The Kick Sugar Coach Podcast
The Kick Sugar Coach Podcast
Rachel Murray: A Holistic Approach to Overcoming Sugar Addiction
Are you struggling with sugar cravings and wondering if there's a path to freedom? Discover the transformative journey of Rachel Murray, a registered holistic nutritionist and former nurse, who overcame her own sugar addiction and now helps others do the same. In this episode of the Kick Sugar Coach podcast, Rachel shares how she uncovered her unhealthy relationship with food during her teenage years and found clarity through Bitten Johnson's sugar assessment program. From nursing to specializing in nutrition, Rachel's story is filled with serendipitous moments that led her to focus on sugar addiction recovery.
We explore the complex and often emotional process of overcoming sugar addiction. Rachel walks us through the initial steps she took, including specialized training and a holistic medicine of addiction program. She also opens up about the spiritual and psychological battles she faced, shedding light on the internal struggle against the voice that tempts moderation. Hear Rachel's heartfelt reflections on giving up beloved foods and learn her strategies for embracing long-term health over fleeting cravings.
Understanding how hormonal fluctuations impact cravings is vital, especially for women. Rachel discusses the significant role hormones play at different life stages and shares her expert insights on distinguishing between emotional and physical hunger. Learn why hydration can sometimes be mistaken for hunger and how a compassionate mindset can aid in recovery. Rachel's journey to a sugar and flour-free lifestyle since December 26, 2020, along with her professional expertise, offers listeners a comprehensive guide to balancing hormones and achieving a sustainable, healthy relationship with food.
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Welcome everybody to the Cake Sugar Coach podcast. I have with me today Rachel Murray, who is a fellow Canadian and a fellow sugar addict in recovery, and a fellow coach who is here to share her passion, her own personal and professional experience with the topic of sugar and sugar addiction, or food and food addiction, and that whole complicated hot mess that we can all land in. So, rachel, I'll just tell you a little bit about her. She's a registered holistic nutritionist. She's also a former registered nurse. She nursed for eight years before moving into this field full time. She has advanced training in nutrition and athletic performance addiction medicine, specializing in sugar addiction and women's health.
Florence:She loves, loves, loves teaching and talking about healthy nutrition and is a woman walking the path of recovery and loves to talk about how we can repair a relationship with food, discover how we can nourish ourselves without using food, new and better ways, while also still having a pleasurable and meaningful relationship with food we don't have to become ascetics and also how they can restore their health and find their ideal body weight and all the good things that we seek for as we start out on this path. Welcome, rachel. Oh, thanks so much for having me. So tell us a little bit about your own story. How did you first come to an awareness that there's something wrong with me and sugar?
Rachel:Yeah, so I don't know that I connected the dots with sugar in particular at a young age, but I definitely knew, probably starting in puberty, that my relationship with food wasn't healthy, that my relationship with food wasn't healthy, and I can remember being like 12 or 13 and just begging my mom to buy me these, these supplements or these pills that I saw in a magazine that I think the promise was to like stop craving or something along those lines. I can't really remember, but so it goes back like a really long time. But I found my way into the sugar addiction recovery space thanks to a series of kind of, I guess, serendipitous events. So I started practicing nutrition in 2018, after I kind of transitioned out of nursing in a hospital setting and I seem to attract the same kind of client. So it was most often women who wanted to lose weight and they were frustrated by the food cravings that just kind of kept derailing their progress. And I had this one nutrition client who she was just really struggling so hard with sugar and food and she wanted so badly to just be able to eat like a quote unquote normal person and lose the weight and keep it off, but at the same time, she would spend hundreds, sometimes even thousands of dollars on food as a way to celebrate like a special occasion or someone else's special occasion, and so, you know, I was really grateful to be able to work with her, but at some point I just didn't know how to how to help her.
Rachel:So around this time I was doing some research, because that seemed to be the same kind of client that kept coming to me, and I happened upon a podcast interview with Bitten Johnson, and I was so intrigued by how she described sugar addiction and that it was a real and serious thing because I think we all have heard it joked about and I think that was the first time I really heard someone speak about it seriously and so I emailed her and she responded almost immediately and we had a little bit of back and forth and I decided to enroll in her sugar training program and as a part of that I had my own sugar assessment done, and it was through that that I learned that I myself was actually addicted to sugar and that's what had been troubling me all these years since I was, like I said, 12 or 13. So that realization really inspired me to pivot my nutrition practice to really focus on supporting women who struggled with those sugar cravings or sugar addiction, and it was. It was just really relieving and freeing, I guess you could say, because there was kind of some concrete evidence and, you know, something that I could really work towards with with that knowledge that I had gained. So if you want me to explain what the sugar assessment is I don't know, I'm sure you've had other guests on talk about it, but I can explain it if you want Sure, go there.
Florence:That'd be great.
Rachel:Yeah, so the sugar assessment so sugar stands for sugar use general assessment recording, and it's basically a gold standard assessment tool and it's implemented through a two-part interview. So the first session you and the practitioner who you're working with asks you a series of questions there's 60, some odd questions, so it's very in-depth and the purpose of all those questions is to determine if your brain has developed an addiction to sugar starch, ultra processed foods, whatever you want to call them, and then with that we're able to provide the client with recommendations and strategies on what to do next, what to do with all that information do next?
Florence:what to do with all that information? Yeah right, it's an interesting assessment because it also asks you about other potentially psychoactive substances, like alcohol and pot and caffeine, and you know like, there's other ways, like what other substances are playing into this potential addictive brain that's becoming more and more dysregulated as we continue to need more and more of substances just to feel, feel okay. Um, so you do this assessment. You're like, oh my gosh, I literally am an addict. So addicts fall into three categories. Well, I shouldn't say that there's users, abusers and addicts. So I think Bitten calls it harmful users versus addiction. And you, you were a full on addiction.
Rachel:Yes, yeah, yeah, so I was. I was somewhat surprised to find that out. Like I I being a nutritionist and a nurse, like and even besides that, I just always been interested in health and wellness. I thought that I was eating healthy, and most of the day I would, but it was always in the evening that I struggled, and so and I know that many people listening can probably relate to this you quote, unquote you do good during the day and then the kind of train falls off the tracks in the evening, and that was totally what was going on with me, and I felt like an imposter because, being a nutritionist, I felt like I had to hold myself up to this specific standard and you know, I wasn't necessarily doing what I recommended to my clients all the time. So, yeah, finding out that I was addicted to sugar, it was actually relieving because I could put a name to what was going on, and and then I had some answers on what I could do.
Florence:And how and tell us a bit about that journey. So you've joined Bitten's course because you're like I need to be more effective with these clients that are struggling to break up a sugar and to fall in love with whole foods and have it stick right, and so you're like interested in this for them, and all of a sudden you realize, oh my goodness, my brain is also developed a dependency and it is now tipped over into an addiction, and this might explain my struggle with late night eating of refined carbohydrates. And so then what happens?
Rachel:So I think at that point, after having my own assessment done, the willpower definitely kicked in. But we all know that willpower is just short term. So I I really wanted to make this work, because I had made that decision that this is what I was going to do. I was going to help other people. So I really just dug in and I actually, for the short term, I transferred my sugar addiction into this research addiction. So I was just researching everything about sugar addiction.
Rachel:I was listening to your summits, to the Quit Sugar summits. I was listening to your summits, to the Quit Sugar summits, getting my hands on any kind of information that I could. So it was all really helpful. But, yeah, I just I transferred that addiction. So I guess it's not the worst worst way of transferring it, but I did really become obsessive about it. And one, one other thing that I did was I did join SCA, which is like an, an AA group for sugar and carb addiction. So that was really helpful too, and I still I still attend those meetings today. So that was really pivotal in my own recovery as well.
Florence:Okay, and how, how, how well did you take to this? Did you struggle like other people or did the light bulb go on? You've got yourself a whole food meal plan, got some support. And when did you sail off? Into the sunset? Or did you have some spectacular face plants and relapses like the rest of us?
Rachel:Yeah, there were definitely some hard times and, um, I think you know I had all the information at my fingertips but yeah, there was definitely some setbacks and a lot of, you know, emotional outbursts and, you know, post acute withdrawal and going along with that, like I had a one year old at the time when I first started all this. So it was definitely a very intense, you know, six months to a year when I really, you know, dug into this. But yeah, it wasn't, it wasn't sailing into the sunset, that's for sure. There was definitely some setbacks and a lot of emotions, but my husband was very supportive with what I was doing and you know that was really helpful. I didn't have really pushback from family. So I I can say that I'm really blessed in that area.
Florence:So yeah, tell us a bit about post acute withdrawal syndrome. Pause, as they say.
Rachel:Yeah, like and this is something that you know I was kind of learning about it as I was going through it and for me it really showed up. It was probably three or four months into, you know, giving up the sugar, and for me it was really. It wasn't so much cravings that I was experienced, it was just like these crazy mood swings and I I thought it was maybe and I'm sure I'm sure it had something to do with it, but I thought it was maybe just related to my hormones with um and having, you know, very little sleep with a one-year-old. But I think that that post-acute withdrawal definitely played into that and it really can sneak up on you. And that was totally the case for me. Like just was not expecting this and it was a good week or so of some pretty, pretty massive mood swings and then it would kind of peter out and then come back again, um, and that lasted, you know, like starting at month three or four, and it did last a couple months for me. So what?
Florence:oh, oh you, you slayed that off easy. Oh that's. Yeah. I think I felt the whole first year like a skinned cat, just so raw and so like oh, my goodness, I hope my skin toughens up, I hope that.
Rachel:I hope that I don't feel like this forever right yeah, it came in waves, like maybe I'm not remembering it perfectly correctly, but I remember that four month time period was really tough.
Florence:And it's funny because, as it's getting easier to stay abstinent, because our body's like experiencing this transformation and it's like, omg, yes, this is better, I like this, this is good, I'm not going to fight you anymore, but in the meantime, this, this emotional vulnerability opens up, so it's like it's not, it's not the cravings and the and we don't miss the food. It's this whole sort of vulnerability to life that we didn't realize. We were so disconnected from, or at least numbed out from. You know, when we're in the food and repressing and suppressing emotions so effectively. Yeah, and then, so four month mark, that started to open up. You started to become really quite connected to your body, your feelings, your emotions. You had a few swings that settled down after a couple months. And then and then what happened? What was the next leg of your journey?
Rachel:So during that time I had I completed the sugar training with bitten and then I also took on the holistic medicine of addiction program that she runs. So I was doing all that. So I was, I was learning all this stuff and going through it all at the same time and, yeah, so that was. It was intense, like it was. Addiction was never an area that that I was interested in or had much exposure to as a nurse. I was, I I was a staff nurse and I worked like on a medical surgical type of unit.
Rachel:So, um, we saw a little bit of that, but it really wasn't something I had had any experience with. So, yeah, I, I just the big part of that first year or two was, um, was just a lot of learning and um, I think that I found grounding, um with, with SCA and just understanding those steps and, um, it was a really and it's still a spiritual journey. But I think that that was the biggest piece for me and just like I was so, so opened up to like all these things that I had been missing because I had been suppressing it with sugar when I, without even realizing it, yeah and um, oh, just a sec, the question just went right out of my head.
Florence:Oh, uh, yeah, oh, my goodness, rachel, just one second. It's something about sugar addiction. Bitten that phase of your life, I don't. Oh, did you at any point this was my question Did you at any point because it had literally not occurred to you, to you were looking into this for your clients? Did your brain ever say nah?
Rachel:Oh yeah All the time it. Oh yeah all the time.
Florence:it still says that sometimes that right, yeah, okay, yes, let's talk a bit about that, because that's so helpful for people to understand that it's not like wow, for the rest of us, the light bulb goes on, we accept, oh, this is an addiction. Okay, I guess I have to be abstinent, you know, and it's all this like peaceful sort of surrender, whereas I still have a brain that tries to tell me, no, you're not really addicted. Like, so talk a bit about that. Like, what was that like to navigate that? Because that came on you pretty darn quick. I mean, you first learned about it and then we're fully into addiction recovery, really quickly.
Rachel:Yeah, yeah, and I think for myself, one of the benefits is that I am very determined once I set my mind on something, so I think that when I heard those voices they didn't last too long. But yeah, I mean it. Like I said, it still happens today and you know it. You, your own mind, tells you the craziest things, like yeah, you could have, you could have a piece of that again, you could have that piece of chocolate. Like you could probably moderate it. And how many years did I try to do that? Like you know, probably. You know I'm 38. So we're coming up on decades.
Rachel:Yeah, decades of trying to do that and it never worked. And we still hear those voices telling us that we can.
Florence:so and how do you handle that voice If I was to play that voice with you right now? Come on, Rachel. Like you know, it's dark. It's 90% dark chocolate. It's high in magnesium. It's good for women's hormones, I heard. Or it's a superfood. You can have a little.
Rachel:You know what I think? That I cut chocolate was my thing too, so it's funny that you say that, um, when I first gave it up, I described it and I hear other people talk about it like this too I was grieving, like I, I thought that I was losing or not not that I thought it, but it felt like I was losing a good friend of mine when I decided to give up chocolate, because that was really um, it was always chocolate. That kind of led me into everything else. And now, when I think about it, like it doesn't have the same hold on me, but I still hear that voice and what.
Rachel:What I really tell myself is that it's just not worth it. Because I really tell myself is that it's just not worth it because, like, even if I could moderate it, like would it? Would it lead me to something else? And so I just don't want to get on that spiral. So I would almost describe it as like a healthy level of fear, because I don't want to um, like I don't want to demonize food, but at the same time, some things aren't actually food. And, yeah, you mentioned like, oh, it has the magnesium, and we hear all that, but it's like it's not really the best source of magnesium.
Florence:If that's really what you are deficient in, there's other things that we can choose from, so yeah, I know there's this moment when we move from FOMO a fear of missing out on all the other foods that everybody else gets to eat, that we think everyone else is getting away with, but no one is Rare, exceptions aside. If we walked around at some party and all these people are enjoying, you know, processed carbohydrates, either in the form of alcohol or sugar, flour, whatever chips and junk, and you know we think, oh, everyone else is doing fine. Alcohol or sugar, flour, whatever chips and junk. And you know we think, oh, everyone else is doing fine. I, how come? I, how come I don't get to eat it? Right? And then I think, if we took 15 minutes and just walked around the party and said, are you really getting away with it?
Florence:Do you have heartburn? Are you on any medications? Do you have any mental health issues? Are you a pre-diabetic? Oh, heartburn, are you on any medications? Do you have any mental health issues? Are you a pre-diabetic? Oh, you have depression. Oh, I would never have known.
Florence:From the outside, looking in, you look happy with this food, right, like, especially when we're around these foods. Because that's what they do, right? They tweak our brain chemistry and they make everything, for the moment, seem like all is well, so no one's getting away with it. But it's a shift when you realize, oh my goodness, no longer am I afraid of missing out on those foods, I'm afraid of missing out on what I have in my life.
Florence:Now, right, I'm afraid of relapse, I'm afraid of going back Like I don't. You got to be on the path long enough and have enough days piled up for your body to have that revelation to go. Oh, no, no, no, no, don't go back. Before it was like, let's go back, let's go back Right, and then it becomes our great ally as it realizes this is better, even though there's always that little addict voice in our head that thinks the party, the food party, is always worth it. But let's talk a little about tapping into your holistic nutritionist background and your nursing expertise, and let's talk a bit about how hormones for women, like what do we need to understand? About how hormones might play into addiction and addiction recovery.
Rachel:Yeah. So this is something that is really come on my radar a little bit more, because it's, as you know, as kind of happens with with our careers when we're in this type of health field is that what's going on in our lives often reflects on the type of clients that we're we're attracting. And so, being 38, you know I'm I'm starting to notice some changes in myself and really wanted to be proactive with that. So understanding hormones has been really top of mind for me and I've dug a lot into that connection between hormones and cravings, specifically for women, in the last year or so. So the big thing that I want women to understand is that if you're struggling with cravings or hormonal changes, you think that they're connected, or maybe just in this interview, you're like wondering, oh, maybe they're connected. We need to know that these are influenced by multiple experiences, so it can be our environment, it can be fluctuations in these hormones, it can be stress, it can be lifestyle habits and just our overall emotional well-being. However, these cravings or imbalances do not mean that you're weak, that you're broken, that there's something wrong with you, and it definitely doesn't mean that you should give up and throw in the towel, because I know that.
Rachel:You know, when we get into our late 30s, 40s, 50s, a lot of women just feel like like that's it. They give up because they don't whatever had been working for them. If they had found something that worked for them earlier in life, it just stops working. And we kind ofs are a normal part of the human experience and they can be influenced by physiological, psychological and environmental factors and in the world that we live in right now, you know all of those are in our face and you know having those cravings it's not something to be ashamed about. So what I try to talk to my clients about is really reframing those cravings and having a perspective of approaching them with, like, a mind of curiosity and compassion rather than judging ourselves. Because, like I said, those cravings can be a normal part of our existence. And, again, our hormones are fluctuating all the time. No matter, you know, if we're in our teen years or we're in our 20s or 30s or 40s, our hormones are going to fluctuate and, you know, throughout the different stages of our cycle, or if we're pregnant or we're going through menopause, all of these hormonal fluctuations are going to contribute to our appetite and our cravings. So, you know, we might have specific patterns that we can kind of follow once we tune into this, and so this can really help us to manage our cravings.
Rachel:Another area that I really like to talk about is recognizing the difference between that emotional hunger and physical hunger, because these are really different hunger and physical hunger because these are really different but they can feel the same. So emotional hunger often arises from things like stress or boredom or you know some kind of emotional trigger, while physical hunger is the body's actual biological response for needing that nourishment. But they can feel so similar. So really learning how to tune into your body and recognize those two differences can, you know, get you on that path to understanding your cravings and knowing how to deal with them. And then, you know, going along with that, we can learn how to build that healthy relationship with food. Oh, you're muted.
Florence:Lawrence, Sorry about that. Tell me about let's go into some details around the difference between emotional hunger versus physical hunger. How can you tell the difference?
Rachel:Yeah. So I guess one other thing I should add into there as well with the physical hunger, sometimes it can also be thirst. So that's another kind of kind of sub point that I think we really are often dehydrated and that can show up as hunger as well, show up as hunger as well. But if you're, when you're trying to distinguish the two, like I guess the first thing that you can do is have a big glass of water. You know, wait 20 minutes. If you're still hungry, then you probably are actually hungry.
Rachel:If you're trying to differentiate between the physical and the emotional hunger, then really just taking a pause to think about, you know, am I feeling emotionally triggered by something like did something just happen in your life? Like in the immediate, you know five to 10 minutes that preceded this feeling? So that could be it. Or maybe you know you are bored, there's it's been a slow day and you're just looking for something to do. Or maybe you're feeling stressed. So, and if you are feeling stressed, then it might actually be a combination of both, because your body is asking for, for nourishment so that it has the energy that it needs to run away from that proverbial tiger. So there are some key differences, but obviously there is a little bit of overlap in there as well, so I hope that I explained that okay and that makes sense.
Florence:Totally.
Rachel:Is there anything else you would like to add about this topic, the topic of sugar, sugar addiction, sugar addiction recovery, before we wrap up today, yeah, I think that the last thing I want women to understand is just a little bit more about how, um, how their hormones can impact cravings and, um.
Rachel:I can just go through one example of this. It's, it's not, it doesn't cover it all, but I think, just if we look at that last week of a woman's cycle so the week before she gets the her period we often talk about having PMS and carb cravings. Yeah, so if you didn't, I mean, many women are struggling with this, you know, maybe all month long, but that week before she gets her period, that's definitely when it's worse. And there's, you know, there's a physiological reason for this, and one of them is that our body is actually building the uterine lining at that time. So we're literally building a new organ in our body. It's an amazing process and so it requires more energy, and we actually most of us require an additional 10 to 15 percent more calories during this week before a period. Therefore, our body is is going to ask us to to consume more energy, and if we're not tuned into this or we're not responsive, then we're likely going to interpret those cravings, or that that want for more energy, as sugar or processed food cravings. So if we kind of backpedal on that and we're prepared for that week before our period and we you know everyone's different on what they need and this applies to both people with sugar addiction or not you know, if we we plan to increase either our protein or maybe we up our carbs using I love Dr Mindy Pell, she calls it nature's carbs so we're leaning into, you know, healthy carbs. We're not. We're not leaning into cake and ice cream, but real whole foods. So if we're preparing by increasing those foods in the week before our period, then this can really help to support us and lower those cravings.
Rachel:And another reason you know we have more sugar cravings is that that week before period our progesterone levels are also rising and progesterone actually likes a little bit more carbs and our body's able to tolerate them a little bit more. So, again, this, this can look very different. So, um, you know, some people do very, very low carb and if that's the case, you can support progesterone by um upping your protein. For others, they do want to lean into those healthy carbs. So, yeah, so I think that just that's just one example that I really want women to understand. Like that week before your period, you're not broken, there's nothing wrong. I mean, there could be something wrong that you need medically addressed, but those cravings, in and of themselves, they don't. They don't signify that that you're weak or broken. They actually your body is trying to send you some messages.
Florence:Interesting Totally. And is there something I so? For me, I always had a menstrual migraine, always, always, it was awful. The only time I didn't was actually since about the age of three, was after I gave birth to my daughter and I nursed for two years and I had just newly got. I found my 12-step program and I was clean and sober three meals, no snacks, whole foods only, no sugar, no flour, no sweeteners, no alcohol, and I was really doing this and I literally lost my period.
Florence:Well, I didn't lose my period. It never came back. It never came back after birth. I gave birth and then for another two years, that was the only time I never had any migraines. It was absolutely incredible. But when I started to cycle again, they did come back and I got it the night before my period started and I had been through a million, million, million experts. I'd even gone to some of the alternative medical migraine experts who would say, ah, it's the tough one, it's the last of the migraines that often shift, even with all the good things that you're doing and I'm teaching that you're doing. But someone had said that there's this drop in estrogen that actually activates the cycle and that the drop for some people, serotonin and estrogen are linked and a drop in estrogen means a drop in serotonin. Do you know anything about that and can you speak to that?
Rachel:That I'm not an expert in, um, that I'm not an expert in, but yes, it's definitely that drop in estrogen, um, for some people triggers those migraines and for others it's it's a rise in estrogen. So, yeah, so it's, it's really an interesting field and this is something that I've. It's funny that you say that, because I am actually researching this for um, for one, for one of um my good friends, because she's also started experiencing these, these, um migraines. So, um, but you are I mean, I can't speak to it much more than you. What you said but you did sum it up beautifully is that the, the estrogen and the serotonin do play. They have a very delicate balance, that they play with each other. So, um, yeah, we do, we do see that.
Florence:And and the thing that was interesting for me, it was interesting for for my migraine. But really, sarah, when estrogen drops and serotonin drops, if they're tied that way, that's why we're depressed and we're miserable and we're moody and we're weepy and we're like, oh right, life sucks. Two days into our cycle we're like, oh, life's good again. What was that Right? So it's just nuts how you're right, like how much our hormones play into our moods and our cravings and and our tendency to get discouraged. And so if we can sort of have a bit of a game plan for that last week, well, the longer you're on whole foods, the more likely your PMS is going to settle. And it might be just this minor sort of piece of the picture and for some people they say it completely goes away.
Rachel:Yeah, the only other thing I can kind of say to that is, like I said before, progesterone really likes a little bit of a higher carb environment. Estrogen, on the other hand, really thrives with low carbs. So I don't know I haven't really experimented with this but perhaps during that time again, you have to be able to track your cycle and know when it's coming, but to really just lean into that and know that that week of your period that low carb is going to feel better in your body. For most people that might be something that helps some people.
Florence:Right, right, not to fight it, just go with it. Figure out what foods you can handle. That don't trigger you. That give your body the support it needs during that that week. Awesome. Is there anything else? You any final words you'd like to say before we wrap up today?
Rachel:Um, I think just really emphasizing that you know that our cravings um are so influenced by our hormones as women and that you know leaning into understanding them can be so empowering. Because we are not taught about this in um, in sex ed, where I wasn't taught about it as a nurse, it didn't really come up in my nutrition program. This was all um things that I went above and beyond to learn and understand myself. So it really is an area that you know women are lacking well, everyone's lacking information, but women in particular, because you know to be able to understand and tune into our own bodies. When we can do that effectively, it really does feel like a superpower because we have all this information at our fingertips that we can use to to support our own health.
Florence:Oh gosh, I just thought of one more question. So you said something about estrogen likes low carb. Why is that? Does when we go lower carb, does that help raise estrogen post-menopause?
Rachel:It doesn't necessarily raise it, but it helps to balance it out. So, um, we're more um insulin sensitive, so um, estrogen and insulin also have. Our hormones are like, they just do this beautiful dance, right? So um, the insulin sensitivity sensitivity changes when, um when our estrogen wants to be higher. So so that is really how that rolls out. Sorry, I don't even know if I answered your question.
Florence:I'm not sure I understand. So as we age and we know our estrogens dropping and we know that for some of us there can be a little bit of a premenopausal and postmenopausal slump and some of us have heard it's you know the estrogen is dropping and that can sort of. That does course correct for some, for many. But when we go low carb you're suggesting that estrogen is better balanced in the body.
Rachel:It is.
Rachel:So, yeah, as we age, that that's an interesting question and I think that for some, if you looking at it from one perspective, you know, it kind of feels like we get the short end of the stick because as we age, we're even less able to handle sugar and carbs.
Rachel:So our body, as we age, we're actually, most of us, do better in a lower carb environment. But that's not to say that all women need to be super low carb as they, you know, enter menopause and beyond. But that can be something that that is helpful if, if you are recognizing some changes with either weight you know, weight loss, resistance or something along those lines um, that lower, lower carb eating can really move the needle for you. But, um, again, even though we might, you know, as we move beyond menopause, um, and we're not cycling and getting a regular period anymore, cycling our food can still be a really helpful thing because, just like anything in life, you know, if we do the same thing over and over again, it kind of loses its appeal, it loses its effectiveness. So being able to still have some kind of cycle with the foods, foods that we eat, can really just help to support those hormones and, you know, keep them. Not necessarily keep them around for longer, but keep them in balance.
Florence:Okay, amazing, wonderful. Thank you so much, rachel, for sharing your expertise around hormones, your own story of recovery. How long has it been, then, that you've been sugar flower free?
Rachel:Yeah, so it's been. It was December 26 of 2020. So I guess we're coming up on two and a half years.
Florence:Yeah, two and a half years Back to back, no slips, no breaks.
Rachel:I wouldn't say any relapses. There's probably been some slips along the way and some setbacks for sure. Yeah, okay.
Florence:Okay, yeah, yeah, amazing, well, wonderful. Thank you for coming today to share your passion for this topic and your story. I appreciate it. Yeah, thanks so much for having me, florence.
