Navigating Menopause: Symptoms, Stages, and Holistic Support, with Zora Benhamou

A lot of the symptoms that we would think could be menopause, which could very well be. Could be heavy metal toxicity or mold or something else.

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And I'm Dr. Ed Levitan. Welcome to the Feel Freaking Amazing podcast.

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Welcome to the Feel Freaking amazing podcast. I'm Dr. Wendy Trubo. This is Dr. Ed Levitan. He's with us today. And our guest today is Zora Benhamou. She is a gerontologist on a mission to disrupt the menopause stigma and age of stereotypes. She's the host of Hack My Age podcast, and it focuses on biohacking for women going through the menopausal transition. So this is near and dear to my heart because I just went through the menopausal transition, and that's why we're going to write our next book.

Me too.

He did, right? He lived through it. So first off, Zora, welcome. And second of all, this is near and dear to my heart because this is our next book that someday we'll publish, which is sweaty and bitchy, and it's all about navigating menopause pub, you know, easily.

Oh, I love it. Thank you so much for having me, first of all. And that is a great title. Can I please, like, write a forward to that?

Because I had that experience. I was like, I'm so sweaty and bitchy. That's the book we're going to write. Right.

So what is biohacking Menopause? What does that mean?

Oh, yeah, that's right. Yeah. I always assume my audience knows what biohacking is. And I just recorded a solo podcast explaining this all, because in my world, it seems like everybody knows what it is, but most people don't. They don't know what a gerontologist is, and they don't know what a biohacker is. And so I've chosen the two professions.

That nobody knows about just to make it hard. Right?

Yeah. So biohacking is really about. Well, think about the word bio for biology and hack for hacking your biology. Right. Taking a shortcut, a step, trying to find something, something to be a bit more optimizing your. Your biology. And so when you talk about biohackers, we're. We're talking about somebody who is Trying to optimize their health. Quite simple. But the average person thinks about a biohacker, if they even heard of this, as somebody who just wears gadgets and does these crazy experiments. And it's not about that, at least in my world. Biohacking means really taking responsibility for your own health. And yeah, we love some gadgets to have some data orings or some Apple watches and try to gather data because what we are doing is little self experimentations. Because the difference between a biohacker and say a health enthusiast is that we look at data, try take a little experiment. We understand that n of 1 is the most important thing. N of 1, meaning there's only one person in this experiment, right. So we would take say for example, I don't know, you're going to do some special diet, right. And other than just saying, looking at a scale, we may look at body fat composition, we may write down how we're feeling, we may look at our heart rate variability, we look at cholesterol, maybe we take some blood tests. We want to experiment with these things and try to find, trying to find what works for us because we understand bio individuality, meaning not one size fits all right? This is just not going to work. And I think you and your audience as well understanding that because we hear so much health information out there, the latest fad diet, the latest thing that people are doing and does that apply to us? I don't know. Right. We don't really know until you do this little self experimentation. So just to keep it simple, biohack biohacking is really health optimization. Taking into consideration that you're doing just this own little self experiment. You're a little scientist trying to figure out what's going on in the body. And, and then you, you, you do have. Biohackers tend to seem, have, have access to a little bit different information. So we like things like red light therapy or cold, cold plunging. And for a lot of people this is kind of strange. They've never done some of these things or heard of any of these things. But we can really utilize these things for, for menopause and experiment with ourselves in a safe way to have a better outcome. It's not just getting a fan and wearing layers. This is the kind of advice you find when you Google on the Internet. What can I do for hot flashes? And it's just not good enough for us. So we like to bring in other tools and teach people how to be their own, I guess, researcher in their own experiment.

What I really like what you're saying, which I really try to talk to as many people as I can about in terms of patients or members of our practice, is that you're really the CEO of your own body. And you have to. I can tell you, here's the best things that in general, but specifically for you, that may be right, that may not be right, but you have to be willing to experiment, and you have to see, because there is no one thing that works for everybody, and you.

Know what works for you or you.

Don'T, then you experiment. Right, Right.

But, I mean, you know, you. You are the judge of what works for you as opposed to the doctor. Right. Like, don't let yourself be gaslighted.

Yeah, exactly. And so what you try to do is empower yourself with some of your own little experiments, and then you can bring the data to your doctor. You can ask as well, what's going on. You. If you take a blood test, what's going on with my cholesterol? I don't understand some of these. And I want to know better about my hormones. And. And this is, you know, this is a way to help your doctor, help you, because. Right. Your doctors, you don't know everything about the patient.

Excuse me. I'm God, and I know everything. Thank you. Like, really, like, just. Just stop right there. I think we have to end this podcast.

Well, you know, this happens a lot, and especially in Europe. In my experience, too. Doctors are like, I would come with my list of questions, and they're like, don't ask questions. Just do what I say. And I'm just shocked. And I go out the door. I said, all right, find someone else.

I think we should make a podcast called the God Complex and interview only arrogant doctors. That's like a parody. Would you like to come on the God. Oh, my God. We should totally interview the arrogant doctors and make it the God complex and not tell them that they're on a parody complex.

Okay.

No, I want to go back to menopause. Zora, I'm not sure if this is something you're going to talk about, but I really want to talk about this because this is, like, the thing. So I know that you work with menopausal women, and I know they come in and they go, my hormones are off. And you're like, okay, well, let's find out. So most women, when they start the process of going into menopause, experience something, and it's often unpleasant. And that's when they come into me and Ed and say, hey, my hormones are off. And what I say to them is, your hormones may be off, but let's broaden that bucket. Because it's not just your female hormones that you're referring to, which is your estrogen. I'm referring to your progesterone and your aldosterone and your cortisone and your DHEA and pregnenolone. And they're like, what? So on my end, I'm always saying to people what Ed referenced at the very beginning of our conversation, which is that if your adrenals are suboptimally functioning when you go into menopause or start the menopausal transition, you're gonna suffer more. And the reason is that as your ovaries and your body make fewer hormones, your adrenals are supposed to pick up the slack. So your ovaries stop and your adrenals start to make testosterone, progesterone and estradiol, estriol. Except if they're stressed, they're going to go down the fight, flight or freeze pathway. And they're not going down the maintain my hormones pathway because they're running from a lion. And so this is my favorite part of menopause talk, is let's get your adrenals handled and support your body, because otherwise it's very hard in today's world to have a transition that's without symptoms, largely because most of us are so stressed. So stress is the devil. Stress and sugar and alcohol.

Stress is the devil. Well, I know we hate to demonize stuff because I tell my audience, let's make stress your friend. It's not stress that's the problem. It's our perception of stress and how we react to it that is the real problem, because stress is not going to go away. But I am glad you brought up the stress component because before I got into the menopause space, I'd always say as a gerontologist, longevity starts in childhood because we, we know, we gerontology looks at the whole life course from birth to death. We don't just deal with older adults. And so we understand that adverse child experiences and things that have been stressors in your life since you were children can affect the way you age and what diseases you get or how many and how your, your health outcomes later on in life. And so, and that has a lot to do with just like you said, your adrenal glands just being completely shot by the time you get to menopause if you have not been able to manage it, because there are, you know, my, my, my question was especially for My professors, when I was studying this, I thought, well, what do we do? Because some, some children are born with a disrupted HPA access, right? This is their, their cortisol and their other stress hormones production happens even at birth. And I thought, oh, my gosh. With some, you know, for example, Holocaust survivors and their children, they'll study the offspring of Holocaust survivors, for example, and they find out these people are really stressed. Their adrenals are completely working very hard.

So that's intergenerational trauma. Yes, that's the epigenetic changes to your DNA that result in intergenerational trauma. That's like when people talk about trauma, that's that, that's what they're talking about.

You got it. You got an A plus. That's exactly what it's called, intergenerational trauma. And, and so my question was, then, what do we do about it, right? This poor baby, like, how are they going to get through life? And they said, well, actually, if the child is born in a loving family, gets lots of care and is able to manage the stress will be fine. So, so the idea is, when you think about menopause, when we cut, it's the same thing I always say now, menopause starts in for the same reasons, you know, this, this stress on our body and not only the adrenals, but the whole function, every single cell in our body is right. Is having. Having to work a little harder when we are maybe born with not the right genetics, but also then have to deal with the, the childhood trauma, and not only childhood trauma all throughout life. I mean, you could be in midlife and, and have be in a war, you know, right now, for example.

And this is hypothetically speaking, right?

Yeah. Yeah. But even, actually, it's not even. It doesn't have to be war or abuse. It can be as simple as being bullied in school. That's a lot of stress. And so there's a lot of ways, again, it's the stress. Some children are able to handle it fine. Other kids are not. So it's, again, our perception of stress and how we respond to it, I think, is the real problem. So the point here is, let's try to manage our stress as best as we can, not only for menopause and our adrenals, but also to live a longer, healthier, happier life.

You've traveled. You are nomad, which is so cool. So you live all over the world. So what you, what are women's experiences around the world of menopause? Is, is it, is it similar Is it different? Like, what's the, is there, is there anything that you can pinpoint or are they totally different?

Well, there's some women, women around the world go through menopause. It's not like, oh, in China, they're not doing it or something. They're just, we all go through it. The attitudes are different. I see what I'm doing right now, the last year or so is I literally walk up to women in the middle of the street and say, hey, can I ask you five questions about menopause? I have no idea who they are. And they tell me so. They tell me, you know, we make these into one minute reels and people love them and they're great, but you know, we don't really know a whole lot about them in one minute or even the, the five or ten minutes that I do talk to them. But I do notice that sometimes in the tone of their voice and, and their attitudes when I ask them about menopause, they're kind of like, what's the big deal? Like, why do you, like who cares? Why do you need to know? Or why, you know, it is just what it is. And they don't seem to, they do have, they do struggle. It's not like they don't, they don't say, oh, we don't get hot flashes or whatever, of course they do. But they're like, it'll pass and it's fine. Most of them that I've interviewed and in my research as well, if you look, you know, through research there, most women are not on hormone therapy. They just like anywhere else, they, they seem to be scared of it. Scared that hormones will give you cancer or hormones are bad, they have a badge of honor saying, I've done this naturally, even though it was really hard and really tough. Or maybe they're still dealing with the symptoms. They don't have the information. Just, they don't have any more information than we tend to have in North America. And so there's still a lot of work to be done. But I do feel that there their attitudes are a little bit different. Like they just seem to be a little more chill. And you can tell though, because sometimes when the women I interview are age 16 over, they're much more relaxed. But of course they're more relaxed because they're done with it. And the ones that were in the middle when I under the 45 to 55 year olds, they're like, yeah, I have hot flashes and night sweats and a little bit moody. And I just tell my Kids to, you know, be patient with me or something like that. So they, they, they may laugh about it a little bit more than I find in the women in Europe and in North America that I'm interviewing. But they go through the same motions. They in general say, I think in India, for example, they would. The average age of menopause I think is 48 or 49. It's much earlier than say North America. So there are different countries that have go through the actual one day event on different, different ages on average. But we all go through it. It's just an attitude thing. And the research shows that if we have a positive attitude, if we have a supportive family and if you wear the pants in the family, that's also very protective and it may have an easier transition. So, so that's, that's what I've been finding so far.

Interesting. So when, when women and men and, and women's partners are looking at women approaching menopause, was that, was that like PC?

That was the dreadful conversation.

So when women are approaching it, are there set stages that, that you have characterized or that are identifiable that you go, okay, here's this, here's what you can expect, here's this, you can expect this. Can you walk us through that if that's occurring?

Yes. So what women, I find I'm going to re. Keep it simple because there are so many stages we could go through and I believe in the future we're going to have a lot more. Even post menopause. It's not going to be just post menopause, but a lot of women in our 50s have no idea what perimenopause is. And there's so many myths and well, just I think it's TLI too little information instead of too much information in life. But menopause, just to get the audience up to speed in case they don't know. Because I'm, I, I don't want to make any assumptions. Menopause is 12 consecutive months without your period. It's just a one day event. After that it's called postmenopause. And before that, the five years in general on average is called perimenopause. That's the time around menopause. But in fact it's really that time right before it. But because we may have some these still fluctuating hormones, even post menopause, it kind of encompasses. And before the perimenopause. So if we're saying 50, if the average age of menopause is 51 perimenopause would be around 46 or say mid-40s. And then before that would call pre menopause. And premenopause starts from when you have your period around, I don't know, age 12, 13. That's was in my generation. It seems like they're having it a bit earlier now, up until perimenopause, because a lot of people confuse that word perimenopause and premenopause, and they just say premenopause for when they really mean perimenopause. So I hope that clears a little bit for you. So the. It's normal to be in perimenopause in your mid-40s from the age of 40 to 45. That's, that's called early menopause. Right. It's. It's normal, it happens. It's. I mean, it's common, but it's just a little earlier than normal. And then before that it's under 40. It's, it's premature, so it's a little bit more rare. But, but again, I, I meet a lot of women who hit menopause, literally that all consecutive days without a period in their late 30s. So to me, it doesn't seem. It's that unusual anymore.

So it's so funny. So 12. I just want to clarify. It's 12 consecutive months. You just mentioned days, but it's months.

Oh, did I say days?

You said days, but I think it was. You were just on a roll. But I think this is where we want to tie the toxins in, because things that mess up our bodies, our bodies don't have a huge range of ways to respond. And we can respond by gaining weight, losing weight, losing brain function, losing fertility, or losing something around our female hormones, either with the frequency of our periods, having our periods, having too heavy, periods, too painful, having fibroids, we don't have that many responses we can have. So when you start to see more and more women having amenorrhea, no periods before 40. Premature ovarian failure. That, to me, is a toxins issue. And we've seen women get their periods back and be like, whoa, I wasn't expecting that. Right. But as you get your body healthier, it gets back into balance. So plug for if you have premature ovarian failure, get tested for fragile X and get tested for toxins.

Yes. I'm glad you mentioned that, because it isn't something. Getting tested for toxins isn't as common with many doctors.

Right. You don't make the connection.

Yeah. And it is a great, great thing to bring up, because the first thing that people think are, oh, hormones. And then either replenish the hormones, let's get them back, or, you know, find. Find a way. But. But in fact, the toxin component is. Is really, really important.

Yeah. All right, so there's premenopause from when you start menstruating. There's perimenopause around age 46 there. It can shift earlier and later for. I have a patient who's 60 and still getting regular periods. Drives her nuts. I'm like, well, you're not gonna have osteoporosis. There's always an upside. So. And then there's menopause, when you haven't had a period for 12 consecutive months. I always feel like there's that. I call it the last gasp. The last. Last ovulation. That happens like, 18 months after the last period. And it's like the don't you forget about me period. And it just happens, and then it never happens again. And it makes women nuts. Right? Cause we gotta work it up and do an ultrasound, do biopsy and blah, blah, blah. I'm like, oh, it's just your last gas, but you're fine. Don't worry about it.

Yeah. And it can be different for. For every woman. I've had women who say, you know what? It's just gone. I don't know, silently left and never came back. And no fluctuations or no, you know, that's. It's one way. Or I've had some women saying that last period was so bad and so heavy and just blood clots everywhere. They were just a nasty last period. You know, the. The thing that I would really like women to understand is that everyone has a different experience. Yes, we have things that happen in common, but we tend to have this stereotype of this horrible experience through perimenopause and menopause especially. So much social media out there making little jokes. And it's funny, it's entertaining, but it's horrifying for a lot of women who haven't gone through it yet. And they're scared and they are. Don't know what to do. And they're trying to reverse aging and trying not to get there, doing everything they can. And I really want women to understand it's. Yes, we have to acknowledge that happens. And some women have it really bad. And then there are women who really don't have any symptom, no sign, and they sail right through it. Not that they didn't go through menopause. There's a lot of Things that are happening under the hood, but they just didn't feel the symptoms, if at all as bad as some of their friends.

Yeah.

So what are some of the symptoms and how do you move past them? How do you help?

Oh, what are some of the symptoms? The typical ones, everybody knows, the hot flashes and the night sweats. That's kind of the characteristic of menopause. And then the low libido, the fatigue, vaginal dryness, urinary issues. There's mood swings in the brain, fog. Sleep is. You know, you get sleep disruptions early on, Even in your 30s, when your progesterone is starting to take the dive. Insulin resistance to people gaining that weight, joint pain, fatigue, thinning hair. The list goes on and on. Those are sort of the more common ones. And then there's the ones that people never heard about, like phantom smells. Right. When you smell something like smoke and no one else smells it, and you never think, oh, that's related to perimenopause. And then there's issues like the osteoporosis that we're more at risk of because of the loss of estrogen and progesterone and everything. All the hormones play a big role in not only osteoporosis, but also the cardiovascular disease. And these are. These are the more. The more serious issues that I think every single woman needs to pay attention to, whether or not you have a symptom. Right.

And don't forget brain health.

I was surprised when I was learning was reflux was associated and that most people don't think about that. But hormones affect hair loss.

Yeah, hair loss. But there's. The thing is all these symptoms, I mean, we just did a podcast with you, Andy, on the Hack My Age podcast, and a lot of the symptoms that we would think could be menopause, which could very well be. Could be heavy metal toxicity or mold or something else. And it's really. Can be. It can be really hard to figure out what it is sometimes. But when you deal with a woman who's around the perimenopause phase or around menopause, then you. You might want to suspect hormones have something to do with that. Right.

That's funny, because the way I. I'm thinking about it is, although some person gets those symptoms, in the Western mind, we. We want to put a label of one thing. Oh, it's perimenopause or it's toxins or whatever else. But human beings don't work that way. We know that there's an imbalance, and most of the time we can find two to five issues that contribute to that imbalance and that the body's just telling you I'm out of balance. Help me, help me. That's what the body's telling me. And maybe it's hormones, maybe it's toxins, maybe it's this, maybe it's that. But it's probably not just one thing.

It's very blend. It's your blended soup. You can't identify any ingredients. It's all blended together.

Okay, good.

That's how I think it is. Like a blended vegetable.

Everybody has their own.

You literally can't. You can't be like, oh, that's the pea, and that's the spinach, and that's the carry. I don't know. It's all blended together, so it's all this big smush.

But like you said, also, you know, it's. It's. If you say thinning hair, the first thing I think about also is the thyroid. And so. But the thyroid has a lot to do with menopause.

Right.

It's just like you said, they're all blended. They're all connected together. So I also like to pull women out of this, go into the doctor. Let's just look at my progesterone, estrogen and testosterone, and let's fix it. And. And then. And I tried to teach people it could be more than that. You know, I think it's just so much more. A good doctor, in my opinion, would. Would look at a lot of things. Insulin or the toxicity or, or the, The. The just thyroid. There's so many other cholesterol. There's so many other things that you could look at, not just a Dutch test. Let's see what's happening. Which is important, but I think there's, like, you. You mentioned it could be so many other things, and, And a really good doctor would. Would be able to put those pieces together. And I think it's hard to find. Do understand how to put everything together, and that's why you guys do what you do so brilliantly. But most doctors that I'm meeting are just. Yeah, it's very, very superficial when it comes to testing. Yeah.

The challenge is, like, when we. We train providers, doctors, nurse practitioners, and there's two main things that you have to overcome. One is. We've talked about both. One is like, that they have to know everything and being okay with saying, I don't know, because we don't know everything. And as soon as we start thinking we know something, we're in trouble. And then two is the mindset of there's one answer as opposed to there's probably three to five answers. Let's go looking, let's go figure it out. So it's. And that's not how we're taught in medical school. We're taught to make one diagnosis and there's going to be one pill to fix that, one diagnosis or one referral or whatever else, and you're done. That's just not how it works.

No. All right. And I think the most important question is, as we draw to a close, where can women find you?

Hackmyage.com is the website and all my social media, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, they're all Hack My Age. So if you can remember Hack my Age, then, then you're good.

All right then. And I know you would, I think, offered that the people who listen to the Feel Freaking Amazing program, if they participate in a menopause program with you, they can get 10% off by mentioning Feel freaking Amazing code. Is that accurate?

Yes. Feel freaking Amazing, which is with a G. Freaking, not freaking. Right. Amazing. For 10% off any of our menopause programs. And, and if you have, you know, any questions about it, you just reach out to me and I'm happy to explain. But these programs are really great. It helps, helps a lot of women get through this transition with ease, with grace and with strength. You know, I really want women to be strong through this period of time and be empowered with, with, with, with knowledge and, and how to go find a doctor and how to go find help and how, how to. You don't really, you really. My motto is, menopause is inevitable, but suffering is optional.

Nice. Really nice. All right then, Zora, thank you for joining us. Thank you for talking about menopause and shedding light on this and thanks for being here for another episode of the Feel Freaking Amazing podcast. All the people listening. She has her own podcast, Hack My Age. You can certainly go listen to that and have an amazing day. Thanks for being here, Zora.

Thank you so much for having me.

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