Glutathione, Menopause, & Aging: The Missing Piece in Oxidative Stress and Why It Matters

Welcome back to Menopause Mastery. So today, I'm joined by my friend, Dr. Gina Nick. She is a leading naturopathic physician and researcher from California, but now newly moved to Nashville. And she's turned her passion from her clinical practice for detoxification into a groundbreaking glutathione master antioxidant product. And what we're talking about today is oxidative stress and the aging process and detoxification. And how glutathione plays a role in helping your body overcome oxidative stress and where you might be missing this in your life. Lots of genetics can contribute to changes in your ability to generate or regenerate glutathione. And so we go deeply into the different detoxification pathways and ways that you can raise your glutathione to not only help with cognitive performance and performance, but longevity. So, join me today with Dr. Gina Nick, and we're going to talk all about vitamin G. So, I want to go ahead and dive in and talk a little bit about how did you really get into healthcare as a whole, but really, how did you start moving into oxidative stress, detoxification, and redox. Because I think most people, they hear that as sort of a buzzword and they don't realize the implications, but that's a unique world to be in. So tell me your story. I know we talked about it before a couple of years ago, but I want everybody to hear your story.

Okay. So I was in naturopathic medical school, which just that whole journey kind of fell into my lap. I was going the traditional allopathic way. I was at UCLA and my honors academic counselor gave me a brochure for a naturopathic school. And he was like, Gina, you're always talking to me about nutrition and, you know, using nutrition to help with different diseases. This just sounds more like you, right? And I'm like, naturopathic medicine? I'd never heard of it, whatnot. And so, that kind of started my journey in that direction. And when I was at— in naturopathic school, you would think I would've learned a lot about detoxification. Right. And that would've— because nowadays it's so cornerstone to how you practice functional medicine and all that. But back then it wasn't. But for some reason, I was very fascinated by that whole concept. I would go to different detox institutes like the Optimum Health Institute or the Hippocrates Health Institute. And then I was like, what? You know, like, what is this whole world of the human detoxification system?

Yeah.

And so, something caused me to go focus in that direction. So, way back in naturopathic school, I kind of like, in addition to what I learned in school, I was off studying detoxification. So then, fast forward, I graduate, I became the director of research at Standard Process Nutrition, and I created this whole 21-day purification program. And, this is long before detox was a buzzword. Long before. I'm talking back in 2000, like 1999, 2000. And, Standard Process caters to healthcare practitioners. And so, we just saw amazing results with all these doctors working with their patients using this purification protocol. So, that really, I mean, it just never stopped from there. I kind of got known for doing detoxification. When I graduated, I was, I started using glutathione in my practice, which is a main detoxification agent in the body. And then I was hired by a company who manufactures glutathione. And they asked, and it was an oral form, which I was taught you have to inject it. It can be used in liposomal form, you know, but other than that, you know, oral form doesn't work. So here I have this raw material that I'm paid to study. So, I had the time, I could afford to take the time to really dive in. And, I was using it with my patients. I was speaking about it to doctors at conferences. And then, fast forward. So, I'm jumping 5-year chunks here, but fast forward and COVID hits. And, I'm homeschooling my daughter and I'm wanting her to take glutathione. Right. Be just to help with her immune system and whatnot. And there was some data that came out correlating glutathione depletion with a severe reaction to COVID.

Mm-hmm.

And I had been formulating products since I started my career. And it was just something I really loved to do. I would custom formulate for patients and whatnot. So I just, I said, that's it. I'm going to create a form of glutathione that tastes good, is accessible, that kids will want to take, that will actually work. And, make it so the glutathione is bioavailable in the cells. And, I had this— I mean, I had spent so much time researching all the inner workings of how glutathione actually works in the body and the whole recycling process and what happens in the body through that process. So, I created a formula designed to be taken every day. I wanted it to taste like a Pixy Stick. I liked Pixy Stix as a kid.

Yeah.

I'm like, I want, I want to hack sugar while I'm at it, you know? So I'm going to, this is a challenge for me, but I tell you what, I created that formula. And to this day, the only thing I've added to it is inulin. Other than that, it's the exact same formula. First go-round, it tasted amazing. It tasted like a Pixy Stick. And so I always say this was very much divinely inspired. And so now here we are, fast forward, you know, another 6 years. And every day, every day I am surprised by the role that glutathione plays in so many different conditions. And I was invited to a nonprofit fundraising event for Duchenne muscular dystrophy.

Mm-hmm.

And before going, I'm like, And, we sponsored it. I was like, sure, I'll sponsor it. And so, Vitamin G sponsored it. I'm like, what role does glutathione play here with this genetic disease that wreaks havoc on young boys? And, it's a very sad condition. And sure enough, there's data showing the role of glutathione in the progression of this muscular dystrophy condition.

Wow.

And so it's just, so, so just, it's just kind of fallen in my lap, this whole thing about deep, the human detoxification system, oxidative stress, and glutathione. It's like, I can't stop. I'm not allowed to stop talking about glutathione. It's like, here I am all these years later. And yeah, so that's kind of, that's the story in a nutshell.

In a nutshell. Exactly. So I will say I have had the Pixy Stix, the vitamin G. Amazing. That was one of my favorite, favorite treats when I was a kid. I don't have a big sweet tooth, so that tart kind of, yeah, I was like, this is awesome. It kind of throws me back to being a child, which is fabulous because then you get benefit from something that feels very childlike at the same time.

Yes. And fun, like something you'd actually want to do every day, you know?

Yeah. Let's face it, most liposomal oral glutathione tastes like ass. I'm just going to be really honest. It's disgusting. It's gross.

There's no— and patient compliance was always an issue. I'd say, you know, you need glutathione, but not everybody wants to get injected. And certainly everyone doesn't want to take a liposomal form or have to refrigerate it. And so it was a barrier to people really realizing the benefits on a day-to-day basis of having healthy glutathione levels in your body.

Absolutely. So let's, let's dig in. Let's talk about the role glutathione plays in cellular dynamics. Like, Just so everybody kind of knows, what is glutathione really doing inside the cell? Because it is so very, very important.

Yes. So, it's doing a lot of things. Most important, I think, is it's protecting the mitochondria of your cells, the powerhouse of your cells where energy is produced. And, that's where toxins from the environment or if you're fighting an infection, that's where they tend to congregate in the mitochondria of the cells where they cause damage. Which leads to inflammation, low energy, poor detoxification capacity, all of those things. And so essentially glutathione is manufactured in every cell in your body, but really it protects those mitochondria from oxidative stress, excess oxidative stress and damage. Yeah.

Okay. So let's dig in. So midlife women. So as women go through, and this gets worse if your genetics are poor in the glutathione pathway, which we can also dig into, but particularly in midlife, midlife, as we enter into perimenopause and menopause, we see a distinct shift in this oxidative stress and it's enormous. If you're testing things like organic acids, you see it, it's very, very clear. And, it goes right alongside estrogen because estrogen helps sort of alter our production of glutathione directly and our efficiency inside our mitochondria. So, let's talk a little bit about this because I don't think oxidative stress gets the notice and the information necessary to women because people talk about all the other stuff. Oh, your hot flashes, your night sweats. And, I'm like, yeah, but oxidative stress damages all the way down to the cellular components.

Yes. I mean, I'd bring it right down to inflammation. So, we know that an estrogen deficiency causes more inflammation in the body. It actually triggers, you know, the whole inflammatory cascade, right? And when you're feeling symptoms, whether it's due to neuroinflammation, you know, foggy thinking, you know, memory issues and all of that, low energy, achiness, even down to hot flashes, you can tie it back to inflammation in the body. And so Glutathione plays a huge role in that. And if you've got oxidative stress, there's an inflammatory process happening in your body. And as those hormones steadily decline, as you go through that 10-year, sometimes 10-year phase of perimenopause where your hormones are slowly declining, women are experiencing the effects of more oxidative stress, more inflammation. Which leads to so many different health challenges. You know, we all started to learn about inflammation because of COVID right? Everybody's like, okay, inflammation. And, and a lot of people experienced the consequence of too much inflammation in your body. Well, that's tied to oxidative stress. And glutathione is such a key to minimizing that excess oxidative stress and lowering that inflammatory load in the body, especially in women as their hormones are declining and they're going right to inflammation. And, I remember way back when, when I would lecture on bioidentical hormone replacement therapy and all of that, I remember putting together this graph that showed estrogen deficiency. And, I went through the whole biochemical pathway. Triggers inflammation. I didn't know that until I prepared for this lecture. Yeah. But that's, it's like A equals B, you know, like low estrogen equals more inflammation in your body. And so yes, you want to replace that def— you wanna correct that deficiency, right? But you also need to deal with the inflammation that has occurred and the damage that has occurred. As a consequence of the deficiency of those hormones. So they work hand in hand. You know, when I made the Pixie Stix and I was giving them to my patients, I wasn't planning to market the product for women going through perimenopause, menopause. It wasn't even, I was focused on kids and immune function, brain health. And my women were having the most profound benefits. From taking glutathione. Women, some women who didn't want to take any hormones and they were experiencing the benefits of glutathione being better sleep. You know, they were, they weren't experiencing the hot flashes. And I'm like, wait, but I'm not even giving them hormones. No, but I'm lowering that inflammatory load that is tied to the symptoms they're feeling. Right.

Right.

So yeah. And a lot of people don't make that connection.

No. And I think it's the— we have the consensus paper that came out about genital urinary syndrome of menopause, the consensus paper that came out about the musculoskeletal syndrome of menopause. And it's just these pockets of inflammation that are showing up in silos of medical specialties in which we have, right? Your urogynecologist and Your orthopedics and things like that. But the reality is this inflammatory condition's happening everywhere. And depending on who we are as women, we may show up with more joint pain or more this or more that, but it's everywhere. But I think even the other part that people are unaware of is the role inflammation plays. And you kind of pointed to it, but I want to dig in a little deeper, the neuroinflammation and how that shows up.

Yeah.

psychiatric diagnostic conditions and brain fog and all these other things. We keep thinking, oh, it's not— depression is not an SSRI deficiency. It's an inflammatory state. Right. And we keep forgetting that. And so, so much of those experiences that we're having are actually being driven by an inflammatory state, often ameliorated by things like glutathione. Yes.

Yes. When you have Inflammation in your body, right? Due to a hormone deficiency, exposure to a virus, mold, you name it, exposure to pesticides, and you've got inflammation going on in your body, which is your body's trying to protect itself. It's working for you, by the way, you know? So it's not like it's trying to attack you. It's working for you. But when you've got inflammation in your body, it triggers inflammation in the brain. There is a direct connection. If you have interleukin-4, which is just an inflammatory molecule circulating around in your body, that's kind of out of control, your brain will make interleukin-4 in response to what the rest of your body is doing. And it's a protective mechanism. It's like the brain, the body's saying, hey, hey, you need to create this inflammatory molecule so that you don't end up with, you know, the brain doesn't get damaged. So it's protective. However, it, when it's out of control or it's not, it's not, the immune system isn't adapting in a healthy way. It triggers neuroinflammation and that neuroinflammation, inflammation in the brain will then be a cause for anxiety, depression, even obsessive compulsive disorder. Even now we're seeing data showing its impact on things like schizophrenia.

Hmm.

To the oxidative stress and the inflammation happening in the brain is what's actually triggering these conditions, or is one major cause that we haven't really focused on.

Right.

And so that's the connection. And you know, as a practitioner dealing with women going through this, it's always like, I don't feel like myself. I feel like I'm going crazy. I, all of a sudden I have anxiety or I have major depression, foggy thinking. Those are the class— some of the classic symptoms that women are suffering with unnecessarily due to inflammation in the brain.

Oh yeah. That's so much so, so much so. And then that, just that relationship between estrogen and glutathione that, you know, Probably mimics things in men, but we just have much more profound impact. I want to jump a little bit into cardiovascular. When you talk to women, the thing that they worry about the most, it's really weird what we get frightened of. I would say breast cancer shoots fear through all women. Although it's 6 out of 1,000 in midlife age group, it goes to 1 in 8 risk when you get into your late 80s because of Spelling errors in our DNA, but the reality is one out of every two women is going to die of a cardiovascular-related event, and so much of that accelerates when we go through perimenopause and menopause. And it's a significant part of it is the oxidative stress, the lack of the endothelium, which is the lining of the arteries, being able to make appropriate nitric oxide, which is really sensitive to this oxidative stress, and then you get arterial cysts. stiffness and damage and all this other stuff. And, I don't think anybody talks enough about the impact of glutathione on those pathways.

It impacts lipid peroxidation.

Yeah.

I mean, it impacts the oxidative stress caused by an imbalance in the metabolism of fat. And then, you start talking about high cholesterol and elevated triglycerides and even alpha-lipoprotein A, and all of those things are tied to oxidative stress in the body. And in women, those things all go up as you're going through those perimenopause and menopausal years. And so again, as important, I wouldn't say if not more important, but at least equally important to replenishing the hormones in the healthiest way for that woman. And we can go into all the nuances there. Yeah. Is deal with the oxidative stress, do something on a day-to-day basis that is helping to protect your mitochondria from oxidative damage caused by hormone deficiencies, exposure to toxins of all kinds, whether your body's making them on its own because it's fighting off a mold and, or whatever it is. There's so many things, right? Or whatnot, but address that. And you can, I mean, we can do it through a healthy diet if we're really, really, really careful, you know, but do what's necessary to protect your, protect the mitochondria of your cells, keep them healthy. And so then look at what are the things that are going to keep those cells as healthy as possible throughout your life.

Yeah. Well, and I want to jump back to the lipid peroxidation. So for everybody that's like, ooh, that sounds like a, that's a buzzword and a Scrabble word. It is. And, it's basically how the fats like cholesterol and other lipid particles like the things you might get done on your cardiovascular panels get damaged. And then, when they get damaged, they recruit the inflammation, they recruit the immune system to then get more activated. You get more arterial plaquing and all this other stuff. And, if you just fix the glutathione redox status and support the artery wall, and I would say provide some hormone replacement therapy, all of that stuff ratchets down. And I just, we don't even, like, how many doctors actually just even look at oxidized LDL? They'll do an LDL panel and they're like, oh, it's high or low. But I'm like, okay, is it pissed off LDL or is it kind of okay LDL? Right? Because we have LDL, we need it, but is it angry?

Right, right, right. And when you say like angry, so I'm a big advocate for understanding that your body's always working for you. Your body's always trying to get to a state of balance or health. So even with autoimmune conditions, right? Which when women are going through these hormonal fluctuations can activate an autoimmune condition. Your body, it's not attacking itself. You know, that's, you know, autoimmune condition, your body is attacking itself. Your body is doing its best to manage a process of inflammation, right? And it, and it's dysregulated. The immune system is dysregulated due to a lot of different things, but it's not that it's attacking itself. It's more so it needs support. in maintaining balance and getting re-regulated. And then we kind of get into the whole thing of nervous system regulation and the role that that plays in all everything we're talking about. Right.

Yes.

So, because just remembering your immune system is working for you at all times, your body is working for you. Give it what it needs, give it the support it needs. Remove as best you can the things that are causing it too much stress. And when you have an autoimmune condition, it's your body screaming out, hey, I need some help here. I'm doing everything I can to stay regulated, but I am not regulated. And so, help me out. And that's where we come in as practitioners. We say, okay, does the body need hormones? If so, what type? Does this woman need support in regulating her nervous system? Does she need more time out in nature? Does she need to be listening to the sounds of nature? Does she need to maybe look at meditating or whatever, or breathing techniques, whatever is going to regulate the nervous system so that the immune system can reregulate? And then you kind of pull yourself out of this concept of my body's attacking itself.

Yeah.

So, yeah.

Absolutely. So, so let's get into this. So every woman is told to detoxify. And like you said, you created a purification program. We actually did one of the clinical trials on that purification system. Oh, you did? Out of my clinic using organic acids.

Oh, wow.

Pre and post, right?

Oh, cool.

So we contributed to that research years ago.

Very cool.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Which is kind of, which is kind of fun full circle. But let's, let's talk about this because we, you know, there's a thousand, you go on Instagram, there's a thousand influencers talking about how to, how to detoxify. Or to do this or purification. We have some that are, you know, really missing nutrients, like, I'm going to do a juice fast and purify, which makes me laugh because I'm like, okay, he doesn't understand a single bit of biochemistry.

Uh-huh.

But, you know, there's a lot that can go into detoxification and it's not just so simple as, you know, I'm just going to take a supplement and, you know, maybe water fast or whatever. Let's go into that and talk a little bit about where you really see, A, glutathione is a big part of that, but How to think about it appropriately when you're walking somebody through the idea of detoxifying?

First and foremost, what are you doing on a daily basis to support the human detoxification system? So, there's this whole system in the body that is just like you have the cardiovascular system and the nervous system and all of that. You have this human detoxification system comprised of the lymphatic system. Comprised of the liver, the kidneys, the skin, the colon, right? So, and this system is working for you 24/7 to take stuff that causes your body harm and in a beautiful way, recirculate it and get it out of your body so that it doesn't cause damage. So you have in every cell in your body, you have these detoxification mechanisms that are operating 24/7. So step 1 is what are you doing day to day to support your body's human detoxification system? That's first, that's before you go on some major detox protocol. What are you doing daily? So what are you doing? Sauna? Are you making sure not to drink water out of plastic bottles? What are you doing on a daily basis to lower that burden? And then we can talk about seasonally, you know, going on a detox program to really pull out the excess stuff that's getting stored because we're exposed now to more toxins than I think ever before. And I don't think our bodies have evolved to the point of handling the stresses that we're under. And that's why detoxification is so important, you know, 'cause a lot, your body can do a lot on its own without you even thinking about it, but it's overburdened. It's absolutely overburdened. And we can test for those things now, which is great, you know, but you know, 9 times out of 10, the body is overburdened by exposure to toxins.

Oh yeah.

And it just, and it seems like it just keeps getting worse and worse and worse in the environment. We can talk about even like electromagnetic frequencies and their role in causing oxidative stress on the body. So your cells are truly, they are under attack. And so again, and I'm an advocate for glutathione. That's my thing. Like start with glutathione, you know, and I recommend taking it in a dosage that supports healthy levels of glutathione in your cells.

Mm-hmm.

On a daily basis, right? Versus a high-dose push once a week, once a month, you know, that your body is dealing with, but most of it isn't even getting into the cells where it can have the effect. So anyway, I'm a big fan of daily. So I'm always, when I'm talking to women going through perimenopause and menopause, it's always what, just pick one thing. Like put that in your consciousness of Every day, what am I doing? Am I choosing to drink out of a glass water bottle, you know, instead of drinking out of a plastic water bottle? Am I choosing to, you know, do a sauna? Because your skin is the largest detox organ. Exercise, even exercise stimulates the colon, stimulates sweating, supports detoxification. Breathing, proper breathing will support detoxification too. So anyway, day-to-day is really important. And then yes, there's, I mean, there's so many different detox protocols out there. It's mind-boggling. The challenge is things like a juice fast. If you are, first of all, it can really compromise blood sugar regulation.

Mm-hmm.

And blood sugar stabilization is so key to longevity and health in general. And so that's an issue. And then water fasting can be brilliant for some people, but if a lot of women have imbalance in their stress response, their cortisol levels are out of whack, which is central to all of the other hormones. And so if you go on a strict fast like that, when you are depleted in terms of adrenal gland function, how your body handles stress, you can actually cause more harm than good. You can put, especially in women going through perimenopause and menopause, it's not necessarily the time. It depends on the woman, but in general, it's not necessarily the time to go on a water fast.

No. And that's what they want to do. Yeah. They're like, I need to double down. I'm like, no, you don't.

Right. Right.

We don't need to double down.

Work with the body. And again, fasting can be working with the body. It gives your whole, gives your whole system a break.

Right.

And so properly designed detox programs give your cells a break from having to detoxify all the stuff you're normally putting into your body. So it allows those cells and those detox mechanisms to work on stored toxins and get them out of your body. And then you start to feel better. You start, you think more clearly, you have more energy. It can, it can work very well, but you're essentially giving your body a break. So, it can do its thing.

Yeah. You know, it's interesting. I got into a conversation with a conventionally trained physician and they were like, detox isn't real. And I was like, okay, so we'll use the other chemical term called biotransformation. And I was like, we have clinical studies of urinary output of toxin excretion from the fat cells of people on an active weight loss program.

That's crazy.

Like, our body does do that storage. And yes, an optimized body can You know, handle it. But let's face it, all of the chemicals that we're exposed to today did not exist before the Bronze Age, and I would argue the Industrial Age. So we're talking 150 to 200 years, like barrage of crap. And and if we look at like breast cancer and colon cancer and all the cancer risks that are going up, they're coming younger, more frequent. It's not just because we're better at identifying it; we flat out are having more of it. And we know that it's directly related to environmental and other toxic. I mean, there was, I don't know if you saw the study, they were looking at tumor cells, breast tumor cells, and exposure to different ingredients that are used in body care products, phthalates, parabens, and just tumor growth explodes and then you take it away and it goes away.

Yeah.

So like, it can be like the big things are the things like you're talking about. It's like, okay, today I'm going to stop drinking out of water. Next week I'm going to start changing my body care products to be something cleaner. And it's the stuff that we do all the time that's actually going to like wage the war and make it better. You know, cause if you detox the minute you take, like I detoxed, oh, I retoxed. I'm right back.

Which is what happens. And you know what, when women are under tremendous stress, that's the tendency. It's like, okay, what do I, I just, what do I have to do?

I'm going to do that.

And then it's going to all be better. But when their nervous system hasn't been regulated first, They're just going to go right back to doing what they were doing before, you know? And it's just, and then it's just this seesaw effect. And that's not where healing is at. That's not where you're going to see the long-term vitality and true health.

Yeah.

So, yeah.

Yeah. I want to, I want to jump into this too, cause you kind of brought it up and I think it's important because in the biohacking sort of longevity space, which I've been in for 22 years, I've got a clinic. VO2 max, body composition, DEXA. We do it all.

We do functional qEEG.

We do it all. However, there is this sort of idea, like, I can go get jammed up with a Myers cocktail with a glutathione push, and that's going to kick everything. But we have this threshold, and each person's different, every body's different, where your body's trying to go to hormesis, right?

Yes.

And cellular signaling and all those other things. And I mean, I'm somebody that did, you know, way back when a series of IVs that really helped me make it over this like extraordinary sort of falling apart, you know, in my mid-30s. And I think that was really, really helpful. But the reality is, is doing these things on a regular basis where somebody is not watching what's really happening could be dampening the body's natural responses. What do you say to that?

Okay. Well, let's just talk about glutathione. Right. So if you're doing IV pushes of glutathione, okay, so what's happening? First of all, it's a tripeptide. Not all, it's a, it's a pretty large molecule. Not all of that when you're doing an IV is getting into your cells. You want it in your cells where it can have the effect, right? So first of all, it's not all getting in. Second of all, when, okay, so glutathione goes into your body. And you've got these toxins. And so then glutathione is handling the toxins and it's then recycling. So it goes from what's called a reduced form of glutathione, which is active glutathione, which is what you want. It converts into what's called an oxidized form of glutathione. It's been used up essentially, right? But then the body in its innate wisdom and brilliance will recycle itself, that glutathione back to a reduced form. There's a natural cycle that happens. In that cycle, the body is using nutrients to convert from the oxidized to the reduced form. Things like zinc and magnesium, 2 minerals, and there's a lot more, but 2 really key minerals essential for so many different functions in your body. And so if you do a ton of glutathione, your body, you can end up with a magnesium A zinc deficiency, and so forth. So I always say more glutathione isn't better; better glutathione is better. And oftentimes it's not those high high doses. There are situations where that is appropriate for a short period of time, but again, it's working with the body. And when you really understand what's going on, you want to make sure if you're taking glutathione that that zinc and magnesium, B vitamins are all kind of. Being introduced as well in a balanced way so that you have homeostasis so that there's balance there and you're not putting a larger burden on yourselves, which, and, and you'll see if somebody does a bunch of IV glutathione pushes, they'll feel better initially. And then there's this point of diminishing return where it's suddenly, it's like, it's not really. You know, Dr. Gina, I did an IV of glutathione, but it just didn't, I didn't get the same effect. Like, well, let's test your zinc and your magnesium and all these other minerals, see what's really going on. And it's, it's that depletion of those other elements that is causing the glutathione to not do what you were wanting it to do, essentially. So.

Yeah. Well, and I think I want to point this out because this gets missed. So when you get a high-dose Myers cocktail vitamin C with your B vitamins and minerals, it's raising oxidative stress in the short term. Naturally, we get conversion to some glutathione. Your body naturally does some of that. But, when you push glutathione right behind it, you waste the glutathione.

I know. I know.

I'm just like, you're wasting the glutathione. But, it was marketed that way 20 years ago.

I know.

But, when you really look at the chemistry, you're like, no, vitamin C. Why high-dose vitamin C can also work as an adjunctive therapy in cancer is because it's massively in the short-term oxidative.

Yes.

And then it gets, and then it gets recycled and utilized and makes glutathione, which then gets utilized, redox, all of that. But when you push glutathione behind it, you're just undoing that chemical reaction. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

It's understanding the whole system, right? It's, it's like stepping back and kind of having a Hawkeye's point of view and looking at the whole thing, not just, oh my gosh, there's, and I always say like, there's over 100,000 clinical studies done on glutathione. Glutathione is amazing.

I agree.

It really, I don't know why everybody doesn't know about it. And I want everybody to know about it because it's accessible and something you can boost yourself day to day. It's, you know, but just because it's that amazing doesn't mean that more of it is going to have an even better effect on your body, you know? And in fact, it can cause damage if you're not—

Right.

Yeah.

Well, and I think, you know, too, the other side of it, you know, we've We've been doing genetics for 14 years and depending on your genetics in this pathway, there's a lot of variability where you can have deleted genes that are supposed to help with that sort of recycling process.

Right.

So some people's capacity for that process are better than others. I call it the Keith Richards gene. I don't know Keith Richards. I have no earthly idea, but I'm like, he must have some amazing genetic pathways to live the life that he did.

I do.

I talk about him all the time and I was like, heaven forbid I'm going to meet him one day and it's going to be like, dude, I'm sorry. But the reality is I couldn't do what he did to his body. I would be dead. And so the other part of it is some people are more sensitive or can't convert as easily and their need for support may be greater. But I ran into a lot of people that have done the IVs and things like that too, that they get halfway through an IV and they're like, oh my God, it's too much, too fast. Right?

Yes.

So I think that too much is such a big thing. Particularly today, everybody you turn to, if I got a dollar for everybody that asked me about some supplement on Instagram, I wouldn't have to, I would just be hanging out in Italy.

I know.

Because everybody's marketing something and much of it is complete bullshit. And, the fact that you've been in this industry for so long and so immersed in it, and more is not always better. It's what's right and what's necessary and what's appropriate to keep your body working at optimal. Is what's necessary.

I mean, I'm so thankful that my first real job was with Standard Process. I was like, my first, I had other jobs before that in medical school and all that within, with supplement companies, but my first real, you know, where it was like executive level, you know, all in. I'm so glad it was there because they have a whole food approach. And so, it's really about looking at the whole complex and the whole— so, you look in nature and it's not just vitamin C, but in an orange, there's all these other compounds that work with the vitamin C that make it more effective. It may not be the super high doses, but there's this compound effect. And so, from the beginning of my career, it instilled in me This appreciation of the wisdom of nature and really looking at how things work together. And so just, it's never just one thing, you know, and when you're treating a human being as a naturopathic doctor and looking at functional medicine, we're looking at the whole person. You know, why, why did you get this diagnosis now? Why you? Why now? What was happening? Did you have a major stressful event that triggered some of this? What's going on in your personal relationships? You know, how much joy are you experiencing in your life? All of those things play a role. And so, and what's frustrating is these women are vulnerable and then they're on TikTok and it's like, here, I took this and my whole world changed. And so it's feeding off of that vulnerability.

Mm-hmm.

And, you know, patients come in and there's, they're like doing so many things and not all of them are working for them, you know? So it's really about stepping back and looking at the whole picture and being reasonable, having an appreciation for nature, having an appreciation for how the body actually works, what's actually happening, and then working with that.

So yeah, no, it's, I mean, you're absolutely right. I mean, you know, I use supplements. I, and I, I can fall victim if I'm on there late at night. You're like, oh, I'll be like, oh my God, I probably could use that for my hair. You know? I know, right?

Right. There's like, there's some lotion I want to order because I saw, you know, and so we all are.

It gets rid of creepy skin. Damn. Yes.

I'm like, oh, click. I need that. I need that right now.

So I'm not beyond it. But the reality is there's tried and true things that we have research on that can really help in general. Like when I got on with Dr. Gina and we were talking, because we've known each other for quite a few years, I was talking about, I just flew back. I flew to and back from Italy, which is a good 14, 15 hours minimum between airports and connections. And, you know, and I took, I took the vitamin G on the way there. I took it while I was there too. But, and then I took it on the way back because we get an extraordinary amount of radiation and other stuff by being in planes. And as somebody who's on a ton of planes, like, I was like, okay, at a minimum, if I were just looking at supporting the radiation exposure that I get from flying, glutathione is something I should do every single day and probably twice when I'm flying. Yes. You know?

Yes. And that's a whole other discussion is the role that glutathione plays in protecting cells from exposure to radiation. There's direct correlation there, and that can be radiation from 5G, or it can be actually getting radiation treatment if you're undergoing cancer treatments. So in, in terms of helping the body to heal from that, you know, and also protecting the cells from Too much damage from the radiation. So yes, absolutely. It's, I mean, it's, it's so important. It's so important.

Yeah.

And it's, and it doesn't, it's not, it's like, it doesn't have to be too complicated. That's, again, having formulated supplements for so many years, I'm at this point where I'm like, okay, it needs to be something people will actually take every day and is convenient. And then also works. It can't just be, oh, and by the way, people always ask, well, why did you put this amount of milligrams of glutathione in this? And why, why did you use this amount of vitamin D3 or this amount of magnesium or zinc or vitamin C? And I'm like, because I was studying how the body works and how, you know, the, the, the amount of glutathione that the body naturally manufactures And if you were in a bubble and you ate a perfect diet and you weren't exposed to toxins and you were eating whole locally grown food on the healthiest soil possible, what would that actually look like in terms of glutathione levels? Right. And I started there and I always say, so the amount of glutathione that's in these Pixie Stix, it's the amount that I, from my original formulation back during COVID And at that time I wasn't dealing with, oh no, Dr. Gina, this is going to be too expensive. It's not going to. You know, it's not, it's not gonna work in the market. I could have put any amount that I wanted to put in there.

Yeah.

I could have put any amount of any of those ingredients. So it was my first formula, right? Based on, okay, this is what I really want to have. And then we work backwards from there, which is how I always formulate. And in this case, it just worked. And those, those are the dosages that are in there. And so it's designed to be able to take it daily. Without burdening the body, but allowing for a natural replenishment of reduced glutathione to maintain those healthy stores in the cells, along with the cofactors, a lot of the cofactors that are needed for that cycling process. Yeah. And so, yeah. Yeah.

And then it supports the liver a little bit too.

Oh yeah.

A little.

Yeah. Just a little. Just a little. Yeah. So glutathione is like a major, a major component in liver detoxification and women Because we're metabolizing hormones at a much greater extent, it seems, than men. Right. And with, with our cycles and all of that, our livers are burdened even more. It's why women are more vulnerable to drinking alcohol than men are. And so that's, and glutathione is very important for alcohol detoxification as well. A lot of my patients appreciate that role of the Pixy Stix.

I was just getting ready to say, yeah, that's, it's a pre, it's a pre and post game.

It really is.

It really is.

I love to tell the story of one of our sales associates where he, there's a picture and he didn't know he was getting his picture taken, but he had a cocktail. He was at a bar and it's a picture from behind. He had a cocktail in one hand and he had a fistful of Pixy Stix, Lunathon Pixy Stix in the other hand. And I'm like, oh my gosh. And so, because he relies on them, I'm like, just stop drinking so much. You know, you're representing our company. But he's—

but at the same time, yeah, he knew he was protecting his—

he's like, look, I'm going to drink. And so I'm also going to take the vitamin G pixie sticks because that's what I'm going to do. And it seems to work for me. And so anyway, it's just side note, but women's hormones are very much affected by how well their liver is detoxifying and glutathione is a key. To having a healthy detoxification system specifically in the liver.

Yeah, absolutely.

Absolutely. Can I ask you a question? Sure. Can you, so before, before we started the interview, you were talking about Minerva. Yeah. Can you share a little more? Because I'm like, this is what we need.

Yes.

I'm so happy to hear this. And we had talked about it before. But I didn't know as many of the details. And now it's real. It's like live and you're doing it. And so, can you share a little bit about that? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I've been playing. We have an app coming out at the end of September, early October. So, Minerva. So, Minerva is really 3 different things. So, Minerva is a femtech, so a technology platform for women's health. We're a telemedicine company and a research company. And so the technology piece is that it starts with an app. So you can download, not quite yet, but you can download Minerva and load it onto your phone. And it starts to ask questions about your health and what your goals are. It's made specifically for perimenopause, menopause, and beyond. So it's not a fertility app they're trying to rebrand for women that are older. And it starts to capture information, what's important to you, what symptoms you're having, what things are you dealing with? What supplements, medications, other things you take. And then, we have a quiz that's called your phenotype quiz. And, a phenotype for everybody, that is your genetics and your environment together. So, part of what I found after 22 years of practice was particularly in perimenopause and menopause, those are 2 major hormone shifts in your sex hormones, but they never operate alone.

Yeah.

There's adrenal issues with them, there's thyroid issues with them, there's blood sugar control and insulin control issues with them. And so, part of the phenotype is to figure out what combination without doing labs. Once you do labs, it makes it easy, but without doing labs, what combination of hormonal imbalances are most prevalent for you, right? Because a lot of times women will get put on hormone replacement, let's say, and they won't feel better. And I'm like, well, because your insulin's 22. There's all this other stuff and no one's looking at it because they're like, I just do menopause care. And I'm like, well, you're not actually doing women's care. Right. And so, the Phenotype starts to walk you through these questions to help you understand your unique kind of hormonal combination. It attaches to wearables. So, if you're wearing an Oura Ring, a Garmin, a Fitbit, an Apple Watch, it starts to pull that data in, not from Apple, but we're pulling it directly in and correlating it to the symptoms you're putting in, your hot flash, all that stuff. So, it's starting to pull that data together and it starts to build a Minerva score. And, that's sort of scoring all these pieces and putting it together in a matrix so you can kind of understand where are my high-ticket items to work on. You can get diet lifestyle recommendations based on your phenotype results. Phase 2 and Phase 3, we're going to combine this together with the prescribing activities, right? So, our telemedicine company prescribes in all 50 states. We use bioidentical hormones. We actually use a compounded bioidentical hormone in jojoba oil. So, it has nothing else but those 2 ingredients. There are no additives, solvents, chemicals, anything else. We've tested it for 2 years in our clinic, almost 3 years now. And so, we capture that, we capture all the other medications and supplements somebody might take. We look at urine, urinary hormone metabolites, your blood work, and we start pulling all that data together because what was missing, Gina, what used to make me so crazy was A woman can show up with symptoms and not a single person can tell you, this is the dose you need. We guess our damn way through it and it hasn't changed in decades. And so, the goal is for us to be able to personalize to an N of 1 to every single woman. Here's what you need, not only just for your dose of hormone replacement therapy or thyroid or adrenal support, but what you need across the board. But, when we're capturing this data at scale— Yes.

Yes.

Now, we can actually start proactively doing research on the data and be able to change women's health trajectory.

Yes.

And ultimately, once that's built, we'll get the titration. So, we'll know, hey, Gina went up to here, went down to here, went back up to here. This is her final dose. Now, we know what it needs to be. But ultimately, this platform will be available to other clinicians. And ideally, we want to be the platform women's healthcare runs on. We want to be able to be in larger institutions so we can become a massive research arm for Flywheels for Women's Research. And so, I built the telemedicine and we brought on patients and then kind of held back bringing patients on while we pulled everything together to scale. We built the technology and the first MVP.

Yeah.

And now, they're both kind of relaunching at the same time. We have a book coming out at the beginning of October too called Just Right. And so, it's cool. It's finally here. We're out raising capital again, which is a whole nother— that's new to me. I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm used to just making stuff happen for Right. But it's exciting. It's exciting to see something that I feel so strongly, because this is the hill I'm dying on, that it's really the next decade or 2 of my life will be dedicated to just pushing this forward. Because as women, we don't just deserve better. The reality is we have to demand better. And that requires us to say, I don't care what the government says. I don't care what the investors say out there in the world. You give us 1%, Screw it. I'll find other people that can. We're going to make it happen. I'm not going to wait for you to give it to me.

Yes. Yes. It's coming. I mean, it's like, finally, you know, it's like the women are coming together and saying, hold on.

Yeah.

You know, we are responsible for usually the care of the children and the care of the home and all those traditional roles. Like, you know, it's just part of what in general, Women do. We do so much. And we deserve to have proper care, proper healthcare.

Yeah.

You know, from a place of truly understanding how our bodies work, given the number of hormones that are going up and down and all of that, and given the lives that we lead, women deserve to have this truly. So I'm so— I'm so— you've, you've gone, I mean, you've done a ton. Since the last time we talked, you know? And so that's, it's really exciting. And it's, it is having that research is we, we, we need it. We need it now. It is extremely important for the health and wellbeing of women everywhere. Yeah.

I mean, I don't know if you read the article when Melinda French Gates talked about her experience of trying to get help. I'm like one of the wealthiest humans on the planet. Can't get help. And, you know, and her thing was, we deserve like that, we deserve better. And I'm like, look, man, if women, especially midlife women, said, okay, for 3 days, we're just not going to work, we're not doing anything, we're not scheduling anybody, we're not taking care of anything, the world would come to a stop.

It would literally stop.

Stop spinning. We do. We make 87% of all buying decisions. Like, we talk about the economy in this very patriarchal thing. I'm like, oh, no, no, no, there's not a house I know. Grocery store experience that is not driven by a woman. I was like, we just need to go, this is ours, we're taking it back. And this is my way of doing that. I'm like, we're taking back healthcare and we're putting it back into the hands of women and we're going to democratize it so every woman gets to participate. So.

Yes. And it will help everybody.

Yeah.

It'll help everybody. Ultimately, it will help not just women, right?

Yeah.

The whole system. And so anyway, it's so needed. It's so overdue. And I'm so glad you're involved in this. It's very cool.

Thank you.

So thank you.

I know it's a lot of work. Yeah. Thank you for asking. It is, but it's, you know, I enjoy it. I enjoy it in my own crazy little way. So, all right. So if my listeners want to get some vitamin G, we're going to have a link for them right in the show notes that we can send to them. And people, it is seriously, it's like an old school Pixy Stick. Like kids love it, but I love it. It's great. You know, even my husband was like, my husband doesn't drink. So he, he makes, we have Tanqueray Zero, which is like a zero-proof Tanqueray and then tonic. And he's, you know, he's like, you've got the Pixie Stick. He's like, this is kind of good. You can almost mix them together.

You can. No, I mean, like it makes awesome mocktails. It really does. Yeah.

No, it does. So anyway, but, um, yeah, we will have a link in, um, in the show notes where everybody can go get Vitamin G, is there anything you— where else can they find you? How can they reach out to you, follow you online?

So yeah, so my physician advisory website is drgina.com. It's just D-R-G-I-N-A dot com. Instagram is @drginanic, so D-R-G-I-N-A-N-I-C-K.

Cool. Perfect. And you and everybody, she just moved from LA to Nash Vegas, Nashville. So we had a long conversation about that. I used to live in Nashville, so that's exciting.

Yeah.

That's exciting. Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, awesome. Well, thank you for being on Menopause Mastery. This has been great.

My pleasure. Thanks for having me.