# Eating in Tune with Your Cycle: The Nutrition Talk You Needed with Sara Widdowson

An episode of [The Cyclist](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1799823350), 27 May 2025, 1 h 00 min.

Audio: https://anchor.fm/s/101bd2764/podcast/play/103241427/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2025-4-26%2F429847eb-aab3-3915-f084-6c51ab52b98e.mp3

This week we're diving into your plate & your cycle. We're joined by dietician Sara Widdowson from Your Monthly (@yourmonthly) to talk all things cycle syncing, hormones and how food can support your cycle as a whole. We unpack how to build a blood-sugar friendly plate, how to eat to support your hormones, and what you really need to know about managing PCOS, endometriosis, or irregular cycle. We have also created the first ever The Cyclist downloadable in collaboration with Sara. You can download it here Follow & Connect: ✨ Instagram: @wearethecyclist ✨ Website: www.wearethecyclist.com We’re so glad you’re here - hit play, subscribe, and let’s learn to cycle better together.

## Transcript

[0:06] This is The Cyclist, the podcast that finally talks about your
[0:10] reproductive health the way your group chat does.
[0:12] No awkward silence, no sugarcoating, just the real
[0:15] messy. Holy shit why did nobody tell me
[0:18] this convos about your body? I'm Jess.
[0:21] Quinn, and I'm Catherine Douglas.
[0:23] We've been where you are, confused, dismissed and left
[0:26] figuring it all out on our own. So.
[0:29] We're gathering the. Information we wish we had.
[0:31] We are the cyclist. Your cycle decoded.
[0:39] Hey Jess, it's been a week of getting our test results back.
[0:43] Would you like to dive into yours?
[0:44] Perhaps been authenticity week. We're not.
[0:47] It's been a testy week. I.
[0:49] Have yes, got all of my gut tears back.
[0:51] I mentioned this in an intro a little while ago that I've been
[0:54] doing a whole lot of testing. I did gut testing.
[0:57] I'm still yet to do the Dutch test, which, which is the
[0:59] hormone test because I ovulated early last month.
[1:02] I and then I had gastro the month before.
[1:04] I kept missing. You have to do it at very
[1:06] specific time of the month and I keep missing that time.
[1:08] Amy Holmes and that's still to come.
[1:10] And then I did fit James, which is something that I've wanted to
[1:12] do for a really long time. This is not an ad by the way.
[1:14] It's just something that I found really interesting.
[1:17] I've been in a place where I really wanna do all of this
[1:20] again. I've done some hormone testing
[1:22] and gut testing or like pre cool, the times around cover
[1:25] times, they think. And my guts still just not my
[1:29] strongest point. And I can feel my hormones are
[1:32] just a bit all over the show. And I really want to look into
[1:34] that if we chose to have another child.
[1:37] And then fit jeans is something, yeah, that I've been exploring.
[1:41] It's a genetic test that basically tells you what your
[1:44] genetically predisposed to and how your body naturally
[1:48] functions. The reason I got on to it was
[1:50] actually because I don't know if I've dived this deep into that
[1:53] at all, but around this time last year I had a really bad
[1:56] anxiety flare up that hasn't really gone away and it's
[1:59] subsided a lot, but it was the scariest anxiety situation I've
[2:04] had in my whole life. I think it was a postpartum
[2:08] thing for sure. And I've really struggled to get
[2:12] rid of it. It hasn't really.
[2:13] I can still feel that sense in my body.
[2:15] And I actually ended up going on medication for it, which is
[2:17] something that I didn't think I would ever do, but I really
[2:20] needed support. And so I ended up doing that.
[2:23] And I really wanted to dive deep into what's going on in my body
[2:26] because I could feel it was something within me, if that
[2:30] makes sense. Like because it would happen in
[2:32] times where I didn't have any. I wasn't stressing about
[2:35] anything consciously. And like it's trigger.
[2:38] Yeah, no obvious triggers. And like, I know stress can have
[2:40] many layers to it. And then I have had a really
[2:42] stressful last kind of five years.
[2:45] So it does make a little bit of sense.
[2:46] But it just, yeah, you know, you can just tell what it's like a
[2:50] hormonal thing or a shift of some kind.
[2:52] That's also where the caffeine things come into me.
[2:54] So this has all come into the fact where I was like, I would
[2:56] rather get answers. I'm someone who doesn't just
[2:58] want to continuously guess. I want to just be like, what is
[3:01] my body actually saying? And so I did all these tests and
[3:05] it's been really fascinating. So I had my, I'm doing it with
[3:08] the nutrition clinic there based on Hawkes Bay.
[3:10] They just offer really great testing.
[3:12] I'm actually gonna get them on the podcast to talk about what
[3:14] they offer and, and the expertise.
[3:16] It's really incredible. And also hopefully chat through
[3:18] my results a bit deeper. The main thing that I was
[3:21] wanting to find out is if I was not intolerant to caffeine, but
[3:25] had a pathway in my body that isn't so great at clearing
[3:28] caffeine. And the girl that I'm working
[3:30] with at the clinic and I had both predicted because it seemed
[3:33] really obvious that I would have this pathway.
[3:35] It turns out I don't, which is really.
[3:37] Interesting. A year and you will match your
[3:39] addiction. It's not good news for me
[3:41] though. No, it's it's somewhere else.
[3:43] It's just not where we thought it was.
[3:44] So basically my liver came back all clear.
[3:46] You get a red, a yellow and a green kind of tick against all
[3:51] of the different actions in your body.
[3:52] And my liver was quite nice, which is really interesting with
[3:55] my history with chemo and stuff. But it's potentially why I might
[3:58] have handled that really well. Who knows?
[4:01] But that's usually where caffeine kind of comes unstuck.
[4:04] Whereas for me, it's actually the way that I methylate
[4:06] caffeine, which is something that you probably understand a
[4:09] lot more than me. I'm trying to learn at the
[4:11] moment and really understand it. But yeah, it's been really
[4:14] fascinating. They have a 28 page report that
[4:16] I'm still yet to completely read, which is why I'm being
[4:19] reasonably brief because I want to understand a bit more.
[4:21] But yeah, so fascinating to see. I think for me, a lot of the
[4:27] issues that play up or show up in my life, I've always been
[4:30] like, ohh, that's because I had cancer and art cause I live with
[4:32] a disability. Ohh, it's cause they have
[4:34] endometriosis. Like there's always these life
[4:37] events that I've gone through that have tested my health and I
[4:40] just put them down to those things.
[4:41] Whereas to have something that has nothing to do with my cancer
[4:44] or my disability or any of my chronic health issues, that's
[4:49] what like those results are the same had I had them taken as a
[4:52] newborn or is it 100 year old woman, which I find really,
[4:54] really interesting. So yeah, it's been fascinating
[4:58] to dive. Deep into a siding, Yeah.
[5:01] I'm looking forward to hearing more.
[5:03] I'm a big believer in your body often tells you what it needs.
[5:09] So you obviously could sense that there was something going
[5:12] on internally and sometimes we can't figure that all out on our
[5:17] own. So there's a saying if you're
[5:19] not testing your guess in. So I think this will be a really
[5:22] nice close the loop piece for you to truly understand what's
[5:26] going on for you and caffeine and hopefully you'll learn a
[5:28] whole lot more along. The way as well, yes,
[5:30] differently it has led to another test of like a
[5:32] potential, another SIBO test, which is interesting.
[5:35] I had Sebo when I found out that I had Endo, that's how it all
[5:38] kind of changed to her head. Yeah.
[5:40] So I might test that again. But yeah, I really like that.
[5:42] If you're not testing, you're guessing.
[5:43] I'm just I, I I don't wanna guess it's.
[5:47] Just I find it quite stressful. Just constantly guessing what's
[5:49] going on in your body. You can go down such a wrong
[5:52] path at times just playing. Yeah, yeah, we're all a little
[5:56] bit guilty of an old Google youth based on a few symptoms or
[6:00] a little bit of advice of social media.
[6:03] Should be enough. Yeah.
[6:06] You've had some testing too. Yes I just had my standards and
[6:09] blood test done with my pregnancy journey and it came
[6:13] back that I was very low in iron which silly me should have known
[6:17] that. I've been complaining about
[6:19] being incredibly tired and for whatever reason did not.
[6:24] I just put it down to the fact that I'm working full time,
[6:27] pregnant, and have a toddler. I mean that would do it.
[6:29] That would do it, but I'm so grateful to have this
[6:33] information because that's actually something that's within
[6:35] my control to fix and hopefully will give me a little bit more
[6:38] energy for these last 10 weeks. What are you planning on doing
[6:43] and to help fix it? So, well, I've started taking an
[6:47] iron supplement, but I am also going to consider an iron
[6:51] infusion. My dad's got a Doctor Who
[6:53] specialises on that, so I'm going to talk to her about
[6:55] whether that would be right for me.
[6:58] I believe it's just a little bit of a faster way to get your
[7:01] stores back up because it can take a while to correct if
[7:04] you're quite depleted. Yes, I did that when I was
[7:06] pregnant with Marla. Yeah, Did you find it made a
[7:08] difference? Can't remember a really would
[7:10] like to remember. I feel like that's all enabler.
[7:13] My sister-in-law said it was the best thing she did her entire
[7:16] pregnancy so. I I can't I got mine a bit too
[7:19] late. I would not have but I can't
[7:21] remember. It was definitely well in the
[7:22] 30s, like it was at there's a point where you can't get it and
[7:24] I was like at the the end of that, so I probably should have
[7:27] got it done earlier. Yeah.
[7:29] So yeah, I will report back. Please don't find feeling, but I
[7:32] do actually possibly to Sabo. Even in the last sort of week of
[7:38] supplementation I feel like I've got slightly more energy
[7:41] already. Which is great.
[7:42] Yeah, that's such good news. Exciting.
[7:45] Today on the podcast we have Sarah Wooderson from your
[7:48] monthly. She is a dietician and she's
[7:50] been working with us at The Cyclist and has a wealth of
[7:52] knowledge. We've both already learnt so
[7:54] much just through working with her.
[7:55] You're going to learn a lot through the episodes.
[7:57] We're gonna jump straight into it, but very quickly we've
[7:59] created a free downloadable for you with Sarah.
[8:02] It's a cycle syncing downloadable to help you
[8:05] understand cycle syncing. It's something that has spoken a
[8:07] lot about online, but for me personally, until I read this, I
[8:10] didn't really understand it. So it's something you can print
[8:12] off or have on your phone and follow throughout that phase of
[8:15] your cycle. It will be available in the show
[8:17] notes of this podcast. It will also be available on
[8:19] social and you will find it on our website.
[8:21] So you will not miss that and we really hope you enjoy it.
[8:23] See you soon. Hi Sarah.
[8:25] Welcome to the Cyclist. No, thank you for having me.
[8:29] Of course, we like to start with a question, which is what is one
[8:33] thing you've demystified about your body as an adult that you
[8:35] wish you knew when you were younger?
[8:37] Such a good Christian. I had a good think about this.
[8:40] And I think my answer would be, I always thought it was like,
[8:44] super easy to get pregnant. Like, I feel like growing up at
[8:47] high school, you're kind of taught don't look at someone or
[8:49] you'll get knocked up. And then as an adult, I learned
[8:53] not just through science but my own experience, that it's really
[8:56] not that simple. And yeah, we're just not as fit
[8:58] out as a species as I feel like we need to believe.
[9:03] I think we can both relate to that.
[9:07] Ohh what blows my mind is you know a lot of my friends are in
[9:12] the phase where they are trying to get pregnant.
[9:14] How few of us actually know that you can only get pregnant for
[9:18] around 5 days of cycle? You know.
[9:20] And I think we all grew up thinking we were fertile
[9:23] everyday of the year, right? So true.
[9:25] Yeah. It's crazy.
[9:26] And like each fertile window, isn't the chance of conception
[9:30] only like between 15 to 25% penis?
[9:35] Crazy. Yeah, it does explain the magic
[9:37] a little bit. All of it when you really break
[9:39] it down and and it all, all the pieces that do fall together
[9:43] when they do it. So it is pretty magical.
[9:44] Yeah. Yeah.
[9:46] Did you find that a little bit of a disheartening experience
[9:48] where you go into it thinking it's going to be easy and then
[9:51] it's not as easy as you expect? Yeah, I guess I mean because of
[9:56] the work that I do, which I know we'll talk about in a moment,
[9:59] like I learnt before my own time of trying to could save that,
[10:03] you know, five months sucks. 80% of couples are pregnant by 12
[10:07] months and 95% of couples are pregnant.
[10:10] But I was probably, like, overly optimistic and thought that I
[10:13] would be, you know, the overachiever, that kind of first
[10:16] try kind of girl. And that was definitely not my
[10:19] experience, which was, yeah, interesting.
[10:22] Good for my career to have their empathy I guess and the journey.
[10:27] Learning on the job. Yeah, exactly.
[10:29] Yeah, exactly. Almost like new too much.
[10:31] And it became like pretty stressful quite quickly as each
[10:33] month went by. And so yeah, and interesting
[10:36] mesh of like the science I already knew, but my life
[10:39] experience, I found it difficult to lean on the science.
[10:43] Yeah, and talking about your career, can you tell us a little
[10:47] bit about what you do and how you came to be?
[10:50] Here I came to hear you. So I'm I'm a registered
[10:52] dietitian and my passion area as Women's Health.
[10:56] I often say to my clients that I just think physiologically
[11:00] females are so much more interesting than being sorry
[11:02] boys. And I just absolutely love like
[11:06] my day today workers empowering women to understand how
[11:08] nutrition can make an impact, whatever their symptoms are.
[11:11] And we either they are along that reproductive timeline in
[11:15] our lives. And I think so much, you know,
[11:18] with journeys like Indo or PCs, things are happening to a person
[11:22] and nutrition I think is such a cool way to empower people to be
[11:26] a part of their own team and do things to help themselves.
[11:29] Well, definitely. You've mentioned fertility, Indo
[11:33] PCSOs. What is the most common thing
[11:35] that you see coming up in your clinic?
[11:37] Is it one of those or is it something else?
[11:39] Honestly, it kind of changes depending on trends.
[11:42] Like at the moment hearing menopause is kind of the really
[11:45] spoken about topic, which is amazing.
[11:48] So I'm seeing lots of clients in that kind of realm wanting
[11:51] support and education. And I work with doctors and
[11:55] specialists. We share our building and you
[11:57] know the people eat my lunch with everyday.
[11:59] So lots of my workers, endometriosis, adenomyosis and
[12:03] supporting women on the back of surgery as well.
[12:05] I don't really have an easy answer for that because it
[12:07] changes depending on what the kind of yeah the buzz is at the
[12:11] time. We are definitely seeing an
[12:14] influx of people being curious about perimenopause as well,
[12:19] which is really interesting because I don't think
[12:21] statistically there's more people going through it
[12:24] necessarily, but the awareness is clearly increasing and people
[12:28] are actually realising that there are triggers and levers
[12:31] that you can pull to make that a better experience for you.
[12:34] Definitely. Yeah, and so amazing to hear
[12:36] that they're reaching out to the likes of you.
[12:39] For help, yeah, I think. I think what's so amazing about
[12:43] being a dietitian is diet is something that impacts every
[12:46] single person. We all have to eat to survive.
[12:49] And so it's such a cool realm to work and where you can help
[12:53] people take something that they're already doing, make
[12:57] tweaks to sort of change their outcomes of their health.
[13:02] Hmm. So and you, you touched on there
[13:05] about women being super interesting and more interesting
[13:09] than men, which I have to say I agree.
[13:10] With. Can you obviously we go through
[13:14] a hormonal cycle that that men don't tend to go go through.
[13:17] Can you explain a little bit about our how our dietary needs
[13:20] shift during the different menstrual phases of our cycle?
[13:24] Yeah, definitely. So I'm sure a lot of your
[13:27] listeners, I mean if you're listening to the cyclist and
[13:30] it's kind of in the name, isn't it, I'm sure they would know a
[13:32] lot about the cycle, really. But I guess just to recap and we
[13:35] have for work he faces cycle and with each phase of our cycle,
[13:40] the hormonal changes that are happening can influence our
[13:42] experience in our body. So women will often comment on
[13:46] things like mood changes, appetite changes, libido
[13:49] changes, digestion changes. Some of those symptoms are
[13:53] great, like it's great to have more libido and to lift heavier
[13:55] weights, but some of the symptoms probably aren't so
[13:58] great. So things like the bloating, the
[14:00] Constipation, ovulation, pain, just to name a few.
[14:03] And there's some evidence that tweaking your diet across your
[14:05] cycle based on the hormonal chapter that you're in can
[14:08] really help with your symptoms. So if I kind of start off with
[14:11] the follicular phase, which is as you're kind of you've begun
[14:14] your periods and you're building up to the point of ovulation.
[14:18] And that part of our cycle, we are what we would call oestrogen
[14:21] dominant. So you mostly have oestrogen
[14:23] running around your system and looking at nutrition and how
[14:26] oestrogen influences that. Oestrogen makes us more insulin
[14:30] sensitive, which I'm going to come back to it in a little bit
[14:33] later, I think. But basically what that means is
[14:35] our glucose uptake is improved. So often women will find in this
[14:40] part of our cycle, our appetite is actually much lower.
[14:42] And I kind of joke with my clients, it's because our
[14:44] appetite is high for something else, because this is where we
[14:47] must reach out. I think you should.
[14:50] And, and, and that part of our cycle where we're more able to
[14:53] like lift TV or weights. There's lots of research around
[14:56] our athletic performance and that part of our cycle.
[14:58] And it's probably because of that glucose uptake, which is
[15:00] pretty cool. I work a lot with young female
[15:03] athletes and I talk a lot in this part of our cycle.
[15:06] Woman can be at risk of under fuelling if you're really active
[15:09] because you don't have the trigger of appetite to drive you
[15:11] to aid as much as you do in other parts of your cycle.
[15:13] So that's something to be aware of fear.
[15:16] And because of their oestrogen buildouts, there's a
[15:18] relationship also between your gut function and oestrogen
[15:21] clearance. So our gut bacteria are really
[15:24] amazing. They're able to act as these
[15:26] recyclers so they can put back hormones into our system if we
[15:29] need extra, but they can also act as excreters, so have to
[15:32] clear oestrogen from our body as well through our bowel motions.
[15:36] So looking at good prebiotic and taking good fibre intake at this
[15:39] part of your cycle is also really interesting.
[15:41] So think plant based foods and I also like to encourage my
[15:45] clients and their follicular phase as your uterine lining is
[15:48] developing, so the endometrium is getting nice and thick and
[15:51] obviously you've just come off the back of your period.
[15:53] Zooming in on iron containing foods is also quite relevant as
[15:56] well. So iron is attached to red blood
[15:59] cells. So women are more at risk of
[16:01] iron deficiency. The men, because we loads iron
[16:03] every month, will make the blade, if that makes sense.
[16:05] So looking at iron in this part of the cycle is really useful as
[16:08] well. So that would be your follicular
[16:10] phase. So I guess to summarise, be
[16:12] aware of appetite suppression, be aware of the fibre importance
[16:15] for probiotic purposes and to look after your digestion and
[16:18] zoom in on their eye in front as well.
[16:21] Then we come to ovulation, which is kind of that grand midpoint
[16:24] of our cycle where you'll have the ovulation occur.
[16:27] Hormonally, what's happening is you're getting a decline in
[16:30] oestrogen and you're handing over the torch to another
[16:32] hormone called produced your own, which I'm sure lots of
[16:35] people have heard of as well. Most women don't even like have
[16:39] this experience of feeling ovulation, but some women
[16:41] experience ovulation pain, which is something that I have woman
[16:45] with in clinic. And to mitigate some of those
[16:47] symptoms, I talk about the effect of anti-inflammatory
[16:50] foods. So things like omega-3 rich
[16:53] foods. So things like your oily fish,
[16:55] avocado, olive oil, chia seeds, hemp seeds, all those yummy
[16:58] things. And antioxidant rich foods can
[17:01] also be really helpful. So those are really important.
[17:03] So they're anti-inflammatory property, but also for the DNA
[17:06] quality of our eggs, which is very interesting.
[17:08] So think antioxidant is like a colour compound and fruits,
[17:12] particularly berries and all of your colourful vegetables as
[17:15] well. Yeah.
[17:16] And then once you leave your ovulation phase, you and what we
[17:19] call the luteal phase, which is last basically from the
[17:23] ovulation point through to the unique day one.
[17:26] So the next beginning of your period, I think this is the part
[17:29] of our cycle where most women will experience the most
[17:32] symptoms. So this is where you're likely
[17:34] to experience PMS or premenstrual syndrome, which can
[17:38] look like lots of different collection of symptoms for
[17:40] different women. But common complaints I'll see
[17:42] here when progesterones hanging around.
[17:44] Progesterone slows your gut trends at times.
[17:47] So it basically takes so much longer for food to move through
[17:50] your system. That's quite adorable actually.
[17:52] It's your body giving you an yourself more opportunity to
[17:56] absorb nutrients from food cause produced your own stands for
[18:00] produce station. So there's a chance you might
[18:02] get pregnant. Does that make sense?
[18:03] So your body's nice and trying to give you more opportunity to
[18:07] get nutrition from what you're eating.
[18:08] But that can come with side effects.
[18:10] Are you know, if you have irritable bowel syndrome, you
[18:12] might notice you're below thing's worse.
[18:14] You might notice you're more constipated cause everything's
[18:16] kind of sluggish and the lead up right before your period to that
[18:20] late luteal phase, woman will often experience their bowel
[18:23] swinging in the opposite direction.
[18:25] So like their period poke phenomenon that muscle resonate
[18:28] with and it's progesterone, but it's also something called
[18:31] prostaglandin is starting to come into your system and they
[18:35] cause smooth muscle when your body to contract and that's what
[18:37] your uterus is made from. So the cramping but also your
[18:41] large intestine. So whoever designed us didn't do
[18:43] a great job making those designs from the same probably a man
[18:48] probably do. And so that prostaglandin can
[18:52] impact your digestion as well as that uterine cramping as well.
[18:55] So some of the things that I talk about in this part of our
[18:58] cycle, that luteal phase magnesium can be really
[19:01] impactful for is a muscle relaxant.
[19:04] So reducing cramping and period pain and that valve spasming
[19:08] effect. And it's also great for our
[19:10] mental health and our mood regulation as well.
[19:13] So the decline in your progesterone levels right before
[19:15] your period is where women will start to experience that kind of
[19:19] mood and stability. Yeah, which lots of people
[19:21] resonate with. And that's probably because
[19:24] produced your own helps us to access neurotransmitters, the
[19:27] main and serotonin, which make our brain feel really nice in
[19:30] the way literally having this withdrawal from feel nice
[19:33] neurotransmitters. So that's why we can become more
[19:35] irritable. Our patience is a little bit
[19:37] less. I always say to, you know, my
[19:39] clients, it's like shit we put up with for the other, you know,
[19:43] 20 or so days, which we just not going to put up with that part
[19:45] of our cycle. So there's some evidence that
[19:47] magnesium supplementation can be really useful for those mental
[19:50] wellbeing points as well. Progesterone actually increases
[19:55] your metabolic rate as well, which is really interesting.
[19:57] So women will often feel hungrier at that luteal phase
[20:01] versus their follicular phase. The oestrogen as a person and
[20:04] the appetites. So I would say lean in.
[20:07] I think too many women prescribed the nutrition like
[20:10] this is what I have for breakfast.
[20:11] This is why I take to work for my lunches and they don't allow
[20:14] any metabolic flexibility around Actually I'm hungrier than I was
[20:18] yesterday. What else do I want to eat or do
[20:20] I need more food today? So the temple isn't higher.
[20:23] Yay. And your body wants you to eat
[20:25] more food. Lean into it.
[20:26] It's always a great at that point as well.
[20:29] And cravings is kind of the other thing I talked about with
[20:31] woman in this part of this cycle and I always find that adding in
[20:35] high protein foods to help. Was it kind of hormonal
[20:38] variation that's going on? That load of regularity as well
[20:41] can be really useful. So bumping up their protein,
[20:43] particularly lunch and afternoon tea time to help with energy
[20:46] levels. And so lots to talk about.
[20:49] Another trial phase. And then we're still kind of the
[20:51] last phase of your cycle is your menstrual phase.
[20:53] So when you're having your period.
[20:54] And there again, I would certainly on things like iron
[20:57] because of their blood loss and aware of your own dietary
[21:01] intolerance in terms of their digestion.
[21:03] Some of the things I'll sometimes talk about there with
[21:05] clients is bumping up what we call soluble fibre.
[21:08] It just kind of happens to bulk up your bowel motions and make
[21:10] them a little restless, silly. And husk is a really kind of
[21:13] easy to remember example of this, which you can add to
[21:15] smoothies or take as a supplement.
[21:17] And again, learning into high protein at this time of your
[21:20] cycle as well. That's so interesting.
[21:25] I love that we get to horse podcast cause I just learn so
[21:28] many new things. I, as you were talking, I was
[21:31] thinking it's probably people driving at home wishing they
[21:34] could frantically take notes. And we've actually worked with
[21:36] Sarah on a free downloadable that you can download to help
[21:38] you follow these throughout your cycle.
[21:40] So that will be available now, which will give more details
[21:43] about over on our socials. But that's something handy that
[21:46] you'll be able to take to help you learn to think your cycles,
[21:50] which is really exciting. And I personally am, have been
[21:53] loving following that because I think we can look at our cycles
[21:56] as something like, ohh, I've got bloating.
[21:58] Ohh, my bowels are low. So, you know, that can feel
[22:00] really irritating that you can also like while you were
[22:02] speaking, I was thinking how empowering it is that we have
[22:05] opportunity to manage it and to if we're listening to it, we can
[22:10] put the right things into our body to help facilitate what
[22:13] it's needing, which I think is so empowering for women.
[22:17] Yeah, there's a real opportunity, I think as women to
[22:21] really understand how to listen to our bodies and take the cues.
[22:25] I'm a big believer that throughout the month our body is
[22:28] sending us different cues for things that aren't right and how
[22:31] we need to adapt our behaviour. But society kind of puts us down
[22:35] this path of being quite prescriptive.
[22:37] Like you're on this Diyers that looks rigid every single day.
[22:41] And I think you've done a really nice job there of explaining
[22:45] very clearly that it's not the same everyday right down from a
[22:49] fundamental hormonal change and the symptoms that come from
[22:53] that. So how do we TuneIn more and
[22:55] listen more and make tweaks and adaptions to suit where we're
[22:59] at? I think it's it's really cool.
[23:03] Yeah, it's really exciting. I had a question while you were
[23:05] speaking, Sarah. What is like, how long does it
[23:09] take for that change to happen? If I'm starting to eat really
[23:13] foods that you suggested, high Omega foods to help in the in
[23:17] the latter half of my cycle, is that something that I'm going to
[23:19] see in that cycle or is that gonna take three months of
[23:22] change from me eating this way for my cycle?
[23:25] Does that make sense? How long does that change take?
[23:27] Probably depend on like the target nutrition point we're
[23:31] talking about. So like the sodium husk example
[23:34] or the magnesium example I gave, because of how those products or
[23:39] supplements are absorbed and used in the body that impact us
[23:42] really, really quick versus things like antioxidants or
[23:45] anti-inflammatory diet principles take so much longer
[23:48] to come to fruition. And so I don't know if that
[23:52] answers your question. It depends on what we're talking
[23:54] about. It probably depends a lot on on
[23:55] the individual as well. I think that having a really
[23:58] good baseline, not perfection, but like, you know, if we're
[24:01] talking about anti-inflammatory eating, you'd want those
[24:04] nutrients like the omega-3 and the antioxidant around all the
[24:07] time. And maybe you zoom in on some of
[24:09] those pretzels at certain parts of your cycle.
[24:12] Yeah, as an increase. And on the magnesium part, I
[24:17] come from the supplement world so very aware of the fact that
[24:21] our soils in New Zealand are quite lacking in certain
[24:24] nutrients, vitamins and minerals, magnesium being one of
[24:29] them being another example. What would you say are the key
[24:33] watch outs for women specifically in terms of what we
[24:37] may not be getting through our food source because it lacks in
[24:40] the soil within our food chain in New Zealand?
[24:43] And I mean, if you look at like rates of deficiency in New
[24:46] Zealand and like they supplement advice that we give like kind of
[24:49] an administrative health level, like iodine is a really
[24:52] important one that you might have heard of before.
[24:55] So iodine is a mineral that's meant to be found in the soil,
[24:59] but it's really display in New Zealand, as you mentioned
[25:02] before, CAT. And iodine is really crucial for
[25:04] thyroid house, which is really important for things like our
[25:07] metabolism, but it's also involved in this cycle as well.
[25:10] And then in pregnancy and during breastfeeding.
[25:13] We know that iodine is also really important for baby's
[25:15] brain development, for babies, thyroid gland development as
[25:18] well. So I've done a really important
[25:20] one for people to be aware of and iron is a big one and that's
[25:23] the less about nutrients in the soil, but maybe more restrictive
[25:27] of females being more risk of deficiency than men, which I
[25:30] mentioned before. And also kind of looking at
[25:33] nutrition trains like plant based eating or being vegan or
[25:36] vegetarian or understandably, lots of people have
[25:39] environmental and animal our fair concerns that come into how
[25:42] people choose to eat as well in. So Ion is a big one that I talk
[25:45] about with woman. Something aware of the
[25:48] prevalence of iron deficiency anaemia, what the symptoms are
[25:50] like and how you can reduce your risk through making really easy
[25:53] nutrition changes. And for a lot of people looking
[25:56] at low dose supplementation across the board can be really
[25:59] valuable as well. Vitamin D is a big one, which
[26:02] has got almost nothing to do with food and everything to do
[26:05] with sunlight exposure and again, how modern females are
[26:09] living. So for those who arena, we have
[26:11] vitamin D synthesis happens when our skin is exposed to sunlight
[26:15] and we get most of our vitamin D like we say from production as
[26:19] opposed to our diet. There's a little bit of vitamin
[26:21] D and egg yolks and a little bit better than to dairy products at
[26:26] the manufacturer level. But most of our vitamin D comes
[26:29] from the sunlight. So you know, seasonal
[26:31] supplementation. I have to tell my clients to
[26:33] take a vitamin D supplement basically as daylight savings
[26:36] Inns. And then you can probably just
[26:38] continue at when daylight savings begins again like in
[26:41] October in New Zealand. Anyway, I think the big one and
[26:43] vitamin D we know is involved in things like fertility.
[26:46] Our ovaries have vitamin D receptors and we have no idea
[26:49] why, which is super interesting. So, well, there's some research
[26:53] that vitamin D supplementation can reduce time to conception
[26:56] and couples not going through IVF, which is really interesting
[27:00] as well, like vitamin D research around autoimmune diseases like
[27:04] celiac disease, Crohn's disease. So there's lots there that we
[27:07] don't know enough about you. As vitamin D is such an
[27:10] interesting one because we're what we sell a lot of skin care
[27:16] here as well. So we're big advocates for
[27:18] wearing sunscreen everyday, but people don't actually understand
[27:22] the the trade-offs of that. I distinctly remember I had a
[27:26] friend who had a cut quite a colicky grumpy baby and the
[27:30] match pass recommended actually trying to get that baby in the
[27:34] broad sunlight, kind of early hours of the morning, late hours
[27:37] of the afternoon. And what a fundamental
[27:39] difference. That small tweak of 5 minutes a
[27:43] day getting sun exposure made to this baby's mood was incredible.
[27:49] So, yeah, how do we get the vitamin D and actually through
[27:53] the sun when we can obviously and summer and daylight saving
[27:56] without the side effect of the exposure to skin cancer that we
[28:01] unfortunately have here in New Zealand is an interesting
[28:04] balance. And, and yeah, I think the
[28:07] approach to supplementation seasonally is, is a practical
[28:10] and, and really helpful one. Yeah, but definitely something
[28:13] we've been learning a lot more about vitamin D and fertility.
[28:16] And that's so interesting to hear.
[28:18] They don't know why. That's fascinating, isn't it?
[28:22] There in the ovaries, it's very cool.
[28:25] Very, very cool. And this is just on
[28:28] supplementation. It's really interesting because
[28:31] quite often when I go to the naturopath, I'm, I might have
[28:34] done a blood test and I'm I'm low on something and they
[28:36] suggest eating more of this type of food to try and boost that
[28:39] up. This is probably a hard question
[28:42] to answer in entirety, but when, when is the line between you can
[28:47] solve this with food and nutritional needs versus you
[28:50] need to start considering supplementation to get you to
[28:53] the level that you need to be like what's the process that you
[28:57] go to decide that? I understand that's a very broad
[28:59] question, but like what are the, what are the things that you
[29:03] would look into to make a decision around that?
[29:06] It would depend on I mean like a the nutrient be like the level
[29:11] that someone has. So if I can talk to like iron as
[29:14] an example to get like a working example.
[29:16] So we store lion or something called ferritin in our body and
[29:20] then our body can access that store of ferritin kind of like a
[29:23] bank, like taking withdrawals or something to maintain your iron
[29:26] and circulation. So a New Zealand, you'll feel it
[29:29] and levels are considered adequate if they're between 20
[29:32] to 200 and you're not considered, you know, to have a
[29:36] deficiency level until your levels are less than 20.
[29:39] But you know, in women who are having a period, I think a level
[29:43] of 50, so 1450, not a 14 of 19 is more optimal.
[29:49] And so if I had a client come to work with me, they had symptoms
[29:52] of fatigue and breathlessness, you know, feeling exhaustion.
[29:58] They maybe have industrious, they've got heavy periods, maybe
[30:01] the pump based, maybe they're runner.
[30:04] So their iron needs are also higher.
[30:05] And they had a federation of say, you know, between 20 and
[30:09] 25, I would definitely be supplementing them because I
[30:12] think the reality is, is so much working towards them being
[30:15] unable to eat enough to put their their ferritin and the
[30:19] positive direction, if that makes sense.
[30:21] And there's so many different limitations to how people make
[30:25] decisions around food and how they're able to balance enough.
[30:27] So I mean, new graduate may would have said like, no,
[30:31] absolutely you can get everything you need from diet.
[30:33] There is no place for supplements.
[30:35] And I eat so much humble pie on that.
[30:38] You know, previous opinion I would have had because I think,
[30:42] you know, when you look at the research around supplementation
[30:44] specific nutrients to get a therapeutic effects, like when
[30:48] we're talking about magnesium and omega-3 to give us
[30:52] therapeutic effects, like a dose that's high enough to change
[30:54] symptom in your body, it's almost impossible to eat enough.
[30:57] I think that baseline lifestyle indicted rice is really
[31:01] important. You can't have one without the
[31:02] other. Does that make sense?
[31:05] But that's less for supplements. But it needs to be tailored, so
[31:09] I kind of can't answer your question.
[31:12] No, I think that's that's good because I think it is quite
[31:15] confusing when people say you can solve everything through
[31:20] food. And I do think that there's a
[31:21] limitation. So just the awareness that you
[31:24] need to understand what is practical because it's it's I
[31:27] mean, in the perfect world, it would all come from diets,
[31:31] right? But we're all working or parents
[31:34] or have busy lifestyles or reasons that we can't each, you
[31:39] know, that might be financials, a whole lot of factors that play
[31:42] into the diet that we do ease. And so understanding that in the
[31:48] modern world or probably in any generation really, that there
[31:53] are some areas that we will need to supplement to to boost that
[31:56] up and reach optimal health. I think is is great to.
[31:59] Know I agree, Sarah, there was a a statistic or a study that came
[32:05] across my Instagram feed and I sent it to you immediately
[32:08] because I get really mindful to not get caught up in things
[32:12] whether they're true or not. And so I was sitting to you and
[32:15] I was like, I'm going to say this to chat about on the
[32:17] podcast. I'm going to read the study out.
[32:19] It said a major study reveals impact of gluten, coffee, dairy
[32:22] and alcohol. The study found that 45% of
[32:24] those who stopped eating gluten and 45% of those who cut it out
[32:28] to reduce pain. The study involved 2 1/2
[32:31] thousand people and they want to know what your thoughts on that.
[32:34] That was paraphrased. So I hope that made sense for
[32:35] you. But basically, I found it really
[32:38] interesting because I'm someone who's played around a lot with
[32:41] you with diet for my endometriosis.
[32:44] And I have done so over the years.
[32:45] And it's hard to find the line and being restrictive, but also
[32:49] figuring out what's helpful. And I saw the study come across,
[32:52] which looked reasonably promising, but also included a
[32:55] lot of foods that I really enjoy doing.
[32:58] What is your thoughts on the study specifically and diet for
[33:01] endometriosis? I think it's a good Christian.
[33:03] And I also like appreciate, like, it's so tricky, isn't it
[33:07] like the, like making your way through research and stuff that
[33:11] kind of gets picked up by the media.
[33:13] And in terms of nutrition with its own challenge, this research
[33:17] isn't really news. Like this sample size you
[33:19] referenced is definitely more significant than what we've
[33:22] seen. But I think you need dietician
[33:24] or naturopath. Working in this space of
[33:25] endometriosis and nutrition has been telling women for years the
[33:29] relationship between power pain, bladder issues, bowel issues,
[33:33] and some of the things we've spoken to the GS, gluten and
[33:35] dairy, caffeine and alcohol. And obviously I feel like those
[33:39] are like the four yummiest things.
[33:42] Just you're just missing sugar, really.
[33:46] And I mean like how so my thoughts on the research are
[33:49] amazing that we've got like the larger sample size because
[33:52] obviously with statistical and power, the bigger the sample
[33:55] size are kind of more that those studies can translate into
[33:59] advice that we're giving an A public health and population
[34:02] level, right. How I use that advice with my
[34:05] clients in clinic is I am, I think someone's entire system is
[34:11] really important, including so not just the endo, but their
[34:13] relationship with showed how they live their lives, their
[34:16] kind of broader nutritional needs.
[34:18] So kind of one of the ways that I take research like that is
[34:21] when I do a diet assessment, I would always start with, and I
[34:25] think there's more evidence for the closure on side of things
[34:27] than the dairy as an example. And there's lots of reasons I
[34:31] can go into why we think that there's an association between
[34:34] collision and power pain. And you know, if that would be
[34:36] interesting for people. So when you look at kind of the
[34:40] research that comes out from overseas, there's a couple of
[34:43] theories about why this change and gluten intake has resulted
[34:47] in a reduction in power pain in people with endometriosis.
[34:50] One of the big theories is that gluten is the protein belonging
[34:54] and lots of different and carbohydrate foods, including
[34:57] weights as a grain and weight as a FODMAP, which is a type of
[35:01] segmentable carbohydrate that's more likely to not digest well
[35:05] in your small intestine and therefore make its way into your
[35:08] large intestine, which is where all your gut bacteria live.
[35:11] Your large intestine sits within a space in your body called your
[35:15] pouch of Douglas, which if anyone listening has had
[35:19] endometriosis surgery. You're like, Oh my God, I've
[35:21] heard of that before. It's the most common site where
[35:23] either diseases found. So I guess to imagine it and
[35:26] your body, your uterus is like the ham and the sandwich between
[35:29] the bladder and the bowl. And a lot of women don't
[35:31] understand the close proximity of those organs, which is really
[35:34] interesting. So because of that, lots of
[35:36] women with India will have bowel related issues.
[35:39] So irritable bowel syndrome, bloating and the link between
[35:42] bloating and power pain and nausea and other symptoms may
[35:45] hear a lot of women talking about.
[35:46] So you're the first theory with collagen is, is it just that
[35:49] women have excluded this huge FODMAP food from their diet with
[35:54] most people eating, you think about Western eating, there's
[35:58] like a big representation of what in the diet isn't there?
[36:00] So is it that that made a big difference in reducing bloating
[36:03] and therefore carpet pain? The other kind of theory is
[36:06] actually more on the gluten. So there's some really
[36:09] interesting research which looks at the genetic link or that gene
[36:14] shearing that goes on between endometriosis related genes and
[36:18] other autoimmune disease genes like celiac disease, which is
[36:21] like super interesting. Celiac disease is an autoimmune
[36:24] disease in response to gluten. So the other kind of big theory
[36:27] is, is actually the relationship between Indo and the immune
[36:31] system could endo potentially be an autoimmune disease.
[36:35] We don't know yet. But when you look at autoimmune
[36:37] diseases like GRACE disease, Hashimotos, which have thyroid
[36:41] conditions, rheumatoid arthritis, celiac disease, a lot
[36:44] of the nutrition recommendation there is to obviously be gluten
[36:47] free, which I think is really interesting.
[36:49] And when someone's looking at the research, like, you know,
[36:52] you need to avoid caffeine, alcohol, gluten and dairy.
[36:55] You don't have to do them all at once would be the other thing
[36:57] someone could think about. So you might just start with
[36:59] one. You might go, OK, I'm gonna join
[37:01] experience experiment where I just, I'm gonna do gluten free
[37:04] for a month or cycle and see how I feel.
[37:06] And if that felt great and you had a reduction in symptoms, I
[37:09] think it's really relevant to kind of like test your
[37:12] threshold, bring back in small amounts of weight and work out
[37:15] how much can they getaway with if you like before I tip on and
[37:18] to getting symptoms again. And I think alcohol, I mean, we
[37:22] have no nutritional need for alcohol.
[37:24] And I could rent for a fight podcasts around the event.
[37:29] I will be there for you on that one.
[37:31] More consumption. It's yeah, this summer you've
[37:34] done something. Alcohol to breast cancer swept
[37:37] Stephenson's anxiety. I could go on forever.
[37:39] And so they might be really easy one to kind of let go of.
[37:42] And I feel like it's almost becoming increasingly cool to be
[37:46] sober or there's somebody non alcoholic alternatives now.
[37:49] Like it's exciting being in the generation where it's okay not
[37:51] to drink and then with caffeine, okay, think it's about
[37:55] exploring, yeah, people's caffeine use.
[37:58] Like why are you using caffeine to get through your day to sleep
[38:01] quality? Like, you know, are you eating
[38:02] enough optimal energy? I kind of try to protect dearie
[38:06] as much as I can because it's such a valuable source of
[38:08] protein for woman. And I think the risk of being
[38:10] gluten free, anti refreeze, you're getting really, really
[38:13] restrictive in terms of variety of foods.
[38:15] But for some clients with endometriosis, being dairy free
[38:19] is really impactful for their symptom management as well.
[38:23] I love what you said there because so I when I came off, I
[38:27] decided I wanted to come off the pill in my early 20s and my
[38:30] period pain came back with a vengeance because I had not
[38:34] dealt with the endo that I clearly was hiding by being on
[38:38] the pill. And the single most impactful
[38:41] thing was going on to a strokes low inflammatory diet.
[38:46] Sorry, I went from having crippling period pain to almost
[38:50] no period pain just from diet twigs.
[38:52] But the challenge was a complete that was so no alcohol, no
[38:56] sugar, no dairy, no gluten, no coffee.
[39:01] It was so restrictive. It was really actually hard to
[39:04] be social when I was cutting all of those groups of food out.
[39:09] You know, you become that annoying person that someone
[39:11] invites you over for dinner and you're like, ohh, I'm not
[39:13] eating. This this this this.
[39:14] That I just it's not sustainable for me long term.
[39:17] But I love what you said there around find the one that's the
[39:22] big trigger for you and then test your tolerance.
[39:24] Like that feels so much more achievable than going, I'm going
[39:27] to completely cut all of these food groups out, which like you
[39:31] say with the dairy example, can actually be a little bit
[39:35] detrimental because you need to really understand, okay, well,
[39:37] if I'm going to cut that full group out, what am I lacking and
[39:41] where do I need to change? Make other tweaks of my diet to
[39:43] ensure that I'm getting enough protein or calcium or what have
[39:47] you. That's a really nice invitation
[39:52] for people to try different things and find what level of
[39:57] tweak they need to make to drive.
[40:00] A fundamental difference in their pain or whatever it is
[40:03] that they're trying to solve. For I think it's such a slippery
[40:06] slope sometimes. I, in my early years of chronic
[40:10] health issues, got definitely into the blurry area of
[40:13] disordered eating because I was trying to fix my diet or my
[40:17] issues, sorry through diet. And I did become really
[40:19] restrictive because I called Turkey.
[40:20] Just cut everything out. And then you realise you're
[40:23] quite nutrient deficient because you aren't eating enough for
[40:26] eating enough variety. And for me, I've managed that in
[40:30] a way where where I can control it.
[40:32] When I'm at home, I be gluten free.
[40:34] But if I'm out and about, I just eat what's on the table or
[40:37] what's been served net than they is OK at the my tolerance
[40:40] because I've managed to test that out.
[40:42] And that's been a really nice way because I don't feel like I
[40:44] have to turn up to the social event and be like, ohh, guys,
[40:46] I'm good for free and also donate garlic or, you know,
[40:49] there's all these things and I just let it go over that one
[40:52] night and hope I know my body is in a better place personally, so
[40:55] I can tolerate that. But it is nice to find where you
[40:58] sit within that because it can it can be really hard to manage.
[41:02] What advice would you have for people who are wanting to to
[41:06] figure out what's triggering them but do it in a way that
[41:08] doesn't feel super restrictive? Me.
[41:13] Like imagining if we take the four so like that we mentioned
[41:16] in the study, so the caffeine and alcohol, the Terry the float
[41:19] in and, you know, like doing a bit of a a so diary, not to be
[41:23] critical of yourself, but more curious, like actually, how much
[41:25] am I eating of these foods? I think is a really nice leads
[41:28] to start with, because I think a lot of people are over and eat
[41:31] much dairy or don't we have much gluten and kind of when you
[41:33] begin to try and get like, ohh, interesting.
[41:35] I kind of stay there so that more than I thought I would or
[41:39] pink coffee might be another example of alcohol.
[41:41] And then maybe think about like what you'd be happy to go
[41:44] without. I think with gluten being gluten
[41:46] free now it's definitely more expensive, but this so many
[41:49] amazing products, like lots of food is naturally gluten free,
[41:52] which is tastier and cheaper than the special gluten free
[41:56] alternative. So like, you know, swapping from
[41:57] serving pasta with a meal to rice or quinoa or Millet, like
[42:02] amazing gluten free grains, which are really easy and
[42:05] delicious to cook and just kind of reducing the exclusion load
[42:08] across your day can be really interesting.
[42:11] I think kind of psychologically breaking it down to like a month
[42:14] experiment can be really useful for people.
[42:16] So rather than make, you know, forever more, I sera have to be
[42:19] gluten free, alcohol free, care free and free dairy free.
[42:22] That's really hard for people to get their head around, but
[42:24] starting with one group at a time and being consistent with
[42:27] it for a month and seeing how you feel and then bringing kind
[42:30] of small increments back in to test your threshold to kind of
[42:34] speak to your point just around, You know, for the most part, you
[42:37] eat a certain way when you're at home and you're kind of in more
[42:39] control of what you offer and yourself and your family.
[42:41] And then when you're out and about, you kind of more liberal
[42:43] with what you eat. I always say with clients to me,
[42:46] it's about informed decision making.
[42:47] Like instead of ohh, my gosh, I've got bloating or covered
[42:51] pain. I don't know why this is
[42:52] happening. And I'm feeling, you know, that
[42:54] kind of pain spiral and feeling really out of control and the
[42:57] injustice of, you know, of India and the symptoms you might be
[43:00] experiencing. To me, Photos have been informed
[43:02] decision making. It's not that you have to be on
[43:04] Friday, but you might choose to, you know, you're going out for a
[43:08] meal. I could order the gluten free
[43:09] pasta or look through pizza and maybe a little bit better for
[43:12] it. But there's some meals are like,
[43:13] you know what, I'm just gonna have to order.
[43:15] And I know I'm gonna feel like this the next day.
[43:17] But I chose that and I understand why it's happening.
[43:20] Does that make sense? Differently, yeah.
[43:23] I think that mindset shift for me has been hugely beneficial on
[43:27] my journey. I think it's really helpful.
[43:29] Well. And we've talked a little bit
[43:33] about Indo, but PCOS, are there any, we've got this coming up a
[43:37] lot in our community. Are there any specific tips or
[43:42] tricks that you could recommend around insulin resistance and
[43:45] weight gain related to PCs that you could manage through diet?
[43:51] We should totally do like a whole probably in your idea
[43:53] around this like the PCs girls deserve so much attention and so
[43:58] many women with Indo have PCs so this is like really not your
[44:02] listeners I'm sure. I will.
[44:04] I will quickly say we're kind of doing a general overview with
[44:07] with Sarah just to get as much information as possible, but
[44:09] we're hoping to get her back to do some deep dives on specific
[44:11] topics, so hopefully we can go into deep.
[44:14] This is flirting with the idea of talking about.
[44:16] Yeah, yeah, totally. Supporting today so with PCOS
[44:23] and polycystic ovarian syndrome and 90% of women with PC, which
[44:27] is thought to have insulin resistance and even up to like
[44:30] 70% and woman with something called lean PCs.
[44:33] I don't love it too, but it's still kind of used in the
[44:36] medical world as well. So resistance, insulin
[44:40] resistance, if I kind of start off with what is there to
[44:42] antillon is almond. It's not a six hole mimic
[44:44] oestrogen on progesterone, but hormones in your body cause and
[44:48] effect to happen or stop an effect to happen.
[44:50] So think about them like an on off switch.
[44:52] And Sterling's job in our body is to correct our blood sugar
[44:55] levels after you get up a bunch of arise after weeks owed.
[44:58] And Tim also has a role in fat metabolism as well on how our
[45:02] body stores body weight as well. And so insulin resistance means
[45:05] that woman with PCs who have insulin resistance, they're
[45:08] making more of the hormone insulin to correct their blood
[45:12] sugar levels after they eat a meal versus woman who is
[45:15] sensitive to insulin, which means he'll make a small amount
[45:17] of their hormone to do the same job, if that makes sense.
[45:21] And insulin resistance connects to PCs because the high levels
[45:25] of insulin and circulation. So because of that resistance,
[45:28] there's more insulin swimming around this woman's blood
[45:30] stream. And it's thought that that
[45:32] insulin production influences the ovaries to favour
[45:36] testosterone production versus oestrogen production.
[45:40] And there's a very careful balance of hormones for females
[45:43] to allow ovulation to occur, which is all females actually
[45:46] tosterone. But we should make very small
[45:48] amounts to that and then mostly oestrogen.
[45:50] And so when PC wise, there's an imbalance of slightly too much
[45:53] testosterone compared to oestrogen and many women with
[45:56] PCOS and that causes, you know, the every diver ovulation,
[46:00] sometimes no period at all, lots of different symptoms like
[46:04] sometimes fertility struggles here growing in places they
[46:07] might not want it to. Sending of the here on the here
[46:10] technique to kind of name the few.
[46:12] So a lot of the work that I do to help women with PCs is to
[46:15] target their insulin resistance. If we correct the insulin
[46:18] resistance and reduce that circulating insulin, we can have
[46:21] really profound impact on the cycle.
[46:24] If you Google Pacewicz and nutrition do people isn't Google
[46:27] anymore. I feel like I could say that
[46:30] instead PCs, like a lot of the advice is like cut carbs, kiddo.
[46:36] And that's because when we eat carbohydrates, they breakdown
[46:39] into glucose and will feature glucose levels and that rise and
[46:42] glucose is what triggers your body to release into.
[46:44] And that we have so much really good evidence to seduce that
[46:48] women need carbohydrates to ovulate.
[46:50] And so I've met many clients with PCs who go on these like
[46:53] kiddo crusades. I'll cut carbs, my pesos would
[46:56] be there within underrating. And this cycle can often become
[46:59] worse. So instead, I think it's really
[47:02] important to understand how you build meals around carbohydrates
[47:06] can have such a big impact on their insulin resistance.
[47:08] So I can kind of shoot through that now.
[47:10] I talk with my hands a lot. So if you're not saying this
[47:13] missing out on my hand shots with carbohydrate load.
[47:19] So if you think about this idea of glycemic load of a meal, so
[47:23] when you eat a carbohydrate food, we can change how quickly
[47:27] and how much. So their food will turn into
[47:29] glucose and your system and therefore how much insulin you
[47:32] will make to correct that blood sugar level by changing what you
[47:35] serve that carbohydrate. So if I take a carbohydrate like
[47:39] a piece of bread, piece of toast seems like an easy one to use,
[47:41] right? So if we take a piece of toast,
[47:43] that's the carbohydrate. If I gave you just the piece of
[47:46] toast as a meal, you would see like a a spike and then a big
[47:49] fall. So you would see the insulin
[47:51] spike and then a fall. How that kind of translates to
[47:54] day-to-day eating. There's like #1 it doesn't
[47:56] really keep you full. You'll want to eat again pretty
[47:58] soon after. You'll have low energy levels
[48:00] because you get that big peak and trough up glucose.
[48:02] But in terms of PCs, you're just until on spiking as the day goes
[48:05] on. If I gave you that same piece of
[48:08] toast and I packed it with protein to here comes eggs,
[48:11] scrambled tofu. Some left over.
[48:13] Chicken, it's kind of random on toast, but you get the, you get
[48:16] the idea, right? A protein hit.
[48:18] Even if that toast portion is exactly the same as option A,
[48:21] you're going to have such a a lower and slower postprandial
[48:25] rise or the cost rise if I had fibre to that meal.
[48:28] So here comes spinach, maybe some hemp seeds, maybe some
[48:31] pumpkin seeds, list other grains from the night before.
[48:34] So plants, I changed that load even further.
[48:36] My car portions still the same if I add acidity to that meal.
[48:40] So here comes a lemon dress dressing.
[48:42] Here comes balsamic vinegar. I change that load again.
[48:46] So with insulin resistance, it's not Johnny carbs, it's choose
[48:50] high fibre carbs where possible and where you can definitely be
[48:53] conscious of the portion or kind of consider, you know, can I
[48:56] load my plate with this one piece of toast with lots of
[48:59] goodies on top versus having two pieces of toast as an example.
[49:02] But I think what's more important to focus on is what
[49:04] our seat building their meal around.
[49:06] Do you have all those other really important components on
[49:08] your plate? So that would be, I guess the
[49:10] big point with insulin resistance is to understand how
[49:15] to keep including carbohydrates in a way that kind of respects
[49:18] it insulin resistance. And there's some evidence that
[49:21] insulin resistance is worse at certain parts of the day.
[49:24] So really early in the morning and kind of later in the
[49:27] evening. So sometimes they speak with
[49:28] women about kind of, you know, the hours in the day that they
[49:31] spend eating, making sure your breakfast it's really high in
[49:34] protein would be a really big point.
[49:36] I've talked about and one of PCs because of the insulin
[49:39] resistance in the morning and exercise, any exercises
[49:43] important for insulin sensitivity.
[49:45] And a lot of women are time poor.
[49:47] And so sometimes we fall into the trap of I don't have 60
[49:50] minutes to to go to an exercise class, therefore I'll do
[49:53] nothing. And I talk about snacking on
[49:55] movement. It's kind of lame.
[49:57] But this idea of, you know, like, can you find 3 lots of 10
[50:00] minutes a day can be so impactful for your insulin
[50:03] sensitivity. And it doesn't have to be like a
[50:05] 10 minute circuit. You know, it can be between us
[50:07] and call. Can you call round the block and
[50:10] you know, you're brushing your teeth?
[50:11] Can you do squats at the same time?
[50:13] Whatever it might be like, building in these tiny bits of
[50:15] movement through your day can be really useful to her.
[50:20] That's so interesting, that building of the breakfast plate.
[50:22] I remember when it was a real phase on Instagram where people
[50:26] were sharing what they ate all the time.
[50:29] And you'd have these really thin fit people being like, I eat
[50:33] like a horse and they're showing their breakfast.
[50:35] And that's, you know, this big piece of toast with lots of
[50:39] eggs, lots of veggies, like huge plates.
[50:42] Actually, that was about insulin resistance, wasn't it?
[50:46] But probably they were doing a better job than the person that
[50:48] thought they were doing a good job just having one piece of
[50:51] toast with some peanut butter. Yeah, I think it's really
[50:53] interesting. I interviewed the 2 royal
[50:55] sisters recently and they spoke about, which I think you pushed
[50:58] with as well, Sarah, I they talk about what can I add, not what
[51:02] can I take away. And I think that's such an
[51:03] important mindset shift around diet and nutrition because I
[51:08] think we so quickly think and that question also exhibited
[51:12] heavily angled around weight gain, which is something we got
[51:14] a lot through our community questions around PCs.
[51:17] And you would and such an empowering way.
[51:19] It's what can I add, not what can I take away.
[51:21] I think it's really important. Well.
[51:25] Which leads to this question, cravings.
[51:28] What's the deal with them and are they our body's way of
[51:31] asking us if we need something or is it just hormonal chaos?
[51:36] I would love to say, you know, like if your body tells you you
[51:39] need chocolate just because you're deficient and magnesium.
[51:45] I have a block of Berry biscuit at home waiting for me and I'm
[51:48] really excited to eat. Vitamin B, I wish that was the
[51:53] case. It's probably more like if if we
[51:56] go back to the same idea of the hormonal fluctuations across
[51:59] your cycle, like cravings for sugar kind of in the lead up to
[52:02] your periods and during your periods, like when you kind of
[52:06] understand who might know what's happening.
[52:07] The I think it makes sense why we create sugar and we'll all
[52:09] have our kind of favourite ways to get that first.
[52:12] It's not about not doing or learning into the craving.
[52:15] Like absolutely just had the garden chocolate, but understand
[52:18] why it's happening in your body is quite interesting.
[52:21] So and you know, that luteal phase example was you having
[52:24] this decline of progesterone, which, you know, literally helps
[52:28] your brain absorb and have an interaction with those
[52:32] neurotransmitters that make us feel really good.
[52:34] So it therefore makes sense you're looking for other things
[52:37] that make you feel really good. And very biscuit is like a hug.
[52:40] It's like, you know what I mean? Or, you know, really low energy
[52:44] levels were. Yeah, I took a lot with clients
[52:47] around that luteal phase in period phase, like building and
[52:50] like making sure you are getting enough food and like good
[52:53] protein. And then the the chocolate can
[52:55] be the add on that kind of understanding how they're
[52:58] underrating at certain parts of your cycle can increase your
[53:00] cravings as well. Pregnancies like it's a whole
[53:03] other like pregnancy cravings ask about, but just from I guess
[53:07] lived experience and I know you both are the same.
[53:09] This all kinds of weird stuff that we crave in pregnancy, but
[53:14] lots of women don't have any particular cravings in pregnancy
[53:17] as well. So Craven's you've got to have
[53:21] minimal. That camp and it's really
[53:22] disappointing. I wanna be that crazy person who
[53:25] wakes my partner up in the middle of the night and is like
[53:27] you must come and get me this specific thing immediately like.
[53:32] I wanted it to feel exciting. The only time in your life that
[53:35] you get to be demanded that. Demand cravings yeah, I was
[53:41] framed things I wasn't allowed from a food safety point of
[53:44] view. Like I can't tell you the last
[53:45] time that I am an egg sandwich and then I forget like far out
[53:50] like a ham and egg sandwich. But it was just the psychology
[53:52] around like, like, yeah, like a pen on wow.
[53:55] She's like, Oh my God, why? Sure.
[53:57] Yeah, yeah. I actually have my froggy eyes
[53:59] closed then. Yeah, I got really.
[54:02] I was in summer, which is, you know, but I think it's, you
[54:04] know, how you want often orange juice or just something like
[54:06] really. Yeah.
[54:08] And like, refreshing and hydrating and ohh yeah.
[54:11] We've talked a little bit about how to adapt your diet based on
[54:15] the different parts of your cycle.
[54:17] What about the different life stages?
[54:19] You've got menstruation, you've got pregnancy, you've got
[54:22] perimenopause, menopause, one of them, I guess one of the top
[54:27] things that you would recommend adding or considering at each
[54:30] one of those points in your life.
[54:31] Yeah, and I mean, like I said at the beginning of our time
[54:34] together, what I love about working with women is our needs
[54:38] are forever changing. And I think for women,
[54:40] understanding what serves your 15 year old self is not gonna
[54:44] serve your first time Mr. Pregnant self or your
[54:46] perimenopause or South or your post menopausal South.
[54:49] And being able to empower yourself with understanding
[54:52] those differences is really important kind of and those like
[54:55] adolescent years where we kind of first giving up period.
[54:58] I still work with so many young women who I'm not eating enough
[55:02] and it's not even sometimes it's not from a disorder point of
[55:05] view. And when you look at like the
[55:08] the metabolic or the metabolism needs of, you know, people in a
[55:11] household and some of these active teenage girls need more
[55:15] calories per day than dead, which is just kind of giving
[55:17] around like that. They're thinking that a lot of
[55:20] families have, which is like dad gets the big meal because
[55:23] there's kind of connotation with dad and eating bag is quite
[55:26] interesting because so I think eating enough would be like the
[55:30] one research that they would like shake these young women
[55:32] around is eating enough is really important.
[55:35] Also your iron deficiency needs. Sorry, your anus and needs in
[55:39] that part of our reproductive life span as is also really
[55:41] high. So iron is also used in the body
[55:43] for growth. And so these these young teenage
[55:45] women are still growing and developing and so therefore
[55:48] their iron need is very high as well.
[55:50] So iron and needing a nice would be like my my adolescent period
[55:53] answer in terms of pregnancy, there's so many different
[55:57] nutrients to really important to different parts of our
[56:00] pregnancy. Some of solate and in folic
[56:03] acids, which is their synthetic version of benign or solid has
[56:07] been shown clinically to reduce risk of your true defects like
[56:11] spina bifida and that first trimester of pregnancy.
[56:15] And the advice is to take a supplemental Zeman on folate and
[56:19] for at least, you know, one or two to three months before
[56:22] conception if you're planning a pregnancy.
[56:23] Whenever I hear that sentence and like, and I know she knew
[56:26] too well kind of the synnex and us will giggle as if you can
[56:29] plan exactly when you're going to get pregnant and do your
[56:31] folic acid 3 months before. But in an ideal world, that's
[56:34] what we should do. I didn't.
[56:35] We talked about before iron and pregnancy, 25% of women will
[56:40] experience iron deficiency and pregnancy.
[56:42] That's more to do with baby taking from our iron stores and
[56:45] it is around what we're eating, but there isn't really
[56:47] important. And Coleraine is another
[56:50] nutrient. We're talking about pregnancy
[56:51] analogies, Excite and vitamin D. There's so many different
[56:54] things, energy needs and pregnancy.
[56:56] I know I'm rambling now, but I'm just kind of giving you
[56:59] different things that are important as a brainstorm.
[57:01] Ohh, it says the whole complicated, yeah.
[57:04] Thanks Sarah back for that one too.
[57:06] And then, you know, breastfeeding, there's so many
[57:08] different needs. Your calorie requirements for
[57:11] producing breast milk are higher than your calorie requirements.
[57:14] And in pregnancy, which is just like super interesting that you
[57:17] can grow a baby on this calories and it takes to feed the baby
[57:21] your side. There's like this is amazing to
[57:22] me. And some of the key nutrients
[57:25] involved in your post Natal house as well.
[57:28] So not just about breastfeeding, but you know, reducing risk of
[57:31] post Natal depression, vitamin D and Eager 3 and your recovery
[57:35] post birth fibre, iron, zinc, protein, ohh, really, really
[57:39] important for building and supporting mental health for the
[57:42] new mum as well. And perimenopause, which we've
[57:45] talked about kind of briefly a couple of times and our time
[57:47] together, but with puree menopause, basically it's like
[57:50] puberty 2.0, lots of hormonal fluctuations and kind of for a
[57:55] lot of women, not the smooth decline of, of hormones, more of
[58:00] like a turbulent landing with lots of pics and troughs of
[58:02] women's like oestrogen. And some of the things I talk
[58:05] about there with women is the insulin sensitivity reduces, so
[58:09] you become more insulin resistant and perimenopause.
[58:12] So lots of women will struggle with brain fog, weight gain,
[58:15] shape change and poor energy levels as well.
[58:19] And so I went with it. And so and resistance there.
[58:22] And because of the decline in oestrogen that's happening, it's
[58:25] really important that women understand that estrogen's
[58:27] involved are now bone health as well.
[58:29] So our bone mineral density. And so I took a lot around
[58:32] calcium and vitamin D and perimenopause and post menopause
[58:35] as well. Oestrogen protects us against
[58:37] cardiovascular disease. When you look at heart disease
[58:40] rates and females versus males before the age of 45, we when
[58:45] you know those hormones are protecting us against heart
[58:47] disease. And you can almost see so
[58:49] perfectly on these age graphs, our cardiovascular disease
[58:53] spikes to become comparable to that of men and around the time
[58:56] of menopause. And it's because we're losing
[58:58] that protective effect of oestrogen and diet plays a huge
[59:01] role in your cardiovascular disease risk.
[59:03] So here comes the alcohol chat again.
[59:05] Smoking, exercise is a knot not to stop smoking, to stop smoking
[59:09] obviously. And in terms of nutrition and
[59:13] you know, the Mediterranean diet, which again, high omega-3
[59:17] anti-inflammatory, focusing on plant based fats versus animal
[59:20] fats can also be really impactful as well.
[59:22] So there's lots there just to kind of give you a quick
[59:26] snapshot of those changes across our reproductive timeline.
[59:30] So fascinating being a woman, doesn't it?
[59:32] Right. It's, it's pretty amazing.
[59:34] Constant evolution at constant evolution.
[59:37] Thanks so much, Sarah. Thanks for coming on the
[59:39] podcast. Thanks for listening to The
[59:48] Cyclist. To join the community.
[59:50] Follow us at We Are the Cyclist, Your cycle decoded.
[1:00:01] Ohh.

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