243. Anti-Aging is a Myth? The REAL Way to Stay Strong After 50!

Yay! I'm so excited. It is my birthday. I hope that you will join me for this celebration because you're gonna get a gift today. I'm not the only one who's getting presents. I am here to pour into you and give you the gifts of reversing your age or slowing down the aging process, whatever you want to call it. I have been mentored by an amazing woman. Her name is JJ Virgin. And she is, I can't believe that she's 60. You will not believe it either when you see her, but she's gonna come on and pour her wisdom over me and over you about how to make the second half of your life, the second chapter, even better than the first. How to look amazing, feel amazing, conquer everything, all your goals, all your dreams. Hi everybody, I'm so excited that you are here. Welcome, welcome, welcome. I am 50. Hello, I am 50 years old and I just feel so excited and so honored to bring you some golden nuggets, some beautiful wisdom. I need to help figure out how to get JJ live up on here. Maybe you can ask to. Here we go. I think I finally figured it out. Oh, it says she's unable to join. Hang with us, you guys. This is gonna be worth waiting for. Oh my gosh! I know you guys want to hear how to slow down your aging process, reverse the aging process, all of those good things, right? Okay, who wants to help? Here we go. I think I finally am going to have her on here. I just want to shout JJ out really quick. Not only has she been my mentor for a long, long time, but she's a 4-time New York Times best She's been on every daytime TV show you can think of. She's just a powerhouse in the world of health and wellness. There you are, beautiful.

I'm here.

Yay! Oh my gosh, thank you for doing this. I was just saying, like, I'm getting gifts on my birthday, but we're here to pour into everybody else and give them the gift of anti-aging, and you are the queen, right?

All right, here's the reality, though.

Let's drop it.

Like, I think we need to dump this anti-aging thing. First of all, it's powerful aging. We don't want to— anti-aging means you just died, right? So I don't know about the anti-aging. I personally, if I could have turned 50 at 30, I would have done it. Like, I tell you, from 50 plus has been the best time of my life, hands down, bar anything. Like, it's fantastic. So welcome to the 50 plus. I'm in the 50-plus club. The big thing I'll tell you is the things you could get away with in your 20s and 30s, that ship sailed.

Yes, I'm feeling all of that. All of it.

You know, the reality is you just make a couple tweaks to your routine, and I feel better and more energetic now than I've probably felt ever.

Yeah. Yeah, that's what I want to unpack. I want to talk about a day in the life of JJ and all your golden nuggets that you can drop on us because We try to do what we've always been doing. We try to work out the same way, eat, or we try to clean up our diet and change things a little bit. But why doesn't that work for women over 50?

All right, so first of all, happy, happy birthday.

Thank you.

Yay! What, what does this make you? Are you an Aquarius?

I am, absolutely. I'm a fish.

And what does that mean? What— my mom was an Aquarius. What's an Aquarius?

Um, an Aquarius is a little bit wild. She likes adventure. She's a quick start. She loves to have fun. She loves people. And that pretty much sums me up. So—

Yes, it does. Yes, it does. That's the Tabatha I know. Anyway, super fun to have you, uh, be with you on your birthday. I really feel that this can be absolutely the best time in life. And really, from 40 on, a lot of things going to be talking about are stuff you want to double down on. Because again, I think the margin for error, like the whole, like, let's stay out late and, you know, you can't— it's just like, yeah, no. And you notice when a bunch of us are out now, it's like 9 o'clock and everyone clears out. It's like they're going to bed. But sleep is such a priority. That is a biggie. I actually think that we need to work out harder.

Let's talk about that because there's a trend going around that is scaring women out of exercise and telling them— I know, right? Like, it's the type of exercise. So tell women, what should we be doing?

Well, and that's all BS too, because it's, it's all this cortisol fear, right? That's what's going on. Okay, so here's the reality. When you exercise, you elevate your blood pressure. You— if you're working out really hard, your blood sugar will go up, your blood pressure will go up, your cortisol will go up. So should you not exercise?

No.

But what do we know? We know that you have better blood sugar regulation because you exercise. We know you have better blood pressure because you exercise. We know that you actually have better cortisol because you exercise, because you'll have better overall cortisol. So you've got to know the difference between acute and chronic. Chronically elevated of any of those things are a problem. Acute levels of those Are great because acutely inflammation goes up as well. Like, all these acute things happen so that chronically they're better. So could we get rid of this whole stuff? I see 2 things going on that drive me nuts. Number one, women afraid that they're going to get bulky. I have literally been helping women work out for 40-plus years, and in 40-plus years, never once have I seen a woman working out hard get bulky. I've seen a woman not working out Get bulky.

Yes, amen to that.

That's not even possible. Bulky body fat, right?

Yes.

So that's the first part. Now, the stress hormone thing— you want to learn how to handle stress better? Do hard workouts.

Yeah. Oh my gosh, I really want to emphasize this because I was in full adrenal burnout from being an OB-GYN. I couldn't get off the couch. I couldn't function. That is a very small percentage of women, and I still needed to work out and gain my endurance back and gain my stress response back. It took a little bit of time, but there's a whole agenda out there that's saying women should be afraid of cardio, women should be afraid to work out, and we are here to tell you, do not be afraid. That's right, you guys. It is your longevity muscle. It's going to keep you thriving in the second half of life. So thank you. I think it's so important for women to know, like, they just need to lift, right? And sleep and restore. What are your tips on restoration?

So first of all, for cortisol, think about it. The single best thing if you have got adrenal exhaustion, we want to teach your body how to come back out of it. Sleep, of course, is number one. But then doing small, intense bursts of exercise to teach your nervous system how to handle stress and recover, handle stress and recover, handle stress and recover. It's going to be amazing. When you look at being high energy in your best shape, your best body composition at 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, it's 3 things. It's how you eat, it's how you exercise, and it's how you recover. And the reality is, if you're not recovering well, you won't be able to work out well and you won't be able to build muscle well because the real building happens while you're Recovering.

Yes.

So all these things, there's 3 little prongs there, 3 legs to the stool. You need all 3 in order to pull this off. I've gotten to be a huge fan of sauna. I think this is one of the most important things. I'm absolutely convinced that the reason that these countries that live the longest and have the healthiest, happiest people, they're all sauna people. I think if we went back and went, what did the Blue Zones have in common? Which, by the way, isn't a vegan diet. Let's be honest. I'm sorry.

No.

I've been to Greece, I've been to Italy. I've never seen vegans as the primary people there. No, they eat cured meat.

Hello.

But when you really look at it, they're sweating, they're moving, they're active, they have community, they have friends. So what do we need to be really doing? Leaning into our girlfriends, having amazing fun relationships, you know, having a great community who are positive, awesome humans who are focused on the cool things that they're doing, not like doing a slide in slowly to home. And then, you know, pushing yourself more. I think that as we age, we have to do more, not less. The less you do, the less you can do.

Wow.

The more you do, the more you can do. I am working out harder doing Harder things now than I was doing in my 30s and 40s.

Yes. And this is what you have taught me, is when you do hard things physically, you can do hard things mentally. You can go after your dreams and you can conquer hard things that you could never even imagine handling because physically you can handle it now, right? Like, I love that Saying so much. And I think that women get scared. They, they start to develop anxiety, rightfully so. You lose your progesterone, your hormones shift. Like, you are feeling these things. We're not going to negate those physical feelings. But you are saying, like, you need to fight against that. You need to work against that and work harder, and that is going to really help you thrive, right?

Yep. Work against gravity. You know, I was reading somewhere that they were like age-proofing their house, almost like you're childproofing your house. And I went, okay, what does that mean? And they're like, okay, we're downsizing into a 1-story house. I go, you know what? Here's what I think should happen as you age. As you age, you should move into a 3-story house.

Love it.

The 3-story house, the— like, let's put the kitchen on the top floor. Let's put the bathroom on the bottom floor, right? You know, it's like, let's make it so you're up and down, up and down, up and down all the time. If you look at all the Blue Zones, what do they have? They're all hills.

Yeah.

They're all living, you know, like, let's get gravity that you're fighting against as much as possible. And let's make it so that you have to carry groceries up the stairs. Let's— you have to do stuff, do hard stuff, do heavy stuff all the time. Super duper important.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. That is what you see in those Blue Zones. You know, they are chopping their vegetables, they're carrying their vegetables from the market up major hills. We don't even chop our vegetables anymore, we buy them chopped up. We could literally not move our body all day long if we wanted to, and I would argue that the majority of us actually are. We're just sitting around, we're turning into slugs, and then we're wondering why it's such a fight. So how many hours a day are you moving on average?

Okay, so here's one of the things, and I think this is the best place to start, and I'll tell you why I think it's the best place to start. I think the very first thing that you should do prior to exercise or anything else is to track your NEAT. Now, I love to measure and monitor everything because you can't improve unless you look at it, right? And so sometimes the first thing to do is to look, whether it's your bank account or your body composition. You know, or your food tracking, you gotta look. And so when you're looking at your activity level, that's step 1. And last year when I was looking at all of the statistics and that the average American gets 3,000 to 4,000 steps a day, which is pathetic.

Right.

Okay, pathetic. And you wanna make sure you get at least 8,000, that there's this beautiful, like the majority of benefits are in the 8,000 to 12,000 range. Of course, more is better. No one's gonna say stop.

Right.

But 8,000 to 12,000 is sort of your like sweet spot to make sure you're hitting. So last year I was like, I'm getting 8,000 steps a day no matter what. That's it. I'm getting 8,000 steps a day. And literally some days it would be poor Tim, you know, we'd be traveling and I'd get back to the hotel and go, yeah, I got 6,500 steps. We're walking up the stairs, you know, to the 18th floor. And then believe it or not, stairs don't give you a whole lot of activity level. So then I'm like, we got to go back outside. He's like, okay. He's such a great guy. But then this year I raised it to 10,000. So I really try to get 6,000 steps before noon so I don't feel behind.

Mm.

And I have a stand-up desk, I have a walking treadmill, and that's when I'm home. When I'm out, you know, and fortunately my house is 2 stories and my office is upstairs and all of the fun stuff is downstairs. So the coffee, the drinks, I was gonna put them upstairs. I go, no, I'm not gonna put 'em upstairs, I'm gonna put 'em downstairs. So I have to go down, up and down, up and down, up and down the whole time. The doggies are usually downstairs, so I'm always up and down. So that's the first step. And the reason I say that is this. Let's say that you want to change your body composition and you want to maybe hold on to muscle, drop fat, or even build muscle, drop fat. And you start to work out, and you— but you also, you start working out hard and you also do a little caloric restriction. Your body will go, you know what? I want to maintain homeostasis, so I'm just going to cut down on my daily activity. And so what you'll find is you're going, why isn't this working? I'm working out, I'm cutting back on my calories a little bit. But then if you tracked your NEAT, you'd find, oh, I'm working, I'm moving half as much as I was. And so that can actually happen because our body is very adaptive.

Mm-hmm.

And we have to make sure that we are not letting that happen. So that's why I always say start with NEAT. That's non-negotiable. Then from that, we're going to start adding in the other things. But if you just make sure that's always happening, you'll never make that adaptation where you go, oh, I'm all of a sudden I'm moving a lot less because I did a really hard workout and I'm compensating, or I'm moving a lot less because I dropped my calories and I'm compensating.

That is fire. I hope everyone actually heard that. I want to reiterate it because that is what I see. You get into this narrative of like, You just need to move your body for 30 minutes, 3 to 5 times a week, and then we're stagnant for like 22 hours or more. No, that doesn't work. You have to keep moving throughout the day. And all these tiny little choices that you're making, like keeping the drinks on the, the first floor and walking to places, taking the stairs, they all add up. They're absolutely incredible. And You guys, I promise JJ knows what she's talking about. She finally got her husband on board and got him crazy ripped and in shape this past year. So the men, if you get the men on board, how much better is your life, right? Because then you don't have to like argue with them and worry about where we're eating and the snacks. Like, I love— tell me some tricks on how you got him on board with you.

Okay, well, that was a sneaky one. Before I go there, I just want to give you one cool thing.

Okay.

That, um, along with that little Yeah. There was a study that came out about exercise snacks or vigorous intermittent lifestyle physical activity. That's what it's called, VILPA. And what they found was that people who did 1 to 2-minute bursts of activity a couple times a day to accumulate 4.5 to 10 minutes total of burst activity— I mean, who can't do that? That means that in the morning you'd wake up and while you're brushing your teeth, maybe you're doing some air squats, and then you have breakfast and maybe you do some jumping jacks, and then you have lunch and maybe you do some up-downs. Like, it's that simple, right? That those people reduced their risk of all-cause mortality, reduced the risk of dying 40% to 50% as compared to people who didn't.

Wow.

I mean, come on. And the way you have to do it to remember it is just start to think of habit stacking, because otherwise you will blow it off and totally forget it. But if you think of, I want to move after I eat, because when you move after you eat— and so what we do is we'll either do a little exercise snack or we'll go out for a walk. We now know that like a minute or 2 of air squats is kind of worth the same amount to your blood sugar as 30 minutes of walking.

Yeah.

So, you know, pick it. But the reality is we just took your excuses away because you can do something. So something for a minute or 2. Now, what happened a couple years ago was I went to go get a DEXA. I hadn't done one for ages, which was a mistake. I think that we should— I think we should have our first DEXA in our teens because that's when we're really laying down bone and we can see if there's a problem. And then maybe one again in our 20s. And then we should start doing them annually. And so I did a DEXA at 39. And so now here I was 59, I was doing another DEXA and I literally went, you know what? I want to put on a little. I focused on building muscle. So I actually upped my calories a bit and really pushed it hard. And I went in and my DEXA at 59 was exactly the same in terms of weight, body fat, muscle mass as it was at 39, which is—

Wow.

Crazy.

Wow.

And so, but I, you know, then I was like, okay, I want to get to where I was in my 20s, which is what I did. But my husband, you've heard of something called sarcopenic obesity or skinny fat. My husband looked great, but he was skinny fat, and he's very much more of the ectomorphic type of guy. And so his DEXA read 25% body fat. And he was shocked. Now, what was great was it wasn't me saying that, it was the DEXA, right? And so DEXA is something we've used forever to go see bone mineral density. But it's great because it's a more accurate way to look at body composition. You can do it at home with a bioimpedance machine, and that's what I tell people to do. But this is a great thing to do like every 6 to 12 months and then correlate it. So he did that. And I was like, oh, you know what, honey? You should really be 10% to 15%. And so we did a couple of adjustments. Now, one of the adjustments was he was needing to tweak his testosterone a bit. And so this finally got him on the horn. It was sitting down at about 300, so he bumped it up to where it should be. And so that played a big role in this. I think he would have gotten about half of what he got to if his testosterone hadn't been optimized. So let's be honest, for women, that's estrogen. For men, that's testosterone. It's very anabolic. Metabolic makes a big difference.

Yeah.

Then he would start like 5:00, he'd start sniffing around and he was like foraging. He's in there, he's got chips, he's got guac, he's got hummus, he's got cashews. He's like foraging, right? And I'm always looking, going, why are you eating before dinner? Like, why are you eating before we're eating? It's kind of like the appetizer concept. I'm like, why do we need an appetizer before dinner? Just eat dinner. So he's foraging and then he'd get dinner and he wouldn't eat enough protein and he kind of would skimp at lunch and skimp at breakfast. So now he had a food scale and an app, the Cronometer app, and he tracked his protein to get 1 gram per pound of target body weight. So he was eating 100 grams of protein a day, 180, and divided and he had 4 meals. And that's what— when I used to work, I used to work a lot with athletes and swimmers and wrestlers. Bizarrely enough, like Razor Ruddock. I mean, like boxers, wrestlers, all that.

Oh, wow.

And so I would do 4 meals. And so that's what he was doing, 4 meals. And he also started to prioritize. He started cranking up the weights. He kind of would phone it in at the gym. I'd look at him, I'd go, really? But he started to pick it way up. So he cranked it up, started doing pull-ups and squats and all sorts of heavy, heavy stuff. And then we added a couple supplements, like we started cranking in the creatine and the Timeline. And so when we got through all of this, we went back and the first— he went from 25% to 17% to 12% to 10%. Now here's what's interesting. And he did that in 8 months. And again, I think we would have gotten half the way without— if we didn't have the testosterone, because this is an unheard of thing. He dropped 27 pounds of fat. He put on 24 pounds of muscle. Again, that's a huge thing, but I think testosterone drove at least half of that. So he had a 3-pound weight change. And this is why we've got to look at body composition, because you'd look at that and go, oh, wow, your weight changed 3 pounds. And a woman, because we're crazy, let's admit it, we would have gone, I only lost 3 pounds, right?

Mm-hmm.

Even though you look entirely different, you're like, I mean, We still— we got body dysmorphia. So this is why if I had my perfect way to work with someone, the very first thing that we would do is start upping your protein. We'd make sure we have that movement dialed in with the walking, and then we would start to add in resistance training. And we'd focus first on muscle because I know that if I can get muscle put on, muscle's metabolic Spanx, holds everything in tighter. It's going to support a better metabolism all day long. It's really the only way that we can impact Substantially your resting metabolic rate. And then having more protein is the best thing for thermic effect of food. And then so muscle is the metabolic spank. It's a sugar sponge. It gives carbohydrates a place to land in your muscles rather than being turned into fat and stored on your gut. And then muscle's also this amazing multitasking messenger where there's over 600 different chemical messages that muscles can send out either to themselves, either to neighboring, you know, organs or all throughout the body saying lower inflammation, Improve my mood, make my bones remodel, all sorts of really important things, boost my immunity. So you look at that and go, you do this kind of stuff and you focus on building muscle, you will drop fat, especially if you focus on building muscle, eating more protein. Guess what's going to happen? Even if you don't start to consciously lower your calories or anything else, you will start to lose fat. Because of the effect of putting on more muscle and switching over to more protein.

Yeah. Oh my gosh, I hope women are hearing this and they're really starting to get it. It's not the number on the scale, it's your body composition. And I've weighed probably the same since 40 to 50, the past decade, within 2 pounds, 3 pounds. Have a bowel movement, weigh less. Eat something, weigh more. But my body composition has been all over the place. I've been like super puffy, inflamed, especially when my hormones dropped. And then I leaned out and I got strong when I incorporated the weight training. And, you know, when I was just running, my body looked totally different as well. So what you're doing with your body composition means everything. But if anybody's listening, if you could understand the importance of muscle to actually have that longevity. Like, it is everything. It does regulate your blood sugar and your mood and your immune system and all the things in your bone health. Oh my gosh. Like, talk about being at risk for morbidity and mortality. Break a bone, break a hip, you know?

I was just looking at it and I, you know, I, I looked at this study now a couple times because I'm like, this couldn't be right. But, and I keep looking at it and keep saying the same thing. I'm like, okay, but it couldn't be right. And it was that, you know, Starting at around the age 50, after 50, 50% of women will have some kind of an osteoporotic fracture. And I'm like, that couldn't be right. But the reality is starting at around age 30, we start to lose muscle, but we start to lose strength and power. And it's really that power where we start to slow down. We know that grip strength is highly correlated with all-cause mortality, that gait speed is highly correlated with all-cause mortality, so is VO2 max. And for most women, they have shied away from the weight room, or if they have gone into the weight room, I've seen you women in there. You are in there and you go pick up these little tiny weights and you're doing like 20,000 repetitions with them. And it's like, stop that, stop that. Go do something heavy. Now, if you're just starting to weight train, the very first thing you want to do, and I really should say resistance train, As you just move your body through those, through those movements to teach your body how to move, then you start adding resistance to it and you build up over time. But you really want to get to a point where you're working in lower rep ranges, heavier weights as fast as you can so that you're building muscle, but you're also building strength and power.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think a lot of people watching are probably Either they've given up working out regularly because of changes in their hormones. I know I completely work— stopped working out when my estrogen tanked. I, I felt like Tim without that testosterone. You don't physically have the strength to get through it or to recover. You're just inflamed. And so if that missing piece needs to be dealt with, like find somebody to help you with your hormones, right? Please tell me you're on hormones, right? You are on hormones, right?

Get some hormones. Go to Tabatha. So here's the reality, and I still remember this, Tab. I was— and it only was a couple months, thankfully. So first thing that happened to me in the hormone replacement journey, and I'd been teaching this course called Overcoming Weight Loss Resistance, so I knew when I was like, uh-oh. The first thing that happened was I started losing my eyebrows and I started getting cold. Now, I'd never been a cold person. I'd always been a big sweaty person.

Oh, wow.

So in a way, I was kind of happy. I'm like, oh, I'm not I'm not sweating all the time. I didn't realize, oh, no, this is problematic. So that was the first thing, was starting to lose hair. And so I went on thyroid. And by the way, my TSH was only 2.2. It wasn't where you'd say super elevated, but that was enough for me to have all the symptoms. So a little bit, I was like, boom, I feel great. The next thing was that I started to notice that my gums were bleeding. And I was like, and then the thing right after that, and this was over only a couple of months, I could not recover from my workouts. I was so used to doing what I was doing. I was like, all of a sudden I just felt so achy and inflamed and awful. And I remember going to my dentist going, my gums are bleeding. I don't know what the heck's going on. He goes, oh, it's low estrogen. I'm like, first of all, God bless this dude.

I was like, you're a guy, a male dentist.

Wow. A male dentist. And I was like, oh, okay. So then, I mean, I immediately started with hormone replacement therapy, and I had been on it since literally my late 40s. And I'm just fortunate because, as you know, when my son got hit, I was right around— I was 49. I was already using a little bit. That sent me right off the deep end. I mean, that level of stress. But I had the hormones. I remember one of my hormone docs showed up at the hospital with estrogen, progesterone. I gotcha. You know, all the stress stuff. I'm like, okay. So I mean, that got me through all of that. But I, I think the important message here is like, you don't have to suffer.

Right.

You do not have to suffer whatsoever. Like, this is not some badge of honor to get through this. This is like the minute you start to notice this, this is where you lean in and you really need to find someone like Dr. Tabatha because you got to get a doctor that understands that you're treating symptoms here, and that as you're going through perimenopause, like, it's a— it's like this. And so, you know, you need to know how to work through that with hormones. It's not like, oh, here's the dose, you know?

Yeah, very much. And your conventional OB-GYNs, which— that's what I was trained to do— we really focus on just getting rid of the hot flashes and night sweats when there's so much more to the BHRT picture. We want to slow the aging process. prevent you from developing diabetes and heart disease and osteoporosis. And so it's a whole different ballgame and way of looking at things. So thank you for sharing that, because I know for me, I just couldn't function without my hormone replacement. And so that's what I see in my practice every day, is women getting their lives back, and they're like, now I want to work out, tell me how to work out. Like, they just— they couldn't even imagine going to the gym before that, you know.

Well, you look at it, and I remember at the time I was working out of a doctor's office in LA and a doctor's office in Palm Desert. And quite often they were like, could you just deal with my— like, I'm going to send the patient in with their labs. Will you just tell them what they need to do for eating and exercise? I'm like, got it. And before I knew anything, like, they'd walk in with their labs and I'm going to hand me their health history intake. But before that, I would just be looking at their labs going, Uh-oh. Because you could see what would happen. I could tell if they were on hormones or not before they actually said a word to me, because if they were not on hormones, fasting insulin was up, hs-CRP, a marker of inflammation, was up, LDL was up. So all these things that, that were saying, hey, I'm inflamed, I'm insulin resistant, and I have all these things linking me to having diabetes or heart disease. Teeth are all that were normal before. Like, you could see their old labs or new labs, you're like, oh, you're in perimenopause, so sorry to see that. So you do hormone replacement therapy for those bones. I mean, you look at bone mineral density and it falls off a cliff when estrogen goes down. And guess what? You don't want to try to get that back. You don't want to lose it. So it falls off a cliff. So we need estrogen and progesterone for remodeling, and then you estrogen to build muscle. Everyone thinks it's testosterone. Estrogen is very anabolic, right? So super critical. Progesterone for mood, for sleep, for anti-anxiety. But you could see it. And I think of hormones for your bones, for your brain, for your heart. Everyone is worried about hormone replacement therapy, and it's like, could that Women's Health Initiative please be put to rest? Women die mostly of heart disease.

Yeah.

And this is super protective.

Hormones are safe. They're protective. They make us who we are. They give us our personality, our drive, our energy, all of it. Just ask a woman in menopause. She will tell you, I'm a different woman. I don't feel the same. You know, I can't live the same. I can't function the same. So you are such a shining example of how to do it right. You know, People want that quick fix. They still come to me for hormones and they're like, wait, why don't I feel amazing? Because you're still eating the standard American diet and you're sitting 23 hours a day and you're not managing your relationships and your stress, all the things. So, Yeah. I just— because you're my mentor and you have changed my life, you have guided me through so much and really directed me And shared your wisdom with me. You've always had a mentor, right? Don't you think that is part of aging well, is just having an elder to look up to, a wiser woman, some matriarch that you would like to be like, and see how she's living and really just have her pour into you? Wouldn't you say that's been a big piece of your journey?

All along the way. And one showed up for me when I was 30, and I didn't really realize it, you know, at the time, because she came into my life when I was 27. I think she was probably 50 at the time. And, you know, I was her, uh, personal trainer and nutritionist. And so I was pouring into her. And she started pouring back into me and planting seeds. And I remember at 30, like, she really helped me make some major shifts That changed the whole trajectory of my life and changed the way I think. Because her biggest thing, she was a mindset coach. And ever since then, I've always sought out mentors. They could be younger than me, by the way. They could be a male. It's really where someone— I look at where someone is. I look at the after picture I want.

Mm-hmm.

And who is there, because you can so shortcut your success. By just finding that person. And, you know, basically, by the way, when you find that person, hire that person.

Yes.

Don't pick their brain. Don't like, I— could we just go to— no, don't do that. Because money is an energetic exchange. So when I find someone who's where I want to be, then I go hire that person. Because the minute that you invest your time and money into something, you basically start that healing journey, that transformation. And that's a necessary step with it. And the more— it's like, in the perfect world, if you found the amazing mentor for you, you would pay whatever it was that would make you pay attention. And I remember early on, I— when I was working at one of those doctor's offices out of LA, and he came to me, he goes, I really want you to help one of my patients. However, he doesn't have a lot of money. He's a rabbi, blah, blah, blah.

Mm-hmm.

But I want him to pay so he'll pay attention and he'll also feel, you know. And I go, all right. So we just came up with what would be that amount, you know. I was like, whatever. But I also knew, and I've done it, I have fallen prey to this time and time again where I will just wanna help someone. And so I'll just do it. Then nothing ever happens.

Mm-hmm.

They never take any— they don't take it seriously or pay any attention. So my big advice is, if there's something you really wanna do, find the person who is amazing at that. And invest a little more than what you can to make that happen, because then you'll really pay attention and the money always shows up anyway.

Absolutely. I think you have to feel a little bit uncomfortable with that investment, because if it's easy and you don't feel uncomfortable, you don't feel like you're stretching past what you can handle, you don't shift, you stay stuck. And I see that with women who want to hire my certified coaches and really dive in and get that support, but they're like, nah, I can't afford it, I can't do this or that. I'm like, but the investment is— you can't even fathom how priceless it is, like what you're gonna get on the other side. Like, you guys, I have been paying JJ in full transparency for years, and this woman has transformed my life, and I will do it 10 times over. She can't get rid of me. So So investing in you is a sure bet, right? Like, if you invest in yourself, you know you're going to show up for yourself, right?

I'm going to read some of these, and I want to refer Robin— and hello, Robin, by the way. I've known Robin now for years. Um, so Robin's concerned about the breast cancer risk, and another gal said, I've been on hormones for years, and sure enough, I had breast cancer. Here's the reality. You don't know what would have happened had you not been on the hormones. So you can't— you're, you know, an N of 1. We can never go back and have you go through that. I really would highly recommend, and maybe Tabatha, you can have it do an Instagram Live with Dr. Jen, Dr. Jen Simmons, who is a breast cancer surgeon putting women on hormones.

Yes.

So I would highly recommend following Dr. Jen Simmons, looking at her work. Because there is a lot of misinformation out about that as well, and everyone is in their N of one there. I'm not saying to do it or not to do it. I'm saying go to the expert on that, and that is Dr. Jen Simmons, who is amazing with that. And then let's see. Yeah, let's see. Someone's like, "How does your dentist know?" I was like, "I know." I still was so surprised about my dentist knowing that. And Susan's doing her weight workout while she's watching. I love this, love this, love this. And as far as an aortic aneurysm, I would go talk to a good cardiologist. Do we have a good cardiologist on Instagram that we could have them go out on what the best thing is for that? Who is it?

I'm going to have to hunt that down.

You go out, you ask Dr. Lisa Koch, K-O-C-H-E. Go ask Lisa Koch. And she will tell you what to do about that. And I'm thinking, can you talk about cholesterol? Yes, intermittent fasting cholesterol, intermittent fasting. And then Guns Patty, what's been working out consistently after my protein, but I'm afraid of eating too many calories. Here's the reality. I didn't say add protein, don't take out other stuff. Here's what's going to happen. We have really 4 macronutrients because if you're drinking, that's a 4th one.

Mm-hmm.

Let's just take that one aside because if you're drinking alcohol, you're not burning fat. Your body's going to preferentially Burn alcohol before it ever burns fat. So let's look at your protein, fat, and carbs. Let's say that you keep your calories the same, and what I'd love you to do first is just start using the Chronometer app, C R O N O M E T R P E R, and just track your calories for a week and see what you're actually doing. Now, what I found is just doing that, you'll make some changes. But let's just say you're tracking because I want to see how many calories are you actually eating. You must use a food scale. You must use a food scale. You must use a food scale because without that, it's not going to be true. And by the way, like you might take a scoop of something and the label says something. It's not the same as the actual weight. Use the food scale. So you use a food scale. Use the app. You track what you're eating for a week. You two weeks is even better. You take that now. You know your average maintenance calories if your weight stayed the same. Then you are going to increase your protein to that one gram per pound of target body weight. You have to do at least. At least 0.7 grams per pound of target body weight. That's the floor, but you can go, you know, to 1 or even a little bit higher. I'm not worried about too much, I'm worried about too little. Boot out a little bit of your carbs and fat. About 25% of calories from protein, by the way, are used in the digestion, assimilation, and muscle protein synthesis of protein. So versus nothing barely for fat and 5% of calories from carbohydrates. So if all you did was take away some of the calories from fat and put them into protein, And keep calories constant, you will lose a little bit of weight just doing that. However, what I would love you to do is just do that for a week. Add your protein, boot out a little bit, keep calories consistent. What you're probably going to find is you'll be full because protein's way more satiating. Protein and fiber together are going to help with GLP-1 response too. Then we can start to look at a little cycling caloric restriction if you even need it. But reality is, if you've got your Non-exercise activity going, that walking, and you're hitting at least 8,000. You've added in some resistance training and some high-intensity interval training. Now you put the protein in, you bumped out a little bit of the other, you may find that's enough. If it's not enough, then I like to do cycling caloric restriction. And that looks like taking your maintenance calories, multiplying it by 0.75, doing that amount, so 25% less for 5 days, then going back to normal for 10 days. And just doing that. And what you're going to find, if you drop body weight, keeping everything else the same, you will— of course, your maintenance calories will go down a little bit because a lot of that's based on body weight. But guess what? If you put on more muscle, it probably won't be that much because muscle requires more energy than fat. Now, it's not a ton, right? Muscle's like 10 more calories a day for each pound of muscle. But, you know, that makes a difference over time. Right. So there you go. That's the easy way to do all of that. So do not fear the protein. You're not just saying add more. I'm saying add more, bump out something. And I actually think unless you're doing a ketogenic diet for, say, brain issues or cancer, I actually think it's probably easier to do it this way versus protein. Yeah.

I was going to say women are adding the protein and then they're They're not working out more. They're not pulling anything out. They're not changing the other pieces of it.

It's not magic. I mean, you got to do all of it. But if you add the protein, then you make sure you're getting at least 5 servings of non-starchy vegetables, hopefully more. Then you're getting in like 2 servings of fruit, preferably berries. And you look at how much fat was in your protein, choosing lean sources, look at how much fat you used for your vegetables. Using things like only extra virgin olive oil or ghee, little bits. And then you see what you need past that in terms of maybe some like legumes or something like that, maybe a little bit of healthy fats like seeds and avocado. You just see where you're at. But I mean, I literally eat 10 servings of veggies a day, some berries, some protein, and I mean, that's, that's about it.

Yeah.

You know, some olive oil. Like, that's my diet. I love that.

Oh, thank you for sharing all of that. And I just want to remind women that hormones are safe and they are part of the picture of health and vitality in the second half of your life. Don't be afraid of them. There's so much misinformation.

Be afraid to not be on them.

Be afraid to not be on them. More women get breast cancer who are not on hormone replacement therapy. And it has to do with our environmental toxins and so many other things. Alcohol is probably the biggest factor for why women get breast cancer. And so yes, check us out. My team would love to help you at Dr. Tabatha. I hope you guys are following on Instagram. We bring you all of this information. It's so vital. It's so vital. But you have gotten the—

How many places can you see? Like how many states are you licensed in now?

It's probably 31 at this point. So I'm licensed in over half the country for sure. We can help so many women across the country. I'm licensed in California finally, which has been such a game changer. I just, I pour into women. I try to just help them through these challenges because I know conventional medicine is failing them and confusing them with their misinformation and all of that. So Thank you for sharing your time with us. This has been so invaluable, and I hope that everybody felt like that was a gift. If you have more questions, reach out at info@drtabatho.com or DM me, whatever, or DM JJ. We both have podcasts. They're amazing.

What's your podcast called?

It is Fast to Faith, and we talk about the cholesterol myths and why cholesterol is not your villain. We talk about all these questions you guys have. So check out Fast to Faith. We pour into you. We are here for you. But I just want to say that you are a godsend, and I'm so grateful for you. And I know everybody's loving this conversation. So thank you, JJ, from the bottom of my heart.

Including me. And for anyone who is on my side, make sure you follow Dr. Tabatha. She is amazing. And again, if you have questions on hormones, she's your gal. She's your doc. Yes, she can help you.

I'm here for you ladies. Have an amazing night. I'm gonna go eat some gluten-free cake.

Yay! As you should. Love you. Bye.