially around women's health?
Speaker 3:I know so much Well where to start. So what my what I'm hoping to do is create different communities as well. So a key thing that I am supporting women with is around perimenopause and menopause and sort of educating around those changes and supporting the things that they can do. Supporting helping them find out where their health care team can be, but that sort of includes you know who's at home. You know things are changing internally in their, in their body, so things often need to change externally because there's also the they're moving into a different stage. So from a psychological perspective they're letting go of things that may or not be what they wanted, whether they wanted to have more kids or they had kids and you know weren't able to have kids and what that means, sort of being that parent or not parent to moving to a time where they're older. And I guess in our culture probably in North American culture as well the elderly aren't really revered. You know some cultures have the elderly as wise woman or wise men. You know they come to, but that doesn't sort of happen in our culture over there. So what that even means in terms of what does this transition mean, is my life over. How can I have a really productive next stage of life. So there's a lot of psychological also grief and loss. You know what didn't I do when I was in my sort of reproductive age that I wish I'd done? So we've got a lot of transitions there as well, and when we're going through transitions, we have to leave some parts behind as well as well as look to the future. So there's some key areas that I really want to support and really help educate women. It's not the food is important and the exercise is important, but there's also a change in a stage of life and I think it's going to be really great to talk more about that.
Speaker 3:One of the other projects that I'm working on is around emotional eating as well. So I think we emotions and food is linked from before. We can even remember, you know, often if, as a baby, we cry, you know, often we're offered food even though we may not be hungry. And I think, particularly when it comes around perimenopause because the other thing that often happens is we put on weight even though we haven't changed anything we are more emotional because our hormones are changing and often we turn to food to manage that, and our solution to manage that is usually I need to eat less food or I need to go on a food plan, and often people are not looking at the real issue, which is what are the emotions and how they're coping with these emotions. So I do have a program around emotional eating that I'm working on. I use brain spotting in that program to sort of support that as well.
Speaker 3:And the other project I'm working on is with a friend of mine who is a trauma psychologist and also a breast cancer survivor and we're putting together some education and possibly a membership. We haven't totally decided to support that recovery from breast cancer as well. So when she went through her experience she got quite traumatized and she found that she, although there's some really good support while you're going through breast cancer, as soon as you're sort of in the cured stage and the mainly the support is about getting back to life and getting moving but there's not a lot of support around. Well, what?
Speaker 3:What have you been through and what's that like emotionally, as well as the other added thing that happens is that often some of the treatments put women into menopause who aren't in menopause already, and it's a very sudden thing. So this is the other thing that you know. Not only are people dealing with an illness, they're dealing with the chemotherapy, they're dealing with um, you know, all those changes. They're also dealing with suddenly going into menopause. So sort of looking about how you heal from a health what can you do but also from a trauma, emotional perspective too. So they're sort of the the things that I've got on the go, that I'm trying to sort of develop so you're not doing anything.
Speaker 2:You're just sitting on your laurels just doing nothing. Um, a couple of things I want to mention. You know, endometriosis is something that I also. When you are you're very young and you get to go through endometriosis, it really does change a woman's body and the trauma and the other part too.
Speaker 2:When you talk about trauma, I liken people who survive any like we talk about cancer, any kind of health scare, whatever you want to call it, because I've had people who've had Cushing's. You can talk about whatever you want, but there's a lot of things you can survive. I liken it to grief and what I mean by that is this when people pass away like if someone passes away in my life I'm not going to say any names or because I don't want to wish anything bad. What people tend to do is they turn around. They turn around and they help you for about two weeks. Everyone's there for you for two weeks and on almost like two to T, 15 days later you're on your own.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I took care of her for two weeks, or him or whatever, and I I talk about when people survive a very big health scare and whatever that is. There's this grief of like where the hell is the support gone? And you turn around and you're like where are they? And I wanted to mention that because I see that a lot, particularly women who are also kind of like if you go to endometriosis it's kind of scary. You can survive it, but once you get literally scraped, people are there for the beginning, but after that they're like okay, so you're back back to life in general and we're not ever talking about this again. I. I think that there's a lot to be said around that number one.
Speaker 3:I don't know what you yeah I totally agree because I think, um, I think what often happens is is people, if someone's going through a treatment or having to make medical decisions, or having to manage their nausea because they're having chemo, it's very much the physical side of things that people are focusing on and there's no time or energy to focus on the emotional side. So once all that physical thing's done and the planning and the hospital visits, that's when I think the emotions processing sort of sets in and that's when the support's not really there, um, and, as you say, like people go oh, you're, you're cured. Now you've got you, you've. You know you've done the treatment, we'll get back to normal, but you're not quite ready for normal. You still got some processing and, and whether it be grief or adjustment, you could still got some stuff to do. Maybe there is some trauma as well, medical trauma, what that means, the fear of reoccurrence. There's so much stuff that you're having to sort of manage, and that usually comes after the physical treatment.
Speaker 2:I have a client today that went for her seven year. For people who've never known about cancer. You go yearly for about five years and then you say you're all set, but she's concerned. So she does it every year. It's year seven and you know, right yesterday we had our session and I'm not identifying her in any other way other than this. She said I think I'm ready to process this and it took seven years. And you know what I said to her no, you're over it, move on. No, I'm kidding. I said, of course, and I think that that's something that not only because it just happened, it's something that I see regularly.
Speaker 2:The other part, too, that I wanted to mention, because you talked about trauma, you know, and eating and how that affects women. I also mentioned a generational trauma in there and how, you know, you got to be a proper lady or you got to whatever, or if you've had a parent that went without food for several months or several weeks, and that generational trauma and your attachment to food and how fucked up that gets. And again, I'm not blaming anyone. It's just a generational trauma. I blame the trauma, not any human being. It's just a generational trauma. I blame the trauma, not any human being. It really plays a factor, I think, particularly with women, particularly after, like menopause and perimenopause, because you know not too long ago, oh, so you can't produce any babies anymore. All right, you're not a human anymore, you're not helpful, and that trauma continues to this day, for the record.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and that's a big part of it Like thinking about. I talk to people about what, what is their food story and not just their food story. You know how did their parents respond when around food and what was it? And you know, I had a client who their parents just if there was any negative emotions, they would just buy her chocolate and that was that, was. That was it. That's how they managed it and and they were doing the best they can and it's, you know, it's from their growing up and how they were taught to manage, and so it's, it's, it's. It's no one's fault, it's just trying to understand it and where it's come from and then try and make a shift. So if something's unhelpful for you, how do you process that and go through it and create that time where it is more helpful?
Speaker 2:So I just wanted to throw those things out. I appreciate you validating my points of views, because one of the things I also want to make sure and for those of you who've known me long enough, you'll know Aaron, you may not know me I don't want to pretend I know what women go through. I'm not that self-centered or whatever you want to call it, but I definitely have some information and that's why I was asking you to kind of confirm it or deny it, because if I'm wrong, I'd rather be wrong and be told I'm wrong than people going oh yeah, you're white male, you know everything. I hate that stuff.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I mean we've sort of spoken as well often about women and men in this and there's obviously transgender and other you know like things and other other diversities and other minorities that um are are all you know, got valid points and valid perspectives and trying to get their points heard. But I guess we are talking talking about the market and the place where I'm sort of focusing my energy on Right.
Speaker 2:You know, we can also talk about race. We can talk about like again, I don't know what they refer to in Australia, new Zealand, I talk about the Oceania, like that. You know, we talk about Native Americans here. I've heard aboriginals being used as a common word because they have their own set of trauma and experiences with that and we're not we're not dismissing those situations. We are not.
Speaker 2:That's not what we were really focusing on women's health and, yeah, I brought up them. You know, again, in case you didn't know, I'm a male, um, so I brought up a little bit of those point of views, but I also want males to be curious and do like me. I'm like hey, here's my information. Is it right, is it wrong? Because I think that one of the things we need to shift in as a community is we don't know everything, and that's okay. Versus, you know I'm a therapist and people are like oh, you must know a lot. No, I'm a dumb as a rock. I'm learning and it's the truth, and I think I want to make sure I displayed that with you too.
Speaker 3:And I think it's not. Women's health isn't just for women, like, as you say, you have educated your daughters, and so to help understand what they're going through as well, and help them understand, but help you understand, you know. And so if you have a woman living in your household, then women's health is important, and the same vice versa if you have a man, transgender, like all their health is important and for us to understand each other, I think is a really key thing.
Speaker 2:You know the time flew. I just looked at the time. The time flies when we're having a good time. Yeah, truly, erin. I really enjoyed our conversation, but I'm sure that other people have enjoyed it even more and may want to join some of these groups that you were talking about. I don't know what to call them other than groups, so you can correct me all you want. How would people reach you? How would people get into these things?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I have my website. My business is called Finding your Flow, so my website is findingyourflowcomau. As in the Australian side, my email is erin at findingyourflowcomau, so you can look at anything on there. I do have a group starting on the 24th of June for emotional eating. It is at a time that is probably in the middle of your night over there, but I will be running if. If anyone is interested, I can run other groups at other times and it's a six-week group. It's group coaching as well as information. So you know, like I, I think my mornings are your afternoons and evenings. So, um, it's just about. If anyone's interested, then reach out to me and we can. We can work together and it'd be. It'd be great. It'd be great and I.
Speaker 2:I don't think that it's going to limit anyone, because I think that when you're interested in something, you just jump on it. You want to do it, so I'm happy to send people at your website findingyourflowcomau sorry, and please go there and I'm going to put the show notes, are going to have all those links and I think you have an instagram also instagram finding your underscore flow yeah, so I'm going to put all that in uh on the show notes.
Speaker 2:please go see in, even if you don't know if you could do it or not. Go see Erin's stuff. I know her website. Like I didn't know the address, but I've been to her website. Very informative, go to it, erin. I can't thank you enough. This was very informative. I appreciate it. I hope the audience enjoyed it too and I really thank you for your time.
Speaker 3:Oh, it's been great, it's been lovely.
Speaker 2:Yeah, tracy, we all owe you a couple of dollars. See you later, bye. Well. This concludes episode 157. Erin Todd, thank you so much. Go to her website. Go join her coaching groups. I know that people might you know. She said in the interview oh, maybe it's going to be too far, but you know you listen to her. You know she knows what she's talking about. Sometimes it's worth staying up to listen to that. But episode 157 is the return of guest host Courtney Romanowski. Courtney will be joined for that interview with Bed Herman. I hope I pronounced the word right and there's an H in there, so that's even worse. But I hope you come back for that.
Speaker 1:Please like, subscribe and follow this podcast on your favorite platform. A glowing review is always helpful and, as a reminder, this podcast is for informational, educational and entertainment purposes only. If you're struggling with a mental health or substance abuse issue, please reach out to a professional counselor for consultation. If you are in a mental health crisis, call 988 for assistance. This number is available in the United States and Canada.