Transcript: EP 350 – Chapter 1 Audio: The Hormone Shift

Return to Podcast Post: Click here

Download PDF

Read Transcript Below!

Dr. Taz: Think back to your teen years. Do you remember the highs and lows, the extreme emotions, the new physical symptoms you had to get used to? This was your first hormone shift, and if it threw you off balance then, why are you surprised when you are thrown off balance in perimenopause?

Hi everyone, and welcome to Super Woman Wellness. I’m Dr. Taz. I’ve made it my mission throughout my career in integrative medicine to support women in restoring their health using a blend of Eastern medical wisdom with modern science. In this show, I will guide you through different practices to find your power type and fully embody the healthiest and most passionate version of you. I’m here for you and I can’t wait to get started. This is a Soulfire Production.

Here begins the hormone manifesto that offers information every young girl and woman should understand, how their hormones shift and how to bring them back into balance. So yes, you can pass this information on to women of all ages, your daughter, mother, sisters, and friends. This is our story and it’s the language we should all be speaking to support, empower, and lead one another across these hormone bridges. This is how we all come together.

Every woman experiences hormonal shifts and disruptions during her lifetime, but the sympathetic nods and offers of help these women got during the rollercoaster years of their puberty seemed to disappear with each passing decade, even as the shifts continue to occur, from puberty into early adulthood, to pregnancy and motherhood, and then to perimenopause and menopause. Universally, there is minimal conversation concerning hormones and hormone shifts, leading women of every age on an endless hunt for answers to mystery symptoms and diseases.

What many of these women don’t realize, is that their hormone journey actually began when they were in their teens and 20s. That’s when a foundation of hormone understanding should have been built. Instead, young women are given band-aids to manage the shifts, birth control pills, et cetera, rather than beginning an exploration into their health. The result is that more and more young women have hormone-based conditions, including PCOS, polycystic ovarian syndrome, endometriosis and infertility, fibroids and fibrocystic breast cysts, and many different autoimmune diseases. These conditions are all triggered during a hormone shift. Indeed, this time is the rollercoaster ride that returns for many women decades later as they enter perimenopause. All of it is there, the anxiety, the crash in self-esteem, even the eating disorders that had been buried resurfacing as the hormones fluctuate, the medical gaslighting by mainstream women’s health. Because these shifts in hormones are poorly understood by mainstream medicine, women have been gaslighted concerning their health, and their hormone symptoms continue to get dismissed in the conversations about their health.

When I graduated from medical school in 1997 and started doing my rotations, the medical field was still a boys club, to the point of being intimidating. Not only was medicine dominated by male physicians until recently, but the training of medical doctors had limited focus on women’s health and hormones. I learned only the basics during my obstetrics/gynecology rotation, and a tiny bit more in the endocrinology rotation. Although, that delved more into illnesses like diabetes and adrenal disorders. Women and their hormones were viewed in a singular fashion, for either reproduction or their libido, not as a whole body issue. Have babies and have sex, the end.

I’m not angry with any specific doctor, but I am angered by a system that gaslights its patients, spreads the same old, “You’re fine,” mantra, and keeps women trapped in thinking that we are just getting old or that the problem is all in our heads.

Hi there. It’s Dr. Taz here, thrilled to bring you my line of nutraceutical products and lifestyle products, the EastWest Way. This line was really born out of a need, my own personal need to find products that worked, combining the best of Eastern and Western medicine, and also finding that in practice, many of these products don’t exist. I remember the early years of practice where I was just trying to find the right B formula for patients and couldn’t find it, and that began the journey of the EastWest Way. Boost, my methylated B, was the first product. It’s now a hero product. So many people depend on Boost for energy, mood and so much more, but from there, each formula has been curated by me to really answer the problems that we are facing, but still merging the best of Eastern and Western medicine together.

What does that mean? It means you might have a nutrient merged with an herb, or you might have something from an Ayurvedic formula combined with a very Western way of thinking. These products work, I use them in practice, and I am incredibly proud of them. I have personally developed each one of them as an answer to something I needed or one of my patients needed. Now, I want you to be able to experience all the products as well.

The EastWest Way is something that I am so thrilled to continue to grow and develop, and for all of you, my Super Woman listeners, love this community so much, I’m offering each of you a discount on any of the products on theeastwestway.com. Again, that’s theeastwestway.com. You have a special code just for my listeners, it’s 30% off, and that code is going to be SWW30 to get 30% off at checkout. If you rate and review any of the podcast episodes, by the way, I’m going to pick a winner every month, and you will get a free EastWest Boost supplement. Just email me at hello@drtaz.com. I hope you enjoy these products as much as my patients have. I live by this line as well. I use at least three or four of the products on a daily basis, and I’m thrilled for each of you to try them as well.

The new normal. Here is the story the majority of my patients describe. They knew something was off, so they went to their primary physician and had lots of blood work done, only to be told their results were normal, that really they were just understandably stressed or anxious or depressed. So they most likely just need an antianxiety or anti-depression medication, or something for sleep and something for focus, and something else for weight loss. “Yes, there are some side effects, but don’t worry about that for now because you’re fine.” That is the normal way hormonal symptoms are treated. Women leave their medical visits feeling hopeless, resigned to accepting all their bizarre and unpredictable symptoms.

Well, I’m here to tell you that normal is not good enough. Historically, normal has meant being free of disease. It does not mean feeling optimal or vital or vibrant. My EastWest holistic approach gets rid of the one size fits all ideology and instead stresses the importance of personal body chemistry and body map. This is the new normal that we should all be fighting for. No more bearing the stigma of the menopausal or hormonal woman, and no more feelings of shame and dread about your hormones and hormone shifts.

Women today are demanding and fighting for answers. They are shedding the tired baggage, cleansing it from their psyche and stepping up to assume their authentic power. The EastWest approach works with our hormones, not against them, to establish balance in all aspects of our bodies, mental, physical, emotional, spiritual, and energetic. But if, instead, you give into the historic shame and guilt of that gaslighting, know that you are saying no to gifts that await you and power that is rightly yours. This is not your mother’s menopause. Normal and fine do not cut it anymore, and your life story is just beginning, not ending.

“What the fuck is happening?” This is a question I hear every day. Women today, at every age, are busy. They are juggling jobs, multitasking, getting lots of things done, and then something changes. They go from super sharp, to foggy, from energetic, to tired, or from happy, to sad. The hormone shifts that women experience can catch them by surprise and they can leave them feeling, well, not like themselves anymore. The hormone journey is one of hormone shifts, except we just don’t talk about it. But knowledge is power. Knowing what’s happening takes away the fear of the unknown. It arms a woman with the tools to move forward. Understanding the hormone shifts that happen at certain points in a woman’s life, whether young girl, teen, young adult, mother or grandmother, prepares her for what she will need to feel her best. We don’t drive cars without some instruction or start careers without some training or education, right? Then why would our bodies be any different?

Part of that preparation is not just recognizing the hormone shifts, but also understanding what those hormones are and how they play together. If you are listening to this book, you may think you are too young or too old to have a hormone imbalance. You may have been conditioned into believing that life is being in a state of what I call hormone hell. That PMS, premenstrual syndrome, abdominal pain, hot flashes, brain fog or disrupted sleep, to name just a few symptoms, is completely normal. The journey our hormones make mirrors the phases of our lives as women.

Think back to your teen years. Do you remember the highs and lows, the extreme emotions, the new physical symptoms you had to get used to? You most likely nod your head, remembering with empathy that teen version of yourself when you were flooded with hormones that made you boy crazy, moody and volatile with your parents and even your friends. This was your first hormone shift, and if it threw you off balance then, why are you surprised when you are thrown off balance in perimenopause? That’s your third hormone shift. Do you ignore the shift? You can try, but your body will not let you. Instead of nudging you into the role of your lifetime, you are stuck in a walk-on part or even on the sidelines, and you feel trapped. That’s because you don’t feel good. You don’t feel like yourself, and that is not what’s meant for you to be. Yet, hormone shifts are a natural part of every woman’s story. It’s a story that we should know by heart. Indeed, these shifts are nothing new or novel, though women today remain in the dark about them, as are their doctors.

You may have been in perimenopause years before any symptoms showed up, or you may have resigned yourself to the unpleasant mood swings, hot flashes or other symptoms, without ever realizing you don’t have to suffer from them.

I have an exciting announcement. My new book, The Hormone Shift: Balance Your Body Through Midlife and Menopause, is out this October and is available for pre-order right now wherever books are sold. Most women, and I’m talking about all women, have been led to believe that entering midlife means existing at the complete mercy of our mysterious hormones. When we take our concerns to our doctors, we’re told that our debilitating symptoms are normal or we’re fine or it’s all in our head, and I’m here to tell you that fine is not good enough and it’s absolutely not in our head.

I want all women to thrive through every life stage, so I’ve devised a hormone reset plan that blends together the best of Eastern and Western medicine to bring your body back into balance, minimize unwanted symptoms, and have you feeling like yourself again. It’s not you, it’s your hormones, and this is not your mother’s perimenopause or menopause. Are you ready to thrive and really embrace this next phase of your life? Go to prh.com/thehormoneshift to pre-order your copy now.