no. 129 - The Uterine Fibroids Episode

This Unmillennial Life

Uterine fibroids may affect as many as 8 in 10 women by the time they reach menopause. This episode uncovers what uterine fibroids are, and what causes them, as well as discussing both symptoms and treatments.

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LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE

• Femgevity Health
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• The Drugstore Cleaner Beauty Buys Episode
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EPISODE KEYWORDS

podcast, umillennial, Gen X, podcasts for women, women over 40, women over 50, uterine fibroids

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

(transcript generated through AI; may contain spelling errors)

Regan Jones 0:00 Hey there podcast listeners. Before we jump into today's episode, I want to mention something that I usually mention at the end of every episode, if you don't hang around till the end, you may have missed that I very often will ask for you to rate and review this unmillennial life on whatever podcast app you are listening to this podcast on. Based on the number of people that I know listen, versus the number of ratings and reviews that I've gotten over the years, I know that there are still plenty of you who have not had a chance to rate and review the podcast. And probably some of that is because initially, to give a rating on Apple podcasts, it used to be that you had to write a review, and I know many of us are just not comfortable doing that. But the good news is that now you don't have to write a review, you can easily give this unmillennial life a five star rating on Apple podcasts simply by going to the show in your podcast app scrolling down below the episodes and then you'll see ratings and reviews tap to rate and if you would select that five star rating there I would be so appreciative. As I say at the end of every episode, it really does help Apple podcast know that this unmillennial life is a podcast they should be recommending to other people. And with that, let's get on with the show. If your skin doesn't know whether to break out a wrinkle if you're caught between planning the third grade class party and researching retirement plans, or if you want to work out but the idea of CrossFit makes your 40 Something knees a you've come to the right place. Welcome to This Unmillennial Life.

I'm your host Regan Jones and welcome to episode 129 of this unmillennial life. Now first of all, I want to give an apology for any of you over the last few episodes, who have experienced a technical glitch that is happening on not my end. But the end of the advertising company that I work with for this unmillennial life. Let me say up front, I know that ads can be annoying, I also appreciate your understanding that it costs money to host and produce a podcast. And as a self employed podcaster. And blogger, advertisements are one of the ways that I make my income. One of the main ways right now however, I never want advertisements to be something that are so annoying or disruptive that they reduce the quality of the show. And I know because I've experienced it myself, that what has happened in some of the recent episodes is that the spot in the episode that I have allocated for a commercial break has actually not been where the advertising company has dropped those in and I have let them know that that is a problem. They have assured me that they are working on it live for the time being I have turned off any automated ads that would roll in the middle of the podcast so as not to disrupt the flow. So if that happened to you, I'm so sorry. Just know that I am aware of the problem. It is something that's happening on there in not mine, but I want to be sensitive to that. And for the time being. I will turn that off until we can get those issues resolved. Okay, that all said let's jump into today's episode. You already know based on the title of this episode that today we're talking about uterine fibroids, and joining me to discuss uterine fibroids is Kristin Marlin Kristen's a board certified nurse midwife, she has over 20 years of experience in women's health. And she really is an expert in menopause and feminine longevity. She's going to tell you a little bit more about her company that she co founded fim jeberti. But mostly what we will be talking about today would be sort of the prevalence of Uterine Fibroids Symptoms that you want to be aware of traditional treatment, and then how in her practice, they actually treat with some non traditional, more integrated wellness methods. So that I'll just simply welcome Kristen, Kristen, and welcome to the show.

Kristin Mallon 3:55 Thank you so much for having me. I'm so happy to be here.

Regan Jones 3:58 I really appreciate that when I was looking for someone to address this topic of uterine fibroids, that you were one of the people that came across my desk, you have a fascinating story with the company that you launched. And I think that we can really focus today on helping women understand a little bit more about uterine fibroids and then also maybe give them a different viewpoint on how they can be treated. So before we jump into that topic, though, I do want you to give listeners a little bit of background on your company for longevity. Yeah, so

Kristin Mallon 4:32 I'm the co founder and CEO of a company called Femgevity Health with is which is a concierge telemedicine platform for women working with hormone balancing specifically during menopause and perimenopause. And then we also focus in on feminine longevity,

Regan Jones 4:50 feminine longevity that's I would assume the way the name The name came about is that right?

Kristin Mallon 4:56 Yeah. So a lot of longevity. The medicine that's kind of practice now is really male focused and male dominant. A lot of the studies that come out about longevity, and a lot of the molecules that are used in longevity are really focused on how they affect men. And the clinical trials are done on men. And so what we focus on is really like, how does how did those studies apply to women? What can we use? What can we not use, and then also the really important component in a woman's life about how when a woman goes through perimenopause, menopause and menopause and how she does that, and how that sets her up for longevity going forward.

Regan Jones 5:31 And you said, it's a tele telehealth based practice, you have nurses, medical doctors explained to me just a little bit more about who is on your staff, if someone you know, down the line is interested in becoming a part of this, this group or seeking out your services, let's just know a little bit more about the company and who they would be interacting with. Yeah, so

Kristin Mallon 5:53 our protocols are all medical based. It's all medical doctors and nurse practitioners. And so we do some nutritionist nutritional counseling, we do some medical counseling in terms of mental health counseling, but the basis of what we do is really getting labs and diagnostic data and then prescribing accordingly, whether it's nutraceuticals, or supplements, or medications or hormones themselves.

Regan Jones 6:18 Okay. All right. Well, thank you for walking that out for everybody. Now, I want to just kind of go ahead and jump into the topic on hand today, and that's really uterine fibroids. This is something that came up as a topic really based on listener interest. Most people who've been listening to the podcast for a number of years know that things pop up, either, because there's something that's going on in my own unmillennial life or in the lives of those people who are my friends, family, or listeners of the show, and uterine fibroids actually has been suggested a number of different times. So let's first set the stage and talk to people about what uterine fibroids actually are. And if you will give them some sort of idea of what causes them.

Kristin Mallon 6:58 Yeah, so uterine fibroids really are non cancerous tumors. So people don't really like that word tumor because they do associated with cancer, but they are non cancerous growths that are coming from the uterine cavities, either outside or around the uterine cavity themselves.

Regan Jones 7:16 Okay. And then, in terms of causes, can you give us a little bit of an idea of like, what causes uterine fibroids,

Kristin Mallon 7:23 fibroids are really kind of a black hole. And we don't really understand fibroids as much as we'd like. But there's a lot of different theories about what causes uterine fibroids. So from our perspective, and this was a kind of a thought that was really made popular by a doctor called Dr. John Lee, he actually has a website called I think it's Dr. John Lee md.com. But the concept of estrogen dominance, because estrogen is a hormone that feeds the growth of, of fibroids. And so estrogen dominance is something that's pretty commonly seen nowadays, it's not a medical term that's really adopted, there's no ICD 10 code. If you go to like a regular generic OB GYN, they're gonna be like, that doesn't really exist, kind of the way that a lot of kind of traditional conventional doctors don't think that Adrenal Fatigue is really exists. That's where a lot of the thought is about where fibroids come from. Although there are risk factors that are associated with fibroids like having a period early like having your first period before the age of 10. Having less pregnancies being on hormonal birth conception, there are certain endocrine factors like being exposed to D S, which isn't really used anymore isn't so common anymore, but that was something that was more common in women that were born in the 50s or 40s. Obesity is also associated with fibroids diet, especially a diet high in red meats and dairy, alcohol, smoking, and genetics are all risk factors for developing fibroids.

Regan Jones 8:55 Okay, so if a woman is sitting and listening to this and is thinking, gosh, I have some of these risk risk factors. clarify for me, because this is a statistic that I've seen, and I just want to understand it a little bit better. from your standpoint. Do all women who have uterine fibroids do all of them? No. Are they all symptomatic? And the next part of that question is what are some of the symptoms that people would be looking for? Yeah, that's a

Kristin Mallon 9:21 really great question. So I think also, we can't really talk about the incidence and prevalence of uterine fibroids without talking about the significant disparity in the high incidence among black females as well. And we can kind of get into that a little bit later about the theories about why black females have a significantly higher proportion of having uterine fibroids. There's some studies that say, I've seen studies that say one in four women will have fibroids by the time they reach the menopausal years and I've seen studies as high as 80% of women will have uterine fibroids by the time they reach the menopausal years. A lot of times these fibroids especially in the early years of the fibroid growth and development, they are asymptomatic. And so, you know, I am a certified nurse midwife. And so I've done a lot of C sections and been into a lot of uterine cavities and many, many times in those C sections, probably about 30 or 40% of the time. And these are women who are younger and their young reproductive years 20s 30s and 40s. And we'll find a fibroid in the C section. Totally. Nobody had any idea about it and we didn't suspect about and even this woman was having ultrasounds in her pregnancy because fibroids can sometimes be difficult to see on ultrasound, especially when an obstetric cinematographer or so nog refer that's really doing pregnancy based ultrasounds and doesn't specialize in gynecologic based ultrasounds is reading the ultrasounds or looking at the ultrasounds and they're really looking at what's going on with the pregnancy. They're not always thinking about, Okay, what's going on with the fibroids? So, it's a little bit like I said fibroids is kind of a black hole. In general, it's a little bit of an unknown, but I would say more than half of women might exactly have fibroids, and then not even know they have them. And then you did ask about the symptoms of fibroids. So there's three, there's so many symptoms of fibroids, but there's three main symptoms that kind of really signify that fibroids are kind of at a later stage or larger. So number one is is bleeding, heavy bleeding, irregular, bleeding, painful bleeding. And this can sometimes be hard to diagnose, because this can also be associated with things like endometriosis, and so they can sometimes get confused. Does a woman have fibroids or does a woman have endometriosis? Or does she have both both are high estrogenic states they both kind of are result of having high circulating estrogen, or more estrogen in relation to the balance of the other hormones. There's also sometimes women can actually feel them, they can actually feel the fiber, they'll feel groco They'll feel like Oh, this isn't there's a hard ball here like so the palpation of feeling them is very real. And then pain can be the the number one symptom. So it's really those three things. Although there are other symptoms that go along with it urinary symptoms go along with it, pressure symptoms go along with it kind of like a bloating or a bulky feeling. There's so many things that happen with fibroids specifically. But I would say those are the top three symptoms that women really feel along with being totally asymptomatic and not feeling anything.

Regan Jones 12:22 Okay, good. Thank you for clarifying all that. Okay, so what I want to do is I want to briefly talk about and you give listeners just sort of an idea of kind of the current treatments that you see within what I would call the traditional medical community, how it's currently how have fibroids are treated currently. And then I think the area that you specialize in, let's talk about the alternatives, the non surgical or natural treatments that it sounds like that you all are using in your practice. So cover both of those for my listeners.

Kristin Mallon 12:54 Yeah, so I think a great way to kind of understand the there. So there's three tiers of treatment that are kind of traditionally used in conventional medical therapies. And I think to kind of understand them, it's helpful to understand the different types of fibroids. And this was something that you did allude to in the beginning, and I can circle back to that now, but there's different types of fibroids. So kind of from like the least severe to the most severe. There's fibroids that are pedants related, so they're attached by the stock, like a stock to the uterus, or to the uterine cavity, sometimes, like on ultrasound, they can actually look like ovaries, they usually can be palpated through the skin, although not always depending on the size of them. And they're usually pretty asymptomatic. They don't bother the uterine cavity, because as a woman is having her menstrual cycle and the lining is being shed, these are on the outside of the uterus, and a woman doesn't necessarily notice them or feel them. The next kind of more serious as we kind of moved down would be something called a sub serosal fibroid or a sub serosal myoma. And these kind of originate from the smooth muscle tissue layer of the uterus or the myometrium. And they're on the cirrhosis surface of the uterus. And so sometimes they also similarly like don't really have the same effects of causing heavy bleeding, although sometimes they can because they're really more like they're coming from the myometrium. And they're not the same as a submucosal fibroid or submucosal myometrium, which is when the when the fibroid is actually like in the mucosal wall of the uterine cavity. And so this is when you're going to have the fibroid getting in the way of the period and the uterus is going to feel like it's kind of like you know, when something's in your nose and you feel like something's in your nose, well, that's what's going on in your uterus, like your uterus is trying to expel every single month, something that's along the inside lining of the wall. And so that's why there's so many heavy periods and so much pain. I mean, some women actually explain the pain of these periods as childbirth like and they're not far off and they're not wrong. Because the uterus is actually trying to expel something from the uterus when there's a submucosal fibroid. There's also cervical fibroids to, which are fibroids that can sometimes be found like within the the service server itself, which is more of like the neck of the uterus. So I think understanding kind of like, the different types helps to understand the treatments too. So there's three tiers. So there's usually the first tier which includes really kind of traditional medical therapy. So this is when someone will get put on birth control pills, or they'll get put on some sort of progestin containing IUD like a Skyla or a Mirena IUD, and that's really just meant to control the pain and the bleeding that's associated with the fibroids. Every once in a while there's hysteroscopic resection of the submucosal fibroids. So sometimes it's a very, very minor minor surgery that's done it can sometimes even be done in office or you know, in an outpatient setting, where a surgeon goes in and just removes the fibroids that are irritating the wall of the uterus. The second tear is, I think, starting to become much, much more common and we've seen developments now in the this tear of treating fibroids which are with gonadotropin antagonists are gonna trigger an agonist and they kind of work the same way, even though it's weird, like one is an antagonist and one is an agonist, but they reduce the growth of the fibroid itself. And these are medications like that you might have heard of like, or Alyssa and Lupron and my friend Ray, they're taken either in injection or pill form. And this basically is used to shrink the fiber. And they work really well, especially for women who kind of have moderate symptoms, not so much severe symptoms or debilitating bleeding or pain every single month. But for the moderate symptoms, they do sometimes work really well. Some women don't necessarily like the side effects, because the bleeding can be irregular. And for some women, it just doesn't work well, because they don't like oh, I have to take an injection every single week, or every single month, they might not like how it makes them feel. And so they like the control of something like birth control, or they like the control of something whether it's just a pill that they take every single day. And then there is in that tier, that second tier something called uterine artery embolization, which is when a surgeon will kind of go in to the uterine arteries or the blood supply, like whatever the blood supply that's feeding the fibroid itself, and they'll put st kind of like almost like a sand into near and around the stock or near and around the base of the fibroid and then create a clot and then that decreases blood flow to the uterine fibroid itself. And then the third tier would be more like focus surgery where someone is going in and having a full myomectomy. You know, this can sometimes be done vaginally or through the abdomen and actually opening up the abdomen and removing the fibroids that way, or endometrial ablation. Um, that's not usually done in women who want to have children in the future, although sometimes it can be and then, of course, hysterectomy is kind of like the ultimate, you know, you've tried everything and you've exhausted all of your options. And that's the only choice that we have left. So that's kind of the way fibroids work and the different types of treatments that are available.

Regan Jones 18:29 Okay, but you all have I, as I understand it, correct me if I'm wrong, some different and more natural treatments. Is that right?

Kristin Mallon 18:37 Well, a lot of what we do is kind of like what I talked about in the beginning. And and I think that it also goes along with early diagnosis and early intervention. You know, there's not really a great standard within the OB GYN community of how often or how early you should be using ultrasound GYN ultrasounds to screen for certain things, like fibroids, and even things like ovarian cancer. So in my practice, we've always been incredibly, incredibly proactive. And we we offer ultrasounds pretty much to everyone across the board that's in their 30s and up, and so we're able to kind of pick up on these fibroids much earlier. fibroid doesn't can't always be picked up on on ultrasound, and sometimes MRI needs to be used. But if a fibroids big enough where it's going to be a problem and needs treatment, especially whether it's natural treatment or pharmacological treatment, an ultrasound is usually enough to be able to give us the information that we need to kind of understand where to go from there. And even in asymptomatic women and I think this is like a huge opportunity for women's health to get better is that we should be using GYN ultrasounds more as a screening tool to help us pick up these are these fibroids much much earlier so we're not waiting till a woman is symptomatic and then working with the fibroid when a woman is symptomatic because often a woman has had that fibroid for many many years and she had No idea before she starts to have the symptoms of the heavy bleeding and the pressure and the pain and the urinary symptoms, etc. So yeah, so I'm happy to talk about how we how we treat it. So because I mentioned that we really kind of see it as this hyper estrogenic state or an estrogen dominant state, what we really work on is controlling the estrogen dominance. So it's not so much that the ovaries which you know, produce the majority of the sex steroid hormones, when it comes to progesterone and estrogen for women are producing more estrogen than they should be, what's really happening is other hormones are starting to decline. And then the ratio of estrogen to other hormones like progesterone DHEA, and testosterone is off. And so when we support and correct for those other hormones, and we bring those other hormones back up to their normal levels, we find that we're not creating the high estrogen or the hyper estrogenic states that are very common for women in their late 30s, and 40s, which lead to fibroid growth. So there's a lot of different ways that we do that. So number one is testing. So we do a lot of diagnostic testing to see, where's the woman's hormones, where's the woman's hormones at different points in her cycle, because the the cycle is really divided into two phases. It's divided into the follicular phase, which is a phase that's dominated by estrogen, and then the luteal phase. You know, there's the ovulate ovulation, which happens right in the middle, but then the luteal phase, which is dominated by progesterone. So checking, we like to check hormones three times a month in the follicular phase at ovulation. And then then luteal phase to see where the hormones are falling and what ranges are normal. And this is actually believe it or not, I think it's crazy. But it's a pretty big controversy out there, among other people who do hormone balancing, or who do type GYN types of services like this, because they're like, Oh, you don't need to test like hormones vary too much like you're not going to get information and you don't need to test, that's a very common thing that we hear, yeah, I've heard that. But getting the getting the hormone levels at the different times of the month, you're gonna get a range. So for example, if you test someone in the beginning of the month, and their extra dial level is 400, versus 50, or versus five, you're going to know much, much more because maybe the range of that person at 400, that range isn't going to be five to 400. If they're 400, in the beginning of the month, you know that that that range is probably something more like 200 to 400 or 200 to 600. So even though you're not getting an exact number, you're still getting a sense of the range of where that hormone is falling at that specific time of the month, which is why I think it's so so important. And as I think we develop more types of tools, there's a lot of tools now we have mirror care, we have probe, we have mental Pro, we have a lot of tools now where we can test urine metabolites at home, and we can track the menstrual cycle at home and understand not not as perfectly as serum and not a perfectly as blood testing. We can track what's going on with the menstrual cycle, to understand what hormones are high and low, and then balancing them out with herbs with nutrients with gut microbiome balancing, or with bioidenticals or even pharmacologic, if they're necessary.

Regan Jones 23:16 That last part that you talked about, the testing with urine metabolites was new to me. So I am very familiar with doing serum testing of different hormone levels, and I will reinforce exactly what you say. I mean, I've had multiple doctors, OBGYN, say over the years. Oh, no, there's no point in doing that. Because you're not ut doesn't tell you anything, because hormones fluctuate. But I know that there's always been an alternative viewpoint. And there's, you know, the opportunity to to have that testing done. And I have had that done and looked at some of that information over the years. But as you were initially talking about the validity of checking hormones throughout the course of a woman's cycle, in my mind, I was thinking, Well, yeah, but how many times does somebody want to go in and have their blood drawn for serum levels, but I love what you said about the fact that there are these tests that do this on a urine metabolite level. So these are, these are home based kits that someone would be able to get through your practice. And that's how you all would assess the hormone levels throughout that month.

Kristin Mallon 24:22 Is that right? Yes. So actually, these these hormone tests are available over the counter. And they're becoming I mean, more and more popular by the month, I feel almost every month, I find that a new test is popping up that will test urine metabolites at home. And in addition to that, there's a lot of new testing that's being done now with saliva as well. So I think that this that, you know, it's funny because my colleagues and I always talk about all the time like the things that are kind of like outdated that like those of us that are in practice every day hands on patients all the time like reading lab reading lab. and working with women and understanding their symptoms, know what's really going to come down the pike, I think versus a lot of doctors that sometimes they lose track with patients, and they get into research, which is incredibly, incredibly valuable and serves its purpose. But we were like this lab debate is going to end soon because we get so much information and then we're able to pinpoint exactly rather than guessing rather than overtreating and giving someone something that they don't need, we're able to pinpoint exactly what a woman needs, and then watch how it changes in her urine metabolites or serum. If someone like you said, is willing to come in three times a month, you know, sometimes a woman's like, oh, I live right by the office, no big, I'll pop on over. But yeah, for someone who lives an hour, 45 minutes from a lab, that's not really realistic for someone to do something like that.

Regan Jones 25:50 And especially for people who are a little bit needle phobic, I'm not one of those people don't mind getting blood draws, but I know plenty people who are so truly the the trade off and being able to do something like this on a urine metabolite level is, is really a benefit. And I will just reinforce what you have said, I'm not someone who is working with patients day in and day out. But as an avid observer in the health community, and as a registered dietitian, it is fascinating to me, where we are today with all of the different levels of testing down to a fingerstick a urine metabolite, like you say, a saliva test, the things that we can do, really home based that it really would have taken a major, you know, act of God almost to get some sort of doctor's order to get a test done, you know, say just 10 years ago.

Kristin Mallon 26:43 Yeah, absolutely. And I'm always so thrilled and pleased because I think the more women, I've always thought that you know, as a practitioner, and as a clinician, as a certified nurse midwife, like we're really partners with the women we treat in their care. And I'm an expert in, you know, obstetrics and really non intervention based gynecology, that's, you know, I'm not a GYN surgeon, but they're experts in themselves and them and them as individuals. And so when we work together, we can use my expertise in GYN and obstetrics and their expertise in themselves to come up with the best, most perfect plan for them. And that's really, the more power they have. And the more information they have in their hands, the more we can work together to create a really perfect, beautiful plan for them.

Regan Jones 27:27 Yeah, absolutely. I constantly advocate on this podcast for people to be, you know, their biggest advocate for themselves. And it sometimes takes a complex medical team to do that. But it really sounds like what you all have, that you are doing in this sort of concierge telehealth space, with women at midlife is very fascinating. And like I said at the beginning, I'm so glad that you and I were able to connect because I think that you have certainly on this topic, shed some light in ways that I did not know and hopefully have piqued people's interest to maybe understand a little bit better their risk factors for uterine fibroids, and explore whether or not that's something that they need to be taking into consideration and potentially evaluating in the future for themselves. So Kristen, is there anything else about this topic that I haven't asked you that you think people need to know?

Kristin Mallon 28:17 There are some more natural ways to treat fibroids for sure. And you know that, I'm sure also as a nutritionist, you know a lot that dairy is a big culprit when it comes to fibroids and women who have sensitivities to dairy can often benefit from going on dairy free diets, and a lot of times gluten free diets. Certainly liver detoxification helps women to metabolize estrogen much better. And so also working with gut microbiome balancing and finding if there's high enzymes in the gut microbiome, like beta glucuronidation. And then you know, supplementing with calcium D helps women to metabolize estrogen more efficiently, making sure they're cleaning up dyes, and like tartrazine and, you know, any type of preservatives in their diet so that their liver can process all of their estrogen more efficiently are really great natural ways to kind of help women with fibroids. The other thing that's really big about fibroids too, is vitamin D deficiency. So that's a that's like been proven time and time again in multiple studies that women that have vitamin D deficiencies are at a higher risk for developing fibroids and having worsening fibroids and morsing fibroid symptoms so correcting that can also be a really helpful thing for women to do.

Regan Jones 29:30 I I'm so glad that you mentioned that vitamin D deficiency is one of those things that I'm actually super passionate about because I think that people are walking around with really poor vitamin D levels and don't necessarily know it. So I would love for you to just briefly give people your recommendation in terms of like, go have your vitamin D check. I mean, I want your recommendation not mine, but is it go have your vitamin D checked and then you know based on what the levels are, maybe you need a different you maybe you need to be aiming for a higher level than what's published, you know, just kind of walk out your thoughts on vitamin D treatment for us.

Kristin Mallon 30:04 So vitamin D is kind of tricky because synthetic vitamin D can also be harsh and toxic too. So you got to find the right forms of vitamin D, obviously, Vitamin D from the sun is the best type of vitamin D, but a lot of us wear protective sunscreen. So we're not always getting the vitamin D that we need there. We really like to see vitamin D levels over 50. And I know that there's some people like 80, I think that there's kind of different ranges that different people aim for and try to kind of achieve the there's, sometimes people talk about insufficiency versus optimal. So we're usually shooting for vitamin D, like at least over 35 minimum. And then if a woman's willing to work with us on it, we'd like to get it over 50 And then the sun is best. So one of the things is there was a study out of Australia about the use of sunglasses. And so we try to kind of work with women about not wearing sunglasses to help their body actually produce more vitamin D, if they're open to that, going into the sun without sunscreen, maybe for just five or 1510 minutes and then applying the sunscreen so that they're able to absorb the sun as best as possible. And then when those methods don't work, and we can't raise the vitamin D up enough, especially if women live in, you know places where like not California where there's sun all the time, then we do supplement usually with some sort of liquid based vitamin D or hyper absorbable vitamin D, and then watch the levels very closely because too much vitamin D can also start to cause symptoms too, especially when it's from a synthetic source.

Regan Jones 31:37 Okay, very good. Thank you for I just kind of added that at the end because I was really felt like that was like a public public service announcement that we needed to, to share with people. Well, Kristen, you have just been a wealth of knowledge today if you will do my listeners a favor and let them know how they can find you online and on social media. All

Kristin Mallon 31:54 of our social media handles our FEM devotee, just ask them devotee on Facebook Instagram Tik Tok. We do run a lot of lives on Instagram on Monday nights at 9pm. Eastern so people can come and ask us questions there.

Regan Jones 32:08 We try to make ourselves pretty available. And our website is longevity health.com. And as I do with every episode, I will be sure to place a link in the show notes to both the FIM devotee website and the Instagram account. Kristen, thank you so much for joining me today. It's really a pleasure.

Kristin Mallon 32:24 Thank you so much for having me. It was just so fun to talk to you.

Regan Jones 32:27 That wraps up my interview with Kristin. And you probably noticed that at some point, I mentioned that uterine fibroids had actually been suggested as a topic to do on this unmillennial life, I believe by a couple of different people. And if you've never taken the opportunity to consider episodes that you're interested in, that you would like for me to research a guest that I could interview, now is the time to do that I am planning for the second half of season seven, which will be coming up after the holidays. And you can submit that information to me simply by sending me an email Reagan at thisunmillenniallife.com. I'll be sure and place my email address in the show notes. Or I have a guest form where you can fill that information out topic suggestions. And that is one of the ways that some of the topics over the years have come up is by suggestions by people just like you so that guest form will also be linked in the show notes. I'm gonna take a quick break but stick around for the odds and ends ending where we're going to be talking about one of my absolute new favorite beauty products that I love. That's coming up next. Today's broadcast is brought to you buy your color guru, your color guru.com is where I went this last year to get my color consultation done. And there's a little bit of comedy in thinking about having your colors done. I say that in air quotes because many of us as Unmillennials remember back in the days of the 80s of doing your color, but let me tell you what your color Guru is doing is so far beyond that. And they're giving you so many tools when you actually have your colors done. And the reason that I say so far beyond that is because back in the day when we would find out what our colors were I think it was like four seasons winter, summer, fall and spring but your color Guru is much more robust than that. For instance, I'm a moonlit summer which is different than a sunlit summer. And one of the things that I love the most about your color guru and the color consultation consultation that I had done is that it comes with a color card. I have both a printed card that I can throw in my purse so that when I am out shopping I can pull that card out of my purse and hold it up to anything that I'm looking at to determine Hey, is this one of my best colors? I also have the JPEG on my phone so if I don't have the card with me, I just simply look at my phone and it has been invaluable. It makes shopping so much easier. So if you are interested in having your colors gone or gifting it to someone else, you can get 10% off off of your color guru consultation by simply using the code Regan which is our E g a n at checkout at your color guru.com There's a link in the show notes. Okay, you've heard in the commercial break that I do with color guru that I really feel like that color guru has been one of the best things that I've done in the last few years from a beauty standpoint simply because I can wear something that's one color not getting compliments put something on it's in my color guru color palette and I seem to get tons of compliments and I love that but the product that I want to tell you about today is one that is easily accessible to virtually all of us. And maybe many of you know about this product. You've seen it at your local you know drugstore slash pharmacy and that is the technologist tanning drops. So people who've been around the podcast for a while know that I've talked about different self tanners, I have a spray tan setup here at home that I use. It's not nearly as expensive as you would think I bought it years ago it's probably increased in price. But I'll place a link in the show notes to that in case you're interested in just kind of the overall full body tanning as we head into the winter. I did an episode on skin cancer with a dermatologist and we talked about self tan and how that really is probably a better alternative than you know getting out and baking in the sun to get that beautiful glow. And for us going into the winter that's not even an option if you wanted it to be so setting all of that aside the only thing about the full body self tanning setup is I don't necessarily feel that it always gives me the best look on my face. The color of it just is sometimes a little too dark and and I just haven't felt like it was you know the best and I have tried different facial tanning moisturizers over the years and I don't know I just haven't found one that I was in love with have had plenty that I thought we're okay. But recently, I on a whim somewhat grabbed a tiny little tube of technologist tanning drops they were near the checkout and a CVS in one of these you know kiosks that has like the trial size travel size beauty products very similar to what you see in Sephora or Ulta. But but like CVS and Walgreens have started to incorporate those. So I grabbed those little tanning drops and I put them in my sunscreen that I was wearing for the day and so that was the first time I used it was on a Saturday well by that Tuesday I went to the gym to a new class that I attend immediately the instructor said oh my gosh did you recently get a facial Your face is glowing and I I kind of thought it was sort of funny because I have not gotten a facial as I said to you and last week's episode when I was talking about the press on nails my budget is really tight right now my beauty budget it it is much tighter than it used to be so that's not really something that I can pursue right now getting facials although I absolutely love them. So I thought that was a little bit comical and I said no it's probably these tanning drops. And it wasn't three minutes later that a woman that I know with the gym that I workout with she came in and said oh gosh did you just get back from the beach you you're just simply glowing. So I thought gosh, you know these must be pretty good. And then over the course of the next two days I had someone that I was on FaceTime with say gosh your face looks great today What did you do and then I was back at the gym two days later. And another woman that I work out with said gosh your face looks great. What what did you do so you know I gotta say four people within the course of about two to three days. mentioning it made me think you know what, this is a really good product and it's affordable. I'm not sure exactly how much I paid at CVS or Walgreens but I do know that on Amazon and I will place a link to this product in the show. Show Notes. This is an Amazon affiliate link as a reminder, that means if you purchase your prices the same but I might receive a very very small commission. They are about $20 on Amazon and you may look at the size of the bottle it's pretty small and think oh my goodness $20 For that tiny little bottle. But you only need about two drops for a little small POM of moisturizer or like I said I am putting it in my my sunscreen. It's highly effective. And it virtually has no odor that is another thing that I like about it. If you've ever used any type of face tanner on you know, obviously your face, then you know that sometimes the smell of those self trainers can be very off putting and having it really really close to your nose like that. It's just something that you tend to smell all day long. So I'm very very pleased with these. Again, the name of the brand are is technologist and you can probably find them at your local drugstore. Down here, we primarily have CVS and Walgreens, but you can get them on Amazon. And there is a link in the show notes. So that makes two weeks back to back with beauty budget buys. As a reminder, in case you've never listened to the episode that I did on cleaner beauty at the drugstore, I'll place a link in the show notes so that you can go back and refresh yourselves on those. That episode is a little bit old, in that I did it two or three years ago, but I don't think that the products have changed tremendously. And there is a handout that goes with ads that you can take with you to the drugstore if you're looking for cleaner Beauty Buys think things like beauty counter, which I love, but it's again, not within my budget right now. So alternatives to beauty counter type products. And with that we will wrap up today's episode have already done at the beginning of this episode in my plea for five star reviews on Apple podcasts. But honestly the best way that you can help this podcast grow is simply by sharing it with a friend, you can let your friends know that this umillennial life is available wherever they listen to their favorite podcasts, including, of course, Apple podcast and Spotify, which is where most people listen to this podcast. If you want to make sure that you never miss an episode of this unmillennial life. Go to thisunmillenniallife.com/subscribe to sign up for episode notifications. As I always say thank you so much for listening, subscribing, downloading and for sharing with a friend. I hope you have a great week.

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