Transcript: EP 328 – Thinning Hair & Women: Reasons Why & What Can Help (Hint: The answer is NOT Rogaine)

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Dr. Taz: Androgens are getting overproduced. That includes DHT because usually we’re not following a diet that’s conducive to a clean and healthy lifestyle and healthy hair. So sugar, alcohol, processed and packaged foods all contribute to high androgens and high DHT.

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 Soul Fire production.

Let’s be honest. We all want thick, healthy, luscious hair. We’ll probably do just about anything to get there. But when we lose our hair, nothing creates a panic, a sense of anxiety, and really affects our self-esteem more than thinning hair. I’ve sat with so many patients who’ve had to battle fitting hair and are desperate for answers. Hi there. I’m Dr. Taz. I’m an integrative health expert and I’m here to talk about hair loss and hair supplements. Look, I’ve been there. I lost a lot of my hair in my twenties and thankfully much of it has come back, not in its full glory, but it’s almost all there. But in those years of trying to get answers, I probably spent God knows how much money buying supplement after supplement, remedy after remedy, desperate and hoping and praying for an answer. And here’s what I learned.

At the end of the day, it’s my internal chemistry more than anything else that determined what was happening with my hair, along with my mindset. If I was super stressed, anxious, didn’t sleep, the hair comes out even to this day. But I want to talk for a second about hair loss supplements or hair supplements in general, and what role do they really play when it comes to your hair? Some people want to ditch the idea of supplements. They think it simply doesn’t work. Why waste your time? Why waste your money? I think I even heard somebody say it’s just expensive urine at the end of the day. Well, I am here to tell you that I’ve healed myself and thousands of patients suffering from hair issues, whether it was alopecia, whether it was general thinning hair, whether it was hair that was breaking or brittle or dry, by helping them change their internal chemistry using supplements.

Now, here’s the problem with supplements in general, you have to pick high quality. You have to pick ones with the right ingredients. So when you’re thinking about supplements for hair, I don’t want you for anything going to the shelf and just randomly grabbing, right? That’s not going to work. I want you to be strategic and thinking through how you’re going to pick the best supplement for you. Let’s break down here. What is really the whole myth around healthy hair? Well, it’s actually very simple. You have to have enough protein and fat. You have to have a healthy gut. We have to have good hormones and good hormone balance, and you have to get a good night’s sleep and learn to manage stress effectively. Without any of that, here’s what’s happening. We’re blocking off blood flow to our hair follicle, to the very place where new hair develops.

Blocking that blood flow causes hair loss that happens when we’re stressed or anxious or using products that build up or styling too much or pulling or tugging, all the crazy things that we do to our hair. So we know we need good blood flow. In addition to that, if we’re not getting the nutrients, hair cannot regenerate. It can’t be strong. It can’t withstand even a simple thing like your pillowcase. So we know we need the nutrients. If you don’t have the hormones quite right, you don’t have your thyroid imbalance, your estrogen to progesterone ratio, hair cannot thrive. Well, let’s get back to supplements because that’s really what we want to dive into. Here’s the role of supplements. They are acting on one of those three or four aspects of healthy hair. There are supplements that improve blood flow to the scalp. There are supplements that really help increase your nutrient load, helping hair to regenerate.

There are supplements that help to balance hormones, making sure you have a healthy head of hair, and there are of course supplements that help you stay calm and at ease, so hopefully your own internal stress drivers are not causing your hair to fall out. That’s what happened to me. So supplements do work, but we got to pick the right ones and they do need to be personalized to you. Here’s what I’ve done through my years studying integrative and functional medicine and really enjoying the merging of eastern and western medicine together. I’ve come up with a blend of different herbs that I’ve seen work over and over again, and here’s why. They address all these different aspects of hair and hairy growth and even hair loss. For example, we know the B vitamins are critical for hair strength. We know iron is so important for blood flow to the scalp and for the density and texture of your hair.

Now, here’s where it all starts to connect. We know B and iron are responsible for hormone balance. If you don’t have enough B vitamins, you don’t have enough iron, your thyroid will crash, your estrogen will not do what it’s supposed to do, and as far as progesterone, it can barely hang on. So using those two micronutrients plays a huge role in healthy hair. Let’s try a few more. What about magnesium and iodine? We know both of these are essential for healthy hair. Again, it’s multifactorial. I love when one nutrient has so many different roles. Medications don’t do that, nutrients do. Magnesium, for example, helps to relax us relaxing the scalp. We also know that magnesium helps with a good night’s sleep. And again, back to hormone balances plays a really important role in hormone balance. Iodine again, helps with thyroid function, really guaranteeing a head of healthy hair.

So we know that iron, iodine, magnesium, B vitamins, all really important nutrients when it comes to good hair. Now, none of those nutrients can get where they need to get to if you don’t have a healthy gut. So using things like glutamine and collagen to build that gut lining important in a hair formula, who would’ve thought? And last, but certainly not least, the right herbs help us shift hair in the right direction. Chinese medicine and Ayurvedic medicine were brilliant. I’m still shocked by their brilliance and being able to understand how plant-based medicine, herbal medicine made a difference for things like hair loss and hormone balance. The Chinese herb fo-ti balances hormones, helps to improve estrogen to progesterone ratios, helps with thyroid function, improving healthy hair, and we also note that the herb Amla, which my mom talked about for God knows how long, helps to improve blood flow to the scalp.

Amla has one of the highest concentrations of vitamin C, which again is helping to regenerate hair, not just hair, but even improving your gut health. As you can see, supplements really do play a role, and one supplement can have so many different effects on the body, ultimately shifting your chemistry and the chemistry that works for healthy hair. So all supplements are not equal. All supplements don’t do the exact same thing, and each of you need to have your own plan. That’s what changes things. That’s what makes a difference and is going to make a difference for you.

Hi, it’s Dr. Taz here. All right, let’s be real. We’re going to be honest for a second. It’s all about the hair, right? At least that’s what I was told by my mother and my mother-in-law when I was losing my hair rapidly. Look, hair loss is real. It’s an epidemic. So many women are suffering from it today and it can knock out your self-esteem In about five seconds, I’ve been there getting dressed with the lights off, not wanting to go out even when I was only in my twenties. Lush Locks is my formula in my product line, the East West Way, which really addresses hair loss by merging together eastern and western medicine, true to the East West Way philosophy. In Lush Locks, there are methylated B vitamins, magnesium, iron, all of which has been shown to promote healthy hair. But the key is that this particular patented formula also contains the Ayurvedic herbs Amla, which have been shown to help regrow hair, improve blood flow to the scalp and the Chinese herb fo-ti, which has been used for centuries in Chinese medicine for hairy generation and hairy growth.

By putting all of these together with additional micronutrients, Lush Locks is the one supplement I can’t live without. In fact, I would take it with me if I was stranded on an island. It works beautifully to help regenerate and regrow hair and prevent further hair loss. I encourage all of you to give Lush Locks a try. In fact, just this month, if you go to the eastwestway.com, type in the code SWW30, you’ll get 30% off your purchase of Lush Locks. That includes the supplement along with the shampoo conditioner. That’s also a part of my hair loss line. Look, hair loss is real. It impacts us all. It doesn’t have to be that way. Try out Lush Locks. Use your code and don’t forget if you rate and review any episode of the podcast and email me at hellodrtaz.com. I’ll send you a free bottle of Lush Locks or Boost, you get to choose. Just make sure you email me and we’ll take it from there.

Hair loss has been a big part of my story. In fact, I credit it as painful as it was for getting me into the field of integrative, functional, and holistic medicine. I really did learn how to heal myself, and since that time, I can’t believe it’s been 14 years I’ve learned to help heal others as well. Now, initially when I embarked on this journey, the very first thing that was suggested to me was Rogaine. Many of you’re probably familiar with Rogaine, if you’ve suffered from hair loss, you use Rogaine, usually topically on the scalp and is supposed to help block thinning hair. Now, anytime you’re dealing with hair loss, I remember how I felt. You’re panicked, you’re anxious. You look down and your hair is thinning. You’re starting to see spots in your scalp and you literally would do anything to make it go away and to return to that healthy head of hair that you know so well.

Here’s the issue with Rogaine. It does work. I’m not going to tell you it doesn’t work, but it only works while you’re using it. So like many things in Western medicine, it’s a bandaid. It’s a temporary fix, not something we should be dependent on forever. Let’s talk about thinning hair for just a minute. What’s happening? Here’s what’s happening for most of us, especially those of us with PCOS, we are overproducing androgens. Now, androgens are compounds. Let’s call them that for now, hormones, things like DHT, testosterone, free testosterone, 17 Hydroxypregnenolone. I know it’s a whole lot. Lot of words there, and you don’t have to memorize them, but here’s what you have to know. Rogaine is designed to block DHT at the scalp, at the root, and so hopefully by doing so, preserves the hair follicle and prevents your hair from falling out.

Now, here’s the problem. It’s temporary and we’ve got to fix DHT from the inside out. Who wants to be dependent on anything that’s only going to work as long as we’re using it? Here’s what’s really happening. Androgens are getting overproduced. That includes DHT because usually we’re not following a diet that’s conducive to a clean and healthy lifestyle and healthy hair. So sugar, alcohol, processed and packaged foods all contribute to high androgens and high DHT. By cleaning up our diet, we start to lower the amount of DHT we’re producing. And then we don’t need Rogaine quite as much, but it’s a little bit more complicated than that. We get into the environment an environmental toxicity. I know you are so probably tired of hearing about this, and it’s getting to be where we feel like we can’t do anything when it comes to toxicity.

But here’s the chemistry, here’s the equation. When we’re exposed to toxins, whether it’s BPA, organophosphates, endocrine disruptors, the whole host of chemicals that we’ve been talking about, and we have chronic deep stress, which honestly everybody nowadays has, and we’re not sleeping and we have an unhealthy, highly processed diet, we overproduce androgens. My diet of diet coke and popcorn, while I did shift work and didn’t sleep, didn’t really work out for my hair. And sure enough, I was overproducing DHT. So Rogaine was a great temporary solution, but the minute I stopped using it, my hair would fall out all over again, and I don’t want that for you. So how about trying this instead? Let’s approach lowering androgens methodically and with maybe three or four steps so that you don’t have to be dependent on Rogaine. I would start with balancing your diet.

Get rid of the junk process, the packaged food switch to a cleaner diet. You’re automatically lowering your toxic load just doing that. Next work on a healthy gut. So many people say, “I don’t have any GI issues or digestive issues, so why would I need to work on my gut health?” Well, if you’re chronically stressed, you’re having hormone shifts. We know you might have leaky gut, so trying a supplement, maybe something with some collagen or glutamine in it will help to rebuild a good gut lining, helping you to absorb the nutrients you need and remember to sleep. So many of us, especially women, think we can get by. I was right there with you by the way. Think we can get by on three hours of sleep or four hours of sleep and we can get through the day because we’re Superwoman and everything’s going to work out just fine until it doesn’t and you end up losing your hair.

Here’s what I’ve learned from Chinese medicine. Getting deep restorative sleep seven hours at least with 90 minutes of deep sleep, 90 minutes of REM sleep makes a tremendous difference in our hormones, our cortisol levels, and ultimately our androgens. So stress management really matters, and when you put those pieces together, you actually have a formula for lowering DHT and not being dependent on anything topical, which usually acts like a bandaid. So why did I stop using Rogaine? Because I fixed my hair, I fixed my chemistry, I fixed my hair, and I’m no longer dependent on using topical stuff to regain healthy hair. When I start to lose hair again, I usually know it’s from the inside out and it’s my check, one of my vital signs to get back on track and start taking care of myself. I want you to think about your hair in the exact same way.