Reversing Aging with Detoxification Practices

Introduction to Mold and Menopause 0:00

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to Mastering the Menopause Transition Summit. I'm your host, doctor Sharon Stills, and I am happy to be here with you and happy to be bringing you yet another important conversation in mastering your hormonal journey. And we're going to talk about something today that is often overlooked and that I really want you to all be aware about. And this is mold. And so maybe some of you have heard of it, maybe some of you haven't. But we're going to we're going to dive deep today and really get the mold story to you.

So you are armed and know what you need to know so you can bring the right questions to your doctor and look for the right testing and all that good stuff. And so I couldn't think of anyone better to have this conversation with than Brigitte Danner, who I just learned is my real life neighbor. So thank you for. And so she, was working as an acupuncturist in Portland before she moved here to Arizona. And that's when her health started to deteriorate. And so she learned a lot, tried a lot of things, and even completed a functional health coaching program in an effort to heal herself and become a better practitioner.

Although several things kind of help, nothing helped completely. And she hit rock bottom in the winter of 2014. Soon after, she discovered Toxic mold and her 100 year old home and began the long journey of home and body repair. She got into the natural medicine field in 2000. As a young environmentalist, she practiced as an acupuncturist and integrative clinic owner for 13 years, performing well over 10,000 sessions before transitioning to the online space. As a functional health coach and educator, she loves to teach about everyday detox, functional living, and toxic mold illness, and she's also the founder of a line of detox supplements called Functional Detox Products.

So I so welcome. I'm so excited to have you here. Yeah, thanks for having me. Yeah. I mean, detox and mold, such an important topic that we often don't think about when we're going through menopause and we're just thinking about estrogen. So I love for starters, just it sounds like you've had quite the personal journey. I'd love if you're willing to share a little bit about that story with us.

Brigitte's Personal Mold Illness Journey 2:27

Yeah. And I'll share and kind of tie in is that I started to get sick, soon after I had my son. So, you know, some of my problems were basically attributed to the hormones, right? I wasn't sleeping well. I was anxious, I was spotting with my periods or other things too. I was getting sick more often, increasing like food intolerances. But I went I went many years, I think like eight years in the same home, up and down symptoms, you know, never suspecting mold. And even when I would see different hormone practitioners or pain practitioners, you know, and it was never mentioned.

I'm kind of until the 11th hour. So I yeah, I definitely have some passion that. Yeah, a lot of times I feel like women are kind of getting beat up and blamed that their their anxiety, their weight gain is sort of their, their problem. It's their stress. And like, they're sort of not good enough. And I think toxins are something that we're living with. We we often don't know I'm going to fat cause it just keeps hitting you day after day. It's like all the things you do. I'm sorry I was working so hard on my health, you know, cooking everything from scratch.

You know, all the things. You know, if you're not getting better, despite all that, I think is really important to consider toxins. So there may be some women out there listening and they're like, yeah, I have my my hormone doctor, and I, I go to yoga and I stopped drinking and like, why do I still feel like this? So yeah, I, I, I want to I'm your example that it can disrupt your hormones and much more. So it's at least good to be aware of. Yeah. I feel like for me, I just like to screen these things for all my patients, just to know, is this something we have to pay attention to, or is it something we can rule out?

And because it's so it's so, epidemic these days, right? It's such a huge issue that historically has been missed even in the alternative community. And I think it's really getting more attention now that, wow mold can really be a root cause of feeling miserable and not being able to heal. Yeah, for sure. You know, and even when I first learned about toxic mold, like a year or two before I got sick, I was like, oh gosh, like that. So like when, when would I ever run across that? You know, when it is, it is pretty common just the way our houses are built, you know.

But it's historical too, like it's mentioned in the Bible. Like, you know, mold just naturally grows places. There's moisture. Right? It's just it's just part of our environment. And we just have to know, like, how to live with it in our modern homes and protect ourselves. Because they. Yeah, that plus all the other factors in your house, an aging you can come really, really sick. You know, I, I shared some things in my story, but it got to the point where I was literally, like, imagining dying, like I was suicidal.

I knew I was so tired, like, I just couldn't imagining having to do it all over the next day. And I wasn't depressed. I just was so tired that, like, my brain was like trying to find solutions to, like, not have to do this anymore, you know? So things got bad and my short term memory was super bad. I would lose things all the time. So it's not something, you know, even sounds kind of radical if you ignore it and things escalate and can get really, really serious. So for the for the woman listening who maybe is just hearing about this for the first time, where do we start?

How does where does it come from? Where are the exposures? How can you tell? What kind of testing do you like? Sure. Yeah, I'm. I sound totally crazy if you haven't heard of it yet, but, yeah, we have mold in our environment. You know, we see it on our food that rots are in the forest. So it's just it plays a role in, like, decaying things. Right? So it has a natural role. There are many, many, many types of mold, in in enough quantity in your house. Any type of mold is kind of a burden on your system.

And then there are a handful of molds, about a dozen molds that are considered toxic. Some of their waste products are literally toxic to mammals. So it's not just humans, it's also your pets. There's been a lot of research in the livestock industry about mold because they're often said moldy grains, and then they can't reproduce. They get sick. So a lot of our information about toxic mold came from that industry. Yeah. And it can be, you know, it's not necessarily like one little moldy spot in your sink is enough to make you sick.

But often, like, I have a lot of friends who are mold inspectors now and, you know, say you're in a, you know, normal, like, 2000 square foot house.

Where Mold Comes From and How It Harms Health 7:31

Over time, it's like you could have like, five different water damage issues, you know, and if they're never repaired correctly, even when the area dries or looks dry, you can still be releasing these toxins. They can release them. It gets kind of stressed when it's dry, so can release them that way. Or when you rush into it, they can emit through a wall. So my inspector friends have also taught me about like 90% of the mold in your home is not visible. It is behind your walls. It's like in your crawl space.

It's places you're not checking. You know, if you saw my home that I lived in, you wouldn't say all this smelly and moldy like it was like 99% in in the walls. So, so, yeah, it's it's, it's pretty common because we live with plumbing and then extreme weather and, you know, humidity. And this can create a situation for it to grow. So I'm often just trying to teach people as much as, like you're learning about your health. I'm glad you're on this summer. I'm glad you're learning. You have to be a good steward of your home, too.

It's where you live. So I kind of joke, like when I was at home, owner of that home. Like I thought it was just about decorating full stop. Like I didn't care about how my gutters drains or when my attic was last, like service. I didn't care about any of that. That is very important. And it's expensive and it's inconvenient, but the prevention is worth it. And just knowing how to deal with, water leak is important, too. So just a quick one. Like, really, it has to be dealt with within 48 hours. Otherwise, mold is going to grow in good stead.

It's a little better for you and I here in Arizona. It's it's so dry. But yeah, generally you have to deal with it quickly. So yeah, that's, that's a bit about it. And as far as how it affects your health, and then it can just be like a load on the immune system if, say, you're just in a house with a lot of humidity and poor circulation, like could just be some load there that your body's dealing with on top of every other load. Right? Like EMF and toxins coming out of your carpets and stress and pesticides.

So it can be that kind of thing. And it can be, like I said earlier, like actually toxic. Like pretty extremely toxic to your cells, to your mind. Okay, Andrea. And mostly we inhale it and you inhale it right up into your brain. Basically it breaks down the drug lane barrier and it can inflame and kind of lodge in your hypothalamus pituitary, which is like your hormone center. So when I learned that much later in my own story, I was like, that makes a lot of sense why my hormones are always so tanked out and I could never get them up since crossing the blood brain barrier, crossing cell walls.

So it can certainly affect different areas of your brain. This is why, you know, explaining why people are tired and people are forgetful. And I know, like, that's so common nowadays. Like, we think that's acceptable, right? To be tired and forgetful. But it's not. It's, you know, and it can get, like I mentioned earlier, like it can get really severe. And it is kind of associated with, you know, types of brain degeneration. So it's not just aging like a lot of that is toxicity. So, you know, it can be all the way from like chronic little chronic sinus issues all the way to like really severe symptoms, depending on how much exposure you've had and other factors in your health, there's really just a whole range of symptoms that could potentially go on.

So I have a couple of questions from like, okay, said, do you think cars are ever a source. How often have mold 100%. Yeah. So so for checking your cars for checking your home is like, what do you recommend for the listeners if they're like, maybe I should have my house check or my car check. What do they who should they call? Yeah. So yeah, there's a few different options. Something like your car will just use that because that one's easier. There's a company. Can I give a name on here? Sure. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

There's a company called Immuno LaTeX out of New Mexico. You can buy from them a plate or a swab. They're very affordable. You pay a little extra fee if you want them to analyze it, if you got, like, some positive growth. But that's a way to see business like a, you know, an algae plate thing. And it is moist. And so molds can grow on there. And then you send it into that lab and they analyze like which types they are and stuff like that. So you could potentially do that in your car and like swab, like the AC kind of vents and that kind of a thing.

Or you could tap your carpet, the dust on your carpet, and you just follow their directions. I mean, for us, we lost two cars and, because when we were remediating our house, we just kind of made some mistakes and, like, what we carried around in the car and, like, stuff like that. And we were so sensitized to our own mold that we were. So we put the cars, like, in storage. I think we sold one right away, and then we put the other in storage. And for like the summer, we actually came to Arizona.

And then we went back and we opened the guard armor like, no, you know, because we get sick immediately. So we never tested our cars. You know, but we knew that they were a problem. So that's a way to we could just put your car, you know, don't use it for a couple months, work on your healing, then you become more sensitive to this type of thing. So you can do those same play tests in a workplace, in a home, in, you know, in apartments. There's pros and cons of, like, every test, just like with the body.

So and that. And then another option, if you're a home owner, is to get, an inspection. So that's what we did is actually our first step is we got an inspector. He happened to be very good. He found moisture in our walls. He found our gutters weren't draining correctly. He he swabbed samples. He did air sample. He. It should be a big combination of things. It's not usually cheap. But then they can get an assessment. It's good because you don't just want to know. You have mold. You want to know where is the mold so you can do something about it.

And so, yeah. And then the probably last option is there's some couple different dust tests that where you can collect dust, like swabbing it around your house and send that into a lab and have that interpreted. Yeah. I think this this phase is confusing because people want it to be like simple. But a house is usually large and it has a lot of areas. And like we said, mold can be in the walls. So, it's not always so simple. And sometimes things get messed by the wrong type of testing or the wrong inspector.

So it, for better or worse, is is like a topic where you kind of have to slow down and educate yourself so that, you know, you do make good choices along the way. Yeah. And I know it's time consuming and expensive, but so is being really sick. And so sometimes we just have to prioritize prevention or investigation and, and and make that something that we can save for or plan for and make happen so that we can. Because like you said, our home is we spend especially after Covid, a lot of us now work out of our homes or we're in our homes a lot, and we want to make sure that our homes are

Testing for Mold in Homes, Cars, and the Body 15:30

our sanctuary is not just, like you said, decorative wise, but just that they're helping heal us and not make us sick. So what about testing? If someone's listening and they're like, I really want to know if I have mold in the body? Yeah, yeah. Luckily that one is a lot easier. So. And these tests didn't always exist. But now with, like an at home urine test, you can test for mold toxins. Coming out like in the waste urine. There's a few little, you know, instructions on how to best do that. You know, we sell our tests.

I know, I don't know, you may be able to get it somewhere without a practitioner, but when I say we usually it has to be issued through a practitioner. And then we do a review of your test because you couldn't get your results. And even though they look pretty simple, you still don't know what to do about them. So we always give a consultation too. But yeah, luckily, I mean, I've only seen one false negatives. I mean the levels can go up and down and how well you detox can depend. But you know, we see tons and tons of positives.

So, yeah, it can definitely be caught, for the most part on a urine test. Yeah, I see a lot of positives too, and that they bring up such a good point. It's the same thing with heavy metals that we don't necessarily detox linearly about the body. Sometimes because we start to detox, things get higher. And that's just because the body's letting go and being encouraged. So speaking about detox, what are what would you like to say about detox and what are there any detox tips or techniques that the listeners can institute at home?

And just what's your home? Yeah, yeah. Well the like the home home repair piece like to the side because that's a whole big issue because anybody listening can do detox. Like you know, everybody basically needs to because if you're not exposed to mold, you're still exposed to pesticides and herbicides and gasoline additives, like at a higher rate than we we'd like to think, unfortunately, and even our own body makes waste products and we get a little less efficient, detoxing as we get older. And as I'm getting older, I think some of the materials I want to produce are around, like this kind of detox for anti-aging and like, beauty and like it really, you know, it really makes a difference.

It's like, I think we just think diet and exercise and I'm like, can we just add detox to that conversation because it's so important. It's so helpful. So I love detox techniques. You know, there's supplements we can talk about as well. But when I was healing, a lot of the techniques are really what did it for me. And a lot of them are around moving lymphatic. So lymphatic fluids, you know, kind of collect toxins and bring them into the bloodstream, but they can kind of back up when we're not detoxing. Well.

And so it's pretty simple thing to do, just get that circulation going so long as your liver's working, as long as you're pooping and peeing. Just to get lymphatic swimming with, like, dry brushing, exercise, mini trampoline. Those are all good starters. I did do some lymphatic massage when I was going through my treatment. You know, there's lots of interesting clinics, and I got some here in Phoenix where you can get a lot of kind of cool techniques like compression techniques and red light therapy, all pretty accessible to us.

Now, I did start doing coffee and when I was sick, and I still do them about once a week. Like, I really just feel that they help me. Castor oil packs are really easy to do. Epsom salt baths. Easy to do. Yeah, that's I think that's, to get us started, if you have any questions about those. Yeah. I'm a huge lymphatic, fan. I'm pretty obsessed with nice. I have, I have lots of lymphatic techniques. I have the flow press, which is a compression that you can go into bit into Paris and, and. Yeah, because I do thermography scans.

And what I realized is because it's a diagnostic test that can actually look at the lymphatic system, there's not really a lot of diagnostic ways to look at the lymph. And so I've been doing them for over 20 years. And what I realized was everyone's lymphatic system is congested because no one has mentioned to it. And so I love that you brought up the lymph because I am I am lymph obsessed. So and it's such an important piece to detect missing. And I love Castor okay. So my favorite things I would love for you to talk a little bit about, because I'm sure some of the women are like, what is she sticky?

What is she doing? Anatomy. What did she say? Coffee enemas. What do I know? It's like, you know, opt in or opt out. But all this is kind of share. I mean, when I was doing my functional health coaching, they found in is coffee analyzed because they're like, oh, maybe your bile duct is blocked and like, your client could go get really, you know, have some. So I thought, oh, they don't sound very safe or they sound a little risky or whatever. And most of us as Americans don't really have propensity to be like, yeah, I wanted to try and enema.

But then I read a book by Jay Davidson, you probably know, and he's in the detox space, and he outlined how to do it and why they're helpful. And I was like, you know, and then I have an interview, and I was like, should I try it? Should I do it? You know, it's like I needed, like the full push to. And he was like, yeah. So, you know, like in, like anything you have to get the equipment and learn how to do it. But once you do it like a few times, it's it's pretty easy. It's not messy. It's just, you know, I think, again, it's not very modern American to, like, use medicine that way, but it's just another way to get, I will say, in this, kind of call it a medicine into your body is it's just a way to get it into your bloodstream to go to your liver.

So there unfortunately, is not a lot of great evidence on coffee enemas. There's not much research. You know, I well, I wrote a book about mold recently and that was probably the weakest. And there isn't much, you know, evidence on coffee enema. But there's some compounds in the coffee. I use, like a light roast coffee. You brew it a long time. And it helps the body recycle glutathione, which is an antioxidant, and liver. And then, of course, all your blood is passing in. Passing through the liver as you like.

Retain this coffee in your lower bowel. So the the premise is basically that it helps you recycle glutathione on it also is a little stimulating. So it's pumping bile. It's not meant to make you have a bowel movement, but it is kind of clearing, you know, the lower bowel, which is always helpful for detox. And yeah, like, once you get the hang of it, you just kind of have to go, like, slow and get the hang of it. But after a few times, I, I just when I was really sick and gave me a ton of benefit, like, I was just so tired, you know, and, if I could do a coffee enema that day, I knew, like, my day would be a lot better.

So, so I yeah, I just got a new routine. So now usually on weekend, I'll still do a coffee enema. It's like if I say, well, it's really I'll say a few things to that. So my very first introduction into natural medicine was gosh, like 30 years ago. And it was with a colon hydro therapist who was doing coffee enemas. So coffee enemas were like one of the very first things I tried and did and learned about. So I've always been a fan of them. And, you know, it's part of Gerson therapy. So I always read coffee enemas.

And with my oncology patients or patients who are very toxic. So I, I think they're very important and they're kind of can make you go, What? But when you really think about it and how it's helping to detox and like you said, recycling the glutathione, there's there's a lot of benefits. And I always say hashtag not all medicine comes in a pill bottle. And so there's no there's a very good example of how it doesn't.

Detox Strategies and Lymphatic Support 24:18

Yeah. I just you know, it's very affordable. You know you can reuse the equipment and you can do other detox techniques while you're in there. You can do the castor oil pack, you can meditate. You know, I'll often do my weekly planner like can it's not messy. It's just like my little hour of me. Time is just one thing. I'm surprised how my clients actually are doing it. Not even because I said it is because they're a community that's really dealing with a lot of toxicity, and they've heard about it.

So I know a lot of people do actually. Really? Yeah, actually do really like it. So that's great. So, so you mentioned supplements and I I'd love to hear what your, your faves are or what you think is important. Yeah, yeah. I mentioned I wrote a small book this year. So it was tough because I had to kind of organize, you know, there's so many supplements out there and so many techniques. So I picked my five top techniques, my five top supplements as just a base, you know, things that I found to be important for me and my healing.

And then from there, you know, I gave a lot more options. But since we mentioned Bluetooth, I you can take Bluetooth mean you can take its precursor NAC as well. Yeah. Some people don't tolerate Bluetooth. I'm just like some people don't tolerate everything. You know, there's always, you know, take it with a grain of salt. But mostly it's pretty well tolerated because this is an antioxidant our body makes. And when you're in chronic toxicity, that important antioxidant is going to tend to lower, right?

When you need it the most. So it's just, you know, and I actually love all antioxidants. Like I probably will write my next book about antioxidants because I don't think they got enough play in the detox rally. I think, oh, like liver and pooping. But it's like your antioxidants are in a lot of the work to reverse all that oxidative damage of the toxins you're exposed to. So, you know, if you don't tolerate glutathione, all you can do, you know, vitamin C, and it's like there's tons of, you know, yogurt, green tea, lots of things out there.

So glutathione one, I chose electrolytes in the top five because when you're detoxing from all you can do, obviously using a sauna quite a bit, we we actually didn't mention sauna, but that's another great technique. And then you're often peeing more because of a certain hormonal imbalance. So you have to answer deplete those electrolytes. Broccoli seed and sprout. I actually chose like, I already loved it for detox and, like, protecting the liver. And then I found out it actually works really well for mycotoxins.

Detox as well is very gentle. So that's one of my top CoQ10 made my top five because it really helped me a lot. Like I mentioned earlier, affects your mitochondria or your little energy makers. So that deep fatigue, you know, you could also be your thyroid is off and this and that. But your mitochondria are often disrupted, especially with mold. So I love CoQ10 again as an antioxidant. So that made my list. And then last is binders. Which people may or may not have heard of, but it's probably the most common.

Like detox supplement, it's either physically or chemically binding toxins, usually in the intestines so that you poop them out instead of recycle them back in with the bile. So they can be a nice aid, especially when you are like actively pushing the lymph and like trying to detox, you know, you know, your practitioner said you do have heavy metals, you do have mold. Just a way to kind of capture things and help them leave the body. Oh, I love that you gave a shout out to antioxidants. I don't think anyone is loved on antioxidants yet.

And they are are so important. They're so important and they're so easy to talk, you know, they're so easily tolerated. Yeah, yeah, I think I'll do one of these. Some. It's just on antioxidants. I'm like, they're not getting enough anymore. Press we do. Yeah. They're so important I think I one thing I learned in the last year is like if you don't you can't recover from exercise. Well, you're not able to exercise like you used to. That's often poor antioxidant status too. So that might be a little tip for women out there.

You know, that sounds just aging. That's the antioxidant status. So you can literally like me taking antioxidants more on days. You know, you work out or before you go work out. So yeah, they're they're really important. And you mentioned the mitochondria, which it's hard to have good hormonal balance if you don't have happy mitochondria. So I'm glad you gave them a shout out as well. All these all these important pieces. What about and yes, definitely the sauna. We actually have, high tech health is sponsoring the summit and we have a whole talk on sauna therapy.

And, how important is and how one of my dreams is to have a sauna in every home. They kind of. It should just really be something that we are we are doing naturally. We, like you mentioned in the beginning, we talk about diet and exercise, which obviously are important, but detox has to be part of the conversation now because of all the toxins and all the different type of toxins and the amount of toxins we're all exposed to, I mean, I, I do toxicity testing and mold testing and so forth on my patients and you don't see anyone who doesn't have toxins and nobody that owns mycotoxins, pesticides.

It's not oh, I'm looking to see if you have them. It's I'm looking to see how much, much. Yeah, it's sad, but it's the reality of our times. And so if that's the reality, then detoxing and doing the things that you're talking about just have to be part of what we do. We shower, we feed ourselves. Right? I t yeah, yeah yeah yeah, yeah. And it doesn't have to be extreme. You know, you can get up and have a lemon water in the morning and like, do some squats and like, arm circles. So move your limbs like it doesn't have to be expensive or a lot of work, but it's just like learning and you're going to learn, you know, ideas on this sometimes, like learning little techniques and getting into new habits.

And then just kind of letting those become, you know, part of your life that you actually start to, like, crave it. Right? Like, you know, you're like, hi. It's like really? I mean, it sounds weird, but like, I'm just really craving my coffee and, yeah, yeah, I'm not making myself do it. I actually like, like it now. And you'll start to crave, like, your lemon water, just like you will, coffee or something. So once you kind of. Yeah, just try stuff on, you get a bigger

Coffee Enemas, Supplements, and Antioxidants 31:28

and bigger menu of things you could do within a given day. Exactly. And, and it's good to have a big menu so you don't have to become rigid where it's like, okay, I wake up and I do this, I do this, I do this like you can have a menu. So today I'm going to do this for my detox. Today I'm going to do that I'm going to drink I'm going to move I'm going to sweat I'm going to do an enema. I'm going to make sure I take off my shoes at the front door all the time. So I'm not tracking in all the pesticides from outside.

I'm going to check my home. I'm going to start changing my cleaning products, my beauty products, my food. I mean, there's so it can be overwhelming. But if we just kind of start to pick away at it, we can really transforms our lives and really helps to it. We have these body stores, but we also have what's coming at us. So it's like we have to do our best to reduce, and then we have to support our bodies so we can be getting rid of what we're exposed to. Yeah, I kind of yeah. It's just like I talked earlier, you can just learn about your body.

You have to learn about your home. It's like it's there's inside and outside because we are interacting with our external environment. So yeah, you have to kind of support both that. It was all said. Yeah. It's it's not always easy being healthy, but it's certainly worth taking the time and energy and attention to to do the things that need to be done so that you can have vibrant health and age gracefully and have hormones that aren't going wonky on you because of underlying toxins. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

And it does become easy, easier and easier. And it's like you wouldn't want to go back to, you know, eating fast food and like staying up all night because you just now it just doesn't make you feel the same. Right. So exactly. Yeah. I always say I, I'm grateful I was sick as a child and that I have a weaker constitution because it keeps me on the on the healthy path. It keeps me choosing healthy things, because I'd rather choose healthy choices and feel good than partake in unhealthy habits and then feel like crap.

All right, so it's it's worth it's worth the work. So anything else about this hormonal transition and detox and mold that we that I didn't ask you about, that you want to share with the listeners or did we get it all? Yeah. Maybe I'll just tie in hormones like a little bit more because, you know, I'm sure you have a lot of other great speakers, but yeah, like, you can, you know, take supplemental hormones or eat certain foods to support hormones, but you, you have to have. Yeah. The whole thing working. Right.

You have to have a healthy gut to detoxify hormones. And you can't have this like heavy toxic load for your hormones to function and communicate correctly. So like if your cells are inflamed, hormonal signals oftentimes can't get inside. So, it is just a piece of, of the hormonal picture. And it just it so it may not be a huge piece for you. Or it could be, you know, however much is affecting you could vary. But just like, yeah, keep it in mind and definitely know like what Sharon said, like having a less toxic home is going to make your menopause easier and you know you're not risking as much like weight gain and symptoms.

Because you're you're just taking that that load off the hormones. Hormones are such a delicate balance, especially as we're aging. And that's all changing. It's already in a better uproar. So you just don't want to add any factors to, you know, make it even worse. So yeah, just just keeping in mind is as part of the picture. And I think there's still tons of hope too. Right. And I'm almost 48 and like, I'm really taking care of my hormones and my health. And I think I kind of look at like celebrities who are a little older than me and like, what are they doing?

You know, it's like they're not just like calling it in like they're eating. They're eating real food. They're drinking too much water. Like Jennifer Lopez, doesn't drink alcohol at all because she doesn't want it to affect her skin, you know. So there is like, it's it's their secrets, but they're not really secrets, right? It's just like taking good care of yourself. Through this time and for me, like, nearing menopause, like, I don't have to look like a celebrity, but, like, I just I want to feel, like, vibrant and great in my body and, like, you know, just feel confident.

And I think when and we're getting kind of sick or sicker and symptomatic and menopause, we can kind of lose some confidence. And it's, it's really sad because you still have a lot to offer. Are you still like, you know, you're still an amazing person. So I think, you know, taking taking your symptoms and taking your health into your own hands so that like, you feel like, you know, I'm going to like, get through this. Like, you know, still like feeling great, looking great. Like you can it's just is like learning how, you know, because it is a huge transition.

So I'm glad that you're putting on this event, so that people can, like, have these conversations, you know, no, like, it's not just automatic to look like Jennifer Lopez, like you, you got to do the things. But we can all do like they're accessible to all of us. So yeah, it's there is we talked about a lot of heavy stuff, but there's like a lot of hope. And like in my own story, you know, my health, like, completely transformed and, you know, so anything, any kind of. And it sounds like in your health too.

So any picture can be changed once you put in the effort. I like that you brought up J.Lo. I just finished watching her documentary. Oh I loved it. Did you love it? Yes, I loved it and I never knew that I was so upset she didn't get her Academy Award. I was like she was robbed. But yeah, she's such an inspiration and and really just, you know, her attitude and everything was really inspiring. And I and I think just to end just reflecting on what you said is so important that it is. And as we've been learning here, I call this the sacred second act of our lives.

And it really is a time of rebirthing and coming home to ourselves and our creativity and all the magic we can put out in the world. But if we if we don't feel good, if our physical bodies

Hormones, Hope, and Thriving Through Menopause 38:08

are not supporting us and they are dragging us to pain and suffering, it's hard to really step into all the beauty we're talking about. Exactly. Yeah. Our listening. And so and that's why I try created my My Read program, which stands for Reinvent Your Health, Explore Your Spirit and discover your Sexy. And even though I think a lot of things can start out here in the energy and can be emotional and traumas, sometimes just going in and paying attention and doing things that serve and nurture the physical body, including a lot of the things we talked about today and detoxing can really just help our energy and our emotions. Just relax and release.

And so we have to pay attention to this beautiful vessel that we are given. And unfortunately, toxicity is a big part of that. And we have to we have to go after it. Not being afraid or freaked out, but just saying, okay, this is the reality. It's now a toxic world. I don't see that changing any time in the near future. I mean, I hope it does, but I don't see that really happening. I see just more and more chemicals being put into the air and the water and the soil and all this. And so we just have to empower ourselves to say, okay, we are going to do what we can do.

We're not going to get crazy. We're not going to, you know, become insane about it, because that's not healthy easy either. But we're going to have an awareness. We're going to think about the things that Bridgette just talked to us, see where it applies to us. And we're just going to start instituting and having knowledge and taking steps. And that's how we really do embrace aging and our hormonal journey and just not only mastering the menopausal transition, but just mastering our experience of being alive and how we want to go through that journey.

So thank you so much for what you shared with us, for if we want to find out more about you, where where do we find you? Oh yeah. I mean, my site is just my name, which is Bridget danner.com Bridget within it and it's b r I'd I t right. Yes. Okay, okay. And of course if you all want to have, less mold in your environment, you can come join Bridget and I in Arizona where it is very dry. Yeah. So there's lots of us actually, who have moved here for the dry climate. It's it's super hot when we're recording this right now, we're, we're it's funny because we went down to, like the high 90s today and it was like, oh, we're having a, you know, a cool wave.

And we can go out now. And it's all it's all your perspective of how you view things. And so here you're in 90 degrees. We're we're putting on jackets because it's a little chilly out. Yeah. Okay. So thank you so much for being here. And I love your story or so inspirational and just living proof that it doesn't have to be your destiny if you are suffering, if you have mold. But there are solutions and you can turn it around and be beautiful and vibrant and productive. Just like Bridget. So thank you for being part of the summit and everyone be well.