204. Dr. Cassie Smith: Fix Your Gut, Fix Your Hormones, Fix Your Health

What if your gut health is the missing piece behing your hormones, energy, metabolism, and how you feel every day? Today, I sit down with Dr. Cassie Smith, a double board-certiied endocrinologist and internal medicine physician who has taken a deeper look at the connection between gut health, hormones, thryoid function, metabolism, and overall health. We talk about why "normal" lab results don't always mean optimal health, how gut health can influence hormone metabolism, the role of stress and inflammation and why understanding your individual biology matters when it comes to feeling your best. In this episode, we learn: The connection between gut health and hormones Why gut health matters for thyroid and metabolic health The differnce between "normal" and optimal hormone levels How stress can affect the gut, hormones, and inflammation What women should know about hormones during perimenopause and menopause The role of fiber, nutrition, and daily habits in gut health How stool testing and the GI Map can provide insight into the microbiome Simple strategies for supporting gut and hormone health Dr. Cassie is also the author of Fix Your Gut, Fix Your Hormones, a resource designed to help people better understand the relationship between their gut, hormones and health. Listen to this episode for an eye-opening conversation about the gut-hormone connection, women's health, and why looking beyond a single lab result may change the way you think about your health. Learn more about Dr. Shah: Website: drshah.com https://drshah.com Clinic: next-health.com https://next-health.com Instagram: @extend_podcast and @darshanshahmd Learn more about Dr. Cassie Smith: Website: modern-endocrine.com http://modern-endocrine.com Instagram: @modernendocrine_ Thank You to Our Sponsor! IM8: Try IM8 with a 30-day money back guarantee. Get 10% off your first order with code DRSHAH at im8health.com/drshah https://im8health.com/drshah

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:03Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Welcome to Extend with me, Dr. Darshan Shah, a podcast dedicated to cutting-edge science, research, tools, and protocols designed to help you extend your health span. Having become one of the youngest doctors in the country at the age of 21, and trained and board certified at the Mayo Clinic, I've accumulated three decades of practice as a board certified surgeon and longevity expert. Over that time, I've discovered that a mere 20% of health knowledge yields 80% of the results when it comes to your health span. We're living in a new era where we are creating a new healthcare system, no longer focused on disease management, but achieving optimal health and vitality. Join me as I interview world renowned experts, offering you a step by step guide to proactively avoid disease and most importantly, extend your health span.

• 0:49Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Welcome to Extend. Today, I'm joined by a doctor, a physician, who brings a uniquely personal and deeply informed perspective to the world of endocrine health. Her name is Dr. Cassie Smith. She's a chief medical director of nationally known Modern Thyroid Clinic, and she's a dual board certified physician who's board certified in endocrinology, diabetes and metabolism, and internal medicine. And what makes her insight so powerful is her own journey. She had to navigate both Graves' disease and Hashimoto's, two thyroid disorders herself, and she finally treated herself and healed herself using a root cause approach. She combined the best of evidence-based endocrinology with integrative strategies

• 1:31Dr. Darshan Shah?

  to treat herself and then to treat thousands of patients. Today with Dr. Cassie, we're going to dive into the importance of gut health and how your gut and your hormones are deeply intertwined, and why you cannot treat hormone disorders without treating the gut first. We're going to do a deep dive into her personal experiences, her patient care strategy, and what it truly means to find lasting relief from complex hormonal conditions. So here we go with our episode with Dr. Cassie Smith.

• 2:05Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Hey, Dr. Cassie, thanks for joining me.

• 2:07Speaker 01

  Thanks for having me. I'm super excited.

• 2:10Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I know. I'm really glad to have met you and, you know, all the great work that you're doing out there in Oklahoma City and beyond through telemedicine and educating the public on how they need to fix their hormones and how it ties into everything else, right?

• 2:22Speaker 01

  Yes. Oh, my goodness. So much. And I'm finally glad that women are talking about this, you know, because I feel like for years, we were suppressed and it was just, don't talk about your hormones, don't talk. And finally, over the last, I don't know, what, five, 10 years, women are actually talking about all the symptoms they're having and all the issues they're having. And I think it's just, it's really powerful and it's really great.

• 2:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, I think so. And it's like, finally, women are not only talking about it, they know their options too, which is really cool. Like I've, you know, prior, when I was practicing, like 10 years ago, in fact, most women's and many women just thought that hormone replacement therapy was dangerous and they shouldn't do it. And it's become a little bit of a revolution in that space with, you know, women finally just seeking out hormone replacement therapy.

• 3:17Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, I got out of fellowship nine years ago this month, and when I was in fellowship as an endocrinologist, right, a board trained hormone specialist, they don't really teach you a lot about hormones for women. They teach you, oh, you know, you can go through menopause and some women, you know, maybe you give them estrogen if they're having hot flashes and, you know, maybe it sort of protects their bones. But there was no real good data about like, hey, it actually protects your brain and it does protect your bones and it decreases your risk of urinary tract infections and yeast infections and, you know, it helps your mood and none of that. And there was definitely no information about testosterone in women. There was nothing about progesterone. And so it's just really disheartening that I have the best accreditation in the country

• 4:02Speaker 01

  for hormone metabolism and nobody taught me anything about female hormones. So.

• 4:08Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It's mind blowing, right? I mean, you're a board certified endocrinologist and you're also board certified in internal medicine too, right?

• 4:15Speaker 01

  Yes, yes.

• 4:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And so you're double.

• 4:17Speaker 01

  I'm certified right now.

• 4:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh, amazing. Yeah. So you're, you're, you're a double board certified doctor. Like to your point, the highest credentials that you could have in medicine for this group of people, women needing hormone replacement therapy, and also like some of the other things we're talking about, like thyroid disease, for example, right? And the way the medical treat system treats these diagnoses of like perimenopause and menopause is just natural aging and there's nothing much you can do about it.

• 4:47Speaker 01

  Right. Yeah. And that's pretty, it's crazy. And also, you know, you and I were talking about before we started this, nobody, no matter what specialty you're in in this country, internal medicine, GI, endocrine, GYN, nobody talks about the gut and how important the gut is for not only hormones, but thyroid, I mean, everything. Our gut is crucial to everything in our body. It's how we digest and metabolize micronutrients in food, but also we forget that our liver and our bile is how we get rid of all toxic particles in our body. We have to have bile and bile acid and bile flow to get rid of hormones, to get rid of toxins, to get rid of alcohol, you know, all of these things.

• 5:29Speaker 01

  And when we don't have bile flow working and we don't have a working gut and we're not pooping every day, I mean, people get really sick and nobody learns about any of that in medical school. Nobody.

• 5:39Dr. Darshan Shah?

  No, not at all. Yeah, even the gastroenterologists don't talk about that a lot, you know, they, they're mainly there for colonoscopies and removing polyps. And I hate to say it, you know, I don't want to offend my gastroenterology buddies, but there are so many people with gut health issues that have seen gastroenterologists after gastroenterologists and don't get anything except a colonoscopy. And they're just told, you know, there's nothing there for us to treat.

• 6:02Speaker 01

  Yes. Or they, you know, they don't even talk to them about diets. And that's what kills me is all of people who come to me and say, yeah, I saw a bunch of gastroenterologists and I still have every GI symptom and they said there's nothing that, you know, that you can do. And then maybe I run a gut study and I talk to them about rebalancing their microbiome. And then you have some gastroenterologists that say, oh my gosh, that's not true. Like none of that's factual. It doesn't help. And that makes me livid because I'm like, it's one thing if you just don't know anything about gut health, that's fine, but don't go telling somebody that their microbiome doesn't matter because I promise it does.

• 6:40Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I know. This is, this is crazy. So Dr. Cassie, what did you have that revelation? Was there like a moment that you realized that your training wasn't going to really help you in the way you wanted to treat patients?

• 6:53Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh. Yes. And it was so sad. So I graduated fellowship in July of 2017 and I took a job like most people do at a hospital. So I worked at Mercy Hospital. And it was literally Dr. Darshan, like three months I'm working and I'm like, you know, you kind of start seeing patients and I, and I did a lot of diabetes. And so you see them and then you see them every three months. And it was like, I was there for three months and I started having the second cycle of people come where it was like, hey, I already saw them once. And I quickly realized that, hey, I'm doing everything they taught me in fellowship. I like, I'm a, I was a very black and white person, like if this, then this, and I will follow the rules. I did exactly what they taught me in fellowship

• 7:37Speaker 01

  and people were coming back and it was like, nope, they're still sicker. I need to add another medication. They're gaining weight. They're, you know, it was just like, nobody got better the first 90 days. And I was like, wait a minute, I just went to school for like 15 years and my patients are just sicker and angrier and I'm putting them on more medicines. And so I very quickly was like, huh. And then about a year and a half in, I was just like, what the heck? Nobody's getting better. I'm just writing more and more prescriptions. At the same time, I was kind of having my own health struggles and I had had Graves' and then I developed Hashimoto's and I was going to endocrinologists. And I was like, hey, guys, this doesn't make sense, this, this, this. And they're just like, no, no, no, just take the pill. Like, it's fine. And so I, it was kind of this

• 8:19Speaker 01

  like collided moment of I was very frustrated with the healthcare system as a patient. I was very frustrated with the healthcare system as a provider and I just kind of lost my mind. I came home one night and I told my husband, I'm going to quit my job. And he was like, you've been in practice for like a year and owe a half a million dollars in student loans. You're not quitting your job. He was like, get it together. That's where it kind of started to collide for me.

• 8:45Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah. Yeah. It makes, it's very similar to my story. You know, I was doing surgery before I got into this field of like integrative and functional medicine. And I had my own health struggles and I went to doctors that could not get better. I had to re-educate myself completely from the ground up to really understand that all of these things are interrelated. Like I had developed autoimmune disease, actually, that was really bad on multiple medications for it, immune suppressive medications. And I was like, I don't want to do this with the rest of my life, you know, I was in terrible side effects. And you quickly realize that the way medicine is taught is great for emergencies and great

• 9:27Dr. Darshan Shah?

  for critical care, but really not the right thought process on how to get people healthy again.

• 9:33Speaker 01

  Correct. 100%. And I think a lot of us that are such great providers and compassionate kind of unfortunately did it out of necessity for our own health or somebody that we loved. And I was the same way. I had Graves' and then I got Hashimoto's and then, oh, you have PCOS and then, oh, you have endometriosis and just like all these diagnoses. And I'm like, wait, wait, wait. What is, you know, like, and it was just like, take this and take this and take this. And I'm like, well, is there something I can do with my diet? And they would look at you like you're crazy, you know, or like, what is causing this? And so that's where I was just like, this is ridiculous. And, you know, I don't know what happened with you, but I started digging into gut health. I fixed my gut, you know, I changed a lot of things. I did exactly what they didn't teach me in medical school.

• 10:17Speaker 01

  Cause what they teach you in medical school is to be very mean to yourself. Don't sleep, don't listen to, you know, like just, so I just started doing exactly different than what they taught me to treat myself in medical school. And I fixed my gut and miraculously I got a lot better. Like, and I was like, huh, interesting. And so then thankfully I had patients that were like, okay, I'll try that. And I started, you know, I spent two plus years being an endocrinologist with zero, like very little success. And being very frustrated with the process for my patients as well. And then I just completely changed my practice and started doing what I did, more holistic. And low and behold, in six months, people were getting better. And I was like, this is crazy, you know, like what, what is going on here?

• 11:01Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, yeah. And then, and then you started a whole other practice and you wrote some books about it.

• 11:07Speaker 01

  Correct. And then, I mean, I, I really, you know, at first as an endocrinologist, well, also let's just talk about the fact that when you venture outside of traditional medicine, you're kind of made, like, and you know, this, cause this was 10 years ago for you. You're kind of made to be like the weirdo and like, oh my gosh, that doctor's crazy. And what they're doing is not right. And, you know, you kind of get blasted by your colleagues. And then you also get this fear tactic, like, oh, you're, you know, I remember when I left Mercy Hospital and they're like, you'll never make it as an endocrinologist on your own. You have to be a part of the hospital system, you know? And like, you just get all these negative fear tactics thrown at you. And it's like, but I'm doing the right thing for people and people are getting better.

• 11:49Speaker 01

  And so, once I got past all that, you know, I mean, people actually start getting better. And so that's when I knew, I'm like, hey, I have to get out of the traditional medicine space because also traditional medicine dictates how you take care of patients and that's not fair for the patient and it's not fair for me. And so it's like, I want to help you, but I can't do it inside of this box where I have, everything has to fit in a box and everything has to have a diagnosis coding. You only have so much time to deal with this and I can only get certain labs, like that doesn't work.

• 12:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right, right. Exactly. Yeah, it's better to get out of the box, like both of us did and do it your way. And, and it just can help so many people. And to your point, people get better pretty quickly sometimes. It's just mind blowing. Once you fix their gut, fix their hormones and, um, you know, get their diet in order. It's, it's pretty miraculous how fast people heal.

• 12:39Speaker 01

  100%. And that's why, I mean, that's why I wrote the book, Fix Your Gut, Fix Your Hormones. Like, I mean, when you really, at first I just did the thyroid, you know, we were kind of talking about this. At first, when I went into practice, I was just doing thyroid and I was doing hormones. And I was just kind of, you know, maybe dabbling a little bit with micronutrients. And then, you know, I was like, well, everyone's adrenals are shot, so we got to look at their adrenals. And then still, as an endocrinologist, I would get people's hormone levels perfect. And I, and I, not even normal, but optimal, because normal and optimal are different things. But I would get their thyroid hormone optimal and I would get their sex hormones optimal. And I would get their adrenals better. And still people were like, I don't feel well. They felt better. And so then I was like, okay, we gotta go to the gut because our gut is what's metabolizing our hormones. Our bile is what's helping us get rid of toxins.

• 13:24Speaker 01

  Our gut is what's helping us metabolize our T4 and our T3 and, you know, make estrogen, progesterone, serotonin. And also when our gut is out of balance and we have a lot of inflammation from cytokines and from, you know, just bad bacterial overgrowth. When there's a lot of inflammation in our body, hormones, no matter what form they're coming in, whether your body's making them or I'm giving them to you, they can't get into cells. So even though the hormone is in the blood, if it can't go into the cell and work, it doesn't matter. And so that's why millions of people in this country feel hypothyroid, feel like they're menopausal or have low testosterone, low estrogen, whatever. And their doctor will say, well, your labs are normal. Well, first of all, normal doesn't mean optimal, but also even if you have a blood level

• 14:08Speaker 01

  that looks like it's normal, if it can't open up the door of a cell and go into the cell and make the cell work, it doesn't matter that it's floating around. And so people have to understand that too. And a lot of times, the reason the doors are locked and there's inflammation is because you have gut dysfunction, which can come from lots of things, stress, medications, lack of sleep, et cetera. And that's kind of what the preface of my book is all about. It's like teaching people, why, why am I told that I am normal, but I still feel that? That's what the book is all about.

• 14:39Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I love that. And so making this connection from your gut health to your hormonal health is, is, you know, a big leap in traditional medicine, right? But I, just like you, I've experienced so much gets better when you fix the gut. And what you're saying is the link there is inflammation, specifically probably chronic inflammation, right?

• 15:01Speaker 01

  100%. Yeah. Like the very, very root cause of it, yes.

• 15:06Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yes, yes. And the cellular mechanism of that is that the channels that bring the hormones in and bind to the hormones, they don't work when you have inflammation.

• 15:17Speaker 01

  Correct. Because cell membranes from a physiologic standpoint are lipid bilayers. So it's made out of, you know, lipid and fat. And then there are like little doors that hormones can kind of float across per se. And when you have a lot of inflammation, that lipid bilayer gets very tense. So things can't move through it. So it's almost like somebody triple locks your door. And so if you have a hormone outside a door, that's like, hey, you know, walks up to the door and the door is supposed to be open to accept the hormone because it's needed on the other side of the door. If that membrane has shifted or locked because it's now tense, the hormone can't get through. And that's where everything goes awry.

• 16:00Speaker 01

  And that's why so many people, millions of people in this country feel bad, are technically hypothyroid, clinically hypothyroid, clinically estrogen deficient, clinically progesterone, testosterone, androgen deficient. But everyone says, oh, you look fine, because there may be hormone floating around in the blood, but so many people are chronically stressed, under like poor nutrients, right? So they're not getting really good nutrients, not moving enough, insulin resistant, not sleeping enough, that their doors are always locked. And so it doesn't matter, even if you or I give them extra hormone, right? Even if we give them hormone and now their T3 is optimal and in the upper range of, of where it should be, if it still can't get in the door, it doesn't matter.

• 16:45Speaker 01

  So that's the problem.

• 16:46Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Absolutely. It doesn't work. And, and I think people, like you said, need to realize that. So just getting on hormone therapy is not the only solution. It might help a little bit, but you can get maximal benefit by reducing the chronic inflammation state that your body is in. So can you walk us through a little bit about how does poor gut health lead to inflammation in the body?

• 17:07Speaker 01

  Oh my gosh, yes. And we could talk about this literally for eight hours, but I will say to start with, just think about like every time you eat food. The point of eating food, despite what we think is for us to live, you're supposed to eat to live, not live to eat. Food literally nourishes our body. But in order for that to happen, everything has to happen in our body correctly. So our stomach was made to be very acidic, so that when food gets to it, it breaks that food down. It chops it up into tiny little particles. It's kind of like our blender. Like if we want to emulsify something, that is our stomach. It is also made to be very acidic, so that if something bad, if we swallow this parasite that is floating around now

• 17:48Speaker 01

  or some bacteria that's on food, usually our stomach acid can be harsh enough to kill it. It's kind of like our moat to our castle, like, nope, not coming in. So our stomach's supposed to emulsify our food, make it small enough that we can actually get nutrients out of it and make sure that bad things don't enter our stomach. That's what's supposed to happen in our stomach. Problem number one are there are millions of Americans in this country on PPIs, right? So medications that change your stomach acid, omifrazol, Nexium, Prilosec, Protonix. And that's because you ate something bad or something bad for several weeks. You drank too much alcohol, you ate too much spicy stuff, you stayed up too late, you got heartburn. You went to your doctor and you're like, man, I've had this heartburn for a week or two.

• 18:33Speaker 01

  And instead of them using their brain and asking you questions about your sleep and your alcohol and your caffeine consumption and your stress, they just write you a prescription for a PPI because it's easy. The problem with that is that those medications were made to be taken for 14 days, maybe 28 at the most, in people with gastritis, a true ulcer, and that's it. But people stay on them for years because it made that heartburn go away. And great, nobody ever said, hey, you actually need stomach acid. Let's talk about why you have those symptoms. So that's one issue. So in millions of people, they're not able to emulsify their food or chop it up small enough. And these are the people who also get sick a lot because they'll swallow bacteria, whatever.

• 19:17Speaker 01

  And it just invades their body because they have no moat. Their moat is dried up. So that's the first problem.

• 19:24Dr. Darshan Shah?

  That makes total sense.

• 19:24Speaker 01

  Right. Yeah. And then when food leaves our stomach and it goes into our small intestines, we have specific bacteria, you guys, that are so important for our body. It metabolizes our hormones, it metabolizes our micronutrients, it makes serotonin and dopamine, which is our happy hormones. It takes our T4 and converts it to T3, which is our active thyroid hormone. It helps us make GLP-1 so that we know we're full and we stop eating. It helps direct our food into our skeletal muscle and our liver instead of our fat cells. There are so many biochemical processes that happen in our gut because of the trillions of bacteria that live there, and each of them having a specific purpose. However, most people don't have trillions of bacteria that live in their gut anymore.

• 20:08Speaker 01

  They have a very small colony of different types of bacteria because we haven't fed those bacteria what they need to continue to live and survive and thrive because our diet is terrible. So we don't eat fibers, fiber, we don't eat polyphenols, we don't eat, you know, omegas, the things. So good bacteria live on those types of foods, on fiber. And Americans get like, what, five or 10 grams of fiber a day on average? And we're supposed to get 35. So all of our good bacteria that are supposed to do all those great things for us start to die because they're starving. And then bad bacteria, we have a little bit of bad bacteria generally, but when all we do is feed ourselves processed food and sugar, those bad bacteria eat and they overgrow and the bad bacteria die.

• 20:53Speaker 01

  So now we have a bunch of bad bacteria and no good bacteria. So now, let's say our food did get emulsified and gets to our small bowel because our stomach is working. If it's not, then you just get huge food particles. But now it gets there and if there's no fiber in the food, the good bacteria are like, well, I can't eat this soupy mess because I don't have the right mouth to eat this soupy mess. Like, I don't, there's no food there that I can eat. But the bad bacteria go crazy because they have all the processed sugary foods. And when the bad bacteria eat, they throw up, we'll just say, something called lipopolysaccharide. It is a toxic molecule that causes our body to think we're being attacked. So every time you eat food, if your microbiome is out of balance, your immune system freaks out and thinks that you are under attack.

• 21:37Speaker 01

  And it releases cytokines, which are inflammatory markers, kind of like an army, and they all run to your gut to figure out what's going on. And then a lot of people have little holes in their gut because they have leaky gut. All that food starts seeping out of their gut. Now it's floating around in our bloodstream. Now we start getting really tired after we eat. We get brain fog, we get joint pain, we get Crohn's and all sorts of colitis and food allergies and all these crazy things because food that was never meant to leave our body is now floating around our body and our immune system is activated and it doesn't know what's going on. That's just the beginning. There's multiple other biochemical processes that happen. But when that happens and those cytokines release and our immune system gets activated, it increases our cortisol and it increases our insulin. And those are two of the most potent inflammatory markers in our body.

• 22:23Speaker 01

  Period. And that happens every time you put food in your mouth, every single time. And if you're drinking ultra-processed foods like Starbucks drinks and every time you drink that, it happens too. And then we wonder why we feel like crap. It's crazy.

• 22:37Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, yeah. It's this cascade that occurs every single day that we're eating this garbage food. And we just gotta really watch, we have to change this, right? We have to be able to understand that the food that we're being fed by these ultra-processed companies that make these ultra-processed foods is actually destroying our gut bacteria and causing our gut to be leaky, inflammation in our body, and therefore our hormones not to work. It's, it's all interrelated.

• 23:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, and also, Dr. Darshan, it's like, people don't realize this too, because also think about this, when you eat something, people think, okay, I ate at noon. And then maybe they start getting tired at like two or three, or they get joint pain at six or seven. They don't correlate that to the food they ate at noon, but remember, it takes time for that food to process through your gut. And so a lot of people have all these crazy symptoms. They never relate to the food that they ate because also people's guts are slow. A lot of people don't digest food normally because their thyroid hormone isn't working correctly because it can't convert in their gut. Or they're chronically constipated from all the bad bacteria. And so your bad bacteria may eat six, seven, nine hours after you eat and then start throwing

• 23:51Speaker 01

  up those lipopolysaccharides, those inflammatory markers. And so a lot of people just don't even understand that the symptoms they're having are to food that they ate because your digestion is so different depending on what's going on. And that's the crazy thing too. Food, like rashes, eczema, six or 52 or 53% of acne, they say, could be completely prevented by diet. But people don't realize that because they just think, oh, it's my cycle. It's, no, it's what you're eating. And so like a lot of these symptoms, mood, you know, anxiety, depression, acne, skin issues, brain fog, weight gain, hypothyroidism symptoms, all of these things actually can be gut symptoms and gut signs, but people just don't put it together and their doctors don't help them.

• 24:37Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, yeah. So you know, one of the things that you said a couple of times is like thyroid hormone actually gets converted in the gut. And I also know that estrogen gets metabolized in the gut as well. And so I never learned this in medical school about how our gut is processing hormones. Can you break that down for me a little bit?

• 24:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I think this is really important for people who are on hormones. If you're listening to this and you've taken hormones and they make you feel worse, or you get really bad PMS symptoms or something, you know, they make you feel worse, it's because you're not metabolizing them correctly. And the scary thing is if you're taking hormones and not metabolizing them incorrectly, it can be not good for you, right? So hormones do not cause cancer. Hormones are not bad, but the environment you put a hormone in will change what happens to the hormone. And our bodies metabolize hormones into good hormones and then bad hormones. And if your, if your gut doesn't work correctly and your liver doesn't work correctly, your estrogen gets metabolized down a four-hydroxy pathway, which is not a good pathway.

• 25:39Speaker 01

  And so what happens with hormones is we have a certain type of bacteria in our gut called our astroblome. These are specific bacteria that are only meant to help us digest our estrogen. And so when we make or take estrogen, it circulates through our body. And then once it's done, it goes to our liver where our liver performs phase one, phase two, phase three detoxification, where it, you know, it puts different molecules on it to deactivate it so that then it can put it into our body and get rid of it. So what I tell people is like, imagine your estrogen, when it's done, it goes to your liver and your liver bubble wraps it like it's gonna package it, like it's very, very fragile and it's gonna put it in a package and send it out as an Amazon package. That's what happens in your liver.

• 26:23Speaker 01

  So your liver gets your estrogen all ready to be delivered to the Amazon package, which is through your bile and into your stomach. And it sets in your bowel as poop, as feces, and it's supposed to leave our body. But the problem is if our astroblome is out of balance, that bacteria that helps us metabolize that estrogen, if there's too much of it, it will go and unwrap the estrogen. So it will start poking holes into the bubble wrap. And the problem with that is if it starts poking holes into the bubble wrap, we have bad estrogen in there, it starts leaking out. And then the longer our stool sets in our gut because we're constipated because we're hypothyroid or because we have bad bacterial overgrowth and our stool isn't moving, more and more of that bad toxic estrogen leaks out of this bubble wrap.

• 27:08Speaker 01

  And then if we have holes in our gut because we have leaky gut because we're stressed and we don't eat well, then it leaks not only from our gut, but into our bloodstream. And then now our estrogen is being recirculated. And this is where women will tell you, oh my gosh, now I have breast tenderness and I have really painful menstrual cycles. I have all these symptoms of high estrogen, but when you look at their blood level, they don't have high estrogen, it's because their estrogen recirculated inappropriately because their gut is out of balance. And nobody can figure that out for them either. And they're like, what is going on? And then some doctors will give them more estrogen because they're like, oh, you have estrogen deficiency symptoms. But then that detoxification process is happening. And so then they're building up bad estrogen and then they're getting worse symptoms.

• 27:50Dr. Darshan Shah?

  They're getting worse symptoms, right? Because they're getting more estrogen, but it's just not detoxifying correctly. Interesting, right?

• 27:58Speaker 01

  And sometimes you can't see it in the blood.

• 28:01Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 28:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:03Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I mean, it's, it's, I, I think these physiological processes that occur in our liver and our gut that we're not checking for prior to people, putting people on hormones even, is leading to people not having success with hormone replacement therapy. So are you an advocate of almost like, maybe we should just, everyone getting put on hormone replacement therapy needs to get their gut looked at first?

• 28:25Speaker 01

  I am a huge advocate of that, which is why I wrote my book. I like my patients all to do gut studies. Like when you become a patient, I like you to do blood work and gut studies because I want to know like, what is going on in your gut? It's also helpful because like, if somebody has a really bad leaky gut, lots of H. pylori, lots of bacterial overgrowth, I know that when they're hypothyroid, I have to give them more thyroid hormone. And it sucks for you as the patient to like, get put on a typical amount of thyroid hormone and you take it exactly how you're supposed to for six weeks. And I do labs and at eight weeks, I'm like, man, your labs look better. And you're like, I still no different. Well, you don't because your gut's a mess. If I know that prior to putting you on hormones, I'm going to put you on double the amount. Because if I give you too much, you're going to tell me by symptoms and I'm going to cut you back. And so it is helpful.

• 29:08Speaker 01

  It's also helpful to your point to know, how is this person going to metabolize hormones? Now, sometimes you can tell by their symptoms, but you also need to know what's going on in their gut so you can help them develop a plan so we can fix it. We want your bile to flow. We want you to digest your food. We want to kill all those bacteria that have lipopolysaccharide that are making you bloated and not feel well. We want to replenish your acromancia and all your butyrate producing bacteria that help you absorb nutrients and help convert your thyroid hormone. But if we don't know what's going on, you know, if you've got a parasite, we need to kill it. If you've got leaky gut, we need to fix the holes in your gut. But if we don't know everything that's going on, it's hard to make a plan for somebody. Because you really, you know, I'm almost to the point where I tell people like, until

• 29:50Speaker 01

  we get your gut fixed, just throwing a bunch of hormones at you sometimes makes it worse. Because if they're not converting how we want them to, you're just going to get worse symptoms. And I know people get upset about that because they're like, just throw the kitchen sink at me, I felt better, I felt bad for 10 years, I want to feel better. But it's like, you really kind of have to start with the basics. You don't have somebody build your house and just slap some walls up with no foundation. Like, it doesn't really work like that. We don't put the roof on and then try to make the foundation. So it's really important that you, you know, your gut is working. Because I promise you, you know this, if your gut's not working, you're not able to metabolize your estrogen, your bile acids are not flowing, you're not pooping every day, it doesn't matter what we give you, you're not going to feel well.

• 30:34Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Absolutely. And so many women come in wanting hormone replacement therapy and they should have it, but they're, they're constipated, they're bloated, they have a leaky gut. And now that I think about it, it's like, those are the women that have the least success. And even the most, there's a woman that also, you put them on estrogen and their perimenopause symptoms get worse. And they get mad at me sometimes. And I'm like, oh, I should have fixed your gut first.

• 31:01Speaker 01

  Yes, for sure. Because, because, you know, I'm a woman that's had some hormone issues too. It literally makes you feel crazy. You're like, why was I happy? And then I'm crying and then you can't figure it out and you can't pinpoint it. And it's because, again, your hormones are metabolizing and you don't know the physiologic timeframe of them metabolizing, so it's hard for you to put it all together. But also realize, I mean, when our body wraps something up and it's toxic and it wants to get rid of it, I mean, we don't want these things recirculating if we don't meet them. So yes, to your point, you really want to make sure somebody can metabolize hormones before you just throw a bunch of them at that person.

• 31:38Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah. Are you a fan of doing like Dutch testing and urine metabolites?

• 31:42Speaker 01

  I am in people who need it. So, you know, if somebody comes to me and they've been in menopause and they haven't been on hormones and we start working on their gut and give them hormones and they feel great, perfect. I think it's really useful in people who have had history of cancer and people who have tried hormones and not done well. I think it really works. People who are chronically stressed or the people who are tired but wired, you know, they lay down, but then they're wired, they can't fall asleep, they wake up and then they're miserable, you know, you've got their, some cortisol issues. I, I do use Dutch testing. I mean, I use any mode or modality I can to help understand why somebody is metabolizing hormones the way they are. And I think it's important to point out here too, that a lot of women don't realize

• 32:25Speaker 01

  how much stress affects their gut and affects their hormone production. And a lot of women listening to this have just like, oh, stress is just a part of life. I have kids, I have a husband, you know, we just normalize it and it really, really impacts your gut. And then, yeah, when you develop leaky gut because of your stress, which you can, you can develop full blown leaky gut only from stress and chronic bacterial overgrowth, eventually it's going to change how you metabolize your thyroid. Eventually it's going to change how you metabolize your estrogen, progesterone, and you end up in a big pickle. And a lot of women are just like, well, it's just, it's just life, nothing can change. You're not going to get better until you address that stress.

• 33:04Dr. Darshan Shah?

  That's a really good point, absolutely. I think stress is one of those things that we try to minimize its effect on our health because you can't really see it, right? It's just kind of building up inside of you and therefore you ignore it. And it's, it's a massive detriment to do so because you're, like you said, I mean, stress by itself can cause leaky gut for sure.

• 33:27Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, you know, I tell women, men too, but symptoms are kind of little gifts. Like a lot of people get really flustered, they'll come to me and they're like, oh, I'm tired, I'm bloated, I'm, you know, and I'm like, hey, these are literally text messages from your body. Your body can't send you a text message or an email, but these are kind of little gifts. They're little clues that like, we need to pay attention to. So instead of getting annoyed and being mad about it, we need to take a step back and say, why am I developing this? You know, we need to be really honest about it. And I, I mean, I truly believe this, like, stress kills people. It literally kills people. And so it's just factual. You have to fix, and there's a whole chapter in my book about it, about what stress does

• 34:10Speaker 01

  to your gut and then how that affects your cortisol and your insulin and your testosterone, your progesterone, your growth hormone, all of it. And so it's, it's really important.

• 34:19Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 34:23Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Hi, Dr. Shaw here. I want to take a minute to talk to you about cellular health. So in my clinics, I've actually seen 30-year-old people with cells that look like they're pushing retirement. And I've also seen 60-year-olds with cells that look like they're 40 years old. So what's the difference? It's really about how fast their telomeres are breaking down. Your cells, you see, are like phones and they have limited cellphone battery. Poor sleep, stress, processed foods, all of these things can drain that battery way faster than it should. So this is the reason why I partnered with IM-8. IM-8 powers that cellular battery. It's not just another multivitamin, it's a comprehensive 92 ingredient formula designed specifically for cellular health and longevity.

• 35:08Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I'm talking 900 milligrams of vitamin C. That's like 20 oranges worth of DNA protection. The clinical dose of CoQ10 that you need to power your cellular engine. You also get zinc, selenium, vitamin E, alpha lipoic acid, all of these work synergistically for cellular repair and protecting your telomeres. So instead of taking a handful of pills every day and all these supplements, IM-8 actually gives you everything that you need in one scientifically formulated system. And this isn't just a theory anymore. IM-8 had partnered with Oxford University, the International Space Station, San Francisco Research Institute, and they've done studies and they've gotten this NSF certified to truly power your health.

• 35:51Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Most people are aging twice as fast as they should, unfortunately. You don't have to be one of them. Try IM-8. I actually have a discount secured for you if you go to drshah.com/ima or go to im8health.com/disc量 slash drshaw and you can get 20% off with my discount code, drshaw. You can also find the link below.

• 36:15Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Dr. Cassie, do you have some favorite stress reduction techniques that you like to give to your patients?

• 36:20Speaker 01

  I do, actually. So I think, you know, what I tell people is like, in the morning, a lot of people wake up in the morning and it's like, especially women, I used to be this person. It's like 5:30, let's get to the gym, let's hammer out this, you know, let's just like, you hit the, you wake up and you just like hit it. And then you're like, gosh, why do I feel like I'm always being chased by a lion? So I think the best thing to do when you wake up in the morning is allow for like 30 minutes of what I like to call just like gratitude time. And so wake up, drink some water, bonus points if you put some lemon in it or some selenium husk for fiber. I try to write down, literally write, hand, pen, write down three things I'm grateful for every day. You can find three things.

• 37:02Speaker 01

  I've had some pretty bad days in my life, but find three things you're grateful for while you're drinking your water and then go outside and walk and look at the sun. Like get some of the early morning sun in your eyes. And I don't care what you think about, but I tell people, try not to like, be on your phone or be distracted, literally walk in nature and see something, hear something, talk to your spouse, think about the day, think about what you're grateful for, reflect, I don't care. And I don't care if it's even five or 10 minutes, but the physiological change that you will have in your circadian rhythm, your brain, your adrenals, your cortisol, just from those little things is astronomically different. Walking releases myokines, gratitude releases dopamine and serotonin.

• 37:47Speaker 01

  Instead of, you know, I used to be that person that woke up at 5:30 and went to the HIIT exercise class. And what that does is kill your adrenal glands, you know, it kills them. And so that's what I tell people is like that. And then bedtime too, you need a sacred bedtime routine. Mine is, I like to again, write down or at least think of three things I'm like, hey, these things went well today. So I like to do that while I'm getting ready for bed. I like to take a bath if I have time. And then, you know, I like to just have 15 or 20 minutes of, of time. Like I take a walk at night as well and then just a little bit of wind down time, whatever that means to you, whether you want to read, whether you want to, sometimes I listen to certain like beats, like calming beats. But you need to have these little routines where you start your day and wind your day

• 38:31Speaker 01

  down, where you can kind of let your body slow down. Because you wouldn't drive a Ferrari 200 miles an hour and then just throw the park brake. Like same thing with your body. You know, you're going 200 miles an hour and then you wonder why when you first wake up in the morning or when you lay down, you can't just fall asleep, like you need to.

• 38:49Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right, right.

• 38:50Speaker 01

  So those are the things I like to do when they're free and they're not difficult. You know, I know there's these like pulsettos and these mats you can lay on and red light. And I like all those things, but like, it doesn't have to be that difficult. You can do this anywhere, like wake up, have some water, throw some lemon or some psyllium husk in it, write three things down you're grateful for, take a walk, period. And you can do that in 15 minutes, right?

• 39:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, yeah, it's great. I have a similar morning routine. I have been doing this thing called the five minute journal. Have you ever seen one of those?

• 39:23Speaker 01

  Uh-uh.

• 39:24Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, just looking up on Amazon is like a journal that basically does exactly what you say. You write down three things you have gratitude for, you know, what you are going to focus on that day. And in the night time, you fill it out again. And I've been doing it for years and I got it for my kids and they do it as well. And it really does help, you know, put you in a different mindset first thing in the morning and at night before you go to bed. And I love the walk outside.

• 39:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, I walk in the morning and at night, it really helps your circadian rhythm. Like I, you know, from med school residency, I just had this weird, like, you know, I was on call overnight. We're like, I would just, I couldn't sleep very well. And then I started walking in the morning, looking, because you, there's different, I talk about this in the book. There's different colors of sun rays in the morning that helps stimulate your body to wake up and cortisol. And there's different colors of sun at night that help with melatonin production. And that in itself helped my sleep drastically. That and then just like not going from a million to in bed and then wondering why I can't fall asleep, right? So like those little wind down routines, I think are really, really cool. But I'm going to look for the journal because I like that. That's nice.

• 40:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, it's really cool. It's called the five minute journal. You know, we talked a lot about gut health and kind of like the problems with the gut. And I'd love to hear, and I'm sure this is in your book as well, but just big picture. Is there like a gut healing protocol that you like to use with your patients?

• 40:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think, you know, testing is really important because everyone's different. So I feel like if you really want a protocol tailored for you, you need to test. Because you may have a certain parasite that unless you get rid of, it's going to be harder. But if it, if you're just generically talking, yes, in chapter two of my book, I have like, here is a 10 steps. Number one is remove ultra processed sugary foods from your diet. That includes, you know, food and beverages. Millions of Americans consume 50 grams of sugar by going through Starbucks or some coffee drive through every morning. And don't even realize it, like you are destroying your gut first thing, right?

• 41:29Dr. Darshan Shah?

  First thing in the morning too, and your metabolism.

• 41:32Speaker 01

  Yes, your sugar processed food. So it's just like as easy as look at food labels. Ideally, you don't even need food labels. Ideally, you're eating whole ingredient foods, but if you're looking at food labels, five ingredients or less, and none of them can be sugar. That's my rule. I don't eat anything unless it has five ingredients or less and none of the ingredients are sugar. Like super easy, easy, move your body every day. Super easy. That actually helps your gut. Get some fiber, eat diverse foods, you know, it's not hard. Little things like that, like starting your day with fiber, starting your day with then bitter. So this is the other thing. A lot of women, especially as we go through hormonal shifts, we have biliary issues. Our bile doesn't flow right. And this is why we don't metabolize hormones.

• 42:16Speaker 01

  The easiest thing you can do for that, you get up in the morning, you drink water with a little bit of psyllium husk. Get the cheap stuff on Amazon. I don't care. Just get psyllium husk, fiber, little bit of water. Put your fiber in there, make sure you stir it up really good and swallow it so you get fiber. And then have something bitter, anything bitter. I don't care. So fiber and then bitter stimulates your biliary like secretions and your gallbladder so much. That's like super easy. Just do that before you take your walk. You can, it doesn't break your fast. So little things like that are super important for your gut and can help.

• 42:50Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, yeah. What are some of the tests that you like to use for gut health?

• 42:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, I personally, we use the GI map. And this is why, there's lots of tests out there. Some of them are a little overwhelming. They are like 40 pages long and then people just freak out and then they don't do anything because they're like, oh my gosh. I think that the GI map does a really good job of giving you information that fixes 99% of people in four pages. And I think four pages is, is doable for people to understand and to go through. So we use GI maps. It's a stool test. I really like it. I have a lot of success with it. From a blood perspective, you can do testing as well. You can do zonulin levels, you can do food sensitivity. But I think the GI map, you get a lot of bang for your buck if you do it with the zonulin level.

• 43:39Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right. And the GI map is nice because I haven't seen a report for a while, but it does tell you about your microbial diversity. It talks you about the pathogenic species that are overgrowing, right? What are some of the other pieces of information you get from the GI map?

• 43:53Speaker 01

  Yes, it tells you good bacteria and you know, do you have really good butyrate building? Are you eating enough fiber? It talks to you about acromancia, which is the bacteria that you must have if you want to lose weight. And it tells you all the bad bacteria that you have. Do you have H. pylori? If you have H. pylori, what bad strains you have. So these are important. A lot of the bacterial overgrowth, the SIBO bacteria, the Proteus, the Club Zella, Pseudomonas, Staph, Strep. It tells you all of that. It will give you the degree to which you have those bacterial overgrowth too. So that tells me a lot about your stomach acid. If you have strep or staph that is overgrown, E to the fourth or higher, I know that you have terrible stomach acid production. And so then we have to work on that.

• 44:35Speaker 01

  It tells you about digestion capability, so proteins, fats, carbs. So it looks at your elastase and your steatocrit. So we know, are you having problems digesting your food? It looks at parasites, yeast, protozoa, candida. It also looks at calcium D gluc rate, which is a marker that tells us whether you're metabolizing your hormones, women, well or not. So a stroblone marker. It looks at calprotectin, which is an inflammation marker. I've actually unfortunately diagnosed five people now with colon cancer just from a GI map. And one of them was a young lady who the GI doctor refused to do a colonoscopy on because she was in her 30s and they said, oh, I'm not doing that. You're crazy. And I said, she was having some symptoms.

• 45:17Speaker 01

  She had a very high calprotectin level. She had blood in her stool and she had a bacteria called Fusobacterium, which we can now see on GI maps, which is highly indicative of very high levels. And that's why younger people are getting colon cancer. And so this poor girl, like I was like, you need a colonoscopy. I referred, the GI doctor refused to do it. I sent her to two different ones. They refused to do it. So she finally got, went to a third one and got it, had stage one colon cancer. Thankfully had surgery, was fine, but they told her to come back in 13 years. She was 37. Two of them told her to come back in 13 years. She would have died.

• 45:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  She would have died. Yeah, absolutely.

• 45:50Speaker 01

  So I mean, it shows you that. It shows you calprotectin. It shows you fecal occult blood. It shows you zonulin, whether they have a leaky gut or not. And it shows you whether you're sensitive to gluten and whether you could potentially have food allergies with an EAP. So a lot of really good stuff.

• 46:04Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Lot of great information, ton of great information. Yeah, from one stool sample, right? And it's just, it's just, yeah, exactly. But it's hard to find doctors that order any type of stool testing, never mind know how to read it. Never know, never mind know how to interpret it, right? We use a different one. We use Vibrant America's stool test. But you know, it's a, I think they're all kind of provides some of the similar information. But the GI map has always been like a standard one as well. But I think for most people, you know, if you can find a doctor that's doing stool testing, that's a really good sign that they are really looking at your body more holistically.

• 46:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, I completely agree. And, and then I think everyone should do one once a year if it is feasible in any way. Because you learn, again, I've learned so much. I mean, my dad had colon cancer and I diagnosed it from his GI map.

• 46:53Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Wow.

• 46:53Speaker 01

  And yeah, I mean, he was one of them, but multiple patients where I'm like, you have colon cancer. You know, and it's, it's sad that that's how it has to happen, but sometimes it does. And it's just a lot of really good valuable information that I think that people can use. And to your point, if you find a provider that does stool testing and understands how to read it and interpret it, you've hit the jackpot and hopefully that will be more standard of care. I actually, you know, I've, I've toyed around with making a course and I, and I still may just to teach people. Because it's like teach providers. And actually in my book, if you get my book, I actually go through the GI map. And I tell people, this is like, there's a whole chapter on, here's the GI map. And this is exactly what it means. And if it's this, then this, and this.

• 47:36Speaker 01

  And so, I mean, you can almost order one yourself and kind of walk through it. Now you're going to need somebody to help you if there's abnormalities, right? And with a clinical picture, but you can get a pretty dang good idea of how to read your own GI map by reading my book. Because I just want people to know, you know, like you need to understand what's going on.

• 47:54Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I love that, that you give people the information they need to even interpret their own GI map. That's fantastic. Do you also give like the hormones that they should be ordering and looking at? Like, you know, in traditional medicine, when they look at thyroid, they just they measure one level, TSH, they don't talk about free T3, free T4, and they don't talk about optimal versus normal. Do you educate people on that as well in your book?

• 48:18Speaker 01

  I do. In the book, I go through all the different hormone levels and what I like them to be. And I even break it down in sections, like if you're PCOS, or, you know, infertility, struggling, or whether you're menopausal. And so it's in the book, and it's all in there. But if you go to our book website, fix, uh, guthormonefix.com, and you sign up there, I give you this free resource guide that you can use as you go through the book, and it has so much stuff in it. And it's literally, yes, a list of here are all the hormones that you should get checked, and here are the normal levels, and here are the optimal levels. And I even do it by like, the time of your cycle, and whether you're perimenopausal or postmenopausal. I give that to everyone, because you should be the CEO of your own health and know how to somewhat look at your labs, right? Like, I'm not saying

• 49:00Speaker 01

  be your own doctor, but at least be your own advocate. And if you know, hey, something's not right, I'm having symptoms, and here are my labs, and this doesn't look right, and you go to your provider, and they're like, oh, everything is fine, then find a different provider, like, get a different opinion.

• 49:14Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Absolutely, absolutely.

• 49:16Speaker 01

  Right?

• 49:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly. I love it that you give so many resources in your book, and you're so, I mean, and you explain it in such a way that just makes sense, you know? And I'd love the way you talk about this, and you make it so digestible for people and actionable, which is so important. What was the name of that website again that you mentioned?

• 49:35Speaker 01

  It's guthormonefix.com.

• 49:38Dr. Darshan Shah?

  guthormonefix.com. We'll also link that in the show notes. And is your book available for purchase now?

• 49:44Speaker 01

  It is. It's on Amazon. So you can get it on Amazon. Just fix your gut, fix your hormones. And then if you get it on Amazon, just don't forget to go to the website to put on all the information. I think there's a QR code in the book as well, once you get it, that if you scan it, it will take you to that website, so you can put your information and get all the, like, I have a whole website, that literally, you can pull the website up in each chapter. It's like, here's any resource you need from this book, here's everything I tell my patients, here's, you know, all the diet guides we use for fiber, like, pretty much anything I give my patients, I put in that book, because, you know, there are so many millions of people that are sick, and so many millions of people that need help, and you just need good resources. And whether you use me, or whether they use you,

• 50:26Speaker 01

  or, I don't really care, I just want people to get to get better, and to have some good, valuable information that didn't come from a social media influencer that has no idea what they're talking about, that can actually help them fix their health.

• 50:39Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, absolutely. Last part I wanted to ask you about is, um, you know, I think a big piece of healing your gut also is to give your gut some of the substrates it needs to heal. Like, I'm a big fan of, you mentioned fiber, I'm a big fan of glutamine. I know that you also have kind of a gut healing protocol that you've put together. Can you talk about that a little bit, as far as like, some of the supplements you can use?

• 51:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, so glutamine, I think, is wonderful. If you've got a really bad leaky gut, cat's claw is good as well. And so we have, we have one called the Remodeler, we use for more of like, uh, just if you have really bad leaky gut. But also, you know, if you have a lot of stress, what people don't realize is stress kills the immune system of your gut. So in my really chronically stressed people, they need immunoglobulins. You know, they need something to really help. So we have one called the Defender, but something with some secretory IGA to really help their immune system. If you're somebody who's struggling with acid issues, like you have a lot of heartburn, there are supplements that will help with that, that will help, you know, with heartburn. If you have H. pylori, Mastic

• 51:45Speaker 01

  Gum, like, you've got to take Mastic Gum to get rid of your H. pylori. It just kind of depends on what's going on. Bitters, digestive bitters are very important. If you're somebody who, when you eat anything fatty, it makes you sick, and you're like, oh, my gosh, I'm so sick, or you don't have a gallbladder, I am shocked at the number of people who don't have gallbladders, and surgeons or somebody, nobody told them, hey, you might need Oxbile for the rest of your life to help you digest fat. They don't know that, they eat fatty foods, they're having diarrhea, and their stomach hurts, and they just think that's a normal part of life. No, it's because you don't have steatocrit, you don't have the ability to, you know, digest fat, so you need some Oxbile. Like, that's it.

• 52:23Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 52:23Speaker 01

  And so, you know, things like that are really important. But I think if you do, if you're very bloated after you eat, and you have a lot of symptoms, a simple digestive enzyme, a really good digestive enzyme, sometimes will help, between a digestive enzyme and some glutamine for just like, support of leaky gut, you'd be shocked what that can do to somebody's, you know, digestive tract, just those two things. So, and I talk about all that in the book, too. Like, hey, if your GI map shows this, or you have these symptoms, or this is going on, try this, you know?

• 52:52Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I love this. So, Dr. Cassie, I already ordered your book, so I can't wait to read it. And I'm sure I'll have questions for you. I can't wait to see, um, everything you talked about. And it's just, it's such a great, um, such a great resource you've put out there. So really, thank you for that.

• 53:07Speaker 01

  Well, thank you so much. Thanks for having me. Yes, I have, it's a long book, though, I will tell you, Dr. Darshan, it's, it's pretty long, because I didn't want to write another one. I was like, I'm just doing all of it. They wanted me to make three, and I was like, no. But I did audible it, it is almost finished. So I'm glad you ordered it. But if you're like, wow, because, you know, I'm, it's like, this is a lot. It will be available on Audible.

• 53:28Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Did you read it yourself? Did you read it yourself?

• 53:30Speaker 01

  I personally read it, and personally edited it. Huh?

• 53:33Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Amazing.

• 53:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, I read it, and I edited it, because I didn't want anybody messing it up, because there's a lot of like, medical terms, and, you know, like, I didn't want, so anyways, because I was gonna let someone do it, I'm like, you might screw it up. I want to make sure. So I read it, I edited it, and then I re-listened to the whole thing to make sure it was right.

• 53:52Dr. Darshan Shah?

  That's a lot of work. You put a lot of work and energy into this.

• 53:55Speaker 01

  It was. It was. But I, you know, it's kind of like my contribution to the world. Like, there's so many really sick people out there, and I wish I would have had this 20 years ago. I wish I would have had somebody like you, or me, or a clinic like I have now. And so it's just, you know, there are a lot of really sick people out there, and people that just want to feel better and heal, and be able to do what they were put on this earth to do. And so I just hope that everyone that reads it gets at least 10% better, and it'll be my, you know, my contribution to the world.

• 54:24Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Your contribution to the world. I love it. Well, Dr. Cassie, this has been such a pleasure. And we're going to link everything, your website, your book, in the show notes for people. I'm a huge advocate of what you're doing, and a huge fan. So really, appreciate you being on the podcast. This is a great episode.

• 54:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I love what you guys do, too. Next Gen, and everything you're doing, I think it's wonderful.

• 54:47Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Thank you. We'd love to have you come visit one of these days.

• 54:49Speaker 01

  I'm going to, for sure.

• 54:51Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Fantastic. We'll talk soon.

• 54:53Speaker 01

  Bye.

• 54:57Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Thank you so much for listening to the podcast today. Please remember to subscribe if you liked this episode, and give us a good review, and share a link with your friends. It really helps to support all of our efforts. I also want to remind you that the information shared on this podcast is for educational purposes only, and is not intended to replace professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Please consult with your healthcare provider or physician before making any decisions or taking any action based on what you hear today, especially if you have any underlying health conditions or on any medications. Your doctor knows your personal health situation the best, and it's always important to seek their guidance.