Jan. 13, 2026

What High-Performing Work Cultures Get Wrong About Women’s Health

This episode opens a conversation workplaces rarely initiate, but leaders increasingly need to understand.
Whether you’re building a career, leading teams, or shaping culture, this conversation challenges how we define success and what sustainable performance actually requires.

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The topics and opinions expressed on the following show are

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This is Beyond Confidence with your host d W. Park.

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Do you want to live a more fulfilling life? Do

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you want to live your legacy and achieve your personal, professional,

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and financial goals? Well? Coming up on ZVO parks Beyond Confidence,

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you will hear real stories of leaders, entrepreneurs, and achievers

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who have stepped into discomfort, shattered their status quo, and

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are living the life they want. You will learn how

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relationships are the key to achieving your aspirations and financial goals.

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Moving your career business forward does not have to happen

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at the expense of your personal or family life or

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vice versa. Learn more at www Don't divpork dot com

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and you can connect with tv ants contact dants divpark

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dot com. This is beyond confidence and now here's your host,

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div PORNK.

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Good morning, It's Tuesday, and of course I'm.

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So thrilled to be here with you today.

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We're going to be talking about an issue which is

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not talked about a whole lot, and it's important to

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have those hard conversations. So I hope each and every

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one of you is entered the new year with positivity

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and energy. And of course there are going to be

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ups and downs, remember that, and let's get started.

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Hello V A Happy New Year, Happy New Year. Welcome

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doctor Marina.

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And we usually start out.

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From the childhood or early youth.

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Do you recall a moment or a person who left

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a positive mark on you?

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You know, I have to say that my mother left

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the most positive mark on me. My mother was a

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working woman in the nineteen fifties and sixties in Canada,

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which was actually quite unusual. Most of my friends and

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classmates their mothers were stay at home moms, so that

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was a bit unusual. And she also really made me

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believe that anything was possible. Whatever I set my mind

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to is possible. And I have really kept that with me.

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My mother's still with me. She just turned ninety seven.

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Oh wow, congratulations. And she lives a walking distance from me,

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and she still has that influence in my life.

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That's wonderful.

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And when you say that she is just very close

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to you at a walking distance, is she living by herself?

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So she's in what's called independent living. It's a residence,

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but it requires an amount of independence, which she still has.

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And yeah, it's a very good setup. It's very close

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to me, so I'm able to pop in and see

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her often and we still have that close relationship.

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How wonderful.

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So when you were a little girl or as you

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were growing up, did you know that you wanted to

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go into medicine?

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You know, I Onys seriously thought about it around the

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age of sixteen. My sister was five years older, is

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five years older, and she was already at university and

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she started asking me, you know, what do you want

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to do? And I think that was the first time

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I really thought I have to make a decision here.

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And I immediately said that I wanted to go into

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medicine because I was just fascinated by how the body works.

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My initial thought was that I was going to be

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a psychiatrist, which is interesting because my sister ended up

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becoming a psychiatrist and I ended up being an obstetrician

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because I changed my mind a few times about what

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I wanted to do along the way.

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Absolutely, and I'm assuming you have practice for quite a

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few years.

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Now, getting on thirty five. Wow, So a.

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Lot of personal experience and a lot of field experience

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and nothing beats that.

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So tell me you talk about that.

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Women's fertility is a signal of their overall health.

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Tell us a little bit more about that.

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Well, I think most people think of fertility problems as

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separate from their overall health. It's really dealt with almost

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as a plumbing problem. You know, if the egg can't

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meet the sperm, there's an issue. But there's much more

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to it than that, because the quality of the eggs

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depends on a woman's health, and it's the same with

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men and sperm quality and quantity, and these have been

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affected by environmental factors, lifestyle factors. We're seeing a lot

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more lifestyle associated disease, whether it's diabetes, obesity, autoimmune diseases,

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and these are affecting fertility. But yet nobody really thinks

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about that in conventional medicine. It's more of a naturopathic,

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functional medicine approach, which I have learned about in my

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career for the last twenty years, I've been very open

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to having a more holistic view, and I really believe

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that conventional medicine has missed the vote on this one.

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We really have to look at fertility as part of

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overall health.

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That is definitely a point that needs to be raised

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and people need to become aware. So I work in

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the corporate and US corporate industry, working with leaders and professionals,

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and of course a lot of my clients are bemen.

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And then what happens is, of course, if you've had kids,

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depending on which of life you're in.

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It may matter, it may not matter.

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And again, as you mentioned about the fertility, and we

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will talk about for all the phases of women's life.

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So let's say you know, women.

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Are in twenties, they're not as much worried because that's

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out there.

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So how would you tell.

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Young women because we don't know, I mean, you know,

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it depends. It's very women's specific whether they're going to

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have kids or not. But rather than just kind of

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thinking fertility as an indicator of having children, Like, how

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can you bring that in in thinking in the mindset

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of women as a general overall health indicator.

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You know, I think it's education, And it's not just

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education of the women. It's also education of the doctors

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of family doctors for instance, who are often approached by

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younger women with menstrual problems, whether it's painful periods or

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irregular periods, and they tend to want to solve the problem,

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but they don't think about the fertility issue. And I

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think women have to know that menstrual problems can be

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an indicator that there could be a fertility problem down

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the road if they're not ready right now, and it

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shouldn't be overlooked, you know. They doctors often tend to

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give women the birth control pill because it regulates your period.

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It makes them less painful, and it seems to solve

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the problem, but it doesn't solve the underlying problem. It

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just covers it up. It makes it bearable, and somebody

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has to have that discussion that you know, eventually this

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man is to be an issue with fertility, and the

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sooner you find out, the better, because you can deal

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with it. There are things you can do, and that

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conversation has to be had and not overlooked. And I

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think perhaps we need to educate women earlier in high school.

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You know, there are sex education classes, and you know

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kids are taught about these things, but it's a different view.

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It's more like prevention of teen pregnancy, which you know,

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I agree is a very important issue. However, they have

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to discuss the fertility issue as well. Don't take your

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fertility for granted. Don't assume it's going to be there

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in your late thirties if you're delaying for that long.

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And many women are now because of economic conditions, because

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they want to pursue their careers, they want to find

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the right partner, obviously, and these things seem to be

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taking a lot longer than they used to because there's

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such high expectations of finding the perfect mate, of you know,

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being well established financially before you even try to get pregnant.

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That's not how our parents.

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Used to be.

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They didn't consider all these details.

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Hell times change. So when we are talking about education,

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so educate our audience as to, you know, what they

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could be thinking in the given time we have and

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if they're having issues, what kind of question or what

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kind of conversation they can have with the doctors.

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So you know, when they approach the doctor about painful

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or heavy periods, certainly you know look at treatment options,

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but first, you know, make a think about the potential

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underlying problem. Is there en demetriosis, is their polycystical varian syndrome,

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because these things have implications for the future, and discuss

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it with the patient Before you just cover up the problem,

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you have to, you know, have that idea that there

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might be something further down the line. And you know

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women will say, well, I'm not ready to get pregnant now,

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but there's still a lot of health improvements you can

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make that will help you help your health right now

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and help the problem down the road so that you're

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ready when you feel ready to get pregnant your health

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is better.

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And what are some of those things that they can do.

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So every lifestyle and thing that you can imagine plays

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a role. For instance, diet is very important. We know

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that the healthier the diet, the better your fertility, and

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the more unhealthier diet, the more you eat fast food,

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the less likely that you are to get pregnant. So

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I talk a lot about diet and one of my

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solutions is to use nutrogenomic testing. I don't know if

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you're aware of what that is. It's genetic testing which

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can be done by a mouth swab or a saliva

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sample or blood work where you can tell what kind

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of diet you should be on and what kind of

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supplementation you require, and that can really boost your fertility.

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So I really believe in personalized medicine. I don't believe

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we all need the same thing. We require different things

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and different diets depending on our genetics. And now that

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information is available, but not to the regular conventional doctors

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don't really know about it. So it's more functional medicine doctors.

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If a patient is interested, they have to reach out

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and learn about these things because it's going to take

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a while for conventional medicine to catch up. It's always

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very slow to change.

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So let's say, if somebody is interested, where can they

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find more information about it?

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So it's you know, now with the internet, with chat, GPT,

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there's so much available and there are practitioners who offer

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these nutri genomic tests. There are different companies. There is

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a Canadian company in Toronto called Nutrigenomics. With an X

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and they offer a fertility panel. It's seventy snips, which

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is seventy gene variations which they have chosen which are

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particularly important for your health, and they can interpret it

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in terms of what you should do to improve your fertility.

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That's one test. There are others available, and there are

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tests that are proven to actually improve pregnancy outcomes, like

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less gestational diabetes and less pregnancy induced hypertension. So that

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is actually to me when I read about that. This

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study was done ten years ago, but it's groundbreaking. I

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don't know why we don't talk about it more because

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there's nothing else that we know of that can change

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those rates of occurrence of those problems, and yet it

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isn't discussed in conventional medicine. So I mean, the same

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can be said for exercise. You know what is the

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best exercise and how much and when? What about sleep?

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Sleep is incredibly important. We know that women who don't

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get enough sleep or get too much sleep are less fertile,

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and the same goes for men. Men's sperm counts have

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decreased by over fifty percent into generations the average sperm counts,

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so men right now are much less fertile than their

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grandfathers were. And there was a wonderful book written by

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Professor Seana Swan about this, and she alerted us to

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the fact that this was happening over six or seven

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years ago. And she believes that a large part of

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it are toxic chemicals are in our environment. And that's

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again the elephant in the room. It's something that conventional

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medicine doesn't talk about, but we have to take seriously.

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It is a major problem.

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Yeah, it's so as we are talking about all of that,

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you know, let's kind of talk about women in workforce.

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And even before we kind of go in there. So

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work is very stressful. Every year it is do more.

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Okay, you did excellent, if you're getting a high rating,

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then next year you've got to even perform better. So

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that pressure and the ambiguity and the speed, especially with

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the advent of open and artificial intelligence, you got to

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keep on doing better and better. So the stress is

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almost in bread in our daily lives and over the weekends.

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Our youngsters have a way like, you know, let's all

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kind of get together and they stay late.

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I don't know if you've noticed.

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It with younger generation or not, but The whole idea

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is let's get together socialize, which is great. But when

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they're socializing, a couple of things that I've observed in

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my young clients is that they stay out late, two, three,

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four am, and that's fashionable because if you're not then

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it's almost like you're not part of the group. And

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another thing is that a lot of drinking kind of

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goes on, nothing wrong with it, it relaxes any thoughts

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on that.

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Well, this this is an issue because I don't know

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if you're aware, but fifty percent of pregnancies are under Land.

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So unfortunately, in those cases, you know, women haven't taken

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care not to expose themselves to alcohol or cannabis or

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other things, and that is an issue. Alcohol there's no

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safe level in pregnancy. We know fetal alcohol syndrome can

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occur with any intake of alcohol, and that's a terrible condition.

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Not to speak about fertility rates in general, but so alcohol, smoking.

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We expose ourselves willingly to a lot of these things

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and there's a very negative impact.

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So while people are out socializing, what would be your

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message to them.

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You know, I'm not saying don't enjoy yourselves. We all

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have to live we have to enjoy ourselves and socializing

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is one of the ways we get over our stress.

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You know, we're all stressed. The whole world is stressed.

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What's important is how we manage the stress. We need

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a solution that works for us, and that's different for everybody.

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You know. It might be getting together with friends, it

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might be doing yoga, it might be meditation, it might

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be just getting enough sleep. But there are a lot

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of things out there that can be very, very helpful.

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I recommend heart math to my patients. Have you ever

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heard of heart mouth?

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Why don't you tell our audience about it? I'm sure

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not everybody has heard about it.

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Yeah, So basically a heart math. They have an app

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which you can use on your smartphone which measures heart

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rate variability, and in fact, there's a lot of ways

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of measuring it now like our rings and fitbits are

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now measuring heart rate variability. The thing about the heart

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math is that it can actually train you. It has

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a program where it trains you to breathe and do

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a meditation like activity to try to improve your heart

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rate variability, which is actually a general measure of your health.

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The higher your heart rate variability, the lower your cancer rates.

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The lower your inflammation rate, the lower your problems with

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getting pregnant. Even so, if you are able to move

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the needle on your heart rate variability, you can improve

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your health and that is a marker of stress low

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heart rate variability. So I like that because that's something

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you can do on your own. You can take your

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own time, ten minutes a day and do it. Where's

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other people prefer organized programs for groups, and there are

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specialized ones that do, like online webinars which teach you

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how to deal with stress on a day to day basis,

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and these have also been proven to improve fertility. People

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need to be aware of them, and they need to

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think that this is part of living in this day

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and age, that we need to have a stress management

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something that we do to manage our stress appropriately. And

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that is different for everyone.

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Right, So in your experience, tell us if you have

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any stories, like you know how you've helped people.

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Well, certainly it goes from very simple help to much

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more complicated help. So in terms of the simple help, unfortunately,

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it's been shown that many women really have no idea

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how their cycles work, how their hormones work, even when

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they're most likely to be able to get pregnant. They've

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probably been taught in high school and perhaps forgotten it

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didn't seem very important, so they don't have a great

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idea of when they're ovulating and so forth. For instance,

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I had one couple. This was years and years ago.

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They had been trying to get pregnant for over years.

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She had regular cycles. They weren't painful, but only upon

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questioning after she's been trying for over a year about

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her cycles, it turned out that she didn't have twenty

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eight day cycles, which are average normal cycles. She actually

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had twenty four day cycles. And this actually happens as

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you get older, your cycles ten to shorten. In your forties,

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your cycles are often shorter than they are in their twenties.

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But what that means is that the time that you're

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ovulating in the cycle is earlier. If your cycle is

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four days shorter, you're probably not ovulating on day fourteen,

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you're ovulating on day ten.

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Oh.

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So she was actually missing her fertile window every month,

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thinking she was doing the right thing having sex on

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day fourteen of her cycle, which would have worked that

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she had a twenty eight day cycle. So that little

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piece of knowledge she got pregnant very quickly. So knowledge

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is extremely important. But then also, you know, stress, which

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we have so much in our society and which often

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is not acknowledged or dealt with, is a big fa

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All doctors and obstetricians have seen the couple who's trying

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to get pregnant, who's trying to do everything right, but

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they're stressing themselves by the whole experience. And sometimes it's

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better to say, let's just stop worrying about this for

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a while, let's just take a break and not try

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to have sex at the right time, not to do

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everything possible to get pregnant, and often that in itself

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helps and the pregnancy rates are better. You know, the

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couple who has you know, given up trying to get pregnant,

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they finally adopt a child, so they don't worry about

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it anymore, and they're the ones who are likely to

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get pregnant. We see that all the time. So that's

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a you know, acknowledgment that that stress is a factor

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that should be addressed.

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Okay, now that's that's a good one that you know

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you mentioned about it. So let's say a woman who's

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in twenties, what can she do like you know, she's

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not thinking I'm getting pregnant. She's still on her career

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path and all that. And there are a lot of

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young women, some of my clients, who have come and

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said like they're freezing X. And so let's talk about

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in two general perspectives. One as a general what should

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she be talking to her doctor for her overall health.

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You mentioned that a lot of women don't know, and

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then I'm doing it, So what would be those questions

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to ask?

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So the unfortunate thing is that regular conventional doctor is

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not well trained in lifestyle medicine, and they also are

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overly busy and they don't have time to talk about it.

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So it's probably I think for a young woman it's

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probably best to either inform themselves or look towards functional

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medicine or naturopathic doctors who are much more oriented in

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this way, you know, to find out what diet is

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the best, what you know are used neutra genomic testing,

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but also recognize how stress plays a role, how lack

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of exercise plays a role. Sleep is very important. But

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the big elephant in the room is these toxic chemicals

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in the environment which we are all exposed to. I'm

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not saying you cannot be exposed to them, but you

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can mitigate the risks by decreasing your exposure. So I

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send patients to the Environmental Working Group. Are you aware

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of the EWG? This is an American not for profit

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organization that informs the public about pollution and how to

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mitigate the consequences. It's a very interesting organization. And so

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have an app that you can download on your smartphone

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which is called the Healthy Living App, and that you

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can scan products within the store before you buy them,

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whether it's personal care products, cleaning products, anything we use

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in our household can have chemicals and it most of

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them do, and this tells you the toxicity rating of

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the product. So if you recognize that you're a regular

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shampoo is actually highly toxic, then you can scan other

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products and find things that are less toxic to use.

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And you know, women are well known for using many

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personal care products and most of them will have toxicity

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in them, So minimizing your toxic exposure. And you know

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in our houses, our houses are actually more toxic than

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the exterior and air quality is another issue. I actually

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recommend that people use a good HEPA filter where they sleep,

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even if they have a household filmlter for the air,

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those are not that great. It's amazing how much more

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