— Claudia Womack

Perimenopause, menopause, balancing the hormones. I went through it twice so I know how uncomfortable this can be. So hormones need to be regulated in the body. And I'm going like this 'cause I'm, I'm imagining your intestines, right? And if you have enough fiber in your diet, you're going to release some cholesterol and some estrogen and you're gonna be able to eliminate that. And so the biggest thing you need to pay attention to is the amount of times your poop in a day because your gut health is gonna completely influence your health around your hormones as well as many other things, your mood, your neurotransmitters, all of that. So the first step I would say is to make sure that you're eating foods high in fiber like berries and whole grains and nuts and seeds to make sure that you are eliminating your bowels once a day. Once you have that going again, making sure you're getting enough water, you're exercising. And another piece I'm just gonna go into before I go into the food piece is that appreciating and realizing that this is a fa a stage in your life and that there are some expectations that need to be let go of while you enter into this new phase in your life that has its own positives as well. So I hope you're entering into a fa this phase without fear, uh, without feeling of such loss that you're not able to enter into it into a, just a centered way. Your body as, as we age, everybody, um, becomes something different every day, every year. And being able to give our body what it needs is really important. So when we're looking at creating some hormones, we're also looking at making sure your antioxidant system and your anti-inflammatory system are working together and they're working well. So those are the foods that you're gonna focus on, antioxidants and anti-inflammatories. When you create what's called reactive oxygen species, like you're, you're creating oxidants, you need an antioxidant to grab it and get rid of it before it damages your body. One of the things it does is it goes, oh, we need to set up our, you know, we're gonna start this inflammation process if you have too many oxidants. And so these two feed into one another, so they need to be attended to together. And the good news is that what's good for one seems to be good for the other. Again, we're talking about fruits and vegetables and nuts and seeds or really great antioxidants. So are cruciferous vegetables, that's your broccoli, your cauliflower, your Brussels sprouts. Those help to get rid of materials that your body no longer need, doesn't need anymore after. Um, it goes through a process, turmeric, which is in a lot of curries, that is fabulous. And if you followed me, I've talked about turmeric a lot, turmeric with black pepper means you can absorb it. If you don't add black pepper to the turmeric, you're not absorbing it. So I like to put 'em in smoothies, you know, going through the process. I would strongly suggest, Claudia, that you create a, a anti-inflammatory antioxidant robust smoothie every morning and you put some raw turmeric in it. And if you can't find that, you can put the spice in there. Some black pepper berries or fabulous antioxidants. Um, fruits and nuts. So I would do a variety of fruit, a variety of vegetables, um, green leafy vegetables. I would put some nuts in there as well and some turmeric. And I would have that. And if you needed another one throughout the day, 'cause it was a particularly bad day. Um, have another one. Now your anti-inflammatories are the same as what I just talked about, but also the Omega-3 fats. The Omega-3 fats are really important. They are found in fatty fish like salmon, but they also are robust in your chia seeds, your flax seeds, your hemp seeds. And you can get plenty of Omega-3 from plant-based sources. Dark leafy greens, um, broccoli, onions, those are all anti-inflammatory as well. You can go on, there are so many different programs out there that will list the foods that help with inflammation and anti um, and antioxidants. And you can, I would suggest you create a list and you make sure that you create, um, a meal or two that has that. And just as importantly, well chocolate's gonna make you f flare up. I'm just telling you we want the chocolate. But does that ever set us off? Sometimes also covering this part of your body, if you cover this part of your body, you're gonna get a hot flash. Take it from me. Um, so you wanna make sure you're not doing ultra processed foods, eating lots of sugar and that way you're not going to, your body's not gonna be in this inflammatory state. So all those anti-inflammatory and antioxidant foods I talked about, if you're eating a lot of ultra processed foods, it's not gonna have the same effect. It's gonna really diminish the effect if, and you're gonna have little to no effect if that. Is this the basis of your diet? Okay, so let's summarize lots of fruits, vegetables, berries, even in antioxidants. Um, we have coffee and tea in there. You don't want too much 'cause that could flare you up. Things that can help, that can help flare women to have hot flashes are your, is too much caffeine, too much chocolate, ultra processed foods. So we wanna make sure we don't have those.