Periods, Parasites and Perimenopause Oh My!
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[00:00:00] If you have ever felt like there was something wrong with you that medical doctors could not figure out, or if you've been to the doctor several times, only to hear them say, oh, that's just normal. Or maybe they looked at your lab work and said there's nothing wrong with you, but you're still having symptoms.
This episode is for you today. I'm talking with Kate McDowell and Amanda Golightly of Aligned Natural Health kate's interest in nutrition grew from working to find a solution to her own health challenges in the past, and after realizing that the medical approach just wasn't helping, Kate found natural methods that greatly improved her own health, and she's gonna share that story with you today.
Amanda is a certified quantum nutrition testing practitioner with a background in N L P hypnosis and Time Line Therapy. Amanda has found that the natural health world and energy medicine have been calling for many years when she found quantum nutrition [00:01:00] testing. Uh, It was a natural fit for improving her own health, which eventually led to her becoming a practitioner as well.
Today, Kate and Amanda run aligned natural Health together, helping their clients to live well naturally. You are listening to success in Mind with Teri Holland, the show for high performing entrepreneurs, leaders, and changemakers ready to take your life and your business to the next level. If you're ready for whole life success, keep listening.
So I wanna jump right into your business because I, I know that you started off in one direction, you've pivoted your business, and let's start with that. So tell me, cause I know Kate, you started the business, right? And then Amanda, you've joined in. Correct. So tell me about how you made that transition from being a weight loss coach to now doing what you're doing today, and, and let us know what that's been like.
So, Initially, I mean, I went back to school for nutrition [00:02:00] because I really wanted to help people. I've wanted to help people with health for a long time, and coming out of nutrition school, weight loss was what everyone was doing. And it was like, there's a huge industry in weight loss. You'll get lots of clients if you do this.
And so I was like, okay, like I could do that. I've been down the road of trying to figure out why I couldn't lose weight in the past, and. Had an understanding of the fact that A, the weight loss industry is flawed and gives us a lot of really bad advice. And so I was like, okay, I can help with this. Now I understand a little bit about perimenopause and what happens in the woman's body, and so I thought, I can do this.
I can do it better. But ultimately it wasn't like filling my cup, I guess, in a sense, because I always wanted to help people with health. And when you go down a weight loss path, Health isn't the priority for most people. It's like, no, get me into these genes. Mm-hmm. [00:03:00] I don't care what I have to do. Yep. And so, yeah, when I, we both actually heard about quantum nutrition testing, which we use now.
There was this like, holy, holy crap, maybe this is what we've been looking for, because this is an opportunity to help people improve their health. Which is so much more powerful. And so for me as well, like, okay, yeah, I lost some weight in the past, but like I had autoimmune stuff and health issues and went through that struggle and it was recognizing that like we can help people on such a deeper level and make such a bigger impact in their lives in general by making this pivot.
So it. It was almost an overnight switch. Nice. Um, we heard about the quantum nutrition testing and there was this like one day course you could go to to learn more about it and growing a business and. [00:04:00] We did that and from pretty much there out, I started adding quantum nutrition testing as the service that we offered.
And yeah, it, it's been amazing like so what is quantum nutrition testing like? I know I've done some work with you, but for everyone listening, what is Quantum nutrition testing? It's basically a fancy term for muscle testing, which a lot of people have heard of. Uh, it's, it's energy using the, the frequency to test the body, to figure out what's not working properly.
Because you can go to the doctor, you can get blood work done, and they test and see like, oh, do you fit into this reference range? And if you do, then it's like, oh, there's nothing wrong with you. What if you still have symptoms? Mm-hmm. That's not okay. And so with quantum nutrition testing or with muscle testing as well, if it's done in person, we can test each person and their [00:05:00] body and see where is the imbalance and what does the body need to get back into balance.
So yeah, ultimately, yeah. Man, did you elaborate on that? I was talking with someone earlier today about this actually, and ultimately it's all frequency. If you go to the hospital, they may put electrodes on you to read your heart. It's not actually on your heart though. It's picking up the frequency of your heart.
So it's the same kind of thing except put in place. I'm gonna use my body to connect with your frequency and I'm gonna be the machine, if you will, and I'm, I'm not touching you with quantum nutrition testing, however, I can still pick up on your frequency and find out. What's not working in your body, if that makes sense.
Yeah. So you can, you do this online, which I find amazing that your client doesn't even have to be in the same location as you for mm-hmm. The testing. Yeah. Yeah. It's really cool. Uh, who I spoke with earlier also mentioned, I think we talked about this earlier, Kate, uh, thinking of Reiki healing, and [00:06:00] there's people who work in the field of reiki and do distance healing, and it's the same thing.
It's all intention, it's all frequency. It's. If that's a, just another way to kind of put it for people. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. And, oh, go ahead. Ultimately, in 2020, it was kind of a need. Right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Like, people couldn't go to their doctor. They couldn't go to see their practitioner, but people still needed help.
And so there was a need where it was like, okay, how can we still test these people? How can we, you know, connect to them even though we're not in the same room as them? Or not even in the same. Country as them. We have clients. The farthest client we've had is in Barbados, um, and we're in Canada. So you don't, you don't have to be in, in the inner office to come get tested.
We can do it from a distance and we, yeah, we do it over the phone and it's great for people because of the convenience and like people have busy lives. We get blizzards and snowstorms in Canada. So the [00:07:00] driving is, the driving is tough. Sometimes kids stay home sick. Like there's so many different reasons why it can be challenging to go, uh, to your appointment.
So to be able to do it over the phone, it's just, it makes it much more convenient for people and we're able to get the reading and tell you exactly what's going on and what your body needs to get back into balance. So, yeah. Yeah, I know. I appreciate it cuz I'm in Vancouver. You're across the country in Ontario and we can still work together, which is.
Which is so cool, so amazing. So you, you started out in weight loss. Mm-hmm. And I, I get that, that would be cuz my background is also weight loss. So I get that that's sort of the easy thing to sell. So what was it about this, like you said you wanted to help people get healthier in, in a deeper level, but what was it about this that really drew you, especially the quantum.
Quantum nutrition testing. Yeah. Uh, in school I worked with a practitioner who did muscle testing and she [00:08:00] also did nutrition response testing. She called it the same thing as quantum nutrition testing from a distance. And I just thought it was really neat and I never really knew how to learn about it and how to get into it.
And so when we saw this, This practitioner, she's actually in Florida. So we didn't actually meet with the woman who is our mentor and who we learned from, um, until a couple months ago now. And so we were able to add this into our practice and start helping people really quickly. And it, it just, it's so great to be able to connect to the body and understand Right.
Our bodies are talking to us all the time. Mm-hmm. We just. Have been like conditioned to not listen. And so yeah, I thought that was really neat and we've just run with it and had so much fun with it. And, and how about for you Amanda? Cause your background I know is similar to mine and n l P and hypnotherapy and timeline therapy.
So what drew you into doing this work? I've always had an an interest [00:09:00] in health and been drawn to it in that way. And even before I did NLP or hypnosis Energy medicine was something that I was drawn to. There was a course I was involved with, uh, I think it was along the lines of traditional Chinese medicine, and they had these audio tracks that basically if you had an issue with any sort of organ, it was, it's along the same lines of kind of what we're doing.
There was a frequency with whatever the track was. You couldn't hear it, but your, I guess your body could hear it. And that was one of my more. One of the older exposures that I had to healing the body and frequencies and stuff like that. And it's just kind of grown from there as far as exploring, uh, traditional Chinese medicine.
And then, um, the emotion code was another book that I looked into and one of the reasons I kind of got into NLP as well, it was the health aspect. And Kate at that time was still dealing with some MS symptoms and I wanted to help her through some of that [00:10:00] And. And health was something that always kept coming up.
So when I was kind of figuring out business-wise where I wanted to be, I thought it would be in the LP hypnosis space. And then once quantum nutrition testing came up and I'm like, why am I, why am I not going towards where my body's been telling me where I'm supposed to be? So I made the switch and jumped on board with the health aspect and getting deeper for people and actually helping them heal in a different way.
So I have to ask, cuz the two of you, you are married. So what is that like? Because when I think about working with my husband, there's no way, there is absolutely no way I will ever bring him into my business because I don't think I. We can remain married, like we can be married, or we can be in business, but we can never have both.
So I'm always fascinated when I see couples who are working together and doing it well. So how, how does this work for you? [00:11:00] We've always done things well together from, we had a time where we were doing a photography business together and taking photos of CrossFit competitions. Mm-hmm. We did CrossFit together as partners in that way.
Yep. And we're just, Good at reading each other and figuring out what the needs are and kind of there's a balance and a flow with us, I guess. I don't know. What do you think, Kate? Yeah, I think the balance is a really big part of it because like we both bring very different things to the table, which is helpful and we compliment each other in a lot of ways.
Which is good in terms of skillset, in terms of one, creativity, in terms of a bunch of different things, which has been good. Um, and communication. Like we are really good communicators. We talk about everything, which is really important in a relationship, let alone in a business. And it's not gonna say, I'm not saying that it's been sunshine and rainbows all of the time.
There are moments where it's. You know, there's challenges, but still talking through things [00:12:00] rather than just ignoring them. Mm-hmm. Um, has been helpful. But I think, yeah, ultimately when you find someone who's like a really good. Kind of yin to your yang or whatever. In terms of the elements of the business, like Amanda's very organized.
I'm moderately organized, right? And so it, it just helps from both sides, right? Because we, yeah. And we enjoy creating and doing things together, so, mm-hmm. Yeah. I think we thrive on being in the same energy of this, and ultimately the intention is to help people and make their lives better and, It's very rewarding to be a part of that process.
So when you're working with clients, are you both working with the same client or do you work with clients individually? How does that work? We work with clients individually at this point. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Our clients can, can choose who they wanna work with at this point. And yeah, cuz we do, um, Like packages with people.
So we'll work with someone [00:13:00] for 12 weeks and it's, it's helpful to have the consistency of the same practitioner talking with you and meeting with you every week. I mean, if there was an emergency or something, we would fill in for each other for sure, but I. Generally speaking, it's one client, one gets one practitioner.
Yeah. I think it helps with the continuity of care and just, you know, making sure you're on board with whatever the discussion was the week before kind of thing. So how do you deal with like just the actual running of the business? Do you divide up the tasks? Do you each have different roles or do you just kind of.
Pick things up. How does that work? Because again, I keep, I keep relating it back to Greg and I, and I'm like, there is no way, like I would end up doing all the businessy stuff. I would handle our books cuz there's no way he'd even wanna look at it. And I'd probably do our marketing and sales. Like I think I would probably wear most of the hats and, uh, Yeah, it would not work.
So how do you two decide who does what or do you just kind of share in it? Is it kind of organic for [00:14:00] you or do you have it laid out what you each do? At this point, I'm full-time in this role, so I do a lot of the creating of stuff, especially like the systems that are set up for, you know, when you bring in a new client and you have, you know, we use cajabi, so you have the forms for them to sign up and for all of those things.
So I do a lot of that stuff right now. Um, in terms of social media stuff, we do our own. Mm-hmm. Which is fun. Uh, we podcast together, we do a lot of creation together, and we do a lot of brainstorming together, which is helpful and fun. But yeah, because this is still my full-time role, this, the goal is to have us both full-time.
Um, we're not quite there yet. So yeah, that's, the divide is kind of, or if there's anything that Amanda needs, like, especially because she's not available, you know, seven days a week. For a client or for whatever I'm able to, to pick up and help with that. Yeah. Depending on the schedule too, I, I can always chip in and help with [00:15:00] some of the testing or whatever the needs are for Kate too.
There's that nice, there's that balance at least there too, where I can jump in and say, okay, you've got, um, more busy schedule, so let me, let me help out at least. Perfect. That's great. Yeah. Yeah. And, and what do you think has led to your success so far in business? What has been the, the key success points of getting you to where you are so far?
I think the fact, the consistency that we've been doing as far as social media. Yeah. Getting presence out there and uh, especially for myself, getting more of the human element in there and actually getting to tell stories. Cause that's, I think that's a big thing that I'm learning from Kate. She's, uh, got a lot of great information to share in her story and, uh, very impactful for people to hear what she's been through.
And I think very huge as far as the inspiration to know that other people can accomplish the same thing. Yeah. Like my life earlier today was basically about that. Like, the one thing you can do in order to get healthier is [00:16:00] decide that you can Absolutely. And from there, helpful, anything's possible.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. I think that's the biggest thing for people to realize is that they can, that they can get better. Yeah. Yeah. So true. And compassion. I think that's a big part of it too. Like if you're going through health things, a lot of people have been through the experience. If you go to the doctor and there is no compassion there, there's, you're not, you're not treated even like a human.
And we very much, you know, See the human in front of us and we listen. And a lot of the times we hear that from clients. Like, you're the first person, our first call with someone is 30 minutes at least. Wow. And people are like, you actually listened to me. You answered, you know, you asked me all kinds of questions, and it's just the feeling of.
Being supported and two people who, who really are just here to [00:17:00] help you and to help you get better. And so I think that makes a big difference for people too. And what was your journey, Kate? I mean, I know I've heard your story, but I think they would love to hear your story, if you don't mind sharing.
What, what was your journey, um, through Health Yourself? How much time do we have? All the time we need. We're good. Um, my journey. So I was diagnosed with MS when I was 22 years old, so 2005. I was a young punk. I thought I was healthy. I exercised, I like ate. Okay. Um, and yeah, I, I, one side of me was numb one morning when I woke up and I just thought I slept funny.
So I went on. My life for a few days, and finally I was like, I probably should go get checked out. And yeah, A doctor that I had never seen before after I was in the hospital for three days, came in and was like, I'm diagnosing [00:18:00] you with MS. And pack your things and go to this clinic. And it was. Wow. I had this, you know, couple days of pity party for myself and mad at the world and hitting my body and hitting the universe and why the heck did this happen?
And then ultimately realized like, well, well, what's next? What now? And I did go the medical route cuz that's what we're conditioned to do. Right. And so I, you know, injected myself every day for seven years. Um, I took other medication to deal with the side effects of that medication and other medication for the side effects of that medication.
And the, the list just continued to grow. But in 2011, when I was at the point where I was like, I can't do this anymore, I. I don't want to continue this way. Um, I went to a friend because I [00:19:00] was raising money for the MS bike ride, which I used to do all the time, and my friend said to me, I love you. I will sponsor you, but they're never gonna find a cure.
You know that. And it was like a knife in the heart, but it was exactly what I needed to hear. And so I went home angry and upset, and a few days later I was like, holy crap, she's right. I'd been waiting for this knight and shining armor to come along and rescue me, and the realization was I need to do something for myself.
And from there, I, it was, it was like, okay, what can I do? There's gotta be something else because the meds were making me sicker and sicker. My quality of life was going down the toilet. And shortly after I saw a video from Dr. Terry Wells who reversed all of her MS symptoms using [00:20:00] food, and that was the turning point moment for me.
That's exactly what I needed to hear. It was exactly the right time. And from there I started making changes to my diet. And it didn't happen instantly, but after a few, you know, years of diet changes and then you start cha changing your diet and you start feeling better and you're like, well, what else can I do if this worked?
There's gotta be other things. What else can I do? And so I just kept looking and kept changing things and things kept getting better. And in 2016, I came off my medication. And have been symptom free since then? Pretty much symptom free me, med free completely. In my opinion. I don't have MS anymore. My doctors would argue me on that, but I haven't had symptoms and I'm not on medication.
And if you don't have the mechanism of disease, do you still have the disease? That I'm not sure. [00:21:00] So yeah, so that's my, my story kind of condensed and squished together. But it's such a powerful story though. I love every, I've heard it a few times now, but every time I hear it I'm so captivated by it. Such a powerful story of healing.
And you know, I've had a similar journey mm-hmm. With autoimmune disorders and with ulcerative colitis where. But the same thing, like I was in remission for seven years and my doctors kept saying, well, you're, you're in remission. But I was like, no, I, I don't have colitis. And they're like, it's remission.
Yeah. Yeah. The interesting thing I heard someone say a little while ago too though, is that I considered that I'm, well, I was considering that I'm cured. Mm-hmm. And if we associate cure as like, You've been given something that now means that you no longer have MS and you can go back to living exactly the way you were before, and, you know, putting all the triggers into [00:22:00] your body and exposing yourself to all the same things, and your disease is never gonna come back.
That's not realistic. Totally. So if remission is saying like, you're now living with no antibodies, with no symptoms, not taking medication, I'm fine with that. I'm okay with remission cuz I used to not like that word. I was like, P what are you saying? I got rid of this. But it's, it's how you look at it, right?
It's like, either way it's, I'm, I'm better, my life is better. Right. So, well, that's where like, I was shocked. I mean, I've talked about this on my show before, like when my, when colitis came back and it was like overnight, came back a year ago. Um, it threw me for a loop because of that. Cause I was like, but it's gone.
It's gone. But I had to take a look at, well, what, what in my life invited it back? What did, what changed in my environment that made it okay to come back? What did I. And not from a place of self [00:23:00] blame, but like what changed in the environment? Cause for my body to have the same response again, something had to have been different.
Yeah, exactly. Like what you're saying is that if you go back to the old habits or the old ways or old thinking, your body still has those mechanisms to create the illness. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Because it created it before. Yeah. Will it create it again? Maybe not. Maybe there's enough healing that's happened that it won't, but yeah.
Why am I gonna attempt that right. Right. It's like if fire burns you once so you're gonna stick your hand in it again to be like, will this burn this time? There was a, a great meme I saw actually my husband sent it to me cuz he was like, this is you. And um, it was this woman and she was like, let's see if the thing that hurts my stomach hurts my stomach today when I eat it.
And I was like, oh. And we had had this talk recently cuz he was like, how can you still like foods that make you feel ill? And I was like, because I like them. And [00:24:00] he was telling me, and I hadn't even thought of this before, but he was like, when something makes me feel sick, I no longer like that food because I associate it with making me feel bad.
And I was like, I don't think I have that part in my brain. Like I think I'm missing that connection of like, this doesn't feel good in me, but I still enjoy it. And so I've been rattling that around my head lately. I'm going, well, How can I still, how can I like the taste of something or enjoy it when it's not making me feel good?
Interesting. Yeah. So he sent me that meme. He's like, this is you. Like this always hurts my stomach, but will it hurt today? It's really good perspective. Totally. Yeah. Was talking with a friend of mine, um, and I shared that with her. I was like, why does it like foods that make him feel sick? And she's like, I don't think I have that part of my brain either.
Maybe it's a male thing, maybe. Cause he will literally be like, no. Like he will not, no matter how much [00:25:00] he loved it before. Once he doesn't feel good eating it, he's like, no, that's, that's repulsive. I don't wanna eat it again. Okay. I need Greg's brain. So now you're working with women's health and hormones.
Is is the focus. Um, what made you decide to focus in that area for your business? For me, I guess it's, I have stories around that too. So that was an easy transition, um, in terms of, you know, period problems and doctors dismissing you and, you know, telling you it's all in your head. I've had that. Yeah. Um, and just.
We're not given answers as women. No. A lot of the times we're not even regarded as like a valid question when you go in with a question sometimes. So it was like I. I mean, this is more so Amanda. Well, you focus on hormones a little bit now too as well. Right. But yeah, this was more, I was like, I wanna do this because hormones is like one of the most [00:26:00] complicated things I've ever studied.
So of course I wanted to work on that. Right. So it was like, you know, there's, there aren't solutions and we can offer a solution. So, mm-hmm. Okay. Let's do this. And then how about for you, Amanda? Do you have, do you also focus on hormones more now or do you have a different focus than, than Kate's focus in the business?
That's part of it. There seems to be, cause we've had a few, well, people that seem to be common as far as, uh, digestive issues and heartburn. Heartburn seems to be a big one that, uh, is kind of attracted our ways. So that, those are some of the things I like to speak to and. Um, those are kind of the main two I think right now.
And a lot of women with terrible, terrible periods like people I keep talking to and how they've got a period that takes them up for two days and they can't function. It's like, that's not okay. That is not okay. Yeah. So it's just something that I know we can help make a huge difference in their lives.[00:27:00]
We're taught that that's normal though, aren't we? Like? Yes, we are. It's normal. It's normal that you can't function for two days. Or even worse, like you, you can't function but function anyway. Like, yeah, yeah, take Advil, go to work. It's common, but it's not normal. Mm-hmm. That's a good way to put it. Yeah. I remember I went to, I ended up in emergency once, like in my early twenties cause I had such an awful period.
I was bleeding so heavily that I thought something was really wrong. I thought I could even possibly be miscarrying. I, there was no, I didn't think I was pregnant for any reason, but other than my period was so heavy. And I went to emergency, and the emergency doctor was a male who was just like, yeah. Um, like he literally told me, take some Advil, put an ice pack on your stomach just to help slow down your uterine contractions and uh, like, deal with it.
Yeah. It's just a heavy period. You're fine. And I was like, but this doesn't feel fine. Okay. I can't function right now. This doesn't feel fine. [00:28:00] But that was his answer. Put a nice pack on and take some avil. I think that's the problem there. He has no idea what's going on with you. And a lot of women are getting that response from doctors that you know, just, you know, go take this pill and go sit at home and curl up in a ball and you'll be fine.
Deal with it. You're a woman, this is just what you deal with. Yeah, exactly. And it's that again, that's not okay. No. We actually wanna listen to our clients and answer any of their questions, concerns. And actually give them an answer. Right. We can find out what the cause is and help them be supported through that.
And so they don't have to do that anymore. Yeah, we don't have to suffer. Yes. Yeah. What a, the novel idea. We don't suffer. Who would've thought? Exactly. So. Exactly. Yeah. What is the approach that you take through through quantum nutrition testing and the work that you do in helping women with their hormones?
With anything at hormones or [00:29:00] headaches or explosive diarrhea or anything that you're dealing with, we wanna find out why. Mm-hmm. And that's an area that medicine really misses the mark is that it's, they look at things and it's like, okay, so what can I give you to make the symptom go away? Mm-hmm. But that's not dealing with the problem.
Right. So the quantum nutrition testing? Yeah, like the first thing that we look at is a where, where is the problem coming from? Is it from your uterus? Is it from your pituitary? Like where is it in the body? Is it coming from? And then what's causing that? And this can be so many different things, things in our environment, things in the food that you're eating, things in your house.
We're all on computers right now, right? So radiation, it can be stress, it can be heavy metals. Like there's so many things that can be causing this. And if we're not dealing with the cause of the problem. We're never actually gonna help it go away. We're never gonna help the body get back into [00:30:00] balance. So if you're bleeding to, I was like that too.
If you're bleeding to death every month, we need to figure out why it's happening so that we can give you a solution that's gonna help make that better. Because like the body whispers when it first has symptoms and it's like they're small and little, but the more you ignore them and don't. Figure out what's going on, what the body needs.
It starts to yell and that's where things, more symptoms come up and more problems come up. And then, yeah, you're ending up in the ER because you feel like you're bleeding to death. Mm-hmm. Why is it happening? And that's what we like to really focus on and address the cause. And also working with the body, we like to actually support it and build it up rather than, In a lot of instances, you're actually tearing it down with some of the medications or what other, whatever treatment is being offered.
Yeah. And yeah, supporting the body. What a concept. Yeah. Cutting things out, which is their other solution. Yeah. Like let's take it out with that. Exactly. [00:31:00] Yeah. You don't need that. Yeah, you don't need that anymore. It's fine. Take out an organ. Yeah. Let's cut out your gallbladder. You'll never digest fat properly again on your own, but it's no big deal.
Don't need that. You really need it. That's the other thing we talk about often as well, that everything's become. Emergency medicine now that's, everything's the go-to. You're always going to the medical route for whatever the problem is. Yeah. Where emergency medicine should be reserved for emergency medicine being maybe my arm's broken or my life is in jeopardy, then yes, those are the people I wanna see.
They can save my life. But otherwise, there are natural options to improving whatever symptoms you're dealing with and getting to the cause. And that's where we wanna focus. So I do have some, I posted on Instagram earlier that I was having you two on the show, and so I asked people if they had any questions and I actually had a couple questions, so I'm gonna pull up my phone [00:32:00] here and see what we have, um, done.
Yeah. There's a couple questions. So the first one is, how do you know if you're in perimenopause? So I guess like what are some symptoms or signs that you're, you're going into perimenopause. Um, some of the symptoms, I mean, symptoms like changes in your periods, especially if you've been consistent and regular for a really long time, can be a sign.
Uh, you can be dealing with more migraines and worse PMs around your cycle. Um, Difficulty sleeping is a common sign of perimenopause. And then another, uh, like colleague I guess said to me a little while ago, she's like, no one told me that my chin hairs were gonna poke out my husband's eyeballs. Oh my God.
So growing like chin hairs and other hair that you didn't have before, um, hot flashes. I mean, there's signs that you're going into menopause as well, but perimenopause is just, Like the [00:33:00] transition. I know, you know, for myself, I went to the doctor when I was 32. My hair was falling out. I was cold all of the time, and it's just signs that some something hormonally is changing and not functioning properly.
And my doctor was like, oh, you're in perimenopause. I didn't think that was supposed to happen at 32. What the heck? So, I mean, ultimately you can start a year before menopause. It can start 15 years before menopause. And so it's just understanding that like this transition, it can be long, but if you have symptoms, it's like that's when it's a good time to go and start getting some answers because more are gonna come and you don't have to just live with them.
Funny what you mentioned about the chin hair thing, cuz I always see these videos of women like making jokes about their car tweezers. Cause that's where they always see them. Is the lighting. The lighting, the best tweezers in their car. I'm like, oh, that's brilliant. Or there was a, A friend sent me a meme the other day that was a woman [00:34:00] and she's like, She gets in her car and she's looking normal, and she sits down in the seat and then all of a sudden she looks in the mirror and there's this, like, she had stuck like a piece of like black yarn to her and she's like, oh my God, where did that come from?
Oh, that's so true. That's so true. Yeah. Oh, I remember being a kid and watching my mom like t tweeze her chin hairs in the car, and I was like, what are you doing? That's weird. Now it's like, oh, oh yeah. It's like one of those things about womanhood that no one tells us about, but we observe it. Like we, we all know about it, but no one talks about it kind of thing.
Yeah. I remember my mom in like our living room window with a little mirror and her tweezers. That was her spot. And then another person asked, what happened to my brain? Followed by a like face palm emoji, which I'm guessing I'm mindreading on it, but I'm guessing what's to do with like brain fog and [00:35:00] perimenopause or like, I've heard a lot of women talk about that getting brain fog.
Is that a perimenopause symptom or is that something else? It could be something else. There's many things that It could be true. Yeah. Yeah. Could be something. Digestive, maybe your digestive system's not cooperating, and usually the two are connected. Wherever your digestive system goes, your brain's gonna follow.
So, yeah. And ultimately in perimenopause, what's happening in the body is there's shifts happening in your hormones and they're things are fluctuating. And when changes happen there, there's gonna be changes that happen elsewhere in the body as well. Right? Like especially progesterone, which is the calming hormone.
In our cycle, progesterone levels often dip through perimenopause. That's why women deal with estrogen dominance and with other symptoms around there. But when, when progesterone dips, you're not gonna sleep as well, right? And if you're not sleeping as well, digestion's not gonna function as properly. And if there's more stress in the system, like there's [00:36:00] so many different reasons that these things can happen.
But yeah, brain fog is, as Amanda said, there's so many different like factors that can contribute to that. But it is something that a lot of women can experience through pen perimenopause. And again, we need to figure out like what's causing that? Is it because your hormones aren't functioning properly or aren't, um, at the levels that they should be to keep things?
Working the way they should be. And that's where like giving your body a bit of support at that time. And I'm not talking biodentical hormones, that's a whole separate topic. Um, but giving your body support at that time so that things can function properly, then the symptoms are gonna go away. Yeah. Like ultimately that's what's needed and that's what's missing most of the time.
I took, uh, I took bioidentical hormones for a while. And it's kind of funny. It's funny that you mentioned that cuz I was a naturopath who put me on them and was like, your progesterone's low, let's put you on this. I loved it. My skin was [00:37:00] great. I was sleeping so well. Um, I wasn't bloated at all. I wasn't retaining water like I felt.
I felt phenomenal. But then I went to a doctor. Like, uh, cause this is when we were trying to get pregnant, didn't happen. Um, I went to a fertility doctor who was like, you know, that's not actually gonna bring up your progesterone level. It's like, that's just a bandaid that's not gonna fix the problem.
Which was funny to me at the time. Cause I was like, the medical doctor is telling me that's not actually helping you. That's just making you feel better. And it was the naturopathic doctor who was like, here's a solution, take this hormone. Which is just funny to me. Cause usually it's reversed. It's usually the medical doctors like, take this thing to make you feel better.
And it's the, the naturopathic doctors na, who were like, let's get to what's actually going on. And so I went off, she was like, you're really wasting a lot of money on this. Isn't gonna fix the problem. It's making your skin clear up and sure you're not retaining water, but that's not actually increasing your progesterone levels.
Yeah. Because again, it's not dealing with why was [00:38:00] your progesterone low. Exactly. Right. If we can find that and get the body to do what it's supposed to do naturally mm-hmm. Then things are gonna get better. Like, yes, your skin will clear up and you'll feel, feel a lot better. But then when it comes to fertility and trying to conceive and stuff and your body is actually working the way it's supposed to, yeah, you're gonna have much better results there.
And like throwing a hormone in the mix. The body gets lazy too. Yeah. So it's like when people, I went on thy, I have so many stories. I went on thyroid medication too, and it's like, oh, your thyroid's low. Let's give you thyroid. Mm-hmm. And it's then the thyroid can get lazy during that time as well. And that's why women don't come off that.
Mm-hmm. Right. Because it's not gonna, it's not making the thyroid function better. No. It's just like, Here, don't worry. I got you. Right. But then, yeah, so f figure it, finding the cause, like I say it over and over again, [00:39:00] but like finding the cause and fixing that is what's actually gonna fix the problem. And then the third question I got was, are there foods we should avoid or eat more of when we're going through perimenopause?
I'm bloated all the time. It could be deeper than a food issue if it's all the time. Mm-hmm. Maybe there's those dreaded parasites involved. Oh, parasites. Yeah. Yeah. I heard there's a story about that for you. Yeah, so let's, what about parasites? They're so intriguing. They're gross and horrible, but they're so fascinating at the same time.
Yeah, yeah. Oh, could be parasites. Probably like a lot of things though, right? Yeah. Like you don't know until you, until you start testing. Ultimately. Yeah. Cause I mean if it's all the time, it's not one specific food or anything. Cuz that would be when you eat that food or maybe Right. It's when you're stressed, something else is going on.
There's so many factors, it's, this is why we wanna test all the time. Right. We, we don't guess. [00:40:00] Yeah. Yeah. And like as we age, our stomach acid decreases naturally as well. Mm-hmm. Right? So if you don't have enough stomach acid, you need that. Mm-hmm. That's what you need to be able to break food down properly.
And if the body's not able to break food down properly, it's just gonna sit in the stomach. And that can lead to bloating a lot of the times too, especially, I mean we need stomach acid to break down protein, but if you're not breaking down the protein in your stomach and you're eating other things with it, like carbohydrates with it, they start to ferment Yep.
In the body and create gas. And so like you get the expanding effect of the bloating stomach, which is not comfortable at all. Yeah. Either. Um, a lot of women will deal with gas. Sometimes there's constipation, but ultimately, like the stomach, if the stomach's not functioning properly and doing the digestion, that's like the first step in like a whole chain of things that the body needs to be able to do.
Dominant effect. Yeah. So there's a [00:41:00] lot of different reasons that that could be the case, and it's, is it more noticed in perimenopause? I mean, does it have anything to do with perimenopause or is it just the point in life? That women are at, where they're starting to experience that more as well. Although, I mean, hormones play a role there as well, because I'm side topic a little bit.
Um, progesterone and bile are closely related as well too. So, interesting. Well, that was it. That was all that I had from Instagram, but, uh, That's kind of cool. So how about, um, if someone wants to work with you, so they're listening right now and they're, or watching on YouTube and they're like, oh, I have heartburn all the time, or I'm getting chin hairs, and they're recognizing that maybe things aren't where they need to be.
What's the best way to work with you, or how do people work with you? How we get started? So ultimately, to start working with us, we do an assessment bundle because we wanna make sure that we're the right fit for [00:42:00] you and that you know, you want to move forward with us. And so our assessment bundle is two appointments, and like I said, it's the first one, actually, both of them are about 30 minutes long, and we go through your health history.
Because we want to know everything. Like a lot of the times you go to your doctor and it's like, oh, I, I have heartburn. And so they just focus on that one area. But ultimately, everything in our body is interconnected. And so we ask you a whole bunch of questions, um, and we want to know, you know, have you had surgeries?
If you're a woman, have you had pregnancies? What were the pregnancies like? Um, what's in your mouth? Do you have any mercury amalgams? Like, we wanna know a good amount about your history and what, what your stresses are like, and what your life is like on a daily basis to be able to really assess you and get an understanding.
And then after that appointment, we test you. So as we said that we do quantum nutrition testing. We test the full body [00:43:00] from head to toe, all of the organs and glands to figure out where the imbalances are, because organs that aren't imbalance aren't going to function properly. And so from there we wanna find out why.
What's the cause? It's the reason you're not functioning properly, and what does your body need to get back into balance? And so then on your second appointment, we create a nice little report for you that tells you everything that we found and we go through it and we answer all your questions and talk about what it looks like to work with us.
And if you want to, awesome. If you don't, that's totally fine as well. So that's why we find this, this like two appointment assessment bundle is really helpful because it gets people clarity on, okay, what's going on with me? It's not all in my head like my doctor said, or there is something wrong, but there is something I can do about it.
Okay, cool. And then we can move forward from there. So that's like the starting point to get to working [00:44:00] with us. Yeah. Thanks. And I'm gonna put your link in the show notes so they can grab it there. Perfect. I wanna switch gears a little bit and talk about health when it comes to entrepreneurs. Cause a lot of people who listen to the show are entrepreneurs and.
I don't know. I don't wanna generalize, but I know from my experience, that's really easy for us entrepreneurs to get out of balance and we put our business first and our health is on the back burner, and then we have to deal with our health. So what are some ways that we can improve our health and how does health and how we're taking care of our health, how does that start to affect our business?
You wanna take this? Sure. It's, uh, not just business owners, like if you, well, I mean as far as parents who are running their own household mm-hmm. Like I was talking with someone earlier this week, and they have a lot on their plate as far as their own health issues and taking care of their son and a, a parent.
And at what point do you start taking care of yourself in order to then [00:45:00] help those other people? You need to start with yourself, fill your own cup, as they say. And if you're not taking the steps, even the basics, like we always talk about drinking water, make sure you're having daily bowel movements and, um, eating, well, actually eating.
Cause I know some people you get busy and, and you think, oh, I'll do that later. And then later comes and it's time to go to bed or something. So it's. Just making it a habit to put these things into your routine. Uh, and maybe that's getting up from your desk and taking a lap of the house or a lap of the, the neighborhood or something just to kind of get moving, get some fresh air.
It's, I think having that awareness of putting yourself first is okay. It's probably a big thing, especially if it's, there's a lot of women listening because I know that's, that is a big thing, that they always wanna put others first and. It's okay. It's okay to put yourself first. You are important too, and you, you are valued and [00:46:00] you should be able to value yourself for being able to take care of yourself.
It's okay. I know for a lot of people, they've probably grown up seeing their moms putting everyone else first too. So there's that modeling and you're just kind of perhaps following that. But just know it's okay to take steps to look after yourself even. Time for self cause Right. People are, people's schedules are crazy and mm-hmm.
Like, I know Kate and I have also mentioned it, just the simplest step of taking five minutes and doing some breathing exercises for yourself and wherever you need to do that. Maybe it's in the bathroom, maybe it's in the closet. I don't know. Wherever you need to do it just is really important because it's, when you get to a place where your health is not optimal mm-hmm.
The, the battle is usually uphill. Right, and you get put into a place where you have to do something rather than now if you're in a good place, you can decide to do something. I heard a fun, an analogy around that too in [00:47:00] terms of like, as a business owner, it, we put things aside when it comes to ourselves because it's like the business has to come first.
The business has has to come first. But when health starts to suffer, what else suffers? The business. Exactly right. So your health needs to be a priority because your business relies on you. Mm-hmm. And like you can't show up for your clients. You can't show up to serve your audience, to do all the things that you do if you're not healthy.
And the analogy that I wanted to share that I thought was kind of interesting is like, okay, so your backyard. If you neglect it, you do nothing. You let it get completely overgrown and out of control and a disaster. How much harder is it? Is, is it to get that back in check? Yeah, and you know, nicely kept and looking good, versus if you just.
Kind of take care of it on a regular basis. And it's the same with our health. If you put that little bit of time and effort into [00:48:00] figuring out what's going on with you, don't ignore the warning signs when they start to come up and deal with them. Now, rather than pushing them back or putting them off, uh, you're going to.
Have better results and you're not gonna suffer as long. Yeah. Yeah. And I, I also say get a dog, like for anyone working from home, you get a dog and you will, you will be forced to stop working and go for walks several times a day, several times a day. Like, I know yesterday I was working quite a bit in my office and all of a sudden Dutch came walking in with a toy in his mouth that was like, it is time for a break.
You'll play with me now human. It's a good reminder. Yeah. It was like, okay, now it's, now it's time. Or they, you know, or they need to go outside and you better, mm-hmm. Better take them out and go for a walk. So you're forced to take those breaks, which is a great thing about having dogs. What about like how our health impacts.
Our cognitive function, our ability to make decisions. [00:49:00] Um, like I, I know that for myself, if I'm not eating well and taking care of myself, like I f I feel it in my head that suddenly I don't feel as clearheaded. Mm-hmm. I don't feel like my brain is firing the same way. You know, I can even tell after, if we have like a weekend of a lot of fun food and party stuff, then suddenly Monday morning I'm like, oh, and I'm not even talking about alcohol cuz I don't drink.
But even just like from too much sugar or too many like fried foods or something. I feel the difference. So is that, is that really a thing or am I imagining this? No, I, I don't think so. It's, I just, I jumped to sleep cuz if I'm not sleeping well, I know I'm gonna be a little more irritable or grumpy getting up the next day.
Right. And that impacts everything. Like from how you leave your house, how you interact with people. Maybe if you're involved in a long drive, how your reactions are gonna be, everything is gonna be impacted. Yeah. And the food too. If you're eating like the highly processed [00:50:00] foods and the sugary foods, ultimately that's gonna feed parasites.
First of all, I eat parasites. They love sugar and parasites eat are neurotransmitters. Ooh. Which changes the way the brain functions. It can change, you know, your, your happy hormones can be off your like cognition. So many different things can be off. And ultimately, yeah, 90% of our immune system is in our gut as well.
So all of the stuff that's going into our system is going to throw us off balance, which is going to impact. Cognition and brain function and make it harder to concentrate, make it harder to focus, make you a little bit more like distracted and agitated and moody. There's so many things that happen when I mean sugar ultimately is a drug.
Yep. Right. That's actually a good point with monocytes because tomorrow's the full moon and that's when they like to become more active. And so if you have symptoms currently, [00:51:00] They're gonna make them worse. They're gonna amplify them or they might add to those symptoms. So just, I'm sure you've been somewhere where there's like emergency services and they, they will say, this is when the crazies come out, or things get a little weird around that time.
Even for yourself. Just take note. What's different around that time for you? Is there. Something you usually experience headaches or something that is different. Yeah. Yourself. I, I learned that from you guys, and that is like my favorite thing to pull out. Now when people talk with the full moon, I'm like, well, you might have parasites.
Call Kate and Amanda, give you a little plug, but everyone's always like, what? What do you mean parasites? I'm like, well, let me tell you, let me educate you a little. That's so funny. Like 90% have them. Right? And no one really talks about it in North America. If you're in other parts of the world, they do parasite cleanses like multiple [00:52:00] times a year.
But here it's like, no, no, that doesn't happen here. It happened. We're that clean here. That's not over. Mm-hmm. Yeah. In other world, parts of the world that happens and it's like, no, it's not true. But yet we treat our dogs for the months a year and get them. Exactly, exactly. Yeah. They have them but we don't get them.
Just the animals get them. Yeah. Yeah. So crazy. And it's funny cuz until I started talking with you, like I didn't, I never thought about it and I was mm-hmm. Parasites. No, that's disgusting. But it makes sense cuz I take my dog every year for their checkup. They get their deworming and they get their parasite protocol and they.
Do all the things, but somehow I thought my body was like protected. Cause I'm a human. I dunno. You have me well trained. Now. I was telling Kate the other day, I was messaging her that I saw a video of these moms that went viral and they were all dancing out in the rain and. Barefoot, like splashing in a puddle [00:53:00] on the road.
And a friend of mine had shared it and she's like, who would come dancing barefoot in the rain with me? And I was like, I'll come, but I'll wear rain boots because there's parasites in that water. It's dirty. It's amazing. I love it. Yeah. That's all I can think about is I'm like, you're gonna get parasites gross.
Ultimately, they're a reality of our lives, so it's just. Again, don't, don't live in fear about them. Just a matter, matter of handling them. Be aware of 'em. Yeah. Yeah. It's, I'm gonna walk on the beach. Exactly. That's gonna happen. Thanks. So yeah. Parasites are gonna happen. They're gonna happen. And I love sushi.
That's the, there's a t-shirt in there somewhere. Parasites are gonna happen. Yeah. Got parasites. Just deal with it. Yeah. Ooh, that would be a great business idea. You guys can market, you can go out places like got parasites, be conversation starter, right? Absolutely. Yeah, that was a big hit when we back ask you for.
Ask me for more on the back or something or Yeah, [00:54:00] that's a great idea. Definitely. I think we'd start some conversations for sure. So now you have a podcast. We do, we do. Can you tell us about your podcast and, and what you talk about in your podcast? Well, it's called Limitless Health, and that's kind of the big area that we, we focus on is health of course.
Uh, which makes sense. And. A lot of times we're just kind of getting in certain topics as far as women's hormones or, uh, detoxing. I know there's a whole bunch of different topics and recently we've just started incorporating having guests on if they were in a certain area of expertise that we want to share with the audience because it'll perhaps bring some value to them and improve their life in some way.
Um, but yeah, ultimately just anything that's kind of along the natural route of supporting the body and making your life better. And there's also mindset that kind of finds its way in there because we're both, uh, we've both been involved with NLP in some [00:55:00] sort of way. And, uh, thinking into results, the lots of amazing programs.
And as I said before, that's kind of the first start to, uh, Being open and available for knowing that you can be healthier and you can't have a better life, regardless of what that is, if it's health, a career, money, whatever it is. And you did, Kate, you took the uh, podcast challenge that I did. Yeah. And can you also share a little bit about how that helped you and helped your podcast?
Yeah. Yeah, it was amazing. It was like really quick, the five days and we, you packed it with so much stuff, which was great. But ultimately we had a podcast before it was called the Limitless Podcast. Mm-hmm. And then, From doing the challenge, I realized that there was a bunch of things that we didn't do right the first time.
There were things that we just didn't know about cuz we just had this moment of like, there's stuff we wanna talk [00:56:00] about. And because we're in alter alternative and holistic health, there's things that we can't talk about on Facebook and Instagram. Yeah, because. It's not allowed. Um, so we figured, okay, a podcast gives us a more open platform or we can talk about the topics that people wanna hear about and that will benefit them.
Um, so we just started talking. We just started recording episodes and what I recognized from doing the challenge was that yes, there were some things that we hadn't done correctly. So we rebranded and relaunched, and that's when Limitless Health was formed. Um, and you just gave us. Like everything that we needed to know in terms of when you're first starting a podcast, the really important things that you need to have, the things to focus on, how to get more eyes on your, on your show and get more listeners.
Um, it was just, it was really helpful. It was definitely packed with [00:57:00] information. Um, I still go back and watch Good some of the videos just because. It's like, like keyword stuff. I wanted to change the description of my show and I was like, oh, what did Terry say? And I went back and like revisited it. So, yeah, no, that it was incredible and a great group of people in there as well too.
So. Good. Good to hear. And now you're ranking in the top 10% of podcast. Yeah. Wide, which is amazing. Yeah, big difference. Before we had like 150 downloads in six months and yeah. Wow. It's been a big difference. Good. It's so exciting to see And, and I'll put your podcast link as well, that'll be in the show notes so he's listening.
You can go subscribe and check it out and give 'em a five star review cuz their show's amazing. I love the one you did about the. What was it called? Like the five things that you wouldn't do? Mm-hmm. That you don't do? Yes. Yeah. Sounds good. [00:58:00] That was good. I was like, ah, water. I have to replace my water filter.
Well, thank you so much for going on today. It's always so educational to talk to both of you. And again, all of the links are gonna be in the show notes, so make sure that you go and you follow Kate and Amanda on Instagram. They host tons of valuable content and information. Check out their website and subscribe to their show.
