Episode 26: Are Toxins Messing with your Hormones? An Interview with Dr. Kristine Blanche, "The D...

Hi, I'm Dr. Tabitha, the functional gynecologist. I'm a board certified OB, GYN and functional medicine physician. I've embraced the world of functional medicine and wellness through my own personal health journey and I'm super excited to share my wisdom and unique perspective as it pertains to women's health. So if you're struggling with hormone imbalance, weight gain, period issues, anxiety, insomnia, you name it, then you've come to the right place. I want to be your functional gynecologist. So welcome. Hi friends. I'm excited to interview Dr. Christine Blanch today. Today she's known as the Detox Doc. So she's the CEO of the Integrative Healing center in New York City. Her passion is giving women and men a place where they can be heard and heal when it comes to their health. So Dr. Blanche's PhD research thesis was entitled the Blanche Breast Cancer Prevention Protocol, which we're going to talk about today. She's going to explain how you can become your own health advocate and make changes and interventions in your life to decrease your risk of developing disease. So this episode is full of empowering, helpful information. But she also talks about working with 911 rescue workers and how she helped them detoxify and regain their health. So her story is really touching and uplifting. I want you guys to know that you can impact your health. You just have to go outside the box, dig a little bit deeper, keep asking questions and figure out your why. Why do I not feel well? Why am I sick? Then we can tackle those issues. Oftentimes those issues are heavy toxic burden causing hormonal imbalances. So we're going to talk about that today. So Dr. Blanche has been featured on News 12, Long Island Naturally Natural Awakenings Magazine, the Long Island Press, Intelligent Medicine Podcast, and all kinds of other media sources. She's just a wealth of information. She is proud to have over 25 years of experience in her various areas of medicine and is the happy wife and mother of two amazing adult children. So, so she's not losing her hair through Covid dealing with homeschooling the way some of us are, but she definitely understands the stressors of this whole situation which we touch upon a little bit. So it's her belief that together we can change the face of medicine to be about prevention and health. So I definitely want you to stay tuned to the end of this episode because she does give tons of information about how to reclaim your health, including her girlfriend Cleanse that we talk about her detox program and even for men, the man up detox. So here we go. Well, welcome Dr. Blanche. Thanks for being on the functional Gynecologist podcast.

Thank you so much for having me.

I'm super excited to connect with you ever since I met you last year in Arizona. So you are out in New York City, right?

Yes, we have a couple locations on Long island and one in New York City.

Oh, very nice. Okay, so I wanted you to come and talk to me about breast health and thermography because I just think it's so important for women to understand that they have the ability to impact the health of their breasts and their future. And you know, I have so many women who are nervous and worried about breast cancer and they don't want to get it, but they aren't really proactive, you know, other than doing their yearly mammogram because I think the genetic aspect is so heavily pushed in the media. Like, oh well, I don't have that gene mutation, I'm fine.

Right.

And we know that as physicians that's not true. Like you just as being a woman, you have a risk. What is it, one in eight? I think. So talk to me. Why did you do your PhD in breast health?

Yeah, it's a great question. So I had spent most of my years in conventional medicine, ER surgery, critical care, and honestly I got into functional integrative medicine because my sister in law was diagnosed with cancer. So she was diagnosed at 32 years old with Hodgkin's lymphoma. And I sort of was desperate to find information to help her. So I started reading all these books and holistic cancer care and integrative medicine and I was like, whoa, I didn't learn any of this. I think most of us who get into integrative and functional medicine, it's a mind blowing aspect when we realize that nutrition matters and toxins matter and stress because we're just not taught that. I sort of went back to school and started studying. Really my focus was holistic cancer prevention. To be honest with you, we had lost my sister in law. Like I said, she was 32. She 2 year old baby girl was just like traumatic, awful, terrible. I started with myself, I was just like, oh my gosh. As I started to read everything, I was like, I'm doing everything wrong, I'm going to get sick. You know, so that was my own, I got to do this for me because I can't do that to my, you know, I can't leave my babies kind of feeling. As every mother I think goes through when they think about their mortality and living in Long Island. As soon as I started my practice, it was just breast cancer after breast cancer, after breast cancer. It was, it's just everywhere here. I mean, we are a hotspot for breast cancer. And so I took care of so many women, you know, through breast cancer, with the diagnosis from a holistic, complimentary perspective. And one day I was just like, this is not enough. We have to shift the focus to be more about prevention. Like, I don't want to help more women through this. I want to help them from ever hearing those words, you know, I have cancer.

Amen. Amen.

Exactly. So I had incorporated thermography into my practice years before that. And thermography is just an amazing technology. It's a fart Fred camera that picks up literally inflammatory patterns in the body. So you can see everything from, you know, autoimmune disease in the thyroid to gut inflammation, to sinus inflammation. And it's most notably known for breasts because we see it's a very different test than mammogram or sonogram because those are more tests of anatomy. This is more of a test of physiology. So I get to see the breasts. I can see, is the right breast more dense than the left breast? How dense are they? Are they mildly dense? Moderately dense, severely dense. And then we can see patterns which we call neovascularity, which is new blood vessels coming to an area to feed rogue cells. So it's much more of a preventative test. It shows me a suspicious area. They may eventually become a problem, which is, you know, it's an action point for people. And we don't just take the picture and bring them back. That would probably be my biggest criticism of thermography, is there's a lot of places they just take the picture and they don't give the patients any ideas of what to do to change the terrain. So that's why I did my PhD research in it. Because after year after year after year of doing this with women and then doing simple things like starting vitamin D, you know, having them use anti inflammatory topicals on their breasts, slight dietary changes, stress relief, like yoga, meditation, we got to bring them back and they get to take another picture and see the before and after and the change they made in their breasts. And we always see a change which is just super exciting for women because they feel empowered instead of afraid. They really feel like, wow, I did that. What else can I do? Yeah, so it's very cool. It's really, I think it's a Technology that more practices should be using because just so objective, like before and after, you can see the difference, you know.

Oh, that's so empowering. That's awesome. How young do you have? Women start with thermography, usually recommend age.

23, you know, sort of when the breasts are fully developed, you know, and then I usually do your first baseline thermography and then they'll tell you to come back in either three months or six months for that initial, those become your baseline. So we like to see that whatever we changed, whatever protocol we implemented, that it's actually working. If they're worried about an area, they bring you back in three months. If they're not worried, they give you six months and then that becomes your baseline. So once a year women can come for pornography. They get to see if anything shifts in the wrong direction, if they've had any setbacks. It's a very telling test. It really does give me a lot of information.

Awesome. Can you explain a little bit more about the topical anti inflammatories that we were talking about? That sounds really interesting.

Yep. So, so we use sacred frankincense oil, which is boswellia, it comes from a tree in the Middle east. And this is an essential oil that we dilute. At first we were using concentrated oil, but it's very expensive, this oil. So what we did was we found that the right dilution of the oil to be able to apply to the breast and still get the same change on the thermography. So the protocol that we studied was for vitamin D, sacred frankincense topically applied. We also checked for MTHFR genes and if they did have a mutation in that detoxification gene, we started B vitamins, methylated B vitamins. We implemented some dietary changes, just sort of like whole foods, anti inflammatory and stress relief. And iodine was the third component for the breasts. There's a lot of data on iodine for getting rid of density cystic breasts. So we actually have women topically apply the iodine directly on the breast, like a quarter size spot twice a week and then we have them take an oral dosage in water. And that was basically the protocol. So we did an initial thermography, we started the women on the protocol, we did a three, a six, a 12 and a 24 month follow up visits. And it was like unbelievable. Everybody had change, everybody had improvement. And that's what I've been seeing in my practice, you know, for the last eight years as well.

That's amazing. I mean everybody had improvement, you know, probably to differing degrees, but like improvement. That's pretty amazing.

So it was impressive. And I used. My control group was just vitamin D. So the women had the pictures and they just took vitamin D. And I actually was surprised that they did not have changed.

Yeah, yeah.

So we know vitamin D is so protective for the breast. We know it's so important for reducing risk for breast cancer, but yet it didn't impact the physiology of the, of the breasts once they were there.

Okay.

And I wasn't exactly expecting that. So that was interesting.

Yeah. So it's, it always is a combination, right? I mean, it's always multifactorial. It's never just one thing that makes you sick or gets you well.

So.

So I think that's, I think even.

Emotionally there's something very, very powerful about. I'm taking care of my breasts. I want them to be healthy. Just that decision, that choice that women make, I think that actually plays a role as well.

Yes, for sure. As opposed to just ignoring it and not even thinking about it. You know, some women are so afraid to even do self breast exams because they're afraid they're going to find something. And I think all of that anxiety just adds to the negative development of anything that could be going on.

You know, I mean, I totally agree.

So I love the empowerment piece. I find it very interesting that you said, you know, New York has such a high cancer rate, because I think of New York and the coast of Michigan a lot alike. Because at the turn of the last century, we had so much waterway production and factory development. And I can just imagine, imagine all of the water pollution and soil pollution that we had during that industrial revolution heavy in Michigan and in New York. And I know where I live, cancer is really prevalent, you know, breast cancer, prostate and pancreatic. So I would love for you to talk a little bit about how environmental toxins play a role in the development of cancer, what you've seen. And please, please share your story about 911 and working with the, you know, the people who took care of 9 11. That was, that's an amazing story.

Wonderful. Sure. So, yeah, I definitely think environmental toxins play a huge role in the development of cancer. I mean, we're having the same high incidence of breast cancer, prostate cancer and pancreatic cancer. Almost every one of my patients that has develop those cancers, I can definitely find somewhere in their history that increased toxic exposure, whether it's environmental, from their job, or maybe it was where they grew up as a kid or, you know, this definitely. And definitely in Your area. In my area, we just, we're just living in a lot of toxins, from air to water to, you know, electrical issues as well, WI fi. All of it is just so congested. And I definitely think for me, the toxins are always the finish line for my patients. So I always work to boost their immune system, heal their gut, get them optimized, and then once they're good, we work on getting rid of those toxins. And that became an important piece of my treatment plans when I did work with 911 rescue workers. You know, so I had worked with the 911 detox project and I was hired to come in and do the exam. Completely objective, not attached. Before and after they did this sauna program and you know, the beginning, I would go in and I kind of knew what they were doing, but I would do, you know, combine function tests. I would do vital signs, blood work, physical exam, and I would sit and I talk to these rescue workers. And this was several years after 9 11. And I mean routinely, they would sit in front of me and just bawl their eyes out and be like, listen, I'm dying. I feel like I'm dying. I can't sleep, I can't breathe. I'm losing my relationships. They had post traumatic stress. It was just heart wrenching to hear one story after another. And then they did the program, and the program included some supplementation. They got into these big saunas. So they'd get on a treadmill and exercise until they were sweating. They'd go into these big rooms where it would be like 10 or 12 people in a sauna at a time. And they would sit there for about 30 minutes until they got a really good sweat. Then they would get out, cool down, shower off, eat some vegetables, kind of take a break and repeat that cycle four to five times, times a day, seven days a week until they were done, which was anywhere from 20 to 40 days. And then they were supposed to come back and see me. And these guys would bounce into the office and say, I feel like Superman. And I'm looking at my chart going, wait a minute. He said he felt like he was dying and he feels like Superman. Next one comes in and says, I feel like I'm 18 again. It was just.

That's so amazing. Yeah.

If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I would not have believed that it was actually possible. But we took 911 rescue workers and with this, I mean, it was intense, don't get me wrong. But it was simple. When you really think about it. And they detoxified about a thousand people. And the data has been amazing. The reduction in cancers, just the sheer improvement in quality of life was so mind boggling to me that that just became essential, you know, essential to help people get rid of the toxins that could lead to the cancers. Because we know, especially breast and prostate, there's a definitive link to toxins. There's hundreds and hundreds of studies to show that they're all looking at individual toxins. Nobody's really looking at the accumulative effect of all of these things we're being hit with. I think it's important.

It's so important. I try to explain to my patients, it's like your cells are a bucket and, you know, they can only get so full before they overflow and create a big old mess all over your system. And you can get by and live. As long as that bucket doesn't overflow, you might not feel very well, you might not function optimally. And then once you spill and have that mess, it's hard to get back from. Right. It's hard to clean that up. So I can just imagine those rescue workers, all of the smoke inhalation and the, the heavy metals. And I heard you somewhere else talking about the cadmium levels from the cell phone batteries. Like things that average people do not think about. Like that is amazing to me. And so often we say, oh, it's just PTSD or it's just anxiety or depression when no, you are physically ill, you are full of toxins that are from the environment. So it's like heartbreaking to me.

Yeah, it really is. And even now, now that we're living through this COVID virus, you know, and people are talking about these young people who are no pre existing conditions and they got so sick and died. And I'm thinking to myself, no, they had pre existing conditions, they just didn't realize it.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, I think we're seeing the impact of that now too, because the body can only handle so much. Just like you said. I use the bucket analogy all the time.

Yeah, exactly. And I would love for people through this Covid experience to start focusing on like, how can I strengthen my immune system and be prepared for the next virus that comes because masks and hand sanitizer are not going to cut it. And the more we sanitize, we're hurting our immune system. We're not strengthening ourselves. And so, oh, it breaks my heart, the message that is out there in the media and just the wrong information that people are getting, like, we need to hide from these viruses. No, we need to coexist with them. They've been here long before we were, and they're gonna be here long after.

Right, so true.

Yeah.

I mean, all these dollars being sent on the respirators. I think my whole goal is to keep people out of the hospital. I don't ever want them to need that, you know?

Yes.

They could just put a little bit of attention into just giving people tools. Tools to be stronger, to build their soldier, you know, to arm their army inside them, their own body. I think that's where the message has to be, you know?

Right. And even if you have not been diagnosed with a disease, that does not mean you are healthy. Right. The absence of disease is not health. I think I hear that time and time again. Oh, I'm healthy. I'm fine. Nothing's wrong with me. Except you're trending toward diabetes. You're trending toward metabolic syndrome, you know, So I think we just need to start looking at things in a different light. And that brings me back to breast health. Like, we now can look at all of the metabolites of our estrogens and see, you know, what are the imbalances and the driving forces behind feeding these cancers. And lifestyle can impact that so much. So do you work with women with, you know, prevention of breast cancer or where are they coming to, at what point in their situation?

In the beginning, I would say I would mostly get a sick family member. Somebody was diagnosed with something like diabetes or autoimmune disease, cancer. And then it was interesting, as I started to take care of them, their whole family would sort of come. So it became like what family practice was supposed to be. You know, the mom comes, the sister comes. I have one family. It's five generations.

No, that's awesome.

And I love that, because that's the whole idea, is they have to live this lifestyle. This is a lifestyle. So the more of them that do it together and support each other, the better. But any female, breast health is always on the radar for me, because hormonal health is so tied with toxins, the difficult period symptoms, the hormonal disturbances, the hormonal symptoms are all precursors to that story that I always heard from women who were diagnosed with cancer. So when I hear those little clues in the story, detective, I kind of educate the patient. Hey, do this, that, and the other thing. And guess what? Your periods are just going to be so great. Turning point when people come back and they're like, I can't believe I had these terrible periods for 10 years.

Yeah. I mean, we get to the point where women think it's normal to have, like, crazy PMS symptoms and heavy periods and. No, it's just that we're all so unhealthy together that we're all suffering. But that's not normal. That's not how we were created to be. Right. So what?

Similar to fibrocystic density. Right. So fibrocystic density used to have the ICD9 code diagnosis, and they unclassified it because they can't really tell every woman in the United States that she has a disease. That's not. We're not asking why is it no longer, you know, abnormal or unusual. We're just declassifying it.

Oh, my gosh, that's awful.

It's crazy.

Yes. So explain to my listeners why do they develop fibrocystic breasts? Because that is a common question I get.

I think it's a combination of things. I think it's, you know, dietary factors are important. I think iodine deficiency is a big issue in the United States. I think that's something I see very commonly. There really just isn't any good sources of iodine rich foods. I mean, you know, I can't really tell. People eat a ton of seaweed because who knows what toxins are in the seaweed. Right. Nobody uses Morton salt, iodized salt anymore. Right. They use beautiful Himalayan sea salt. So there really is just not a lot of iodine in the diet. It's honestly as simple as that. And so when you give women back the appropriate dosage and the appropriate things that they need, their body heals, it heals itself. So really it's just about filling that nutrient dense, you know, nutrient deficiency to reverse the symptoms. And vitamin D, I think, does play a role also in the fibrocystic disease. So I think it's like a combination of things. But, you know, women walk around with very painful, you know, rock hard breasts for years out of their lives unnecessarily.

Yeah, for sure. And so I think I was surprised when I learned about bromide and how that's put into so many of our processed foods and it competes with iodine in our system. So even if, you know, by some miracle we're getting enough iodine, we have other things competing with it. You know, I know that was my issue as a young girl when I developed postpartum thyroiditis. Like, I just had so much fluoride and chlorine and all these halogens built up in my system that the iodine couldn't even function. So I think that's a really good point that you bring up. And I think part of it is from our dash diet and you know, the low salt, no salt diet that we went through in the 90s and 2000s, like salt became this villain. And it's really.

Salt and fat were just the bad.

Yes. And they really just messed us up hormonally so bad. I. We're still recovering, you know. We really are. It really is so true. Yes. You don't have to suffer with painful, miserable breasts. That's not normal. Do you do the Dutch test at all with your patients?

I don't. We are very limited in New York with a lot of the testing that we do here. So it's just very restrictive. So I have to really be just a really good detective and use a lot of clinical history to kind of get all the information.

And it's pretty obvious when there's estrogen dominance. Right. And you can tell when people start implementing those changes and their bad symptoms go away. Right.

Nice side effects.

Exactly. That is awesome.

Yep.

So do you find that women who are carrying these extra toxins and xenoestrogens and everything have issues with their weight?

Definitely. So I kind of, after my experience at the 911 detox project, after a couple years of research and really delving into it, I created a. A three week detox program that I have. It's called the Girlfriend Cleanse. And it's really designed to mobilize the body's ability to get rid of the toxins, you know, get rid of the hormone disrupting chemicals. And I think it's very important to prepare someone's gut, get their gut healthy, and then do the detox. And that's when I get the best results. It's very gut nourishing as well as detoxification. And most of my patients that have bad periods, you know, I may give them a supplement or hormone protect or something just to kind of help them with the symptoms. But once they detox, they normally don't need those supplements anymore. And I tell them, use your period as a gauge if three years from now you're feeling breast tenderness or your cramps come back or all of a sudden you're crabby the week before your period in your head, I want to be going, it's time to detox. Because I do find that that's the key. And the women are funny because they go into it. A lot of women will do a detox and their primary objective is to lose weight. Right, Right. Healthy and young. And that's okay because that's the side effect. So once you start to let go of these toxins, physiologically, we store a lot of the toxins in adipose tissue. So for women who've told me for years they're eating healthy, they're going to the gym, and they're stuck in my mind, I'm always thinking, well, they've got some toxins in there, and that's a really safe place for our body to keep those toxins. Until I give them a safe way to get the toxins out of the body, they're stuck at that weight. And then they get that last 10, 15 pounds and they're like the happiest, happiest person ever.

Yes. Oh, I. That's what I want everyone to understand is that if you are struggling to lose weight or you feel worse when you're trying to lose weight, that is your body's way of protecting you from this stored up toxin load that you have. So I love that you're healing the gut first and then you're doing the detox program.

I think on that note, I've had women do these kind of crash detoxes, like super crazy fasting, juicing, too long, too hard kind of approach, and they get the push of those toxins. They can get very, very sick. So I don't believe in the detox reaction. If you get a reaction, your body's trying to tell you something's wrong.

Yes.

When you detox safely, you should feel better and better and better and better. So I like that you brought that up too, because that's something. That's one of the reasons I created the program is I didn't want people doing things that were dangerous. Because I definitely have seen that.

Yeah. Because there are supplements out there that pull the toxins out, but they don't actually bind and remove them from your system. So then they're just going and depositing somewhere else. And that feels horrible.

You know, I call the toxin relocation program.

That's awesome.

From my hip. And put it in my brain. Not exactly.

No, that's not what you want to do. It's not good. And the other, you know, thing is that sometimes the word detox gets thrown around for more simpler things like a colon cleanse or a liver cleanse, things like that. That you're not really pulling toxins out of your cells and getting them out of your system. So you just have to be careful the way that word is used. Right?

Absolutely. 100.

And you guys also do the man up detox for the gentleman, right? Yes.

Yes. So I had so many couples. The women would convince their husbands to do the girlfriend cleanse with them, and they had these amazing results. And they would come in and say, you got to change the name. I'm not going to tell my friends. I want my friends. I lost all this weight and I feel great, but I'm not telling them. I did the girlfriend cleanse, so took me a couple of years, but we got the man up detox launched, which is very similar, but men have different needs than women, so.

Yeah, exactly. That is very cool. Oh, my goodness. And so you along those lines, you are writing a book that's supposed to be coming out. Is that true?

It is true. I'm getting a little closer now that I have a little bit more free time and home confinement.

Yes, exactly. Like we're all forced to do our projects. We've been putting off. Right, exactly.

The prevention plan. And it's just the years of my patient stories, my things that I've learned. I learned most of what I need to know from my patients, to be honest with you. And I have a few patients that are going to be writing chapters in the book about their own experience with their health and kind of just dabbling into lifestyle medicine, preventative care, and how it affected them. Because I think that's so powerful for people to hear other people's experiences.

Yes.

The biggest thing I hear is I don't understand how this was so easy to get better once it's done. It's always a little hard in the beginning.

Yes.

That's the biggest thing I hear in the end is I can't believe how easy this was, you know?

Right. I. I think that people just need some guidance, and they need to know that what they're doing is the right thing. You know, I get so many patients that have, like, done 50 different things and none of it consistently because they're so confused about what they should be doing. Right. Like, oh, this website says I should do this. And so it's just good to work with a functional doctor to get, you know, have somebody to walk you through it and say, what you are doing is okay and it's gonna work and it's gonna help. And I think once you start feeling better, it's easy to stick with it. Right?

Definitely. Once you gotta get a return on your investment.

Yes.

Then you'll be all in. Definitely.

Is there anything that tops the list when you talk about preventative medicine for women? Like, what should every woman do?

Definitely take Vitamin D, I think a really good probiotic is very important for keeping your gut healthy. Those would be really, really big ones. And then just biggest thing is diet and stress relief. Yeah, this anti inflammatory and the stress is big. I mean, I think that's one of our problems in New York is we're running on a rat race. You know, we're just go, go, go, go, go. And it really does take a toll on people's adrenals, their hormones, their reserve. So I think stress relief is really, really top for women, I think, specifically.

Yeah. Because it's completely interconnected with your female hormone system. Right. Like, my patients have definitely had more cycle issues than ever with this COVID 19. Because they're so stressed they're stuck at home with their kids or they can't, you know, make money or they can't do what they need to do. And you know, they're calling me like, hey, my period didn't come or I can't stop bleeding, you know, or I want to rip my husband's head off. And it's that stress hormone. It isn't even your sex hormones. It's that damn cortisol. Right. So, so true. I know. Like, people need to meditate, they need to do yoga, they need to have downtime and alone time. I've been taking advantage of that.

I mean, now more than ever. We need to it. We definitely need it because it's different stresses, you know, feel a lot of fear associated.

Yes, exactly. So, well, I'm excited for your book to come out. That's going to be amazing. You're going to have to come back and talk to us about it when it comes out. Very cool. So you are still on lockdown, you're still doing virtual visits in New York. If somebody wants to implement your protocols, do you work with them online out of New York, or do you have that capability?

I have a lot of patients all over the country. All over the world. I did a webinar today, the Wellness Warrior Workshop. We have people from Spain and Dubai and Germany.

Oh my gosh, that's awesome.

Yeah, it's, it's, you know, it's really easy to take care of people virtually. And I think right now more than ever, people need as much support as possible and even just a sense of community to be able to talk to other people. It's so isolating to be home with just your family as much as you love them.

Yes. Especially if they're, you know, 10 and under.

Oh, my God. Exactly. I don't envy the people with two and three year olds, let's put it that way. I know. But yeah, I think that if you go on our website, drchristineblanch.com, we have options for group visits as well as individual visits and new patient workup, kind of the whole functional medicine. And there's links to our detoxes as well, so they can look into that.

Awesome. And that is Christine with a K, right? Dr. Christine Blanche. Awesome. Well, I've just enjoyed talking to you so much. You're just a wealth of knowledge.

Oh, thank you so much. This was great.

This was wonderful. So promise me you'll come back when your book comes out.

I definitely will.

Awesome. All right, take care.

Thank you so much.

Bye.

Bye.

Thank you so much for staying with us today. I love Dr. Christine and I knew you would love her too. She's just full of wisdom and helpful information for regaining your health. And didn't you love her story about working with the 911 rescuers? The first time I heard that, I had goosebumps because it's just so life changing for them. And I don't think that we fully understand the complexity of what the environment has on our systems, the impact that it has. So don't downplay what's going on around you in your life life and in your environment. It might have a huge part to do with what you're going through. So I encourage you to work with a functional medicine physician if you are struggling with any issues so that we can find the root cause and get you back to health, get you feeling amazing again. So if you want to check out Dr. Blanch, I will put the link in my show notes. Her website is christineblanch.com and also check me out on Instagram and Facebook @ Dr. Tabitha T A B A T H A Shoot me your questions. You know, send me a dm. I would love to shout you out on my question of the week episodes or tell me what topics you want me to cover and I will get on it. I am here for you. I do this for you. I highly encourage you to pick one thing out from this episode that you're going to incorporate. Maybe that's getting your vitamin D level checked and upping your supplement because really you want to be up where 50 to 70 and you probably are much lower than that. We just honestly don't get enough sun exposure and vitamin D in our food anymore. Or maybe you realize that iodine might be an issue. Whatever resonated with you in today's episode, I encourage you to make one little change. Because if you do that with every episode, it's going to add up. You're going to see significant change. They multiply on themselves. So keep working on being the best. You and I will see you ladies next week. Go have an amazing week.