Overcoming Estrogen Dominance with Magdalena Wszelaki
15 Dec 2025 · 35 min
Podcast interview (JJ Virgin with Magdalena Wszelaki) focused on 'estrogen dominance': what it looks like (symptoms such as heavy/absent/sporadic periods, PMS, fibroids, endometriosis, fibrocystic breasts, fat distribution, hot flashes, and links to estrogen receptor–positive cancers), how to test and interpret metabolism (urine/saliva DUTCH test recommended over blood for full estrogen metabolite profiling), genetic contributors (COMT, MTHFR, BRCA mentioned) and practical management (elimination diet removing gluten/dairy/soy/eggs/nightshades temporarily, low sugar, increase cruciferous vegetables and broccoli sprouts, liver support with bitters and supplements like DIM, calcium D-glucarate, magnesium, vitamins C/E, zinc, and herbs such as vitex). The episode includes a CTA to take the "How estrogenic are you?" quiz (jjvirgin.com/estquiz) and to read Magdalena's book Overcoming Estrogen Dominance.
Questions this episode answers
jjvirgin.com/estquiz
Chapters
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We have never talked about this on the show or if we have, it's been a long time. We're going to be talking about overcoming estrogen dominance today. And I have got my pal, Magdalena Shalaki. She is the founder of Hormones Balance, which is an amazing book. You'll want that. You'll want both these books, Overcoming Estrogen Dominance and Hormones Balance. Beautiful book. She's a certified nutrition coach, an herbalist, and also an author, speaker and educator. And she's really like one of those people who not only is she obsessed with this subject, but she learned so much by healing herself. She's in full remission of her hormone challenges, lives a symptom free life, and it teaches tens of thousands of women how to find their hormonal balance with her books, online programs and education. Plus she has an amazing product line. I just love the name of Welina. And so all her all natural supplements and skin care products. So just absolutely someone you want to be dialed into. And you're going to love this interview. And we've got another cool thing in this interview, so you'll want to make a note of this. You're going to want to go to jjvirgin.com forward/estquiz and you will be able to take the how estrogenic are you? Quiz and get looped in with Magdalena. All right, Hang out with me. I'll be right back with the interview.
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Learn more@mcafee.com online protection. All right, Mag. Delena, Shalaki, welcome to the show. Good to have you here.
Bye.
I think what I want to do is throw out to the audience, anyone can go on Instagram and if they can actually spell your last name correctly, should give them, like, you know, free overcoming Overcoming estrogen dominance book, you know, so full disclosure to everybody listening. I've known Magdalena for what, like eight years now? Yeah, I would say long time. I used to just call her Magdalena W. Because her last name is. It's Polish, right?
Yeah.
It's very challenging. And even today, I was like, I said her last name so many times. I'm like, how do you say it? And I mispronounced it. So there you go. I'm just going to say Schlacki throughout the show. There. That's It. So I want to dig in today. I don't think we've ever covered this topic just as a sole focus. And I know you're kind of obsessed with it since you are the queen of hormone balance. We are going to unpack estrogen dominance today. And so where I would love to start is. Let's just define it to begin with, like, what it actually means. And I also want you, as you're defining it, to. To, you know, part of it is as women, aren't we estrogen dominant? So what does dominant really mean?
Yeah. So would it be okay if I start off with the symptoms first?
You know what? You can do whatever you want. How's that? Magdalena gone rogue. Here we go.
That is not true, but thank you for permitting that. And, you know, so the reason why I suggest symptoms is because I think that would allow an audience right away to connect with, you know, is this a show for you or not? Right. And I feel like 90% of women have estrogen dominance in some level or another at one point in her life. And so, you know, it can start anything from women who are still menstruating having horrible period problems. So that could be absent periods, super heavy periods, sporadic periods, having, you know, periods that incredibly painful. You know, as women, we are always told that PMS is a. It's a. It's a package as being a woman. And I can tell you right now that this is not true. Your period can come and go and be pretty uneventful if you don't have estrogen dominance. But also you have other symptoms that so many women suffer from, like fibroids, endometriosis. You know, one of the most painful conditions young women can experience. How many of us here have examined our breast and found a lump on our breast and, you know, the sense of terror and fear and confusion that it creates. And how do you get it properly diagnosed? Right again. Fibrocystic. And fibrocystic lumpy breasts are all due to estrogen dominance, but also certain things. I mean, like in your space, jj, you know, women who have a lot of fat around their hips and cellulite around the hips and thighs. Right. And buttocks, that the weight just wouldn't go away no matter how much they exercise. That also can be due to estrogen dominance is really interesting. Where your fat gets deposited in the body can be due to different hormonal imbalances. And then you have a few cancers, estrogenic cancers, such as breast cancer. So estrogen receptor positive breast cancer, which is the most common Breast cancer amongst women, as well as thyroid cancer, ovarian, uterine and lung cancers in non smokers. Really interesting. Is also due to estrogen dominance. And almost every woman has a man in her life. And so prostate problems as well as prostate cancer in men can also be due to estrogen dominance. So, you know, you tell me, who do you know in your circles who hasn't had one of those things, right?
No one, honestly. And everyone sees them as normal, which is the big problem, isn't it?
That's dangerous because, you know, that's the reason why I do this work because it's something that I've, you know, my whole family has got a huge tendencies towards estrogen dominance. I inherited both the genes on both sides of my family and it's not surprising that, you know, I have lot of deaths in both sides of the family from different estrogenic cancers. So that was a big prompter. You said I was obsessed about it. I, you know, in a good way, Magdalena. Yeah, I take it in a good way. And I think I am. And initially came from a place of fear for my own health and then later it became, you know, more of an inspiration of really showing a lot of other women it doesn't have to be that way.
Yes. So thank you. We're absolutely spot on, starting with symptoms. So everyone go, ah, next question then. If those are the symptoms and these are things that are so common, are there lab tests that can verify this? And you also talked about, you know, your genetics, like what are, what would be the things on a genetic profile that would look for and what we should, we'd be looking for in labs and what happens in labs when you've got cycling hormones.
Yeah, sure. So you know how initially, right at the beginning of the podcast you asked me like, what exactly is estrogen dominant? So let me define it first before we talk about lab testing because that will be easier to understand. So estrogen dominance can happen. I'll just talk about two major conditions. One is when your estrogen gets broken down to what I call clean estrogens and dirty estrogens. And that predominantly happens in your gut and your liver. And so there are lab tests that show you metabolites, estrogen metabolites that are beneficial, that are fairly problematic and those ones that are just highly dangerous. And one of the tests for that is one of my favorite is Dutch. Dutch. Dutch test will show you all of that as well as a lot of other hormones. But those are. The estrogen metabolites are a big part of it. They show a big picture. The other form of estrogen dominance that can happen is the ratio of estrogen towards progesterone. These two are two dancing partners. If you go and see a dance competition, and if the man is overly cocky or flamboyant and the woman is timid, right, it looks off. And the same thing happens with hormones. And so progesterone especially, you know, for women who are 45, the minute we turn 45, our progesterone starts dropping really drastically. And even though estrogen starts dropping too with it, the most of the time, progesterone drops much faster. And so the ratio between estrogen, progesterone is, is a problem. Again, these things can be tested very easily. You can get it done through Dutch testing. You can also get it done through saliva testing. I would not recommend blood testing for estrogen dominance just because it is not showing as a full picture. And we don't have a lot of time on the podcast today, so I'm not going to go into details, but if you really want to have a good picture, then saliva and urine testing is the way to go.
Okay, so one other real quick thing beyond looking at the testing is is this a challenge that women face up until they're postmenopausal or does this continue after menopause?
Yeah, that's a really good question. And the answer is it continues, which is very paradoxical and hard to understand for a lot of women who are in perimenopause, menopausal, post menopausal. Because you think like, hey, estrogen dominance means that estrogen dominates. But how can it be? Because I'm already low on estrogen, Right? So let's just park this thought for a second and think of it this way. Who are the women? What is the demographic that suffers from things like estrogen receptor positive breast cancers? Those are women who are 55 and above. This is the highest demographic. Are these women high in estrogen? No, they are low in estrogen, yet they do have estrogen receptor positive breast cancer. That shows you that even though your estrogen can be low. Again, going back to the types of estrogen, how you break down those estrogens, however little you have of them, can be highly unbeneficial. And that's what can cause still the growth of cancer. But also, again, your estrogen progesterone ratio can be off and that's what can be causing it. So, yes, absolutely, you can have estrogen dominance even if you are in menopause or postmenopausal.
So I feel like one of the things that is not talked about enough is good versus bad estrogens and breaking down estrogens. And independent of someone doing say a Dutch and really seeing what the estrogen metabolism are, would you recommend that, that women should be focused on detoxifying estrogens in general because all of us were going to have some of the bad estrogen metabolites, correct?
Absolutely, yes. And that is, that is very true. I mean Dutch will show you, you know, the 2, 4 and 16 metabolites. Right. The question is then what do you do with this information? And you know, a lot of people like to start off with supplements. I, I might be biased in that way. I feel like supporting that. Cleaning up your diet is really the first step. And so I think it's a two throng approach. You know, one is removing foods that are highly inflammatory because that's going to definitely the inflammation is going to contribute towards more of those dirty estrogens being created. And number two, with food you can really support your liver in very powerful ways with using things like bitters, bitter vegetables, bitter foods, using digestive bitters, you know, using castor oil packs. All of that will support the liver to skew the balance towards the positive and protective metabolites of estrogen rather than the dirty ones. And then there are some supplements like dim sulforaphane, for example, calcium, diglocarate, magnesium, vitamin C that can really tremendously help again with that metabolism to generate more of the positive, the clean estrogens. And then you know, on the point also on progesterone, one of the, there's some really wonderful that there isn't a food that can help to produce progesterone. But there are some supplements and nutrients that in higher doses can definitely help. And those would be things like zinc, vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin E are just wonderful. And you know, as an herbalist, I would also say that Vitex, also known as Chase Berry, in fact, it's just a wonderful herb that helps you to raise progesterone levels. In fact, in Germany, where herbal medicine is actually fully even covered by insurance, when you go and see a traditional conventional allopathic doctor and a woman, for example, can't get pregnant and they test and she's low on progesterone or she's got hot flashes, which by the way, that's one of the symptoms I forgot to mention is hot flashes of estrogen dominance. One of the first go to methods in Germany would be to put a woman on Vitex to raise her progesterone levels. So just quite a lot of things that we can do to mitigate estrogen dominance right off the gates.
So you kind of glossed over high inflammatory foods. So let's go back. You're like, don't eat foods that. That can create inflammation. Like, let's go through what they are. I always think we can't hear this enough. Right. So let's talk. Let's talk through because I would love people to have a pretty clear picture. Now, obviously, you wrote the book Overcoming Estrogen Dominance. I think that if you're listening, you're going, wow, there's a lot of information here. You're going to want to get the book Overcoming Estrogen Dominance. But I always, whenever I have an opportunity to go, let's unpack the foods that you should that are creating inflammation.
Let's.
Let's talk through some of those here.
Yeah, so, you know, you and I are definitely two P's in the pot when it comes to. When it comes to food and all the food intolerances. Right. And so, you know, so the book is definitely is based on the elimination diet, which basically means that you're cutting out the inflammatory foods. Being the biggest one in my mind would be. And, you know, not just my mind, but from what our audience and our community experiences is the benefits of right away, eliminating, not reducing. I want to stress the word eliminating completely, temporarily. Things like gluten, dairy, soy, eggs, those will be the big ones. We also don't use nightshade vegetables in our book. That doesn't mean it's bad for you. It just, you need to do the elimination diet and figure out whether it's a yay or nay for you. So those are. And then, you know, and the whole book is also very low in sugar. So I know that's another thing that you talk a lot about. We use.
And you said something important, you said this is to figure out if it's yay or nay. So you're pulling these foods out, you know, and you're. You're checking in to see how they make you feel. So again, nightshades may work or they may not work. Eggs may work, they may not. You know, it's like I'm always hopeful eggs will work because I think they're such a great food. But some people, they just, you know, slam their autoimmune symptoms straight up. So again, these are eliminations where you're connecting the dots to create what's right for you. All right. Yeah. Talk sugar.
Well, yeah, I mean, you know, it's. So the book is not sugar free. It's. That's not that. The purpose of the book is just to really teach our audience and how to first recognize how much sugar there is in everything. You know, And I mean, you know, I cite examples that are just openly there in the public. I mean, if you, you go to Starbucks website and you look at the Frappuccino ice. Frappuccino, you know, we're recording this during summer, a lot of people are doing very, a lot of ice drinks. Ice, actually when you just something to be mindful of. Like when you, when you have an icy ice cold drink, your receptors, your sweetness receptors in the mouth get actually numbed. So you actually don't realize how horrendously sweet something is.
I did not know this. This is huge information. No, I did not know this.
So think of it this way. Like have it, have ice cream that's melted, right? How disgustingly sweet it is. But when you have it, when it's frozen, it's like, you know, it's just sweet. I mean, that's the way ice cream should be. But when it's stowed, I mean, it's pretty gross. And so, yeah, so that's that receptors and getting numb. So, you know, talking about like, I'm not singling out Starbucks here, you know, But I mean, this is just, I'm just giving this an example. I mean, you're talking about, I think there was something like 57 grams of sugar, right? So let's do the math. That gives you, that sets you off with what, you know, 57 divided by four. What would that be?
You mean how many calories? What are you looking for?
No, like teaspoons of sugar. Sorry, I'm divided by four. So there'll be like probably 15 teaspoons of sugar. And that's the small, that's a small size. You know, this is just, just to be extremely mindful of that. And the. So, you know, we are not, we're just basically doing a low sugar approach with the book. But one of the things I think which is a redeeming quality is that once you really get off sugar and your receptors recalibrate, have an opportunity to recalibrate is really quite wonderful. When you go back and have that cocktail that you used to have in your favorite bar and you just go, oh my God, this is just disgusting. Like, how could I have that? I could have been drinking this the whole time. So, yeah, I mean, sugar plays a huge role with estrogen dominance as well, the biggest thing is it's the inflammation that it creates. It raises your cortisol levels, which then brings down your progesterone levels. It feeds Candida. It's going to, you know, it's going to impact your gut health because of growth of Candida. And the gut is also super important to clear out those dirty estrogens we talked about. So all of them. I sound kind of complicated, but, you know, I think, like, what you have done with your books and what I've done with my book is that we just, you know, when you look at the meal plans and recipes, everything is designed in a way that how to eat breakfast, lunch and dinner, that is all of those things are packed together so that you lower your blood sugar levels. You don't ever do sugar first thing in the morning. I'm a big, big fan of doing savory breakfast. I've lived around the world, and I can tell you right now that if you go to Japan or Turkey or Ethiopia or Peru, everybody, the whole world is eating savory breakfast. And there's a reason behind it. Right?
Yeah, I know. I lived in Japan and it was an entirely. We had salad and fish.
Right. You know, I mean, and then you have a bit of miso soup, a bit of rice for breakfast. And I mean, that's, you know, I mean, I'm not saying that as a, as a Westerner, you should be doing that, but just really focusing on savory. So all the whole cookbook is really focused on savory breakfast, starting off the day that way. And you will see how much less you crave sugar throughout the day when you start off your day that way.
So I think it's important because you have been doing research on this for years and years. Like, you know, you've been especially researching herbals and supplements and food and how they impact hormones. And so you're giving a lot of information right now where people like, oh, my gosh. But you don't have to worry because you've laid it out in a program. So. So important information. You've laid it out an important. So what about. We didn't really talk the gene thing, though. Like, what. What about genes? Because you said you had the genes on your mother and your father's side. So let's talk. You know, you see Angelina Jolie having mastectomy because of her genes. Their mom had what, you know, what's the gene connection and how much should we be concerned about the genes?
Yeah. So the genes. You're referring to Angelina Jolie is the BRCA one, BRCA two. And you know, I think that's a very personal decision. You know, she had a removal of her breast. But also BRCA can also affect the pancreas as well as the uterine and as well as ovaries. And so the question is, do you start removing everything or do you change your lifestyle to a place that it doesn't manifest? And so it's a very personal decision. That's the minority of cancers in our population. The majority of breast cancers are the results of estrogen dominance and also progesterone. So that you have a lot of women having estrogen receptor positive, progesterone receptor positive cancer. But what a lot of people don't know, including practitioners, which is interesting, is that the progesterone receptor positive breast cancer is actually. The progesterone receptor is actually activated and is overly sensitive and then opens up to cancer because of excess estrogen. So when you lower estrogen, you clean up your estrogen. Your progesterone then becomes a non issue.
But doesn't progesterone lower estrogen?
No, it doesn't lower estrogen. No. They just need to be in balance, both of them in order for your body to be in a good shape. There is other markers and I talk about in my book that you want to look at. And so one of them, the big one is the COMT gene. COMT which is one that is highly correlated with estrogen dominance. Dr. Ben lynch has done an excellent job in explaining COMT gene. And so a lot of women who do have the COM gene there are super go getters or workaholics that are highly accomplished women. And then sometimes it comes at a price where we are much more where basically this is the gene that helps you to clear the dirty estrogens from your body. And so when you have that inhibited then you just have to be living, you know, if you don't want it to be manifest you're basically going to live a cleaner lifestyle supported with a lot of supplements, have a really clean diet, anti inflammatory, get a ton of sleep, right. So I mean this is one, there's a couple of other ones like mthfr. I mean if you have you know dose mutations is something that it just basically shows you that your liver is not functioning the optimal place. So there is, there is a role in that. But I will say the COMT gene is like the, the biggest one. And so out of the five, just to give you an example, out of the five com genes that they are, four of mine have double mutations on them. So basically 80 to 90% of my ability of clearing estrogen is compromised. Right? And so that explains gj. Whenever I go to, let's say Italy and I decide to go be a little bit silly and have maybe a little bit of gluten here and there, very seldom, but I do. And I have coffee and definitely more wine than I would at home. You know, I definitely have a PMS from hell and my period is super heavy and very painful as compared to when I don't do it. And I always used to be really angry with myself thinking like, why is this happening to me? And you know, the rest of the world is living this way, like why me? So I just had to go get over that and realize, like, hey, you know what, that's just in my genes and something to honor, you know. But it does come with certain benefits too.
So, you know, it's interesting though, like whenever you start to look at jeans and then you look at what, you know, what the impacts are, you always get down to when you eat an anti inflammatory diet, when you eat more vegetables, when you sleep better, when you move, when you meditate, it's like all the stuff that we should be doing ultimately go, oh, and I remember just listening to Dr. Joe Dispenza who was saying, you know, really, 5% of our diseases are actually, you know, due to genes and the majority of it is just due to lifestyle. So I still think we always like all the things you're talking about. If we just all assumed we had these genetics, genetic issues and we made sure that we were exercising, getting good sleep, detoxifying bad estrogens, eating, eating a hormonally balanced.
Right.
I mean we'd be better off.
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So let's give people three things. Like if you were going to say the top three things that someone could do listening right now to start taking control of this situation, what would they be?
So the first thing I will say, do an elimination diet Right off the bat, right? And so that's gonna be. That's definitely the biggest needle mover for our community. I can't tell you how many women have said in our community, you know, I removed gluten, dairy, and. And just everything has completely changed. My lumpy breasts are not lumpy anymore. My period is not an event anym. Hot flashes completely, completely disappeared. So do the elimination diet. You're gonna be. It's gonna transform your life. I would say the second thing is about adding things. And so adding cruciferous vegetables, you know, for just really people throw away the goddamn lettuce is completely useless. It's like, it's got. It's nutritionally very low density. There is not much in there. It's just full of water tastes, it's tasteless. And so you gotta cover it up with a lot of sugar and salt in order to give it some kind of a flavor. There are so many more nutritionally dense vegetables that can really support your hormones. One of them will be things like arugula, mustard greens, you know, focus on adding some collard greens. Kale, that's your favorite, J.J. right? I know you love kale.
If you hide it.
You know. And so also things like, you know, surround yourself with things like cauliflower, broccoli. Broccoli sprouts are just absolutely freaking amazing. They contain something called sulfurous, which is a substance that's been shown to have a lot of benefits. But one of the ones I want to focus on today is that, can you imagine little tiny broccoli sprouts can kill stem cells of a cancer. How powerful is that? And there's actually like a number of studies showing that. Right? Why are we not talking more about that? So bring on the broccoli sprouts. You can either buy it in the store, you can grow it yourself. Takes five days to grow them, super easy. And I cover that in the book too. And I would say the third thing to do is, you know, supporting your liver. And as an herbalist, I might be skewed towards that. But adding bitter herbs before a meal, so things like a digestive bitter, something is squirt in your mouth that just starts the whole cascade of engaging your whole digestive system on like getting ready for the food, digesting everything down, supporting your liver, releasing bile so that, you know, you. You Bile, by the way, also binds up estrogens. Another interesting fact here, you know, it's just something that really can. I mean, so many women just say, like, they have no more constipation problems ever since they start doing digestive bitters. Right. There will be. And those digestive bitters will typically contain herbs such as for those of you who are maybe hardcore, you want to make it yourself. But they will be containing things like dandelion root, burdock roots, artichoke leaf, endographis. You know, those are some of the classical bitters. But you can combine it with some nice things like orange peel and some other, you know, nicer herbs so that you can even out the flavor. Yeah. Have you ever had digestive bitters, jj?
So I am one of those super bitter tasters.
Oh, so it means you taste too much.
I like bitter. Yes, I am. I do not. Like, I'm a super taster. And, and I like, I had to do all this when I was doing Freaky Eaters show. Like, we checked everyone for super taster. I'm a total super taster. I'm super picky. Like, if I love coffee but it cannot sit in the pot, so I have to have like an Americano made fresh. I can have all the weird bitter, like, bitter. I can't handle it. So. So that would not be something that I would enjoy. Yeah, I was like, I was listening to that, going.
Well, thank goodness most people are not super tasters. But you know what? I, I've, I've formulated my own. And, and, and they're really nice and balanced. And so I would love to send you a set and there's a before a meal and after a meal and see what you think. Yeah.
Because I would love to be able to use them if they're not. If they're less bitter. I know I'm so, I'm so picky about stuff. It's. It's crazy. But at least I know why I know why I know I'm so picky. Well, here's what's super cool is you have your quiz that everyone is going to be able to take. And now that you've been listening to this, you're going to want to be taking that the how estrogenic are you? Quiz. I'm going to put this quiz, you can go take it at jjvirgin.com forward/estquiz. And what is a couple minutes to get through?
Yeah, totally. Yeah, Perfect.
So you get through it real quick and important place for you to start. And then you're going to want to get Magdalena's book, which I always love books that you've done all the hard work, heavy lifting, research so that you can just walk through it. You'll know exactly what to do. So.
Well, yeah, research is one, but let me tell you, recipes took as much time, if not more.
The recipes are the hardest part. Oh my gosh. Yes, they are. I totally get it. My gosh. All right, well, thank you so much for imparting all of this wisdom. I super appreciate it. I appreciate all the work you do in the world. And again, jjvirgin.com forward/est quiz go take the quiz how estrogenic are you? And make sure you get Overcoming Estrogen Dominance by doctor by doctor. I just made you a doctor Magdalena by Magdalena Shalaki. And bonus points if you can spell that name right. Thank you, Magdalena.
Thank you so much.
All right, that was a ton of information in a short amount of time, so you're definitely going to want to get Overcoming Estrogen Dominance. There's a lot I love about Magdalena's work, but what one of the things I love is that she takes all of that research and puts it into super actionable, easy to follow steps. So grab the book, take the quiz@jjvirgin.com EST Quiz and again, bonus points if you know how to spell her last name. And no cheating by looking it up. All right, if you've not yet subscribed to the podcast, make sure you go to subscribe to JJ.com and I'll see you next time. Bye.
Hello listeners, this is Anne Bogle, author, blogger, and creator of the podcast what Should I Read next? Since 2016, I've been helping readers bring more joy and delight into their reading lives. Every week I take all Things Books in Reading with a guest and guide them in discovering their next reading. They share three books they love, one book they don't, and what they've been reading lately. And I recommend three titles they may enjoy reading next. Guests have said our conversations are like therapy, troubleshooting issues that have plagued their reading lives for years and possibly the rest of their lives as well. And of course, recommending books that meet the moment. Whether they are looking for deep introspection to spur or encourage a life change, or a frothy page turner to help them escape the stresses of work, school, everything. You'll learn something about yourself as a reader and you'll definitely walk away confident to choose your next read with a whole list of new books and authors to try. So join us each Tuesday for what Should I Read Next? Subscribe now wherever you're listening to this podcast and visit our website what Should I read next podcast.com to find out more.
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