285-SYNCPodcast_MiriamJacobson

[00:00:00] Jenny Swisher: Welcome friends to this episode of the sync your life podcast today. I’m being joined by my new friend, Miriam Jacobson. She is a functional medicine dietician, and I’m super excited to have her here. We’re going to be talking about all things, women’s nutrition specific to reversing diet, culture, mentality.

[00:01:13] Jenny Swisher: We’re going to be talking about. How women should really embrace nutrition and what we see in the culture around us. So I’m super excited for this conversation. We had a pre call a few weeks ago and I felt like I could have talked to her for days. I love when that happens. I love when there’s sort of just a synergy and an alignment in, in vision.

[00:01:25] Jenny Swisher: And this is something that I’m really passionate about. I mean, if you, if you’ve been listening to the podcast, this is not new to you, this idea that. I have seen in practice so many women who are struggling with metabolic health, hormone imbalance, et cetera, because of perhaps underfueling or, uh, just sort of this dieting mentality that I think a lot of us have suffered from.

[00:01:45] Jenny Swisher: So I’m excited to unlearn with you. You have so much knowledge in the realm of dietetics and nutrition, and so let’s dive in. So Miriam, tell us who you are, what you do, and how you got to doing that.

[00:01:55] Miriam Jacobson: Thank you so much, Jenny, for having me here. I’m so excited for our conversation today and to dive deep into all of these amazing and really important conversations.

[00:02:06] Miriam Jacobson: Um, so as, as you mentioned, I’m a functional medicine dietitian and I have been in the health and wellness world for 15 ish years now, maybe over 15 years. And I first started studying nutrition. In undergrad, because I always wanted to be in a helping field, and I thought that I was going to go into social work and I kind of just needed to take a science class.

[00:02:29] Miriam Jacobson: So I ended up in a nutrition class and I was so fascinated. With how food interacts with us in so many different ways, not only is it the physiological and the biochemical, but it’s also the social, emotional, cultural dynamics that we experience. play with food. And so that’s really what started me on my path to nutrition.

[00:02:52] Miriam Jacobson: And I got a whole degree in nutrition. I got my bachelor’s degree in nutrition. And at the end I graduated and I was like, I still don’t really know how to eat well, which is so wild that you can study something for four years and not know the basics of that. And so at the time, I was also really struggling with my health in other ways.

[00:03:10] Miriam Jacobson: I was an early trauma survivor, um, and so when I was 13 years old, my father was actually killed on 9 11. And so I, I, at the time, I didn’t understand how the emotional impact of that and avoiding my emotions really impacted my physiological health. And so I was eating really poorly. I was still holding a lot of trauma in my body and I was suffering physically.

[00:03:32] Miriam Jacobson: And so when I was in my 20s, I was always hungry, tired, nauseous. I was in pain. I couldn’t sleep at night. And I went to my doctor and I needed help. I was like, I’m 22 years old. This is not, this is not normal or healthy. Um, I’m scared for the rest of my life. And basically, all he did was talk to me about my cholesterol levels, and he was like, You, this isn’t an issue, that you’re kind of like making this up, it’s probably to do with hormones, right?

[00:03:57] Miriam Jacobson: And, which is obviously so frustrating, I’m sure so many people who are listening can relate to that. And, at the time, because I had my degree in nutrition, and I was working to become a registered dietitian, I was also the assistant to a functional medicine nutritionist in New York. And I told her what happened and she was like, okay, let’s do some food sensitivity testing for you.

[00:04:20] Miriam Jacobson: So I put my trust in her because I saw how successful she was with so many patients that would come into our office. I would see patients come in and the name was the same, but they would come in like from week to week and I’m like, you’re a different person, right? And so I did the food sensitivity test.

[00:04:35] Miriam Jacobson: I cut out all these inflammatory foods that I was reacting to. Within three months, every single one of my symptoms went away and resolved. And that’s when I was like, Oh, this is the power of nutrition. And this is how I want to help people. And so through her guidance, I figured out that what I wanted to do was called functional medicine.

[00:04:57] Miriam Jacobson: And so that’s when I went back for my master’s degree and I started studying functional medicine, which is really helping people understand why they’re sick. Why do you have digestive issues? Why do you have hormone imbalances? Why do you have mood issues, anxiety, depression, and how can we really balance it with food with physiology with, um, using nutrients and, um, really understanding our bodies like chemistry and how that is so individual.

[00:05:26] Miriam Jacobson: Yeah. So, That’s how I found functional medicine. That’s kind of my path along becoming a, you know, dietician and a functional medicine dietician. And it’s really incredible, um, to be working in this space. And I’m just,

[00:05:38] Jenny Swisher: yeah.

[00:05:39] Miriam Jacobson: So floored every single time I see improvements with people.

[00:05:43] Jenny Swisher: Yeah, that’s amazing.

[00:05:44] Jenny Swisher: I’ve shared here on the podcast before I have a similar, similar story with food sensitivity, food sensitivity testing, and just a bio individual approach to our health, right? Which I think is missing for so many people. And I love how you explained it so simply that, that functional medicine really is just, it’s a root cause approach.

[00:05:57] Jenny Swisher: It’s, it’s looking underneath the hood to see why you in particular are having the symptoms you’re having. Because there’s always a cause. And I feel like modern medicine is quick to bandaid things or use pharmaceuticals or a lot of times in hormone health, right? We just slap some birth control on it and move on.

[00:06:11] Jenny Swisher: And I love functional medicine because, well, really because of my own journey dealing with chronic migraines and then figuring out that actually 14 different neurologists couldn’t figure me out, but a few root cause tests with a functional medicine doctor could. So I’ve had my own journey in it and obviously advocate for it.

[00:06:27] Jenny Swisher: But one thing that I want to call attention to here is. I love that you, well, first of all, you know, sharing your story about just like childhood trauma and the things that have influenced you. One thing that I teach in my, in my community, my course taking community is what I call the five fundamentals of hormone balance used to be just four.

[00:06:43] Jenny Swisher: So it used to be sleep, supplementation, nutrition, and exercise. And through interviews on the podcast and meeting people like you and meeting amazing different doctors and naturopathic, uh, doctors and such, I started to see this pop up so much with this connection between our traumas. And then how we show up in the world and the things that are happening in our lifestyle with our nutrition and with our sleep and with our anxieties and all these things.

[00:07:07] Jenny Swisher: So we added a fifth fundamental to, uh, our fundamentals just this year of managing our traumas too. So I want to get into that at some point, but, um, I think that just this idea of like, we all kind of have our own story, which is ultimately what leads us here. And then it’s like, and then you can’t unlearn that.

[00:07:21] Jenny Swisher: You can’t like, You know, say, well, I guess I’ll just go back to just the modern way of whatever doctor’s covered on my insurance. Like, no, because now all of a sudden you have a different experience, you’re feeling better. Like you said, you’ve seen, you’ve witnessed people’s transformations. And now it’s like, you want to be able to turn around and share that and help other people.

[00:07:36] Jenny Swisher: So we have very, so many similarities in that, in that regard. So let’s talk more about just this idea that health is individual. I’d love to hear from, from your perspective. Um, I heard recently, uh, Maya Feller speak. She’s, she’s, I don’t know her exact title, but she’s with the Institute of Integrative Nutrition.

[00:07:53] Jenny Swisher: And she was talking about this idea that like, a food for me could be different for you. Right? So like, when I did my most recent food sensitivity test, it came back that apparently I have a high sensitivity to bananas, which I wasn’t consuming a lot of bananas. That was very interesting. I also learned that I had a high sensitivity to broccoli and some cruciferous vegetables.

[00:08:13] Jenny Swisher: Um, interestingly, you know, I was, I’m telling everybody to eat more broccoli because I know the benefits hormonally speaking for detoxing estrogen and all the stuff, but here I am probably overdoing it on the broccoli apparently. So health really is individual to each of us. So kind of touch on that and how you work with people in that regard.

[00:08:19] Miriam Jacobson: Yeah, I mean, it’s really fascinating. It absolutely is so individual and what maybe adds a little bit of a complex layer on it is that it’s dynamic even inside of our own bodies from day to day, year to year. And so, for example, with food sensitivities, yeah, you can be sensitive to broccoli, right? And so, um, really understanding why maybe you’re sensitive to broccoli, right?

[00:08:41] Miriam Jacobson: And even digging, like, a layer deeper. So, food sensitivities can be causing inflammation in the body, but then really understanding, like, Are there digestive impacts? Um, you know, maybe you’re not digesting your food properly, and maybe that’s what’s causing, um, a sensitivity to broccoli, or is there like leaky gut, right?

[00:08:56] Miriam Jacobson: And so really, um, peeling back even more layers can be really, can serve us. Um, really well. And, you know, I think this individualized approach is really important, especially when it comes to understanding what we’re experiencing in our body and also what we want to be achieving, um, and what our goals are.

[00:09:12] Miriam Jacobson:And I think taking like a goal centered approach and really aligning everything with that, because it is the most, impactful thing that we can do because there are a million things that we can be doing for our health at one given time, which is just so overwhelming. Yeah. You know, and, and so what

[00:09:24] Jenny Swisher: I was going to say, especially right now, right?

[00:09:26] Jenny Swisher: Like all the podcasts, all the Instagram is all about like, have you done your red light therapy and your sauna? And what about your cold plunge? And are you doing this and that with your nutrition at all? Are you, are you meal prepping? And then macros like is so overwhelming. And I always tell people like, okay, like, what is, like you said, what is your goal?

[00:09:40] Jenny Swisher: And let’s start with the things that we need to, you know, to implement first. So I, I hate to interrupt you, but I just wanted to say like, it is so overwhelming. And I think that people are women in particular, right? It’s like, a lot of times we have this idea that like, I don’t have time. I don’t have time because we really do take on the world for everybody else.

[00:09:56] Jenny Swisher: Right? Like it’s my response. Pack my daughter’s lunches, make sure their bags are ready for school, you know, get them bathed, get them on the bus, like, whatever the case is, like, their lives are my responsibility. And so at the end of the day, we’re like, well, mommy doesn’t have time to meal prep, like, or mommy’s not, you know, we’re not investing in a cold plunge, like, or whatever it is, you know, so what are the things that we can be doing?

[00:10:12] Jenny Swisher: Number one, I want to say this, like when you mentioned that about what, what’s a layer deeper, like, why, why am I sensitive to broccoli? So the functional doctor that I’ve been working with said the same thing. And she mentioned, we had a whole conversation on like sulfation issues, which was interesting for that, but I let like, you want the type of doctor or dietitian who’s going to say, okay, not just here are your sensitivities.

[00:10:31] Jenny Swisher: Avoid these. which I see happen so much, but also why. Maybe let’s dig a layer deeper as to why those are your sensitivities. I love that you mentioned leaky gut, all these other things that can happen. And then I think what goes missing a lot of times, I see this so much with women in our, in our practice is like, they come in.

[00:10:48] Jenny Swisher: And they’re like, Oh my gosh, I’m sensitive to these foods. So they just mix those foods, never realizing that actually those foods might be able to be reintroduced. Right. And like you said, like your body is ever evolving over the course of time. So, um, I think that’s all really, really good stuff. And I think that the people need to come away from this interview, ultimately learning that like you need to know what your individual goals are and then also do the work on whether it’s testing or working with the right practitioner to really see what’s going on, right.

[00:11:12] Jenny Swisher: Like from a root cause perspective. So

[00:11:14] Miriam Jacobson: there’s. Oh, sorry.

[00:11:15] Jenny Swisher: Go ahead. Go ahead.

[00:11:16] Miriam Jacobson: I was like, there’s two things I want to respond to. Yeah, there’s just such a rich conversation. Um, but yeah, if you look at food sensitivity tests, if you do a test today and then you do one six months or nine months from now, the results are going to change because our immune systems are constantly evolving.

[00:11:32] Miriam Jacobson: So like you said, it really is important to like, look at the layer deeper. And I think for women, the second thing I want to say is for women, especially like you were saying, we’re, Spread thin. We’re we invest in other people and our work and, you know, other people’s needs over our own. And What that does nervous system wise, we talk about trauma, we talk about stress, that’s really stressful in the system.

[00:11:58] Miriam Jacobson: And what do you think stress does to our gut?

[00:12:00] Yeah,

[00:12:01] Miriam Jacobson: it breaks down the mucus layer, it causes leaky guy, it reduces enzyme production and stomach acid production, right, so that we’re not actually able to digest the foods. And then the foods that are making their way into their gut, they’re slipping past that mucus membrane.

[00:12:17] Miriam Jacobson: And that’s what leads to food sensitivities. Right. And so when we take this like root cause approach, a lot of people, like you said, just like want the prescription of the diet and like what to eat and what to cut out. Um, but really, I think what we really need to be doing is working on our mental health and understanding how to create better boundaries in our lives to, to Improve our vitality, right?

[00:12:39] Miriam Jacobson: Cause that’s really what is going to improve hormone health longterm. That’s going to, what’s improve our quality of life and our longevity as we, as we move through life.

[00:12:48] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. One thing that I want to say too, is on this topic of, you know, individual goal setting and women understanding, I totally see what you’re saying because most women will come to me wanting, they want prescriptive fitness and they want prescriptive nutrition.

[00:13:02] Jenny Swisher: They want me to hand them a plan and they want to follow that plan to a T. Ultimately, so that if they don’t lose the weight, they can blame me for that plan. Right. So it’s like,

[00:13:09] it’s

[00:13:10] Jenny Swisher: not like, and I, I really try to avoid. You know, the idea of prescriptive anything, because it really is. It really, like people will say to me, you know, I teach cycle sinking.

[00:13:19] Jenny Swisher: So like our fitness program is catered to the menstrual cycle. And I’ll have women that say like, well, I know that the workout for today says this, but I don’t, I don’t really feel very good or I have low energy. And I’m like, so are you asking for me to give you permission to rest? Like, I should not have to give you permission to rest.

[00:13:33] Jenny Swisher: Like you should know your body. You should have that intuition. And you should, everything should follow your energy, right? So there’s this sort of conditioning, especially in the world I’ve been in, you know, I entered health and fitness through direct sales 13 years ago, and there’s sort of been this conditioning behind, you know, I like to call it diet culture mentality, right?

[00:13:52] Jenny Swisher: And this sort of, or conditioning when it comes to fitness, like I follow the calendar, I do the thing so that I get the results. Right. And I think the more we can unlearn that and unravel that. And say, okay, what feels good to me today and am I, am I following an overall plan that serves my goals is number one, I would be willing to bet that if we just took 10 women off the street right now, and we asked them like, what, what are your health goals?

[00:14:17] Jenny Swisher: We would get an answer that I would categorize as a diet culture response. I want the flat stomach. I want my arms toned, or I want. I want to lose 15 pounds. I want to get back to my goal weight, which a lot of times women’s goal weight is like their high school weight, which makes no sense, right? Like there’s so many different things that I hear on a daily basis.

[00:14:33] Jenny Swisher: And when I started doing telehealth consults with Dr. Page, Um, I started to see this times 10, like it was literally times 10, very rarely will a woman come in and say, I want longevity. I want to gain muscle and perimenopause. I want to be strong so that I can be a powerful grandma, right? Like, we don’t hear those things, but at the end of the day, like, what are we really after, right?

[00:14:53] Jenny Swisher: So it really does start with sort of like deconditioning the goal and saying, okay, yes, what is your goal? But then does that make sense? Or is that just the conditioning that you’ve been a part of? Anything you want to say there?

[00:15:05] Miriam Jacobson: Yeah, oh my god. All the things I want to say there. But I, you know, I think that’s such an important conversation because I hear that time and time and time again where it’s like, oh, I want to lose the weight.

[00:15:13] Miriam Jacobson: And I’m like, I actually won’t take on patients anymore who only want to lose weight. Mm hmm. Because that’s That’s doesn’t mean anything, right? Like that’s such an external marker for our health. And when we can really connect with how we want to feel inside of our bodies, I find that to be even more motivating because what happens when you have a strict meal plan, right?

[00:15:37] Miriam Jacobson: You follow it and you’re like, I’m doing really good. I’m doing good. Right? We like, we love to label food. I dialed it in. I’m dialing it in. Yeah, exactly. I’m on the wagon, you know, and so when you like eat a cookie, right, you should be able to eat a cookie if you want a cookie, you know, people feel really shamed and really feel guilty.

[00:15:52] Miriam Jacobson: And then they like go off the other end. Right. And so it becomes a feast or famine. And we begun being we begin to demonize food and demonize our bodies, which is honestly, just a massive distraction. For what else is happening in our lives, you know, um, it ends up pulling us out of our emotions and out of our work and I really think that there is a much larger conversation there in terms of like the patriarchy and, you know, how women are valued, right?

[00:16:20] Miriam Jacobson: Um, but I do want to say that I, um, As a member of a gym like pre COVID, but I remember going into the gym and they’re like, Oh, you had it was a very high end gym and they were like, Oh, you have, you know, free few sessions with this trainer. And I was like, great, you know, it’s free. I’ll meet with a trainer.

[00:16:35] Miriam Jacobson: And they start and they have you like talk about your goals. And I was like, Oh, well, I’m really, I’m hypermobile. I really want to work on my joint stability. Um, and I just want to make sure that like, I get to age 80 and I can play with my grandkids. You know, like that’s my goal in my life. And she put me on her scale and she was like, Oh, but you need to lose five pounds.

[00:16:52] Miriam Jacobson: And she wouldn’t let it go. And so even, unfortunately, like the health professionals and the people guiding these conversations are impacted by that as well. And so I think it’s really important to have those conversations around like, what even are your goals? Right? Are they motivating? Are they based on someone else’s standards for how we think we should look?

[00:17:14] Miriam Jacobson: Or is it really how we want to be living our lives and how we want to be feeling as we move through the day? And I think that is And I think that’s the core conversation that needs to happen before any changes, any lifestyle food changes happen.

[00:17:27] Jenny Swisher: Yeah, agreed. I mean, I, so in the peak of, let’s see, probably my late twenties into early thirties, I thought I was the peak, like just in peak physical shape.

[00:17:34] Jenny Swisher: Like we owned a gym at that time I was teaching bootcamp classes from 5am to 6pm, even throwing in my own workout in the middle of the day. If this was before kids, of course, too. So this was like. Fitness was my life. Like I was, you know, we hosted certifications at our gym. We did a lot of things, uh, in that space.

[00:17:47] Jenny Swisher: I never wore real clothes. Like I was always in workout clothes, right?

[00:17:51] I

[00:17:51] Jenny Swisher: remember like finding myself and my husband in a fertility doctor’s office after five years of unexplained infertility. And I remember saying to my husband before the doctor came in the door, I’m like, this is such a waste of time.

[00:18:03] Jenny Swisher: Like we are so healthy, like we’re so fit and healthy. And of course at that time I looked like I could be on the cover of something like I was super toned because I was doing nothing but movement all day long, probably under healing. Cause I, my adrenals suffered later. Um, And my husband was like, you know, yeah, we’ll just hear him out.

[00:18:11] Jenny Swisher: So he has a say, and when he came in the door and introduced the idea that I most likely had endometriosis and we were most likely dealing with some other issues, hormonally speaking, and we kind of went down this Avenue of like, Oh, actually. Internally, I’m not doing so great. Um, that was really my first awareness that like health in general is not necessarily your physical fitness.

[00:18:32] Jenny Swisher: It’s not necessarily like what you look like. It’s not the abs, it’s not the body. It’s metabolic health, right? And I think, I do think the conversation is changing. I follow people like Dr. Mark Hyman and others who, who are really sort of stepping up to this, you know, every, every patient in a doctor’s office should have their metabolic health evaluated.

[00:18:47] Jenny Swisher: We should be looking at insulin. We should be looking at how their blood sugar is doing because it is the root cause of so many diseases, right? Like we should, a person should know. Uh, or have regular checks on what foods are causing sensitivity issues, or, um, I think women should be having Dutch testing, you know, every so often for a year or so to see what’s going on with their hormones so that they know what’s going on.

[00:19:06] Jenny Swisher: Instead, we have such a reactive approach to health. Like, I like to say like, Oh no, now your house is on fire. I guess we need to throw stuff at it to put it out. Like, it makes no sense when there’s plenty that we can be doing, um, from a functional perspective. So, so yeah. So what I’d like to ask you though, is like, In what you do on a day, so you’ve mentioned a few things.

[00:19:22] Jenny Swisher: You’ve mentioned this sort of like, um, biological needs. So I want to touch on this first because I work with a lot of women who are fitness enthusiasts. They tend to be women who are also under fueling. So their activity level is high, right? We’re starting to see this now where everybody has a walking pad.

[00:19:35] Jenny Swisher: Everybody has a weighted vest. We can’t just go on a regular relaxing walk. We have to like wait ourselves out. You have to do it while we’re doing other things, right? Like Which is, I get it, like we’re increasing our movement, there is a large percentage of people sedentary, but the fitness enthusiast woman tends to then, it just becomes more, it becomes, okay well now I work out and I do a weighted walk on my walking pad all day long, right, so like now all of a sudden we’re adding all these things.

[00:19:57] Jenny Swisher: And as our activity level increases, a lot of times those women are not upping their fuel intake. So like if we’re not upping the food, not giving our body enough energy. That’s when we’re going to see things like internal health decline or metabolic dysfunction, right? So, um, so one thing that you mentioned earlier was like the body is always going to prioritize survival, right?

[00:20:15] Jenny Swisher: That’s how I like to say it. Your body, like if it is deprived, if you’re under fueling and overtraining or, or one or the other, what I see, what I tend to see even in my own life and in phases that I’ve experienced of this, I see where in the evening all of a sudden I want to eat everything, right? Like it’s like, I, I feel like I dialed it in all day and then at dinner and beyond all of a sudden I’m like, I just want the cookie.

[00:20:35] Jenny Swisher: I want everything else, right? I want people to understand that, you know, I think that we use phrases out there like binge eating or emotional eating. These are real things, but at the same time, your body from a scientific perspective, has a biological need for survival. And so when we are under fueling for our activity level, what your body is literally just responding to its environment.

[00:20:56] Jenny Swisher: It’s literally like, I need more food to be able to do all this stuff you’re making me do all day. Right? And so I want people to understand that there is a biological need. So yes, binge eating, emotional eating. I’m not, I’m not slamming that in any way. What I’m saying is. If we focus more on fueling properly, those biological needs are then met, which then sets you up for a better experience, uh, you know, later in the day or whatever the case is for you.

[00:21:18] Jenny Swisher: So. Um, I want to ask you about that. Let’s talk about underfueling and what you see in your practice, and then we’ll go from there.

[00:21:25] Miriam Jacobson: Yeah, absolutely. I, I think that’s such a good point because so, so many women are under feeling like you’re saying. And so of course, like our bodies are going to have this like rebound hunger in the evening.

[00:21:36] Miriam Jacobson: We’re going to then label it, like you said, as binge eating or emotional eating, and then we feel shamed for it. But really what happens when we can feel ourselves properly is especially those that fitness When you actually fuel yourself properly throughout the day, you’ll see your performance improving, you know?

[00:21:52] Miriam Jacobson: And so I think again, like when we were so focused on aesthetics and, you know, losing weight as to any expense, like it begins to really, um, drain us. And so it’s like, what, what happens when we can actually feel properly throughout the day? You had mentioned blood sugar levels, right? Our bodies have a circadian rhythm that matches our intake, our food intake.

[00:22:16] Miriam Jacobson: So we should be eating during the day. That’s when our bodies, that’s when our insulin is most sensitive. That’s when our blood sugar is going to be like best controlled. Um, especially if that’s when people are more active. But then as we get into the evening, your insulin sensitivity goes down. Right. And if you’re moving around all day, and that’s when you’re stopping and you’re like, Oh crap, like now I’m hungry.

[00:22:39] Miriam Jacobson: Now I can actually listen to my body and not in this like fight or flight. And then you take in a ton of food, your body isn’t going to be able to process it as well as it would during the day. And so if we can begin to shift our mindset to being like, Oh, actually I do need to be eating every three hours.

[00:22:48] Miriam Jacobson: Or if I’m working out for more than an hour, I really need to be thinking about how I’m going to fuel, right? Because your body, um, is going to just like struggle so energetically. It’s going to increase your stress hormones, your cortisol, your adrenal, which is going to have downstream effects on, on your other hormones as well.

[00:23:06] Miriam Jacobson: Especially, you know, If that’s chronic, if it’s a pattern that you’ve started to falling into, right? If it’s one day, it’s not going to happen, but it’s, it’s the repetition. That’s really impacts our circadian rhythm and our hormones

[00:23:18] Jenny Swisher: for sure. And, and just to share a little bit of my experience too. So after, you know, um, a handful of years of owning the gym and adrenal burnout.

[00:23:20] Jenny Swisher: Um, so one of the first things that I started to notice for me was not only the fatigue, especially in the morning, like not wanting to wake up and my cortisol was obviously disrupted, um, but also, you know, cortisol and blood sugar go hand in hand. I would also see like hypoglycemic symptoms in the mornings.

[00:23:35] Jenny Swisher: And that was one of the first things that I remember, like, kind of coming back to that deconditioning idea. Um, I remember saying to my husband, so I kind of lived in this box, as I’d like to say for a long time of like thinking that I needed to follow a certain eating regimen that I thought was healthy at the time that I now realize wasn’t, wasn’t.

[00:23:51] Jenny Swisher: It was very low in fat, not enough protein, um, just under fueling in general. And. I remember one night before bed, I was really hungry, felt a little lightheaded. And I said to my husband, like, do you think I could have a banana? And he was like, if you have to ask that question, you need to reevaluate like what you’re doing.

[00:23:53] Jenny Swisher: Right. And it was my first awareness that like, wait a minute,

[00:23:56] Miriam Jacobson: good man, good man.

[00:23:59] Jenny Swisher: Probably honestly eating his own bucket of popcorn at the time. Like he probably was like, really, but anyways, like I, you know, I think, um, that was my first level of awareness that like, I’m really like mentally hung up here and I have some unlearning to do, so that’s, that’s one thing.

[00:24:07] Jenny Swisher: But also. I started to see like the biological needs flare up, like feeling lightheaded. I started to feel like I was just really fatigued. And literally almost every woman that I now meet with or work with, I like to say their check engine lights are flashing. And when you ask them what’s wrong, they only can really identify with that fatigue.

[00:24:25] Jenny Swisher: They might use phrases like brain fog, but I’m really tired. It’s always, I’m really tired or I don’t have the energy, right? And I like to measure things in energy. So when women say their energy is off, I immediately go, go first to, you must not be eating enough, right? Or we’re not eating enough of the right foods.

[00:24:39] Jenny Swisher: Is this something that you’re seeing, like when you work with people, are you seeing that this is normally number one or what are the most common things that you address first?

[00:24:47] Miriam Jacobson: Oh, yeah, no, eating enough food. I, when people come to me, especially women who have a history of wanting, you know, wanting to lose weight or, you know, like, um, body image issues, even, you know, women of like, that aren’t overweight, I see actually it inflicting like, even more so sometimes.

[00:25:01] Miriam Jacobson: And, um, I see them glorifying skipping meals. They’re like, Oh, I want seven hours of that eating today, right? And yeah, that’s going to make you more anxious and more depleted. And that’s what I see all the time is women struggling with low energy and anxiety and mood issues. And we need, we need food. You know, you were just talking about how you were eating like low protein, low fat.

[00:25:16] Miriam Jacobson: What do you think is the backbone for hormone? It’s protein. Exactly. That’s literally the building blocks for hormones. Yeah. Right. And so, um, and so of course people are going to be feeling bad. They’re going to be feeling brain foggy, anxiety, like fatigued. And like you were saying, we tend to listen when the house is on fire, but like we also don’t.

[00:25:38] Miriam Jacobson: I see a lot of people throughout the world and throughout my life, just even in my personal life. Right. Right. You’re like. Oh, like I’m feeling this, this and that, you know, like I’m feeling depressed or I’ve headaches, but it’s okay. Like it’s normal, you know? And it’s like, okay, just cause it’s common doesn’t mean it’s normal, you know?

[00:25:51] Miriam Jacobson: And so how can we begin to shift that conversation and be like, actually, you don’t need to settle for these symptoms. You can feel better. Yeah. Um, and there is answers, right? beyond what maybe, you know, your internist is going to share with you or even knows. Right. Right. And so I think, again, having these conversations and being like, Oh, you can feel better.

[00:26:15] Miriam Jacobson: And the house is burning, even if it’s a small fire in the corner, it’s gonna catch fire if you don’t extinguish it.

[00:26:23] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. Yeah. And I think for me, it was like, really just, No, like thinking that I was doing the things I’m like, well, I live an active lifestyle and I’m healthy and I’m training and I’m, I’m following these macros.

[00:26:35] Jenny Swisher: Right. And then you realize later, like, wait a minute, but I’ve shot out my adrenals. My blood sugar is crashing. I, I have brain fog now that I didn’t have before. Right. As we get older, as women, we enter perimenopause our hormones shift. Anyway, I certainly wasn’t doing that any favors. And I, I’ve said this so many times, but it’s worth repeating in 2021, I decided I was going to focus on two things.

[00:26:56] Jenny Swisher: I was going to unlearn the restrictive eating mentality that I’d been part of for so long. I was going to focus first on protein. So I really did keep it that simple of like, am I getting one gram of protein per pound of body weight? at the very least. And I wasn’t. I was averaging like 60, I think the average woman averages 40 to 50 grams of protein per day, which is insane.

[00:27:15] Jenny Swisher: That’s probably a third of what she needs. But I was probably around 60 to 70. And I will, I’ll admit too, that probably 20 to 30 of those were coming from like, A process shake or supplement that wasn’t real food, right? So for me, I was like, no, I’m going to focus on I want 135 grams of protein to match my body weight.

[00:27:33] Jenny Swisher: And I want to focus on animal sources because I know that’s best for me. And so that was my number one priority followed closely by sleep and making sure that I was getting good quality sleep. I invested in an aura ring. I started sort of biohacking my sleep. Those two changes led to crazy body composition changes.

[00:27:51] Jenny Swisher: In a good way and a such a drastic improvement in my hormone health. Um, Well, I was actually at that time when I was working with my functional medicine doctor. I remember telling her, I was like, Oh, this is I’ve been following this way of eating for a really long time. Right. And it’s, it’s this, this portion control mentality.

[00:28:07] Jenny Swisher: And when I shared with her what I was doing, I said, you know, yeah, I, I, she said, well, how many healthy fats are you consuming per day? And I said, well, I get, I eat like a quarter of an avocado a day and I don’t do dairy because I’m highly sensitive. And so she was like, anything else? Like, and I was like, no, like that’s, that’s, what’s allowed on my plan.

[00:28:24] Jenny Swisher: Right. And she was just mortifying. She was like, this is where your hormones come from. You have got to be consuming a healthy fat at each meal. You’ve got to be consuming enough protein. And since then, like, since I launched my course later and all the things like this is what I do is I teach self advocacy for women and I teach the ability to be able to.

[00:28:43] Jenny Swisher: Understand these basic principles. And I will tell you that the number one, the number one game changing thing for most women is not normally the Dutch test. It’s not normally the cycle seeking fitness. It’s not normally the things that they come in for. It’s, oh my gosh, I started eating more and I started focusing on fueling myself.

[00:28:59] Jenny Swisher: And now I have the energy and I sleep better and my anxiety is gone and this is gone and all the things. And so if you’re listening to this, I mean, I don’t want to beat a dead horse, but like, hopefully you’ve picked up on it by now. Very real. Now I want to focus, um, while we still have a few minutes on this idea of, cause I like to say, um, Women will ask me all the time like, well, are you a macro coach?

[00:29:13] Jenny Swisher: Right? Like, can, can you help me with my macros? Or what apps do you use to track macros? And I like to say that for women’s health in particular, it’s not just the macros, it’s the micros. And when we’re not getting enough of the right micronutrients, right, that’s when we can start to see issues. So I would love for you to touch on that too, just as a dietician.

[00:29:29] Jenny Swisher: Like how do you, how do you address, you know, macros, micros, and all the things.

[00:29:35] Miriam Jacobson: Yeah, that’s it’s a great question. And I just also have to say I don’t ever really recommend people count calories or even I don’t really recommend people count to macros because I don’t think that we need to do math to eat well.

[00:29:48] Miriam Jacobson: And I think it’s often a distraction from what’s really important, which is the quality of food that we’re eating. Um, when we can focus on eating really whole, balanced meals, that’s how we’re going to be getting the most nutrients from our food, both macros and micros. Um, but something that I did want to touch on that you had mentioned earlier that feeds into this conversation, um, actually really intimately is, are we digesting the food that we’re eating?

[00:30:15] Miriam Jacobson: As we get older, as women get older. We actually, our ability to create stomach acid, HCL, really decreases, right? We need HCL to process protein, to liberate B nutrients from the food that we’re eating, to liberate our minerals, like iron and zinc, which are important for hormone health, from the food that we’re eating so that we can absorb them, right?

[00:30:40] Miriam Jacobson: And so if those, if even if we’re eating well and the digestive Issue. You know, the digestive processes aren’t supporting the food that we’re eating. We’re not going to be extracting optimal nutrients from our food.

[00:30:50] Yeah.

[00:30:51] Miriam Jacobson: And so the first thing is, of course, making sure that you’re eating enough food.

[00:30:55] Miriam Jacobson: Like you’re saying that you’re eating a high quality diet. You’re eating lots of plants. Right? You’re eating good protein, you’re eating good fats, that’s the foundation for a really good diet. And then how are you digesting and absorbing those nutrients is going to impact your cellular health, your mitochondrial health, right?

[00:31:15] Miriam Jacobson: And how those vitamins and minerals are impacting you metabolically. And then of course, there’s your symptoms, your symptoms, your health issues, your diagnoses, will impact and maybe drain your nutritional health a little bit. So people who are dealing with autoimmune conditions or depression or endometriosis may have different nutritional requirements, right?

[00:31:41] Miriam Jacobson: And so that’s really again where that individualized health comes in and for me, I personally love Running testing because I think it’s such a powerful way to really get into that bio individuality. So I love, um, there’s a nutritional evaluation to pass through Genova diagnostics that I’ll run, um, for a lot of my patients.

[00:31:57] Miriam Jacobson: And it really shows us what are your metabolic pathways? How are you breaking down carbs, fats, proteins and converting that into energy? What’s happening with your fat profile? You know, your omega three fats, your omega six fat. Um, what’s happening with heavy metals and really looking to like, how can we individualize your micronutrient approach and your macronutrient approach to complement metabolically what’s happening for you.

[00:32:21] Miriam Jacobson: So it is a really cool way to work with the body where things might not be on fire just yet, right? But it’s a really good preventative approach. Yeah. Um, and for people who, where it is on fire, it’s also really helpful, but, um.

[00:32:32] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. But you’re able to say like, well, I see some matches here in the basement next to some newspaper.

[00:32:35] Jenny Swisher:It’s getting kind of close.

[00:32:35] Miriam Jacobson: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Like there’s a little bit of inflammation happening under the surface. Like, how can we nip this in the butt, you know, and prevent anything from.

[00:32:39] Jenny Swisher: I’m glad you mentioned the genetics thing and the omegas. I just, I, we just did a couple of interviews that I’ll link up in the show notes with, uh, an omega three expert doctor that came on to talk about omega six, the three ratios.

[00:32:50] Jenny Swisher: And also just talk to somebody about things like MTHFR and different genetics that factor that. For so many of us. I, so I just, I turned 40. So I’ll be 41 this year. I just, I just invested in a genetics test. Um, with, I did the three by four genetics test and it was fascinating. It was fascinating. I love the way that they, they give you the results.

[00:33:02] Jenny Swisher: Cause it’s like in cartoon format. So it like made total sense for me. I get this, but it explains so much about me. Um, just in, just even my personality, like my different, I have COMTI, MTHFR, so like, it makes so much sense as far as like, balance issues that I’ve seen. But it’s like, I can’t believe at 41 that I’m learning something about myself that I probably should have known at like 2 or 3, because your genetics don’t change.

[00:33:25] Jenny Swisher: Right? So I mean like, This should be part of our proactive health plan, because I have suffered so long from migraine headaches and all these endometriosis and all these things that now I understand why, because it all does come back to my genetics so I could have been catering my nutrition bio individually I could have been catering things differently but instead.

[00:33:36] Jenny Swisher: I was following this, these sort of societal norms of what healthy looks like and what healthy is. And these are healthy foods and these are not healthy foods and it, it’s a whole bunch of bull. It’s a whole bunch of bull because like I said, at the very beginning, what works for you doesn’t work for me.

[00:33:47] Jenny Swisher: And vice versa.

[00:33:49] Miriam Jacobson: Yeah, exactly. I mean, I have patients always like, am I going to be on these vitamins forever? I’m going to be on supplements forever. And I’m like some, no, but some, yes, because you have an MTHFR mutation, you need activated B vitamins. Yeah. Um, so it really.

[00:34:01] Jenny Swisher: Absolutely. Oh, I lost you. Okay. Bye.

[00:34:01] Jenny Swisher: There we are. We froze up for a second. Okay. Okay. Perfect. So I want to ask just one more question related to this. So, you know, we, you mentioned seeing where, uh, often in your practice where women are underfueling. Is there anything else that you would say that you see most commonly with women, especially like 30 plus, as far as, I see this almost all the time, and this is something that we address.

[00:34:15] Miriam Jacobson: I see skipping meals, underfueling, like we talked about, um, and I see digestive issues just getting worse and worse as we get older. I think people are like, oh, it’ll just get, you know, better. As, as we, um, if we just ignore it, it’ll get better.

[00:34:27] Yeah.

[00:34:28] Miriam Jacobson: But I find that like a lot of people, especially when they have early digestive issues or like early stress, especially when they’re like 15, I’m seeing women in their late thirties now come to me.

[00:34:37] Miriam Jacobson: Early forties, and they’re like, what, what, what gives, you know, I’ve been seeing the GI doctor, I’ve gotten colonoscopy. Like there’s nothing here. Right? Sure. And so, um, so I’m seeing, like, I know that that’s not necessarily a habit, but I’m just, I’m seeing Oh yeah, I see that a lot. Yeah. That’s interesting.

[00:34:53] Miriam Jacobson: Um, and that’s a,

[00:34:53] Jenny Swisher: yeah. ’cause I mean, I’ve been listening to a lot of people. Dr. Sarah Gottfried is one. She just, you know, um. The autoimmune cure, and she talks in there about like autoimmune diseases popping up in sort of like age 40 plus, like in this sort of perimenopausal window, and also how the gut microbiome is changing during perimenopause and beyond.

[00:35:05] Jenny Swisher: We’re now learning more about how the brain, I just heard recently, Dr. Lisa Moscone is really a pioneer in the space of Alzheimer’s research and the links to estrogen and hormones. And she was talking about that the brain changes 82%. During the perimenopausal years for women. So we’re learning more about the brain.

[00:35:20] Jenny Swisher: We’re learning more about the gut microbiome. We’re learning. So when you say this, when you say, I see women here, all of a sudden, now digestive issues are happening. And then it’s leading to other things that makes total sense to me. But because it’s like, yeah, I mean, yeah, I mean that, that, you know, if, if everything is truly shifting in this time of our lives, then of course it all matters.

[00:35:34] Jenny Swisher: So Sean Stevenson is somebody that I’d like as well. He wrote the book on, of course, I’m just going to escape me, but I’ll link it up on the show notes. Yeah. And he talks about how food is really like, like what we are, we are what we eat. And so at a cellular level, like what’s going into our bodies is exactly what, what we’ve become.

[00:35:48] Jenny Swisher: Right. And so it’s like, if we want to live with maximum energy, you know, we need to stay away from the questions that we get that people like me or you get all the time, which is what are the best foods to eat? Or what are the best workouts to do? Or what are the, and we have to stop and ask the question, what are, what are the best foods for me?

[00:36:02] Jenny Swisher: What are the best workouts? What are the best supplements for me? What are the best supplements for me? And so when we can embrace that idea that health is individual, I think is when people will really level up their energy. Right? It’s, it’s, it’s, we’ve got to step into that, what I call body literacy.

[00:36:15] Jenny Swisher: Like, understand your body. Be able to peel back the onion and work with people like you or, or doctors in this space who are literally, they can ask the right questions and really get to that root cause this has been awesome. So I, I may have you back on. We may just, um, make a part two someday. Cause I feel like we have such synergy, but.

[00:36:26] Jenny Swisher: Thank you for doing this. Is there anywhere you want to point people? I would love for people to find you, whether that’s on social media or your services. So please tell us where we can find you.

[00:36:33] Miriam Jacobson: Thank you so much, Jenny. Yeah. So people can connect with me. My business is everybody bliss. And so I’m everybody bliss.

[00:36:39] Miriam Jacobson: com or on Instagram where I am sometimes I’m at everybody bliss. And, um, yeah, I, I do one on one work. I also run corporate wellness. programming and also speak with larger audiences. And so if any of that resonates, I would love for people to reach out.

[00:36:55] Jenny Swisher: Perfect. Awesome. You guys will, we will link all that up for you guys in the show notes.

[00:36:58] Jenny Swisher: Thank you, Miriam, for being here. You guys, we will talk soon. Bye bye.

[00:37:00] Miriam Jacobson: Thank you so much, Jenny.

[00:37:02]