From Oral Health to Clear Skin

Hi everybody, I'm Dr. Sanda Moldovan, periodontist and nutritionist. Welcome to the Holistic Dentistry Podcast, the show that gives you the tips and tools to detoxify your mouth for a healthier body as we explore together the root cause of disease. Remember, you're not healthy until your mouth is healthy, so take care of it in the most in a natural way. Hi everyone. Welcome to another episode on the Holistic Dentistry Show. I'm excited to talk to you about an interesting connection between oral health, gut health, and skin health. And I'm very excited to have a special guest today, Dr. Sanda Moldovanovan. She is a functional dermatology coach who left traditional dermatology to help women over 35 address the root issues With over a decade of medical experience and advanced functional medicine training, she now focuses on education, not diagnosis or treatment, to help women connect the dots between gut, hormones, stress, and skin. So welcome to the show, Surara.

Thank you. Thank you. Nice to be here.

Yeah. You know, you're the first guest we're actually addressing skin issues on the show. And, you know, I always say leaky gums, leaky gut. And now we can say, say Skin issues, right? And kind of that order.

That order. Yeah.

And, um, I'm curious, what led you to this path? Or how did you discover that connection between gut health, hormones, and skin health?

Then the connection actually started with my own personal story. At the age of around 11, 12 years old, I developed eczema. And when I went to see a doctor, I was told, okay, it's genetic. You have to live with it. You know, just use the steroids. So for years I used steroids until I was in college. And I just like, I don't like using steroids. Actually, I was using my pocket money to buy the steroids, and I was like, I didn't like that. So I started to look at my lifestyle. What was I doing right? What was I doing— what was different? When do I flare up? And long story short, I kind of figured out some of my triggers, and I stopped doing those things, and I haven't had a breakout in over— age myself here— 25 years.

Amazing.

I mean, I realized there were certain things I was eating or certain products I was using. Like, I realized I was very sensitive to fragrances, and so I avoided fragrances when I could. And I was not only— my skin was sensitive, my nose was also. Like, I would be sneezing, have allergies, and I realized there were certain things that I needed to avoid. I did not link it to the gut at that time. I just knew, even though subliminally, I had some gut issues that I just thought it was nothing, and I just kept moving on. Then when I was, when I went to medical school, went to dermatology, I met a patient that came in and he had something called adenitis suppurativa. If you know about it, it's very, like, really, really gnarly diagnosis, and it's very annoying, and I literally cry for my patients when they come in. Because it's—

I actually don't know what that is.

It's like a lot of inflammation, almost like, imagine having boils, but multiple of them in the axilla, in the groin area. Sometimes I had a family that had, they had it everywhere. Uh, it is really like, I literally cry for my patients because it's very hard to have a quality of life when you're dealing with that on a regular basis.

Yeah.

So I asked this patient, I said, how are you doing, Junior? Are you following your medication? Just looking at his history. And he said to me, I'm fine. I was like, what do you mean you're fine? Because I haven't had a flare-up in 2 years. First of all, I was happy and I was surprised because if I could do that for my patients, oh my goodness, that would make my day. And so I asked him, what did you do? Because I learned a lot from my patients, from everyone around me. And he said, I saw a naturopathic doctor. And at that time I didn't even know what naturopathic doctors did or who they really were. So I had to do some research and I found— and he found out that he was— he reacts a lot to nightshades. I didn't know what nightshades were, so I did a Google search and I go, huh, interesting. Later on in functional medicine, I realized nightshades we're actually doing exactly and what we're releasing causing inflammation in the body.

So let's, let's talk about that for a second. I'm, I'm just gonna kind of, kind of slow you down a little because some people listening may say, what in the world are nightshades? And we're certainly not talking about blinds. So explain to us a little bit, what are nightshades and what exactly do they do?

And I like tomatoes, bell pepper, you know, um, plants. They have lectins in them. And lectins are not bad guys. They're just like some, some people cannot deal with them correctly, or some people already have underlying inflammation cannot deal with the lectin that's coming from this particular food. So you always say like the three-tack rule, which one is going to shoot the whole thing away? Like if you do like a domino game and domino is going well, and then one last domino just drops everything. So for some people, that's what causes their initial inflammation, or, and I say overall inflammation where everything just falls down, domino just falls down. They've already had inflammation going on. So for this particular patient, that was his issue. Somehow his body was not able to deal with lectin and that lectin just added on top of everything that was already already going on, and that's why he had the flare-up. Does that mean he will never have it again? Does that mean I'll never— I can never have eczema? No, it just means that I am using my lifestyle to control the trigger. So genetically, yes, I have it, but the trigger is in my hands, so I get to pull it or not pull it. And that's what I found out. So after I met him, I started researching about different holistic medicine, alternative medicine. I went to acupuncture, homeopathy, and I landed in functional medicine because it spoke more to me. With a background in biochemistry to go deep down and figure out what is actually going on at the cellular level, at a mitochondrial level that's affecting the skin.

Yeah, absolutely. Very interesting. And you know, so many people are suffering from eczema actually. And, and of course you go to dermatology and what's the actual, like you said, subscription is like a steroid or like some kind of topical cream, but it's really not a solution. And a lot of people listening to this might be very surprised that eczema can come from the gut. Got.

Yes, yes, yeah, I was surprised too because that was not what I was taught. And the more I look back on my life, uh, because at that time when I developed eczema was when I went to boarding school. If you don't know about boarding school in Nigeria or Africa, a lot of other countries, at a certain age after elementary school you go to boarding school and that's away from home. So my food was not controlled, my diet was all over the place, my lifestyle changed. I was no longer with mom, I'm now at school, and that's when everything started to come up. But so when I look back now and I look at my timeline timeline, which is what I do with my clients all the time, is like, when did this all start? And that kind of gives an idea of what the root cause is. So for me, that's what happened. And at the time when I saw this patient, I was also going through my other health issues from the gut, with the root cause of the gut. It really— functional medicine really gave me the green light that, oh, this is what's happening, the haha moment.

Let's dissect a little bit about the, you know, the food and how it can cause, let's say, eczema. Eczema. Is it— do you find like it's food? It's food like a certain specific type of food that can create, like, that can cause eczema for most people, or it varies?

It varies in general because some people, based on their genetic, their upbringing, their family life, their stress level, how are they managing? How are they at time zero? So if they were born and they had, it was C-section birth or vaginal birth, that's already started the timeline. If they were breastfed or formula fed, that's also on the timeline. Were they exposed to other elements in the environment to strengthen their immune system, that's also timeline. But there are certain foods that should not even be in our pantry at all. The overly processed foods, the food-like foods that doesn't look like food. Again, it says it's corn but doesn't look like corn. That's my litmus test right now. If I look at the label and it has like— I'm a biochemist. If I cannot read all those chemicals, then it shouldn't be going in my body.

Absolutely.

I can put on— if I'm putting on my— if I can read it and it says corn and it's natural and it looks like the corn and it is broccoli and looks like broccoli, yeah, then I should be eating it. And so that's the littlest steps that I've had to abide by.

I like those rules, you know, and I say the same thing, always read the label. So if somebody has eczema, eczema, where should they start the process here? Is that something that they can do at home? Let's say with the guidance of a coach such as yourself?

Yeah. So the way I tell my clients, and not just my clients, family members, friends, anyone that I meet, One of the things that we're missing, in my opinion, in conventional medicine is the foundation. The foundation of health is all in our hands. I say that health is— wellness is a right, not a privilege, but it's the person's right to learn what they need to do for themselves. The simplest things that we forget is hydration, you know, sleep, making sure you are eating while you're sitting, not rushing, chewing your food. Because I always say, if you want your gut to be like Vitamix, Actually, take it back, the teeth, like Vitamix, because the gut does not have teeth. So if you don't chew your food and you swallow it, it's just sitting down there. Imagine having your food in the fridge and nothing has been done to it. Over time, you're not going to like the smell in the house. That's how I, my analogy for not chewing your food. So chew your food, sit while you're resting. Don't drink too much water while you're eating. Drink your water away from your food so your acid can actually do its job. Just think about the acid at the beginning of like when you use a knife to chop down your vegetables. You need to do that. And then the teeth is one that does the Vitamix function.

I love it. That's a great analogy.

So that's just where to start. Everybody can do that. Everybody can do that. Watch what you eat, read the labels, sleep. Sleep is so crucial when it comes to healing of the skin or healing of the, of the supporting the immune system. You need to sleep. It's not overrated. Actually, it's underrated.

Yes, I agree with you 100%. And going back to the teeth, you know, like, and chewing the food well, there's actually enzymes in the saliva that start the digestion of the food. So that's why, that's another reason why, you know, it's so important to slow down and chew your food well to be able to add those enzymes. And, you know, to your point, don't have a lot of water because the enzymes that are added during the chewing process and the saliva breakdown, you can dilute that with all the water you drink, especially the acid. Especially the acid as well.

Yeah.

Very good. And more importantly, to have teeth, you know, actually I have so many patients that come to me that don't have teeth and I ask them, how do you take in your nutrition? And they said, well, I just eat processed foods cuz those are soft and you know, they mostly swallow them whole. Swallow them whole.

So, um, that must be very difficult.

Yeah. It, it may be for those patients actually take the Vitamix out. Vitamix out.

Yeah.

And blend the food so you can get that nutrition. Nutrition. Yeah. Good point. Good point. So those are key things to kind of get away from eczema, right? Stress, you mentioned sleep, hydration. And how do people know what foods to eliminate? Is there a test that you do for that or that you recommend for that?

I really don't like eliminating food per se. I mean, temporarily we might eliminate foods because what happens with people like have skin issues like eczema, like me, is we become very afraid to eat because we're afraid something's going to flare us up. And then we do like a test, maybe like in the conventional medicine and say, says you're allergic to all that stuff, but you don't have any reactions to it. So my goal is, instead of just saying eliminate all this, it's going to be temporary elimination. There are certain particular foods, like for instance, I'm gluten sensitive, and I wasn't before. Actually, I was a, you know, bona fide breadaholic for a long time. So when I noticed that I was having a lot of issues with bread and gluten, I had to stop, and I stopped for like a few years, and I brought it back again, and I realized my body did not like it. So that's different. If you want to eliminate it, that's okay. But just cut a bunch, eliminate all kinds of food, then it takes away away the nutrients that the microbiome that we're trying to support doesn't have enough nutrients to support it because we're eliminating everything. I might do a trial elimination for like about 4 weeks and have them bring it back and they're reacting to it, then I'll take it off for a little bit, not forever. As we— as a gut heals, then we can bring those foods back. So I'm not a proponent of saying, okay, never eat this ever again, because what happens is, and that's a— that happened to me, where you start to take this off and that off and this off, and then you have nothing left to eat.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, this reminds me of a patient of mine. He actually came in and he had periodontal disease, bleeding gums. He had gut issues. He was slightly overweight. And then he disappeared for about 8 months. He showed up 8 months later. He was 40 pounds lighter. He fixed his gut issues. And then I looked at his gums. And there was no more bleeding, no more periodontal disease. And I asked him, what did you do? Cause he didn't have, he didn't have even dental treatment. So he said, oh, you know, food elimination, exactly what you're talking about. So this is the connection that validated for me that, you know, once we heal our gut, you know, the mouth can also get better as well as the skin and other organs in the body.

Yes. We all work together.

Exactly. Exactly. Now you say the skin is a report card for internal health. What are some of the earliest skin signs that something is deeper that's going on?

So it might be itching, might be redness, might be rash that comes and goes, not consistent, but you get it here, you get another time.

Are you talking about the itching at your face or any part of the body?

Any part of your body. Any part of the body. It could be the face. It could be anywhere. It could be redness of the face. It could be, you know, rashes, you know, that comes and goes. It could be even hives that comes and goes. Puffiness around the eye, underneath the eye. Hair loss can be another sign. And I always tell people when you start having hair loss, sometimes because the body doesn't have enough nutrients, so it's going to say, "Oh, we don't need hair. Let's take care of it." Because it wants to keep you alive. Your body wants to survive. So it's going to eliminate the unnecessary and try to give the body what it needs. So those are the tell— some of the signs that something is not going well.

What about acne?

Oh, that's one of the rashes. I put them in the rashes, like, yeah, breakout.

So you put them in the rash category. Interesting.

So yeah, acne is one of those that shows a lot of gut issues and there's a lot of evidence that shows that dysbiosis in the gut resulting in inflammation, whether it's through, um, some molecules that are causing more other molecules to activate them so that it can be more inflammatory, can cause acne, can cause things like eczema, psoriasis, rosacea. There's still a lot of research that needs to be done to support this in clinical settings, but there are evidence showing up I mean, I just did a presentation this last week and there was— I had so many articles and I'm so happy for that because we're getting to the root causes of what's actually going on.

Yeah. Why do so many women over 35 develop breakouts again, even though they're eating clean and using good skincare?

Yeah, I hear it all the time. A lot of time people tell me, oh, I never had it as a teenager. Now all of a sudden I have all those breakouts. But what happens is there's hormonal shifts that happen when we got it the first time, you know, in our teens, you know, when we started our period. There's also another hormonal shift happening around 35 and above when we're going to the perimenopausal, menopausal stages. And as that shifts, if the body is not where it needs to be, it's not steady, you start to see reactions. And this can be caused by like stress. Stress will increase your cortisol. Cortisol will add more. There's sugar swings. There's hormonal imbalances that come from the gut itself. So that's why women around 35 start to see acne for the first time or again.

So is there a simple of, uh, like the solution to let's say, help with the acne as balancing the hormones, or is there more that you do with them?

And when I get clients that talk about, oh, I think I have hormonal acne, I say, yeah, probably. But I don't go for the hormones first because I just said it with your patient that came in that had dental issues, you know, overweight, all that stuff, and had periodontitis. And all they did was what? Lose the weight, take care of the gut, and everything got better. So I am a proponent of going for the gut first. And it's not to kill anything, but it's to support the gut, the gut. So that I call it the village. The gut is like a village. You have the good guys and the bad guys. You want to have more of the good guys and less of the bad guys, bad guys. But you don't want to kill the bad guys off because they might be your plumber, they might be your carpenter, they might be your, I don't know, uh, somebody that's helpful in the society. But when you have more good guys, then the bad guys cannot come.

Makes sense.

So that's kind, that's kind of like what I, what I like to do with the terrain of the gut.

So what is one good way that you recommend for your patients to build a good terrain for the gut? Like a good habit.

Yeah, those things I mentioned earlier are already very good because as I said, if you're sitting down and you're eating, like I love to cook my food and smell it cuz that gets the salivary glands going, the amylase going and all that stuff. So if you sit down and, and also when you're rushing and eating, the body thinks, oh my goodness, there's a lion chasing us. It doesn't have time to digest cuz that's not what it's meant for. When a lion is chasing us, you don't go to the bathroom, you don't try to take a nap, you don't eat. And so when we're eating and we're rushing away eating, the body doesn't know the difference. It just knows the clues. Sitting, eating, doing hydration, sleeping, those same thing will support the gut health. And also making sure you have variety of fruits and vegetables on a regular basis. I mean, the rainbows and more. And my, one of my coaches says at least 30 different vegetables in a week. So planning out, just like we plan our vacation, I'll plan everything else, planning out that your food actually has all those things in there on a regular basis. And that's going to support. And fiber. Definitely fiber. That helps a lot with every skin issue. Make sure we have enough fiber in our diet. That will support the gut health.

What's your recommended amount of fiber that you recommend, uh, your patients take? Because we know there's an epidemic of low fiber today.

Yes. Well, I think we're like less than 10 grams a day, most of us.

That's so low.

So 30, and it should be around 35 grams of fiber a day.

35. So—

35 to 40.

What do you recommend as a source of fiber? What's your favorite source of fiber?

I love to eat a lot of vegetables. Like, I like to eat different kinds of vegetables. Like, on, even for breakfast, I'll have vegetables. And I've been doing this for a while now. When I started functional medicine, I started adding vegetables to my breakfast. I might have just like maybe eggs with spinach. I don't eat eggs that much anymore, but eggs with spinach. You can have like broccoli with eggs. Actually, that is so delicious. If you've never had that done before, just like mix the, scramble the eggs and then put the broccoli in there and then cook it. It is so delicious.

Low fast.

So I try to add vegetables with every meal that I, that I eat, and that helps a lot. And I like things like chia and hemp seed and a lot of different herbs, like, I mean, a lot of nuts that I add to increase, because I'm thinking about when I'm eating, it's like, okay, what do I need to get today? What does my body need? And then what does my microbiome need? Because they need two different things. And I said, okay, do I have enough of that? And that's sometimes my food doesn't make sense, but it makes sense based on the content.

So we have to think about consciously who are we feeding? Are we feeding the microbiome? Microbiome, are we feeding ourselves, and based on that, distribute the food.

Yes.

What is your favorite food for feeding the gut microbiome?

I was actually about to start on psyllium husk as a fiber supplement. I like to do chia. I do the polyphenols. So I will— I don't cook with olive oil. I usually use broth to cook, so I don't use oils to cook anymore. And I will just drizzle the olive oil on my food. Before I used to cook beans with oil, so I don't do that. I just take a good clean olive oil that I can find and I just drizzle it over. So those polyphenols, you know, try and get the bacteria, the beneficial bacteria to grow. Some, as I said, I'm always thinking, who needs my help today? And they all do. So yeah. Yeah. So a lot of vegetables. I love broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, cabbage. I eat a lot of cabbage.

Very nice. Yeah, me too. Being Romanian, we also eat a lot of cabbage in our culture. So especially now with the, you know, cold season, we definitely eat a lot of cabbage.

And I make it very easy. I don't, I don't look for recipes. I just sauté everything. Just makes my life easier.

That's so true. Yeah. Yeah. There's so much variety of cabbage out there.

Yeah.

Yeah. You can find delicious. Mm-hmm. Now you talk about the, you know, the gut-skin axis. What are 2 to 3 gut patterns that show up almost instantly on the skin? The skin?

Hmm. Instantly, not a lot I can recall right now that show up instantly, but over time they build up. So for instance, this is very common in conventional medicine. We see people that come in with strep throat, either first, and then they have psoriasis. Oh, I didn't know that. So gut psoriasis is linked. Yeah. Gut psoriasis is known that is, is linked to strep throat.

Interesting. Interesting.

And I've seen kids, 6, my youngest patient I had that was 6-year-old, and I didn't, it didn't make sense that we're treating she kept coming back and we found out she's a carrier of strep because she kept getting gut psoriasis.

So basically with strep, once that's treated, is the psoriasis go away or not particularly?

Basically. So that's the oral-gut-skin axis connect, uh, connectivity.

I see. I had no idea because, you know, I guess, uh, there must be some connection there with the immune system that is triggering our reaction to the strep.

Yeah. The other one is staph, staph and eczema and strep and eczema. Mm-hmm. And then cutibacterium also, P. acne.

Mm-hmm.

That also C. acne now, that also is linked to acne and can be found in the mouth. And so a lot of time there's some research that shows that when you have high amount of C. acne, you see exacerbating acne.

You know, this, uh, this, uh, brings me to think about the cavitation work that I do. So the cavitations are basically holes in the jawbone where people have had missing teeth and I always buy up we have to see these for microbes. And oftentimes there are microbes in there such as strep and staph inside the cavitation site. So my patients do say that their skin gets better after cavitation work. But I never knew this connection with— that it's from strep and staph.

Oh, actually there is a connection that you can have sometimes with hives. That is, that can be immediate. Hives can be immediate. Hives can be caused by a lot of things other than food. Sometimes just the climate, a cold climate can cause that, but that's usually immediate, but that's not long-lasting. I mean, usually it puts maybe, you know, a few seconds to minutes and it goes away. But lo and behold, every time they are exposed to that same element again, they get it. It's getting— it's a— sometimes it could be a histamine issue. It could be, uh, but it's not something that's long-lasting. That is not sometimes life-threatening.

Now let's talk about hormones. How do blood sugar swings and stress hormones sabotage a woman's skin and mood and metabolism?

Because blood sugar is also supported by estrogen. So at that transition stage, we have also estrogen. It's not just like, okay, all of a sudden one day estrogen just goes down and progesterone goes down. It's like this teeter-totter that happens, the swinging that happens. And at that point, the estrogen stops, is not able to do its job correctly to manage the blood sugar. So when you add much blood sugar into the system, that skews and affects what estrogen is already trying to do, but also with the stress, then you have high cortisol because women are always on the go no matter what. And so, and we'll, it's like we have to take care of everybody else before ourselves. That's what we're taught. That needs to change. I— so you have high cortisol, which also, also going to affect, is a master hormone. It controls other hormones. So it's going to affect estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone. So you already have this going on with the diet, with a lifestyle, no sleeping, which the sleeping helps to support support the hormones and does the repair. Now you have an addition of stress on top of that. And so yes, we're going through this transition, which is normal. However, at that stage when we went to that transition, where were we? Where was, where was the body at that point? So depending on where you are, if you are well-balanced hormone-wise, I'm sorry, microbiome-wise, you're sleeping well, then you can coast through that transition easier. But when you're not is when everything— remember I told you earlier that, you know, you, it's like a domino. Everything is stacking on and then all of a sudden the last domino hits and everything falls. And that's why a lot of women start to have skin issues and other issues around their perimenopausal, menopausal transition stage.

I see. And you know, you mentioned sugar. Usually when people are stressed, they go for sugar. Yes. So, so, uh, on top of the fact that cortisol causes sugar imbalance, now we're adding sugar to our diet when we're stressed.

And then when the sleep is not balanced, I don't know if this ever happened to me. It's happened to me before where I don't sleep well because I'm doing something or I'm traveling. And for some reason, in the middle of the night, I get up and I want to go to the kitchen. Like, it is unbelievable. I mean, now I know, I'm like, oh no, because your body's like, get up, get up, go get some sugar, we're low. So you're by yourself in the middle of the night in the kitchen. It's not like you want to, it's just that, you know, there's this demand.

You know, one of the things you mentioned earlier that I want to go back to is the cooking with oils.

Yes.

And it's interesting that you've decided to just cook with broth and just add good quality olive oil. Have you noticed a difference in your skin when you change that type of cooking?

I noticed, I noticed on my skin, yeah, my skin too, but overall, like my whole body, like I feel less heavy. I have more energy. I sleep better and saves me a lot of money.

Yeah.

I mean, I use, I do use ghee once in a while. And actually I do the same thing with the ghee. Now I put it on my food. Because ghee has its own benefits, but that's the only thing we cook with. But whenever we, um, broil any meat, we save it and put in the freezer. I don't even buy broth. I use the broth from the meat that I cook, and we take it out and we use it to do our sautéing. And I've seen a big difference because first of all, you're not consuming a lot of those oils that supposed to be clean, and we're trying our best to get the cleanest oils, but we're not 100% sure. You know, you buy it, you think you're buying organic olive oil, and you find out later on that it's not really organic, and it's not just olive oil. So to me, that kind of gives me peace of mind to avoid all that in the first place, even though I'm not using the seed oils. And I, I'd rather use that money and go on vacation instead.

Yeah, that's right. I actually, whenever I go to Greece, we try to get good quality olive oil from there. And what do we mean by good quality olive oil is something that has high levels of polyphenols. And nowadays they measure the polyphenols in olive oils, which is really nice. So from what I understand, everything over 1,100 is really high high quality, high phenolic.

We need that. The microbiomes need them. Yes. Yes.

If someone feels like they've tried everything, what's the missing link that often unlocks the biggest skin improvements? I'm sure you've had those clients that come to you and say, I've tried everything, you know, I don't know.

The everything, because I was like that. I thought I tried everything. This is not what my skin has to do with my weight and everything else. I'm like, I've tried everything. I go to the gym 6 days a week and and eat healthy. Yes, I was eating healthy. I avoided a lot of processed food. I'm less— I would say 80/20, 90/10, because nobody's perfect. And I was going to the gym 6 days a week. I was lifting weight. I was doing all that stuff, and nothing was moving. Sometimes it's literally having somebody else listen to you, and that's what happened to me, and realize that the things that are missing are the simplest things that you even overlooked. Like, how many hours are you sleeping at night? How much water do you drink a day? How often do you have a bowel movement? I had a client recently, she comes, she has breakouts. She's busy, she travels a lot, and she's like, I'm not ready to do your program yet because I Well, I'm like, that is exactly when you need to do the program because that's your life. If I do it when you're on vacation, when you go back to your life, everything's off. And along the way, within like a few weeks, she's like— and she walks out, she used to run every 3 miles every day. And she's like— I'm like, why do you run so much? Because I'm talking about inflammation. She's like, because I need energy. So within 2 weeks, she comes back to me, she said, I don't need to run to get energy anymore. I get energy when I wake up in the morning until I go to bed And this is all about lifestyle. Make sure she had enough water, make sure she was having regular bowel movements, she was detoxing correctly. That means eating what she needs to eat and have everything go. She was on vegetables. She was on a good diet and she did better. So sometimes it's the simplest things. So before you go for the high-harching solutions, look around and say, what do I need to do better? And then don't push yourself too much. Just start one step at a time. Find something that you do regularly and then tag in, do a tagging on, tag on to something that you want to start doing. So I'm telling my clients right now, even on social media, for next year, what is one thing you want to change about your health? Don't wait till January, start now. Make a plan, get a friend, do it together.

I love it. That's great advice. This is one of the actually action steps that somebody could take if they want glowing, clearer skin. But what are actual 2 to 3 simple steps that people can see the biggest difference on their skin? You mentioned sleep is one of them. Is that one of the ones that will make the biggest difference? Or is it something else?

Yes, yes. Sleep is very, very important. First of all, it's going to help the, you know, circles under the eyes, definitely. And the goal is to go for 7 to 8 hours of sleep. That's the goal. The other thing is what time you go to sleep. I know sometimes it's hard for people to go to sleep the 7 hours or— so if you go, if you wake up at the same time every day, that kind of starts to help your circadian rhythm. Rhythm. Avoiding eating late at night. So, at least 3 hours before you go to bed. So, the eating hygiene, that's all part of that. So, the eating hygiene, the sleep. So, the eating hygiene includes the chewing your food, sitting at, eating at rest, making sure you have all the rainbows, make sure you have enough fiber. Those alone, those two alone, and then the hydration. But the hydration, not where you drink water, clean water with minerals if you can, away from food. Like, I get up in the morning and I want to drink 3 cups, I drink 2 cups of water every morning. Like, you should have a bowel movement before 10 AM. Preferably, or as soon as you get up in the morning. So go to bed on time, sleep 7 to 8 hours, eating hygiene, hydration, and just those 3 things. And you don't have to start with all 3 at once. Just pick one.

Yeah.

And then, and then add on and tag on.

Yeah, absolutely. Those are key things. And, you know, speaking of constipation, I feel like a lot of my patients, it's something that we ask. Yes. We ask. Because that will just back up the toxins and help us like create this feeling of being unwell. Unwell. Slow down healing. And with this, with this, you know, epidemic of constipation, I feel a lot of people are dehydrated.

Yes.

And also I think they don't eat enough fiber.

Yep. That's why I said eating hygiene and sleep. And when it comes to constipation also, we have to ask them because people don't think they're constipated. They think going once a week, that was me once upon a time, is normal or going every other day, it's normal. Like when you start having a bowel movement after you, a few hours after you eat your meal, that's great. Minimum once a day because it shows up on the skin.

It also shows up in the mouth. People will get halitosis.

Yeah. Yeah. It shows up in the mouth. It shows on the skin. That's hopefully that gets somebody to get up today and start drinking enough water to have a good bowel movement.

So true. And, um, you are also providing a link here for a free Glow Smarter, Not Harder guide. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

So I wanted to come up with something that will help people just to get started, like something I wish I had years ago. Just basic things that, you know, we're not taught in school about this stuff, you know, taught as kids about this stuff, about the sleep, why it's important for you. I have a cheat sheet in there. I have a printout you can just print out and put in your refrigerator, you know, how to— what— how many hours should you sleep? How should you drink your water? You know, how often should you have a bowel movement? Just basic things that is going to help help as a foundation. That's what I want to create, something that will help, that could have helped me years ago. So I want to create it and give it to people.

Yeah, well, thank you for sharing that. We're gonna put that link in the show notes below. And tell us how people can work with you.

So I work with people one-on-one, and I also have some programs. I have a program for overall wellness for any, for women 30 us, and it's called Beauty Within. And I call it that because when I went through the program, I realized that a lot of us are looking for beauty from the out, but actually it's from the within, from the gut, from the hormones, everything. And this is a lifestyle coaching, no medication, nothing at all. And I've had people lose 25 to 30 pounds, get more energy, sleep better, and be centered. And you know what, especially for women, mindset and all that called I Have Boundaries. Then I have one, it's called Break Up or Breakout, and it's a 4-month program. Love it. Like, we all want to break up with the breakout. So, and this includes some functional labs and coaching also, but also a lot of lifestyle. I totally believe in lifestyle. I don't want to do anything without lifestyle support, because what you do is you help someone out, they feel better, and then they're back to where they were because there was no guidance or teaching on how to move forward and live their lives. I also do one-on-one one coaching with that comes and say, okay, I don't want to do your program, but I want you to support me in A, B, or C. And they can join my one-on-one program, which is a program where I coach them. Lab depends on if they want labs or not, functional labs or blood labs. And we just go through— again, it's for me, it's like I want to hold their hands because I wish someone held my hands when I was having— dealing with this as a teenager and just walk with them, um, and be their support and guide.

Yeah, amazing. Well, thank you so much for all this enlightening information about the connection for in gut health and oral health. Oral health. Everyone, thank you so much for listening. If you know somebody that could benefit from today's episode, please share it with them, with them. And you can follow me on Instagram @DrSandaMoldovan and send me any other ideas of shows that you would like information on. Information on. And with that, thank you so much for being here.

Thank you. I really appreciate you.

And everyone, everyone keep smiling. Thank you so much for joining me this week. Please make sure you check out the show notes for any links mentioned in the show. If you like today's show, please invite your friends to listen as well. That would mean a lot to me. Do you have a question you'd like me to answer? Message me on Instagram @DrSandaMoldovan. This is Dr. Sanda Moldovan, and remember, your mouth is the gateway to your health, so take care of it in the most natural and best way possible.