Gut Check: Eat to Improve Energy, Weight, and Mood with Dr. Amy Shah
Show Snapshot:
Hot flashes. Brain fog. Extra weight that won't budge. You're not imagining it — and you're not powerless. Dr. Amy Shah, MD, double board-certified physician and author of Hormone Havoc, says food is the most underused tool for navigating menopause — but most doctors never bring nutrition up. We explore her 30-30-3 method, the power of protein timing, why most women are way under the daily recommended fiber intake, which probiotic foods ease symptoms, and how small, sustainable shifts can restore your energy, sharpen your focus, and help you feel like yourself again. Fix your gut. Feel like yourself again, beauties!
Show Links:
Follow Dr. Shah:
Dr. Shah’s Book:
Quotable:
Transcript:
Dr. Amy Shah 0:00
The gut is like the supermom of your body. She is organizing everything, she's processing things, she is figuring out what the body needs, what they don't need. And so what happens is the gut is always talking to our hormones, and when that communication is fragmented or blocked, you get hormone havoc.
Katie Fogarty 0:29
Welcome to A Certain Age, a show for women who are unafraid to age out loud. I'm your host, Katie Fogarty. Before we dive into a power-packed show, I want to take a minute to ask a favor. I am looking to boost our Apple Podcast and Spotify show reviews. So if you have learned something on A Certain Age, if you enjoy popping in your AirPods and meeting a fabulous new woman each week, if you've ever nodded your head in agreement or thought, "Wow, I never knew that," please let me know in an Apple Podcast or Spotify review. Reviews help other women find the show. Now on to this week's episode, beauties. Here's some food for thought: what if the right foods could eliminate your hot flashes, brain fog, and midlife weight gain? I don't know a single woman who hasn't hit midlife and thought, "What happened? Why am I exhausted, irritable, sleepless, bloated? Why don't I feel like myself?" If you are struggling with hormonal symptoms and getting zero nutritional guidance from your doctor, you are not alone. Dr. Amy Shah, author of I'm So Effing Hungry and I'm So Effing Tired, joins me today to crack open the pages of her latest book, Hormone Havoc, to reveal why nutrition should be a first-line treatment for perimenopause, yet doctors rarely discuss it, because here's a shocking gap — most doctors, even menopause doctors, shortchange the impact of food's power to heal. As the Cornell-trained nutrition specialist and MD, Dr. Shah has a food-first protocol that's transforming women's lives. Today, she's sharing her 30-30-3 nutritional method, explaining why your gut controls your hormones, and is here to help us eat, exercise, and take on lifestyle choices that will make you feel even better than before. Real foods, real relief, real results. Believe me, I am really excited for this one. Welcome to A Certain Age, Dr. Shah.
Dr. Amy Shah 2:33
Oh, thank you so much for having me, and I love that intro.
Katie Fogarty 2:37
I'm very excited. I've been following your work on Instagram. I loved cracking this book open and diving into the pages. I know you've written two bestselling books — I'm So Effing Hungry and I'm So Effing Tired. This latest, Hormone Havoc, opens with a very personal story. You hiked the Inca Trail at 46. This was a grueling five-day trek, and then you had the experience of watching a circle of Peruvian men gasp and laugh when you revealed your age. So as a jumping-off point, I would love to hear from you what was going through your mind in that moment, and how did it crystallize what you wanted to accomplish with this book.
Dr. Amy Shah 3:16
So at the end of the hike, I felt so accomplished. I felt so good. I had been in nature for five days. I felt like I was killing it, like I was on top of my game. And as I stood there in that moment when they were gasping at the fact that I was "so old," it made me realize, wow, I don't really even feel like I'm old. I don't really think I'm old. I don't feel it, I don't think it. But I think that society kind of has these preconceived notions of what people should be like, look like, think like, act like, in their 40s and beyond. And that really got me thinking, if I'm feeling this way, I know other people are feeling this way, and we need to redefine for women how they can actually step into the best years of their life, even in their 30s, 40s, 50s and beyond.
Katie Fogarty 4:23
And it's — you know, it was an interesting story — because the men were not laughing at you. They were laughing and surprised because they didn't think you looked 46. It wasn't that they felt you were too old. They were just like, "Wait a minute, how could that be?" And I thought that was just very interesting, that people make judgments based on what it means to look and be at a certain age. And so your work really is working with women across all ages, but a lot of your focus has been on women in the peri- and menopause phase and how you can help them manage symptoms and manage their life through a really food-first focus, right? And in your book, you say that nutrition should be the first thing discussed in perimenopause, yet it rarely is. You're a double board-certified physician. You've been trained in both medicine and nutritional sciences. Why do we miss the boat on using food as a fuel and as a tool in our Western medical society?
Dr. Amy Shah 5:26
Yeah, that's a great question, Katie. That is the question that I'm asking — why is it that there's no nutritional framework that actually exists in medicine, not just for women, but for anyone really? When we learned about nutrition in med school, the average number of hours was like six hours of nutrition training in all of medical school. It was about biochemistry, about the individual vitamins and minerals that make up food. And there was a lot of talk about how that all interacts inside of cells. But we never really talked about how we should eat as individuals, and especially for women who are going through this massive change in their bodies. And I thought, well, there's research that informs this, and we should be giving people a framework. It should not be a diet. It should not be a weight-loss plan, which is what it's been for the last 50 to 100 years. Women just get weight-loss plans and restrictive diets. It should actually be a framework that helps them through this part of life. And the why of why it hasn't been included so far is a really tough question. When I was in medical school, I was one of the only people — actually, I was the only person — who came from a nutrition background, and nutrition was not thought of as a science. It was thought of as kind of a soft science, almost like a psychology or music major. They treated me like I was this very non-scientific person coming into med school. And that was fine with me, because that was my interest and I wanted to do that, but it really spoke to me about the fact that people considered nutrition kind of secondary — it wasn't a primary focus. And I'm so happy that over the last 20 years, we started to understand the power that food has over our body and also how our gut health can really be changed and modulated in a positive way through food, which has all brought nutrition into the focus.
Katie Fogarty 7:50
Now it's so important, that distinction you raised at the beginning — nutrition is not about, in the protocol of your book, "let's eat more salads." This is not about weight loss. This is not about how to change your body to shrink it. It's about how to optimize and fuel your body for health. And it's really fascinating to hear that over these two decades that you have been practicing and immersed in this space, the science — I guess the respect for the science — is really changing. We do recognize that foods are these critical building blocks that can power our health. So let's get into some of the science. At the core of your protocol, as I said at the beginning, is the 30-30-3 method, right? So can you walk us through what that is and how you developed it, and why?
Dr. Amy Shah 8:37
Great question. So I developed this because when you look at the bulk of the research, it really shows that there are a few things that can make a huge difference, not only in gut health, but in hormone health, brain health, and overall health. And for women, we've heard a lot about protein over the last few years, because women, as we get older, lose one to three percent of our muscle mass per year at the onset of menopause. And we know that now it's coming into focus that we should be doing resistance training and we should be eating more protein. But I think for a long time, and even now, there's really no definition of what that might look like for a person walking into this for the first time. And so I looked at the research and I said, okay, well, protein needs for every single person are very individual, depending on how active you are and how much you're lifting. But there is a universal thing that keeps coming up in the literature: having your first meal of the day be high in protein is something that will set up your gut, that will set up your cravings, that will set up your energy, and that will set up the choices that you make for the rest of the day. And so I decided that was a fundamental thing — that if you were going to start to change your nutrition, you could start with that, and it would make a huge change in your life.
Katie Fogarty 10:02
So it's so interesting — it's not just the protein, it's the protein timing. So we want to start at the beginning of the day to get ourselves set. When you're talking about how it impacts our gut health and the way our system is fueled throughout the day, what did you learn? Why is protein so important early in the morning?
Dr. Amy Shah 10:24
A couple of reasons. Protein in the morning sets you up for more total protein throughout the day. So if you don't start with protein in the morning, there's no way you're getting enough protein in your day. Most women who are trying to actively and positively fight against the changes of menopause and perimenopause — like you're just trying to get stronger — they understand that protein is the building block of muscle. And so you really do have to give your body that supply of protein so that you can make more muscle, or at least maintain the muscle that you have. So that's the second reason. And then we now know that our gut bacteria love a few things — they love fiber, they love probiotic foods, and they love protein. And so not only are you helping your cravings — we know that if you have more protein, you have better craving control for the day, so you're less likely to reach for ultra-processed food — you have a better chance of getting to your total protein goals, you have a better reserve for weight training when and if you do it, and you're feeding your gut bacteria something that it loves. So that was a no-brainer for me, that one.
Katie Fogarty 11:36
So the 30-30-3 — the first leg of this nutritional stool you're creating for us is 30 grams of protein to start our day. What is the second 30 in your framework?
Dr. Amy Shah 11:49
It is 30 grams of fiber throughout the day. Over 90% of people in the United States are not getting enough fiber — we're getting about 12 grams every day. And we have study after study, thousands of studies now, that show that for longevity, for inflammation, for disease prevention, for hormones, you need closer to 30 grams — like 25 to 30 grams — which is actually a conservative estimate. And so that became the second pillar. Because I thought to myself, why isn't anyone telling us that we should be getting 30 grams of fiber? That is a fundamental health requirement for our body as we age. And so that became the second pillar. When I say 30 grams of fiber every day, people are usually like, "Oh my God, what is fiber? Why fiber?" And that kind of starts the conversation about how important our gut is for the rest of our body. When our gut gets fiber, it is actually food for the gut bacteria that live in our colon. You're feeding them so that they can thrive and signal and help your body make decisions. And so fiber becomes essential. In fact, there are studies that show that for every 10 grams of fiber that you eat, you decrease mortality by 10%.
Katie Fogarty 13:22
That is a fascinating statistic. Isn't that crazy? So I'm doing some quick math here — if I'm adding my 30 grams of fiber, that's an incredible benefit. So all right, we are going to be diving into all of the how-tos: how do we get the 30 grams of protein, what are your recommendations for how we're adding fiber to our diet, I want to talk a little bit more about how the 30-30-3 allows us to help regulate our hormones and minimize or mitigate against some of the impacts. We're going to head into a quick break in just a minute. But before I do, I want you to tell us what the three is.
Dr. Amy Shah 14:00
The three is fermented foods. Three fermented foods every day.
Katie Fogarty 14:04
All right, so three fermented foods. So we've got our 30-30-3. We're heading into a quick break. When we come back, we're going to break this down further. All right, Dr. Amy, we're back from the break. When we went into it, you walked us through the 30-30-3 framework. We want 30 grams of protein, we want 30 grams of fiber — which is a big step up from the average American who's only getting 12 — and we want three probiotic foods. We are going to dive into your recommendations on each one of these. But first, I want to ask you: how does this approach help positively impact our hormones as we're moving through perimenopause and menopause? What are some of the benefits we can expect in terms of symptom mitigation if we are following this framework?
Dr. Amy Shah 14:47
Great question. So the 30-30-3 — it is protein, fiber, and probiotic foods. This is the basis of good gut health, hormone health, immune health, and brain health. If you get this right, you will actually improve your hormone health, but also your brain health and your immune health. And this is based on very, very large medical studies. It's something that really should be a part of our medical visits, part of our education, part of our menopause books and training modules. It is something that can be transformational.
Katie Fogarty 15:30
Yeah, you write in your book that our hormones, our immune system, our gut, and our metabolism go way off kilter during the perimenopause and menopause transition. I'm throwing my hand up in the air virtually — I had all of these things go off kilter at different points. Walk us through this cascade. How does healing the gut actually reduce the hot flashes, the brain fog, the anxiety, and sometimes the weight gain that many women experience in midlife?
Dr. Amy Shah 15:58
Okay, so the gut is like the supermom of your body. She is organizing everything, she's processing things, she is figuring out what the body needs and what it doesn't need. And so what happens is the gut is always talking to our hormones, and when that communication is fragmented or blocked, you get hormone havoc. And then when that communication with our immune system is blocked or non-existent, you get lots of inflammation, and in turn, that leads to brain fog, that leads to hormone imbalance and rollercoaster effects, that leads to the hot flashes in the weakened state — because the supermom of your body can no longer function the way she's supposed to. And this supermom is in charge of keeping our hormones in check, our brain in check, our immune system in check. And so a lot of the problems that we're having in perimenopause can get so much better when we improve this communication. When we give this supermom the food she needs, the rest she needs, the data she needs to be organized — that is the reason. I think the way to think about it is that gut health is a conduit for better hormone health.
Katie Fogarty 17:30
Dr. Amy, you had me at "rest for better organization." I was like, that sounds delightful. And it really does. Because I think anyone — even if you're not a mom — any woman who listens to this show has multiple balls in the air. Women have tremendous capacity, but they carry tremendous loads. We're all doing a lot of things, and we have a lot going on. And one of the tools for rest that you offer in this book is circadian fasting, right — which is when we're not eating at certain points, we're almost giving this rest to our body. So we touched on this a little bit earlier in the conversation. But how does eating according to our natural 24-hour rhythm help us get off the hormonal roller coaster? And what does this actually look like in practice, in daily life?
Dr. Amy Shah 18:18
Okay, so we are creatures that need sunlight. We're like plants — just like every organism in the world, we need input from the sun and dark cycles, because 80% of our biology works on this. So that's why doing things like staying up all night, eating a huge meal at midnight, having no food all day until sundown — all of these things are part of normal modern life, but they're really detrimental to our health, because our bodies, including our gut bacteria, need input from the sun to fine-tune themselves, to be able to work on their processes. Our body is always trying to figure out what time of day it is, and so light is the number-one signal for it to know the time of day. And then food is also another signal for it to know what time of day it is. So when you're eating really late at night, you're kind of throwing off the circadian rhythms, and you will see the downfall the next day. In our modern society, we kind of don't pay attention to circadian rhythms. Almost all of the newest technology — iPhones, Uber Eats, frozen meals that you can eat at midnight or 2 a.m. — really goes against what we know about circadian biology. We know that our body needs to be moving and eating during daylight hours, and it needs to have some kind of rest and repair time in the nighttime hours. And that's why sleep and circadian fasting can be so powerful.
Katie Fogarty 20:13
You have something you call the Shah Protocol. It's a seven-day plan designed to jump-start health, and you outline specific things that people can either do for the first week and then modify to make their own. You say it produces noticeable changes in gut health and sleep quality within that first week. So I'm so intrigued — what makes seven days the right timeframe, and what should women expect to experience as they move through those first few days?
Dr. Amy Shah 20:39
Well, I thought a lot about it, because I asked myself: what's the minimum amount of time that we would need to see change? We actually have data that shows you can change your gut bacteria in a very sizable way in just three days. These bacteria have very short lives, and they're constantly changing and shifting based on our behaviors and diet. So we are able to change our gut very quickly. And we know that circadian rhythms can be fine-tuned very quickly — just as you can imagine, even a few days of good sunlight and rest and sleep can really improve your overall health, but also your energy levels and your mental health. So I thought to myself, what do I do with my patients? I usually say, "Let's do this for a week and see how you feel," because it's a really easy way for people to buy into what you're telling them when you give them a timeframe — "Let's talk this time next week and see how you feel." And that has worked really well for me, because people are willing to try anything for a week. And when they start to see the changes and feel the changes, that's when you really can get people to buy in. And what I usually find is, after a week, they're like, "You know what? This is crazy, but I feel so much better." And then you iterate from there — you tweak it and make it your own. I just put a framework there so you can have a starting point that is meant to be a starting point, and then you make it your own. You do the things that make you really happy, do the movements that you love, pick the times and the locations that you like to be outside. It is a life-changing framework.
Katie Fogarty 22:36
A week feels very manageable, which I think is just a great starting-off point. And I know for myself — obviously everyone has different experiences — but if I get four phenomenal nights of sleep, I feel like a new person. It really does not take long to feel physically improved by making small action steps. So let's get into some of the action steps. We talked about the 30-30-3 — 30 grams of protein. We were saying earlier in the show that we've all gotten the message on protein. I sometimes joke that I'm eating protein like I'm getting paid to eat it, right? So we've absorbed that message, which is terrific. Thirty grams of fiber sounds like it's going to be a heavier lift if the average American is currently only getting 12. So let's dive into fiber. What are some recommendations to improve our fiber intake? What are things that your average patient doesn't think about, that they might not even realize could really help with their fiber intake?
Dr. Amy Shah 23:41
I think people just don't know what has fiber in it. We don't talk about it the way we talk about protein. There was a lot of educating that happened a few years ago around protein, and I think a lot of even the mainstream population is starting to learn that. But fiber has not caught up yet. So fiber, shockingly, is in a lot of the things that we actually love. For example, avocado is a huge source of fiber. Blueberries are an amazing source of fiber. Leafy greens, broccoli. And then one of my biggest hacks for fiber, for people who are just new to it, is to add chia seeds to something, because chia seeds — just one tablespoon — has five grams of fiber, and you're getting a huge boost of your daily fiber from just that. So it's stuff that we eat all the time, things that you can easily incorporate. Add a few blueberries to your breakfast. Maybe add some chia seeds to your yogurt. Maybe you are eating avocado and getting your fiber in that way. And like, it actually adds up pretty quickly. It's just not present in your frappuccinos, fast food, chips and crackers, and candies. Those things are almost fiber-free. And so one of the things I like to do with this framework is set goals. You're not going to lift 100 pounds on your first day, but maybe if you have a goal of 30 grams of fiber, you can start to see what fundamental changes you have to make in your life to increase the amount of fiber. For me, it was actually eating at home a little bit more, because I realized, "Okay, if I need avocados, I need blueberries, I need chia seeds — I could cut veggies, I could add that to my lunch." Making those foundational changes and working up to 30 grams is actually the best way to do it. And I find that once you start to know what foods actually have fiber, it's not actually that hard to get.
Katie Fogarty 26:00
Yeah, I think you're spot on when you say you need to set a goal for yourself, because you can't meet a goal you haven't set to begin with. And if you put it out there — I think a lot of us are very good about checking the boxes and calendaring the things that need to get done and doing them. So just recognizing that this is now a new goal — 30 grams of fiber a day — makes it so much more attainable. Plus, the foods that you listed out are delicious. I'm sure so many people love a blueberry, love avocados. These are really — chia seeds, I love that hack, because that's so easy. I put that on top of my oatmeal. To your point, you can mix it into your yogurt. There's a ton of great breakfasty, delicious snacky things that you could add chia seeds to. So that's a great little hack. Let's talk a little bit about probiotics, because I think a lot of people were probably like me — when I think of a probiotic, I think of yogurt — but in your book you give us some other offerings. And I will say I was a little surprised to see sauerkraut listed as a hero ingredient. So help bring us up to speed on probiotic foods and put on our radar things that we may not be thinking about.
Dr. Amy Shah 27:12
Okay, so even when we were hunter-gatherers, we sought out rotting food that had bacteria in it — that was fermenting. And evolutionarily, we have always wanted to eat fermented foods. In every culture all around the world, you will find some kind of fermented food, which is so fascinating when you think about the history of all this.
Katie Fogarty 27:39
Well, maybe except for Americans. I think of kimchi — I love Korean food and I love kimchi — and there's kombucha and things in other cultures. But when you think about the American diet, what would be our fermented food that we've been eating? Or do we need to tap into other cultural offerings?
Dr. Amy Shah 27:54
Yeah, I think the easiest one in our culture is yogurt. And not the one with the M&Ms mixed in — the actual yogurt that has live probiotic cultures. So yogurt is probably the easiest thing. Probiotic cottage cheese is also another really easy option in a typical American diet. And then raw apple cider vinegar is actually a really good source — you could add it to your dressing or just add it to water. Really easy ways to incorporate. And then of course, you mentioned kimchi, sauerkraut, natto, miso, and so many other amazing fermented foods from all around the world. I think what happened is that once we got refrigerators and freezers, we didn't need to use fermentation processes to preserve foods. Because in ancient cultures all over the world, the reason they had to learn how to ferment is that it was a way to preserve things — and that actually fed our gut bacteria, because our body wants those live bacteria that are a part of fermented foods. And as we modernized, we started to lose that act of fermentation. Even stuff like pickles now is not fermented — they're just pickled and put in the refrigerator, and that is not what I'm talking about.
Katie Fogarty 29:24
So with a lot of salt and other stuff, and sugars even — exactly.
Dr. Amy Shah 29:28
So I think we need to go backwards in time and think, "Okay, clearly the research is bearing out that these foods were really good for us, that we sought them out." There's evidence that we ate tons of fermented foods years ago. We have only 50% of the gut bacterial diversity now than we had generations ago because of that. And so getting back to eating some of these foods is essential. It's like our gut is supposed to be like an Amazon jungle, and a lot of people have a gut that's like a barren wasteland. And so thinking about it that way — I get a lot of pushback on social media. People will say, "I can't eat fermented foods," or "I can't eat fiber because it bloats me up." And you know what? All that stuff happens because if you have a barren wasteland, you cannot just add all these plants and seeds and fertilizer — it's not going to work, and it's actually going to have a negative effect. You have to start to nurture it from step one, trying to go from barren wasteland to little sproutings, and then into larger plants, and then an Amazon jungle. And when it gets closer to that Amazon jungle, that's when you can actually eat a ton of fermented food and fiber and really nurture that garden. But that's not going to happen if you're starting from scratch.
Katie Fogarty 30:55
Let's talk about that, because that is a great point. And by the way, it's a phenomenal visual — I'm picturing this: a lush Amazon jungle down to a green, manicured American lawn to a barren wasteland. And we're not expecting lush vegetation to grow on either our little American lawns or our barren wasteland. So if we are looking to include things that we don't yet do — if we're looking to go from 12 grams of fiber up to 30, if we're looking to add at least one, if not all three, probiotic foods to our diet each week — what do you recommend in terms of how we get going? And my part two to this question is: how long should we expect it to take before we can move on to the next level and keep improving?
Dr. Amy Shah 31:42
Well, that's like asking, "I'm going to tell you it would be really great for you to do three pull-ups, because that's been shown to be really great for upper-body strength and long-term health," and you might say, "Well, how long is it going to take me?" It depends on how often you train and where you're starting from. And you're not going to start your first day with the goal of getting to three pull-ups, right? You're going to have to do a ton of foundational work to get to the point where you can even do one pull-up. So I think it's the same as going to the gym or doing this kind of exercise regimen — you want to break it down for yourself. So if you're really that person who's basically had a frappuccino and maybe a wrap and fast food and you're trying to get to 30 grams, you're probably just going to do one thing — like maybe you're going to add chia seeds to your yogurt or to your oatmeal and start there. And then maybe after your body gets used to that, you're going to add the blueberries to that oatmeal, and then maybe you're going to add avocado to that wrap, and then go from there. That's what I would recommend. There are people who can just go to 30 grams right away — they're already almost there, and adding more is not going to be a big deal. But there are people who are going to have lots of gas and discomfort if they start adding 30 grams from the beginning. So there's a huge variation. And most people, I would think, are like me. We think we're eating really healthy, but I was eating a pretty fiber-free diet, and so getting to that 30 grams — and definitely getting those three probiotic foods — was a challenge. I definitely had to do this over weeks and months; it wasn't an overnight change.
Katie Fogarty 33:38
Yes, so start with where you are, and it's going to be different for everyone — which is phenomenal advice. There's no one-size-fits-all solution. And I just want to chime in — you mentioned miso and natto earlier in this conversation. I lived in Japan for two years after college, and I love miso and cook with it still. Even just as a flavor, you can add it to regular soups — it's delicious. If you're making chicken noodle soup, you don't have to be making Japanese food. And natto is truly, at least on my end, very much an acquired taste, and I never acquired it. But there are so many wonderful foods out there that you can include in your diet and mix in in different ways. So I love that you make all these recommendations throughout the book.
Dr. Amy Shah 34:24
I just want to add one more thing — there are certain things that are very normal in Europe. Like, kefir is really common in Europe but not very common in the US. And those are nice ways to add probiotic foods. Kefir is kind of a thinner, more probiotic-heavy version of yogurt, and you can mix it into yogurt — especially to get a less grainy consistency than Greek yogurt has. Mixing a little kefir into that could be a really nice hack for someone who's just starting out.
Katie Fogarty 34:54
Throughout your book you sprinkle what you call "quick pauses," which make the book very user-friendly. They're quick, hot doses of action items — a bit like SOS emergency tools for symptom relief. At one point you were talking about how anxiety is a common symptom for perimenopausal and menopausal women. We all know we're living in anxious times — you cannot look at the newspaper or the TV news without feeling that sense of anxiety. There are specific foods out there that can help with anxiety symptoms. I particularly loved this section of the book because I was like, "I really need to incorporate more of this in my diet." Can you walk us through a few?
Dr. Amy Shah 35:33
So here's the thing: a lot of people don't understand that food can actually modulate your mood. There are foods that increase anxiety — we know some of them, like excess caffeine, for example — but we don't often know that there are absolutely foods that you can have that lower anxiety. And one of the reasons I actually recommend fermented foods, or probiotic foods, for women is because they actually have an effect on your brain. Regular intake of fermented foods is linked with lower levels of anxiety. Omega-3s are something that are great for your brain and actually help with anxiety — so that's your chia seeds, flaxseeds, walnuts, algae oil, fish oil, that kind of thing. Magnesium-rich foods are another one. I love magnesium because particularly for women, it's one of the things that has been shown to really improve long-term health, brain health, and also anxiety. So that's your pumpkin seeds, leafy greens, almonds, avocados. Dark chocolate is another one, turmeric, and surprisingly, something like kiwi fruit has been shown to actually help with mood and sleep.
Katie Fogarty 36:54
These are all phenomenal foods, and foods that I enjoy eating. So I'm happy to learn that I'm doing the right thing and that some of these foods can help with mood and are also neuroprotective, which is terrific. This book is sprinkled throughout with so many great doses of information, so many quick pauses that you can use to just quickly add something new to your life, to your routine. What is a quick pause that you reach for again and again in your own life?
Dr. Amy Shah 37:19
Oh gosh, so many. One is just to go out for a walk. That's the simplest one. I would say that works for me every single day. If you are looking for a reset of your energy, your hormones, your gut, your mood — a sunny walk can work wonders.
Katie Fogarty 37:38
Yep, movement always works. For me, it's a yoga class — it's not outside. But whenever I'm feeling stressed out or I don't have enough time, that's the time that you need to go. Your book talks about this as well — the importance of exercise. Share with us a little bit more about why it's so important for your gut health to be moving your body.
Dr. Amy Shah 38:00
So when you move your body — whether it's a yoga class, going for a walk, or weightlifting — all of those are included in my recommendations. Your gut bacteria get really happy. They actually start dancing, if you could look at them under the microscope. And they create these amazing anti-inflammatory compounds called short-chain fatty acids, which travel all over your body and calm inflammation. And so not only are you burning calories, which is what we always think of with exercise, you're actually improving your gut health and your hormone health, because you're activating these gut bacteria, making them happy, and having them create compounds that can help all your hormones and your mood.
Katie Fogarty 38:41
When we talk about the importance of feeding and fueling our gut bacteria — which helps regulate our hormones and our moods — what is the role you see for supplements or other medicines? Or do you want us to prioritize food and movement as number one, and then rely on supplementation as a number two? Where do you land on this?
Dr. Amy Shah 39:02
Yeah, I think supplementation is exactly that — it's supplementing your diet. And I'll be honest: most women do need some supplementation. Most women in perimenopause, for example, need things like vitamin D, omega-3s, and magnesium. Those are some examples of things that almost every single woman would benefit from, and after that, it's basically a personalized medicine approach.
Katie Fogarty 39:30
Speaking of personalized medicine, your book is filled with recipes. Is there one that you go to again and again?
Dr. Amy Shah 39:37
Oh gosh, yes, so many of them. I think my favorite egg scramble is in there. When I started to do the 30-30-3, I was like, "Okay, what can I make at home that's so simple and easy?" And so I started to make this egg scramble in the morning with lots of veggies and spices and just eggs. And it was so delicious. Got my 30 grams of protein, it was quick, easy — and so that's the one I love, because if you're looking for a quick, easy, at-home recipe, that's the one.
Katie Fogarty 40:15
I loved all your breakfast recipes, because I'm such a creature of habit. I love oatmeal — I put blueberries in it, I put apples in it, I put cinnamon in it. Sometimes I do bananas and walnuts, but it's like Groundhog Day with breakfast. So I love having all of these different options. They all sounded delicious — although the sauerkraut did surprise me, but I'm a big "try anything once" person, so I'm definitely going to try some of your breakfast sauerkraut recipes. Love it. Okay, we're running out of time, Dr. Amy, but I do have two last questions for you. I really want to hear your thinking on this. One of the things that I loved about the book is the way you closed it. You close with your powerful reminder that we have 4,000 weeks of life. I actually had a wonderful woman on the show who wrote a book called 4,000 Mondays, and it's about how to get to the end of your life without regret. You share that as women, we spend nearly half of our weeks in various states of transition as we move through perimenopause, menopause, and post-menopause. Beyond symptom management — which you've given us a lot of tools for — what is a fundamental shift in perspective you want women to embrace around this age? Can we stop seeing menopause as an end or a loss, and instead start to see it as an opportunity?
Dr. Amy Shah 41:30
I mean, I see this all the time, and I think now we have studies that show that you are the age you think you are. When they do studies on people and ask them how old they think they are, people perform on tasks for memory, cognition, and muscle strength at the age they think they are. If they think they're old and failing, they actually do worse on those tests. And so it just shows you that the mindset shift you have to make actually creates real changes in your life. And it's really hard to believe that until I saw the studies — and I'm like, that is crazy! That means that the more you believe that you have a lot of gifts still left to uncover, that there are still things you have left to do, that you're still young and vibrant, the more you will act that way.
Katie Fogarty 42:29
We all need to have that mindset shift. I love that. My last question for you: you frequently post on social media with your teenage daughter. This catches my eye because I have a 25-year-old daughter myself, and I truly believe that we are at a tipping point for how the women coming behind us chronologically — the women who are younger than us — will experience the perimenopause and menopause transition. Having worked in this space for so long, seeing all the sea changes happening right now with greater education and advocacy, what is your hope for the future generation about how they experience this transition?
Dr. Amy Shah 43:06
Oh, I love that question. I felt so sad when I was talking to my mom and she was telling me how she felt completely out of control — that she was one of the one-in-ten women who quit her job because she didn't know what was happening with her body, that no one in her immediate circle, no one among her doctors, no one in her family, told her what was happening. And I am so happy that we're putting an end to this. I feel so sad that she had to go through that almost out-of-control, negative experience in her life. And I'm so happy that it stops with me, and that my daughter — who, unfortunately, hears about perimenopause all the time — I want her in her teens and then in her 20s to really prepare her body so that she can go through this time like she's just floating through it, because she has already done the groundwork.
Katie Fogarty 44:06
Yeah, the culture of silence, the culture of enduring it without resources and support, is truly over. And it feels like a really optimistic time when I think about women's health and when we think about it for our daughters. So it's really exciting. And this book that you've created is yet another phenomenal tool that women can use — in tandem with whatever else they're doing with their medical providers, whether or not they're using HRT, whether or not they're availing themselves of medicine. This book addresses HRT, but it really gives so many lifestyle, diet, exercise, and nutrition tools to make us smarter patients, because that at the end of the day is what really drives results for us individually. Dr. Amy, I so appreciate you coming on to talk about Hormone Havoc. Before I say goodbye, though — how can our listeners find you, follow your work, and keep up with all things Hormone Havoc and Dr. Amy?
Dr. Amy Shah 45:00
Oh, thank you so much for having me. This was such a fun conversation. You can find me at Dr. Amy Shah on Instagram or TikTok. You can find my book on my website or anywhere books are sold — it's called Hormone Havoc — and my website is AmyMDWellness.com. Those are the places I hang out the most.
Katie Fogarty 45:19
Terrific. Thank you so much. This wraps A Certain Age, a show for women who are aging without apology. I took so many mental notes on this episode. You had better believe that sauerkraut is going to be in my grocery cart from here on out. If you learned something on this show, if you learned something on another episode of A Certain Age Podcast, if you enjoy hanging out and listening to our remarkable guests every week, I would love to hear about it in an Apple Podcast or Spotify review, because reviews truly help other women connect with the show. They help the show to grow. They help guests recognize that this is a show worth coming on and spending time with. I read and appreciate every one of the reviews — they truly make my day. Thanks for sticking around to the end of this episode, and as always, special thanks to Michael Mancini, who composed and produced our theme music. See you next time, and until then — age boldly, beauties.