Discover GABA: Your Ally For Metabolic Health & Anxiety Relief

Trudy Scott, CN

Dr. Gersh, thanks so much for inviting me to the summit. I am excited. We had some good back and forth trying to decide on the topics, and it is going to be a great opportunity to share what I know about anxiety and what an amino acid is called GABA. I am excited to be here, and I am excited to share this with my community. Thanks again for inviting me. The reason I am so passionate about anxiety is because of my anxiety issues. In my late thirties, out of the blue, it seemed I suddenly developed anxiety, and I developed social anxiety. This is a little bit crazy because I always considered myself an outgoing person. I was not a fearful person. I was a rock climber, and I did climb on vertical ice. I spent the night on a portable edge and a big wall climb. I was an adventurous person who wasn’t very anxious. But I just decided to develop this anxiety, which seemed to come out of the blue. But it was happening in my late 30s when my hormones were starting to change. That was the first clue for me. 

I learned this term called perimenopause, and I thought I did not have to worry about menopause until I was in my 50s. I discovered this term during perimenopause. This was before I became a nutritionist. I was working in corporate America. I was very stressed. I had hormone changes going on, and then I started to connect the dots that it was gluten issues, leaky gut, heavy metals, and nutritional deficiencies. I had this whole group of issues that were causing my anxiety. One of them was neuroticism and imbalances, which we are going to talk about today. 

I had low GABA levels, and GABA was amazing for me. It is an amino acid that I use as a supplement. It was fantastic for me. It stopped my anxiety quickly and then I was able to dig deeper and address all of the underlying factors that were also contributing to my anxiety. Long story short, I went back to school to become a nutritionist. My anxiety went away, and my mission is to teach and educate other women about anxiety and nutritional solutions so they do not have to struggle. Because it took me a long time to get all the answers. But it was amazing to think that changing your diet, addressing hormone imbalances, getting rid of toxins, adding in specific nutrients, and addressing lower GABA levels could turn things around. I was excited to go back to school to become a nutritionist, and here I am today. I wrote my book, The Anti-anxiety Food Solution, so I could share my information with other women who were going through this issue.

Felice Gersh, MD

What a wonderful ending to what could have been a very traumatic and unhappy story. I am so happy that you went on this journey, and we are all benefiting. I am sure many people out there are wondering, what is the connection, though, between nutrition and neurotransmitters? What is the connection there? How does what you eat relate to such things as neurotransmitters, and how do neurotransmitters relate to emotions?

Trudy Scott, CN

Well, the food that we eat provides the building blocks for making neurotransmitters. We need good-quality protein. That is a key building block for neurotransmitters. You have got to eat quality animal protein, but you also have to have good digestion so you can break down that protein. Then you get the cofactors that are needed to make those neurotransmitters, zinc, vitamin B6, and magnesium, from the beautiful, quality organic foods that you eat. Quality foods are important. We know that pesticides can disrupt neurotransmitters and affect hormones. We want good-quality food and healthy fats. 

It is important to provide those raw materials for making those neurotransmitters, and then there is a close interrelationship between neurotransmitters and our hormones. When you have good progesterone levels, for example, that’s going to enhance GABA production. When you have good estrogen levels or estradiol levels, that is going to enhance serotonin production. There’s this merry dance going on between our neurotransmitters and our hormones, and then food is the foundation, but sometimes food is not enough. We may have a nutritional deficiency that we need to address with a specific amino acid or with a specific nutrient.

Felice Gersh, MD

I think many people will find this fascinating because, unfortunately, as you are very well aware, the world of psychiatry does not delve into this at all. They try to come up with drugs to modify in some way a neurotransmitter and a drug that is often used as one of the SSRIs or benzodiazepines. Is there something wrong with any of those drugs or those adjuncts, or should those be put on the back burner and left there?

Trudy Scott, CN

As a nutritionist? It is outside of the scope of my work, but I have a lot of people who come to me because they want to get off their benzodiazepines or their antidepressants. Then I will work with them in conjunction with their doctor because I cannot make any changes, but I will educate them. then they go back to their doctor and they talk about, talk about tapering off these medications, and I would love to see people consider food and nutrients first because there’s, you talked about psychiatry. There is this term called nutritional psychiatry. It is published in the literature. There are several papers, and a lot of the research has come out of Australia, and it is now recognized that food and nutrients have an impact on our mental health. Why do we not start with that and then keep the medications as a last resort if we are not getting results? But I am finding people are getting results if you address the underlying biochemistry, which you do not need to use as an indication.

Felice Gersh, MD

Well, that is so helpful for everyone to know that it does not mean they should check their antidepressants or their drugs. They need to coordinate with their physician. But to start with the idea that you start with food, and I know there has been talk about a gut-brain axis and that there’s this connection, then maybe you could tell us a little bit more about how the gut and the brain connect. I know I have heard that if you have an injury to the brain, it can affect gut function and vice versa. Does that play into anxiety, neurotransmitters, general emotional stress, and such?

Trudy Scott, CN

Absolutely. We’ve got this connection between the gut and the brain. We have these microbiomes in the gut, and this produces serotonin. A lot of people are aware of that, but it also produces GABA, which is a calming neurotransmitter. When you have dysbiosis in the gut, or, in other words, a derangement of your microbiome, that can, in turn, affect your mental health, make you more depressed, and make you more anxious. Having good gut health is important as well. I love the term psychobiotics, which refers to good bacteria that have an impact on your mood. This is a lot of research that’s come out of Ireland, and psychobiotic Lactobacillus rhamnosus is one of them. It’s an anti-probiotic that changes your mood. If we can get our guts into a healthy state, that can make a big difference as well.

Felice Gersh, MD

Well, certainly, this is very applicable to women with PCOS who have high levels of stress and anxiety. It was shown back in 2015. The first study came out of China concerning the leaky gut and the impaired gut microbial population. This is key information for women with PCOS. But so many of them, I said, have anxiety. Where would you start? Say a woman is eating a standard American diet and has a lot of anxiety. Should she just change her whole diet overnight, too? Could you take baby steps if she is not used to eating or cooking whole foods? When you have your clients, how would you say, Let us start, and this is where we start?

Trudy Scott, CN

Well, I wanted to just go back to what you were talking about, the incidence of anxiety, and then I will come back to your question about where to start because there is a lot of research that supports the connection between stress, anxiety, and depression. They talk about a lot of the studies I pulled, talking about how 26 to 35% of people with PCOS have anxiety. But what I wanted to clarify is that a lot of these papers are talking about the psychological impacts. They are not talking about biochemistry, which is what we are talking about today. You will read a lot of the studies, and they talk about the psychological impact because people with PCOS have body image-related factors. They are worried about infertility; they have worries and fears of depression and low self-esteem because of what is going on with them, in terms of being overweight, in terms of excess hair growth, and terms of body mass index. I just wanted to make sure that, if anyone’s looking at the research, they’re talking about anxiety, but they’re talking about the psychological impacts of PCOS and not about the biochemistry. We always want to bring it back to that. 

But I am glad you asked the question about where to start. I always start with the amino acids, no matter what the condition is or what is going on, because if you are telling someone, Okay, we need to have you change your diet, we need to have you eat more protein. We need to have you reduce carbs. We need to have you start to learn to cook. That is overwhelming. If you are eating a standard American diet, it is overwhelming. People are just going to say, Well, how do I do it? They are also going to have to use willpower to stop eating the high-carb diet that they may be eating, to stop eating fast food. To stop eating the processed foods that they are eating. We want to focus on real, whole foods. But to make it easy, we use amino acids because what the amino acids do, and I will talk about GABA in a second, is that they address that overwhelm, they address that anxiety, and they stop the cravings. It is easy to make those changes. I was someone with PCOS. 

The first thing I am going to do is talk to them about GABA. The way I do that is to give them the low GABA questionnaire and have them narrate their symptoms on a scale of 1 to 10. For those people, who do not know what GABA is, it is Gamma-aminobutyric acid. It is an amino acid, and it is a neurotransmitter. We use the amino acid as a supplement to raise levels of low GABA. We address the low GABA neurotransmitter by using an amino acid supplement called GABA. It is a little bit confusing, but that’s the way it is. I will have people write this. They gave us symptoms on a scale of 1 to 10. Do you have physical anxiety? In other words, are you feeling tension in your neck? Are you feeling it going up into your head and your shoulders? A lot of people will be so intense about this. Do you have these different tense muscles? Do you have intrusive thoughts? Do you have gut pain? Do you have insomnia? Then do you stress eat? If you eat, is it as a result of stress? Are you using alcohol to fit in and feel sociable? Do you have ADHD-type symptoms? Do you have laryngitis or spasms? All of these can be a result of low GABA levels. 

Then, as we are going to discuss a little bit later, PCOS comes into this as well because I’ve got an amazing success story to share with you. But before we go there, how do we do the trial? Write your sentence on a scale of 1 to 10, and then we do a trial of GABA, and we see what results you get. Now the amazing thing about the amino acids is that you get results within 1 to 5 minutes. I am sitting with someone, and they will tell me, Yes, I have this physical tension in my neck. It is a nine out of ten. I just love chocolate chip cookies, and as soon as I am stressed, I just go for the chocolate chip cookies. That is a 10 out of 10. We will do a trial of GABA there. Then within 5 minutes, they should be able to say to me, I am not feeling as physically tense or physically anxious, and I am not even thinking about the chocolate chip cookies. 

The key, Dr. Gersh, with using GABA is to use it sublingually, so I will have them use a GABA powder, or we will use a liposomal GABA, or we will have them open up a GABA capsule and just put that on their tongue and hold it on their tongue for 1 to 2 minutes. Then we will get some feedback so that with that usage of GABA, we are getting quick results because it is getting absorbed through the mouth, and then from there, we may increase based on how they respond. But say, for example, that in this case, someone had a nine out of ten for physical anxiety. They stress each other; they’d use the GABA. They told me it was a five out of 10. I am feeling much more relaxed. A lot of people will say to me, I just feel like I had a glass of wine. That is the feeling we want without needing the wine or that carbohydrate. Which do you self-medicate with to feel good? 

Now and then they will say, I do not even feel the chocolate chip cookies. I am not even thinking about it. They might say that is a four out of 10. That is telling me that GABA is possibly going to work for them. then, over the next few weeks, we will increase from that initial starting dose. The other key thing, Dr. Gersh, is that we want to start low. A lot of people start to get high on GABA, and then it can make them more anxious and affect their sleep. I will use a starting dose of about 125 milligrams. But to answer your question about where we start with dietary changes, if we start with the amino acids, then it makes it easier for them to make all the dietary changes. over those first few weeks, they are starting to make the changes by adding in the GABA and seeing how it affects their overwhelming anxiety, stress levels, and the ability to not need to self-medicate with the sugar to feel good. We are starting to make an introduction to all the dietary changes that they need to make to be healthier.

Felice Gersh, MD

Well, I was going to ask you, how does it get in so quickly? Now you explain that you are doing it on the tongue, or sublingually. I could see people wanting to do this all the time. It sounds like, Wow, I just feel so much better. But you did say you could overdo it. How does a person know how to dose themselves? I am sure you will work with them. You can take too much. Is there a way to know ahead of time? What would be the interval? How often can you take it in a day?

Trudy Scott, CN

GABA is typically used 4 to 5 times a day away from protein, so on waking mid-morning, mid-afternoon, and evening, and then some folks who are having trouble sleeping or waking up feeling tense can even take some at night. Ideally, we want to get the dose before bedtime so they don’t need to take it at night. But that is the typical timing of when to take it, and what we do is have them in, so we will start at 125 milligrams. for example, in this case, where they got some benefits, they’ll do 125 milligrams, maybe four times a day, and then in a week, if they are getting benefits. But it is not quite enough what they are feeling. Yes, I am feeling much more relaxed. I am not as overwhelmed. Icano eats less carbs. They will say, Okay, well, let us increase it a little bit, so let us double that to increase the dose to 250 milligrams and do that four times a day and see how you do. If you see additional benefits, then you should stay on that dose. If you feel you need a little bit more, then you may go up again. 

If you go up and you are not getting any additional benefits, then you go back down to the previous dose, and then we will have clients use that dose for a month, maybe two months, maybe three months; maybe they will go on holiday and they forget to take it, and then they realize they do not need it. Or they just say, Look, I would like to see if I need it anymore. then we just reduce the dose slowly. It does not have to be reduced, tapered, or anything, but a lot of people have to do that. They are not getting back to where they were. I would say that PCOS is longer-term because we have to address all the underlying factors—the dietary factors and the hormonal factors—so it can take a little bit longer. 

Then I wanted to also put it out there for folks who feel fearful about doing this; it is an antidote. If you happen to take too much and you do feel anxious, you just take a thousand milligrams of vitamin C, and that will negate the effect. It will take away the adverse effects. I will show you what those are in a second. But it’ll also take away the benefits that you have. Say you felt calmer initially and then you started to feel a little bit ramped up, or some people will get a sudden niacin flush. As such, you do not feel ridden hot, but you can feel tingly with too much GABA. You may feel a little bit uncomfortable because you have a little bit of a tingle going on, and it dissipates very quickly. It will typically dissipate within half an hour if you do take too much, but a lot of people feel a little bit fearful. Then I have had some people not knowing what to do, and they will take a 750-milligram capsule for the first time, and they will feel more anxious. They may feel racing hot, and then they’ve got this tingling feeling that does go away, but it is not very comfortable. 

For folks who feel a little bit worried about how much they should use, knowing that there is this vitamin C is very helpful. The other thing is that it is very individualized. The dosing depends on each person. I mentioned that 125 milligrams is a starting dose. For some people, it can be a quarter of that. I had one client use 125 mg of chewable and put it in their mouth. By the time I picked up the page you said, I felt so relaxed. I said, Take it out, take it out. She needed one-eighth of 125 milligrams. It is very individualized. But 125 milligrams is typical. Unless someone is very sensitive, then we might start lower and then build up from there.

Felice Gersh, MD

By taking it at these intervals, it lasts pretty much for that length of time for most people. Many women with PCOS. Of course, this is beyond the PCOS population’s binge eating disorder. You talked about chocolate chip cookies; it could be chips; it could be all kinds of things. This will help control it all through the day if you interval dose it. Is this for most women, or do some people need a boost? That bag of chips is calling my name, and I cannot control it. I cannot stop obsessing about it. This will help take that away. Maybe they need a boost, or maybe they will not need a boost.

Trudy Scott, CN

Ideally, a lot of people will use GABA once a day, maybe when they feel they’ve got a binge episode coming up or they are feeling more anxious, and I want to have my clients use it consistently. Yes, it is going to start getting their labels up. It does last in the system for about 4 hours, so that is why we do it multiple times throughout the day. But some people are more anxious in the morning, or they are more anxious later in the day, or they are more anxious at night. In that case, they may be doing 125 milligrams throughout the day, but later in the evening, they manage to have a higher dose to help if this binge eating is going on. But keep in mind that each of the neurotransmitters has a mood component and a binge-eating component. We have not talked about low serotonin and how that can also cause binge eating. I like to do one amino acid at a time, and then we know if it is working. It is easy to figure out how much and what time I need. But then we would look at low serotonin, for example, and that can cause binge eating. We would then do a trial of tryptophan or 5-HTPsimilarlyy, look at the symptoms, and then do a trial. then there are also low endorphins, which is a big factor when it comes to emotional eating. 

There is another amino acid called DPA or d-phenylalanine, which stops and raises endorphins at an X in a similar way to LDN, low-dose naltrexone, but it is an amino acid. What it does is raise endorphins and stop the need for comfort eating and emotional eating, and I would say that in the PCOS population, all of those neurotransmitter imbalances may be present. Certainly, it is very common in my community of anxious women who do not necessarily have PCOS. It is very common to have neurotransmitter deficiencies in all the different areas. Seeing as we are mentioning them, I am just going to mention the other: low blood sugar is a factor, and there is an amino acid called glutamine that can stop cravings as well. Low dopamine can also contribute to binge eating, and you need that sugar as a sugar fix to give you that energy and focus. 

However, I wanted you to test and focus on GABA because there is so much research on GABA, specifically about PCOS. When I was preparing for this, I was amazed to see the research. One of the studies that I pulled showed how GABA was used in rats with PCOS. There was reduced body weight, reduced body mass index, reduced testosterone, a favorable lipid profile, normal glucose tolerance, and a decreased number of cystic follicles in the ovaries. In this particular paper, I want to just read the name of it in case people want to look it up: Protective Effects of GABA Against Metabolic and Reproductive Disturbances in PCOS Syndrome in Rats. 

The conclusion was that the effects were comparable to those with metformin, which is profound to me, and that they did not have any of the side effects. which can include anxiety, racing, heart shakiness, and depression. The authors conclude that the results suggest that GABA treatment has shown protective effects in PCOS and provides beneficial effects either by reducing insulin resistance or by inducing antioxidant defense mechanisms. Here we’ve got GABA that is helping ease anxiety, helps stop binge eating, and it is having all of these metabolic effects when it comes to peace. When I looked at this research and did a blog post about it, I was just blown away. I know you looked at the blog post, and you were pretty intrigued as well. It is very exciting to think that GABA can play such a role in PCOS.

Felice Gersh, MD

I think this is almost unknown in the PCOS community or among PCOS therapeutic managers. I do not think the doctors, nurse practitioners, and other nutritionists have a clue. I found this to be incredibly eye-opening. and it fits with the whole notion that everything is multitasking in the body, so neurotransmitters do not just exist in the brain; they do things throughout the body. Most everything has a metabolic component as well as an emotional component. In this article, I know, as you said, it was in rats, but almost everything is conserved in terms of genetics between rats and humans. That is why they can use them as study subjects. 

For me, I am going to tell you that I am going to start using your protocol just incredibly frequently because I think this is the norm. It is not just about anxiety. That is great in itself. That is phenomenal. But it is dealing with these metabolic issues. I was going to ask you, and I have learned something about some of the other neurotransmitters that are probably weakest in GABA, in terms of serotonin and dopamine. I know some of these are produced by the gut microbiome. They are not just produced in the brain. I do not know about GABA, but can you tell me if there has been any research on where else in the body GABA is produced and, besides, in the neurons?

Trudy Scott, CN

It is produced in the gut as well. Is just in a similar way that we produce serotonin in the gut. We reproduce GABA in the gut. One of the psychobiotics is Lactobacillus rhamnosus, and they did a study, a rat study again, where they severed the vagus nerve of these rats, and they found that the benefits that the rats had been well limited to back up their rats were given lactobacillus rhamnosus, and it was calming and it lowered the cortisol levels and essentially their anxiety when they severed the vagus nerve, which is communication. One of the communications between the gut and the brain was that they were not getting that benefit. We know there is this microbiome impact, and we make GABA in our guts, so it is amazing. 

As we’ve got our receptors all over the body for GABA. The paper that I mentioned was a rat paper, but there was a 2019 paper looking at women in Egypt with PCOS who also had dyslipidemia. They had high testosterone and low vitamin D levels. They found that they were giving them GABA, which had an impact. They report that we’ve got GABA, which is reported to improve insulin sensitivity through its peripheral receptors in the pancreas, the ovaries, and the adrenals in animal models. We know this. I will point you to anyone else who is interested. There is a lot of research on GABA in diabetes and its effects on blood sugar and the pancreas. We can hopefully see a lot of that research being applied to the PCOS community because, because of them, we know about the metabolic issues that we see with PCOS. It has a huge impact on the pancreas as well, which then impacts all of these metabolic effects. It is exciting. 

Felice Gersh, MD

Extremely, and you are going back to your own story, how you were approaching an early but within the normal range of perimenopausal women, trans, transitioning,  and their hormones becoming more irregularly produced and less reliable, with a trajectory that tends downward. We know there is a relationship between hormones and neurotransmitters. In women who are losing their estrogen, there’s a much greater increase in anxiety. Women in perimenopause and menopause have doubled the incidence of anxiety, or four times as high if they’ve had a prior history. 

Women with PCOS, and this is often not recognized, have a problem producing estradiol in their ovaries. I am thinking estradiol and I’ve just done a little deep dove in it. I do not know if this is anything that you have been looking at in terms of the relationship between estradiol and the production of GABA; there seems to be a relationship. Maybe if you do not have enough estradiol, you do not have enough GABA, but by giving GABA, you are getting rid of the middleman of estradiol. You’re going straight to what you need and providing what every cell needs to function properly, whether it is a neuron, whether it involves insulin function, and so on. Is that something that you have also been looking at?

Trudy Scott, CN

The biggest connection I have seen, Dr. Gersh, is between progesterone and GABA, so I have not looked into the estrogen connection, but I am intrigued, I know that’s a big passion of yours, and I love your work because of what you bring to the table in terms of educating about estrogen. I am going to look into it. I do not have an answer for you now, but I am sure there is a connection, and if we find it, it’ll be very exciting to know and share as well.

Felice Gersh, MD

Well, in addition, I would love to talk a little bit about the progesterone effect because women with PCOS do not ovulate regularly, so they do not have the levels of progesterone they should have. same thing as women go through perimenopause and their ovulation becomes less frequent. What is the role that we do know and that you can share with us about progesterone and GABA?

Trudy Scott, CN

They feed off each other, so to speak. We know that progesterone only improves GABA receptors. If you have low progesterone levels, your GABA levels will suffer. When I am working with women in my community who are in perimenopause and may have low progesterone, the first thing we do is support GABA, as a nutritionist who focuses on the nutrients. Then if they got low or they’ve got PMS, for example, or PCOS, and we know that they’ve got some hormonal issues. I will work on supporting their neurotransmitters first. supporting GABA, supporting serotonin, and within two or three cycles the hormones are doing better, their production of the hormones is better, and if they still need support, then I will refer them to a nurse practitioner or to a doctor who can support them from a hormonal point of view if they need identical hormones, for example. 

But using the Gabba and the serotonin support will usually start to normalize a lot of the hormone imbalances in two or three cycles. Going back to what I said earlier, you are getting results for anxiety, binge eating, and cravings, but it takes a little bit longer to work on the hormone support. There is a strong connection between these neurotransmitters and our hormones. Yes, so I wanted to just say that as well. Of course, there are other things that we look at, and the other big issue that I see in my community is this social anxiety condition called paranoia. I had that as well. These nutrients—zinc, and vitamin B6—and evening primrose oil help with paranoia. They also help with hormone production and neurotransmitter production. 

You asked earlier about where I should start. I will have people start with the amino acids. We are starting to make dietary changes. Then I look at some of these other factors, such as paranoia. Once we start to address that with those nutrients, it then starts to have a trickle-down effect and affects the hormones, improves estrogen and progesterone, and then helps to make the neurotransmitters as well. It is a big picture; we are just focusing. It is not just GABA’s, not just paranoia. We’ve got to do the whole picture, as we are just focusing on a small area here today. 

But I wanted to end with a wonderful case study because, when I did the blog post about the research, I had a woman in my community share how GABA had helped her with her piece areas. Can we talk about that?

Felice Gersh, MD

I was just going to ask you to do that because, when I read that, it just warmed my heart. Everyone has to hear this story because this has global effects on the body. It starts at the top and works down beyond the ovaries. This is phenomenal. This is groundbreaking work. I would love for you to share the story of your patient and your client.

Trudy Scott, CN

She did the blog post with the research, and my community’s amazing. If I share some research, they will come back and tell me their story, which is wonderful. Then I took her story and created a new blog post, and then I got more feedback. It is wonderful how when you get results, you want to share it with the world, which is wonderful. As you say, it is very heartwarming. When I hear results like this, it is amazing. Then I get to learn, too. If she had not shared this, I probably would not have been at your summit. It is wonderful. I appreciate her sharing, and I appreciate her giving me this opportunity to share here, too. This was a woman, she said. I was diagnosed with PCOS when I was 27. I am currently 43. When I was diagnosed, they immediately put me on birth control and metformin. I also eventually went on anti-anxiety medication. That is common. I have been anxious my whole life, even as a kid, but my anxiety increased in my late 20s and peaked in my late 30s when panic attacks started taking over. Even with the anti-anxiety medication, it was debilitating. 

I first heard about GABA and amino acids and how they can help with anxiety from a podcast you did with The Wellness Mama, about three years ago, I started to wean off my anxiety medication, and I started taking GABA and noticed a huge difference in my anxiety. I eventually got off birth control and all medication for my PCOS and started regulating my cycle with diet, lifestyle changes, and supplements, all the while still taking GABA. Now I ovulate every month, which I could never do on my own before. I am going to give a lot of credit to GABA. But it was not just GABA. She made the diet changes, and she made the lifestyle changes as well. 

But what was heartwarming, Dr. Gersh was that she said this feedback about her oldest daughter, who is nine, who was also showing early signs of developing PCOS and other issues that she had dealt with when she was younger. She had a slightly different response. Her mood was changing, and she was getting angry out of nowhere, which was unusual. You usually think of anger issues as being low serotonin issues, but because of her good results with GABA, she said, I started her on a small dose of GABA, and immediately both of us saw a difference in mood. She now asks for her happy pills daily because she does not want to feel those dark feelings anymore. I wish this information was around when I was young. It could have helped me so much with what I had to struggle with for years. Debbie, I appreciate her sharing her story and letting me share it. Then she gets to help her daughter, too, and we get to share and help other people as well. pretty amazing results.

Felice Gersh, MD

There is no pharmaceutical out there, guys, that has a result like this. We give ovulation-inducing drugs, and they give out metformin just like water, but it does not yield these results. Every side effect is a benefit, You improve anxiety, and you also improve all your metabolic functions. You improve ovarian function. I think this was probably one of the most eye-opening interviews that we have had at this summit. I cannot thank you enough. I know, Trudy, that everyone wants to follow you. They want to learn more. Maybe they would like to work with you. Tell us, how can people find you, and what could be their next step if they would like to work with you?

Trudy Scott, CN

Thanks, Dr. Gersh, for your kind words. I am so glad that you are excited about this, because, as you can tell, I am excited about GABA and the amino acids too. Thanks again for having me at the summit. I am all about empowerment. I want to empower my clients. A lot of clients just take my advice from my book, The Anti-anxiety Food Solution, and start making the changes and getting results. If you are a DIY person, that is a great resource for you. It has all the dietary information, a chapter on Amino Acids, and a chapter on Paranoia. But if you need support, I’ve got online group programs where you can work with me and have the opportunity to ask questions and figure out how much GABA you need, and when to use it. If you are the person who feels you need that support, I’ve got these online group programs, and then, of course, I am on Facebook. Trudy Scott, Anti-Anxiety Food Solutions on my blog I send out my newsletter once a week with new information, new research, and new case studies, and then, of course, I also teach practitioners how to use the amino acids. I would love it if more practitioners were using these amino acids with their clients and patients. That is where you can find me, and that is where you can get information.

Felice Gersh, MD

Well, that is fantastic. I am sure that not everyone wants to read a book because anxiety underlies almost every problem that women with PCOS face. None of that would have happened if she continued to have anxiety. She would not have had the ability to make all of those other lifestyle changes. I just love your protocol. Although I would never wish someone to have the symptoms that you had to deal with, I am glad it happened because it changed the trajectory of your life and your career. It is a great story. It is pretty darn amazing. I cannot thank you enough, and I look forward to following you up and learning more about GABA and the other amino acids and utilizing them in my practice. Thanks again so much.

Trudy Scott, CN

It is a pleasure, and I am so excited. Thanks again for having me. I look forward to sharing this with my community. I know it is going to be invaluable for them, so thank you for doing it, Dr. Gersh.