Optimize Midlife with Womens’ Health Expert Erica Humbert

In this “Expert Episode” of Mom to MORE™, host Sharon Macey is joined by Erica Humbert, a Family Practice Nurse Practitioner and owner of Optimized Life Health, a medical practice that specializes in 1 on 1 care and finding the root cause of common problems in all areas of women’s health and wellness.

Erica is the kind of women’s advocate we need. 

She understands WHY we’re exhausted, WHY we have trouble losing weight, WHY we aren’t sleeping well, WHY our hormones are out of whack, and what we can do to get our act together NOW for optimized health going forward.

Erica treats hormone imbalances to achieve weight loss, optimize vitamin levels, and find mental and physical wellbeing.

Erica’s transition from traditional medicine to a more personalized, holistic practice highlights her dedication to empowering women to take control of their health. Erica’s focus on addressing hormone imbalances, strength training, and proactive self-care reflects her belief in the importance of tailored solutions for each individual. Her journey inspires others to advocate for themselves in healthcare, pursue their passions, and embrace a balanced, fulfilling life at any stage.

Erica has 21 years of healthcare experience, including 11 years as a family practice nurse practitioner, 10 years of nursing, and served our country for 5 years as a Navy Nurse.  She received her training at the University of Florida.

She is also a motivational speaker for organizations, conferences, and podcasts (now adding Mom To MORE™️!) on topics such as the importance of hormone and vitamin assessment and treatment, the mind-body connection and living a happy, healthy lifestyle.

Join Sharon and Erica as they discuss hormonal changes, advocating for yourself in healthcare, and the importance of strength training while you age.

[00:00] Introduction
[02:26] Erica Humbert’s background and expertise in women's health and wellness
[03:33] Transitioning to a new model of care
[05:09] Common health issues for women at different stages of life
[06:43] Challenging the aging narrative
[07:57] Understanding hormone replacement therapy
[10:10] Research on hormone therapy and its effects on long-term health
[12:09] The role of strength training in support of women’s health and longevity
[15:32] Finding joy and time for yourself and strategies to prioritize self-care
[19:25] Tips for finding the right doctor
[22:14] Recognizing perimenopause symptoms
[29:42] Find Erica Humbert and her work online

NOTE: This episode is for informational purposes only and should not be considered medical advice.  Please speak with  your own health practitioner to determine what the correct and appropriate protocols are for you.

Learn more about Erica Humbert:

website: optimizedlifehealth.com

Facebook: @optimizedlifehealth

Instagram: @optimizedlifeaprn

Looking for More? Follow @momtomore on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok.  

@Sharon Macey on LinkedIn.

Keep an eye out for episode #24 of the Mom to MORE™ podcast where Sharon is joined by Heidi Johnson, nonprofit founder, author and host of the Charity Matters podcast. Coming soon - you won’t want to miss it ♥

• Episode Transcript

  Erica:
  The happier and healthier the mom is, the healthier the entire family is. I can't tell you how many times I've had a woman in my office, exhausted, in tears, telling me all the reasons why she can't work out, she can't meal prep, she's too busy, and I'm like, what happens if something happens too? Especially if they're the mom that has the home role. She is like, oh, everything would fall apart.

  Sharon: Welcome to the podcast where motherhood meets reinvention. I'm your host, Sharon Macy, and this is Mom2More. I'll be speaking with remarkable moms who have embraced the art of transformation, crafting their more by leveraging the skills they hone as stay-at-home moms. They'll share their experiences, struggles, and successes as they return to a former career, pursued a passion or hobby, or charted an entirely new path. giving you the clarity, motivation, and inspiration to help you answer the question, what do you want to do when your kids grow up? This Mom2More episode is a departure from the usual. Yes, she is a mom, but today, Erica Humbert is my expert on everything women. What I love about Erica is that she really gets women, especially women of a certain age. Erica Humbert is a family practice nurse practitioner and owner of Optimize Life Health, a medical practice where she specializes in finding the root cause of common problems in all areas of health and wellness. She works one-on-one with clients to create a customized plan to optimize their health and their life. She has 21 years of health care experience, including 11 years as a family practice nurse practitioner and 10 years of nursing. Erica served as a Navy nurse for five years. Thank you for your service, Erica. And received her training at the University of Florida. Erica is the kind of women's advocate that we need. She understands why we're exhausted, why we have trouble losing weight, why we aren't sleeping well, why our hormones are out of whack. and what we can do to get our act together now for optimized health going forward. She's particularly focused on the assessment and treatment of hormone imbalances to achieve weight loss, optimize vitamin levels, and find mental and physical well-being. I love this, right? She uses natural solutions such as lifestyle and mindset changes whenever possible and medications when needed. Her passion for customizing care and taking more time with each individual to fully assess and treat each aspect of their health led her to start her own practice. And boy, we need more of that. Additionally, she's a motivational speaker and has addressed organizations, conferences, and podcasts on topics such as the importance of hormone and vitamin assessment and treatment, the mind-body connection, and living a happy, healthy lifestyle. So welcome, Erica. I am so thrilled that you're joining me today.

  Erica: Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be on the podcast.

  Sharon: Great, thank you. Well, let's jump in. We have a lot to cover today. First, we have to give a shout out to MOM 2.0, which is where we met earlier this year. Yeah, that was an amazing summit. So thank you, MOM 2.0. I also wanted to point out that while you are only licensed in the state of Florida, the information that you share today can be taken to your menopause specialist or your functional health practitioner. And later on in the episode, we will get into specific questions you can ask to determine if a physician is right for you. All right, so Erica, give my listeners some background. Why did you move from the modern model of medicine to what you're doing now?

  Erica: It's a great question. I was working in primary care and just really, I got into medicine and to nursing originally because I just loved helping people. And I love my work, but in the primary care model, it just became busier and busier to where under the insurance based system, it was like, you have 10, 15 minutes, we're packing your day with 18 patients. And so like, I kept hearing the same things. I mean, especially in people like starting late thirties all the way up through sixties, I kept hearing, I'm exhausted, I can't lose weight, I'm having irritability, I'm fatigued, I'm having trouble sleeping, and then with 10 or 15 minutes, I was only able to just check the most basic labs, listen to their heart and lungs, give them a few pointers, and they had to go, and I just kept feeling like they were frustrated, I was a little bit frustrated, I wanted to just take more time, be able to get a lot more labs, dive deeper into what was some of the common problems, and I really found and fell in love with treating hormone imbalances and vitamin deficiencies. I find them all the time. And a lot of times when they're corrected, I eliminate the need for other medicines. If someone's just having a hormone imbalance, and we work on that, they often don't need, say, Zoloft. So it's been way more gratifying work to be able to take that time and really have someone feel 100% better and come back and tell me how much things have changed for the better for them. So I'm loving it so far.

  Sharon: Absolutely. Sidebar, the fact that a doctor would give a patient Zoloft if they're actually having hormone imbalances blows my mind. Let's talk about the top issues that you find women are dealing with and that you are helping them work through.

  Erica: The most common ones at the top of the list would be weight gain or difficulty losing weight. I keep hearing women say, I'm doing the same thing I have always done, yet my weight is creeping up gradually or even rapidly. Difficulty sleeping, irritability, hot flashes and fatigue. I'm just so tired. And all the doctor says is that I'm normal. Everything's normal. Please help.

  Sharon: And I guarantee that there is not a woman over 50 who has not experienced everything you just said.

  Erica: Yes. And I think, and it's not everybody, but I have heard patients tell me that often a provider will say, well, you're just getting older. So, you know, deal with it without it. It does not have to be that way. I don't believe in that. I think if we have the right lifestyle changes, we're exercising, we're eating healthy, whole foods, we're taking the right vitamins. We make sure we have our hormones balanced. There's a lot we can do. And we're not just like, we're not just relegated to like, we're just going to feel, you know, fatigued and tired and be overweight. I don't think it has to be that way.

  Sharon: I want to point out what you just said, because that was so important, is that no, you do not have to accept a doctor saying to you, oh, this is just what happens when you get older. That's a big no-no. And that probably means maybe that physician isn't right for you. Right.

  Erica: And not all physicians say that, but I've heard patients tell me that more often than not. And it frustrates me because I'm like, this is my profession. We need to do better. If a provider cannot figure out why is this person having these symptoms, don't brush them off, but maybe refer them to someone else who can dig a little deeper or give them something to go on. Don't just tell them, well, you're stuck because I just don't buy that.

  Sharon: So let's talk hormones. I just want to share with you that I am on, I guess you call it the trifecta of hormones. I'm on estrogen replacement and progesterone and testosterone, and it has been life changing for me.

  Erica: Yeah, so I love that. I'm on the trifecta as well. I'm 42 years young and took my own labs, found my own levels were already declining and went ahead and jumped on them now and I feel great. So there is a stigma. It kind of started in the late, it was like the late 1980s. There was a growing recognition and that's Not that long ago, and there was a growing recognition only then that maybe we should study women. Before that, studies were conducted mostly on men, and they extrapolated those results to women. Like, well, we studied men, so we just assume women are the same, you know?

  Sharon: Oh my gosh, that's crazy.

  Erica: Only in the 1980s, so finally some government bodies got together and started requiring, you need to have more women in these studies and you need to study women's issues. So the Women's Health Initiative was this giant study that got put on in the early 1990s and the idea behind it was, let's see if we give these women estrogens and progesterones, if it would improve bone density. They only looked at a few things, bone density, cardiovascular disease risk, and breast cancer risk. And the average age of the women in the study was 63. So they were really looking at older, a little bit older. Yup. And they were using conjugated equine estrogen, which is horse estrogen. It's derived from the urine of pregnant mares. It's cheap, easy to process. So that was the kind of predominant estrogen on the market. So they were using that. They were using midroxy progesterone acetate, which was a synthetic progesterone that was stronger. and were widely available at the time. So these were not bioidentical hormones. And they saw an increase in some clotting. So heart disease, strokes, and pulmonary embolism, those kinds of like clots, and some increase in breast cancer risk. Interestingly, I thought this was interesting. I was going over the data before the podcast just to kind of brush up on it. And there were women that were in progesterone and estrogen in combination, and women that were on estrogen alone. And the women on estrogen alone had a decreased breast cancer risk, but that was just not widely talked about much. It was just kind of like this whole stigma was slapped on. Hormones cause cancer and blood clots and it was sort of like that was the end of it and it kind of hormones became Sharply declined in use after that since then there's been more attention being paid to bioidentical hormones These are hormones that are generally lower in potency. So bias is the common one that this is one I'm on it's estriol and estradiol and It's a beta-7. I want to say estradiol and that's Molecularly very similar to the estrogen in our own bodies and derived from plant-based sources So I kind of like took some notes But like there was a study in 2013 done and then an international journal of compounding pharmacy Where they looked at a cohort of women not as big the women's health initiative is a much bigger study Smaller cohort and they follow them for 36 months, but they saw a decrease in cardiovascular disease very interesting decrease in inflammatory markers, and I think is at the forefront of a lot of health problems in women.

  Sharon: Yeah, and that would be your CRP, they call it the C-reactive protein. And yes, that I'm aware that you really want to keep your inflammation marker as low as possible.

  Erica: And those inflammatory markers correlate with cardiovascular disease risk, so it makes sense to me. Less inflammatory markers, lower cardiovascular disease risk. And what I thought was really cool was they saw the number of medications in the women who were given the bioidentical hormones went down, which does make sense to me. And that's what I do see in my practice. Sometimes when I get women's hormones balanced and have them losing weight and living a healthy lifestyle, they can often gradually, with my supervision, come off of certain things like blood pressure medicines and antidepressants. A lot of women are given antidepressants for hot flashes. because the provider is kind of afraid to use women. They don't want to use them. They've heard it's bad. I think a lot of these providers mean well, but they really need to look at the latest data. And there's not a lot of data. I was looking over it myself, and a lot of large-scale trials haven't been done. And this is my biased opinion here, but I think it's because studies are paid for by large corporations that can benefit from the study's results. They don't determine the results, but they pay for the study to see the results. And I just don't think there's a lot of big money to be made in a large scale on hormones. So there's nobody running these giant studies. For example, there's very little studying on testosterone in women. And I use it and love it and have women doing very well on it and need more studies. I mean, honestly, we really do. They are game changers for women. and not to be dismissed. I mean, I'm not saying everybody needs to be on it. Certainly, you have to talk with your provider and talk about your risk factors and whether or not it's a good option for you. But I think in medicine, like anything, there's risks to doing something and there's risks to not doing something. So if you take a woman who needs estrogen and progesterone and decide not to do that, there's risks associated with that, like lower bone density or maybe even a higher depression. There was a decrease in depressive type symptoms in the women on bioidentical hormones in that 2013 study. They did like a depression scale score and found lower depression symptoms in these women, which does make sense to me too.

  Sharon: Well, yeah, because if you're feeling better as a human, you're not going to be depressed or anxious about things. If you feel like your body is working the way it should be working, despite we're getting older and older. When you and I first chatted at the Mom 2.0 Summit, you had said something which I thought was really interesting. You said that we should be at our peak in midlife and that this should be some of our best years versus the years where everyone's like resigned to, oh, I'm just getting older. So let's talk about that. Hormone health at all ages and stages of life.

  Erica: I love that. So I totally believe that. I think not always, but oftentimes by the time a woman gets to midlife, she maybe knows a little bit more who she is. If she's decided to raise a family, she's may have gotten that family kind of at least a little bit more self-sufficient. She's maybe climbed the career ladder in a lot of ways. So I think these should be the best years of our lives. I know for myself, I was a little bit better as far as health habits. what I did in my 20s versus what I do now. So really these can be the best years. I think if women are aware of hormone health as young as 20s and early 30s, really some hormonal decline starts in the mid to late 30s for a lot of women. If you think about, say, when a girl starts her periods, she started puberty maybe a year before that. So the hormonal changes happen before you saw the period. Just like before your periods start to become less often and cease, which we call menopause, your hormone levels are declining already before that. That's happening in the 30s. So if women are aware of that and having that assessed and making sure to look into whether or not they need at least hormone balancing, maybe they don't need to be on hormones yet, you know, they at least are aware of that, they can have that addressed at that age and stage. And then anything that's good for our health is generally good for our hormones. I mean, the mind-body connection is there, the hormone connection is there. So, you know, at all ages and stages, eating healthy foods, exercising regularly, doing the things that you love are going to be good for your whole body health and your hormone health. I was actually looking at the research between exercise and hormones, and there haven't been a lot of long-term studies, but they've done studies where they've looked at athletes and then looked at their hormone levels that grew their blood a couple of hours after exercise and saw boosts in testosterone, estrogen, and progesterone, which are important to women. So it stands to reason that it's going to have better long-term effects on their hormones too.

  Sharon: Hey y'all, time to talk about my sponsor, Ally Shoes. hands down, the most comfortable shoes I've ever worn. The way they're designed, by women, of course, and engineered with this cushy insole design and perfectly placed padding, I can literally wear these shoes all day and I cannot say that about other brands that I have worn. But don't take my word for it. Ask InStyle, Business Insider, and CNN, who are saying the same thing. And I'm sharing the love with all of you. Head on over to ally.nyc, where new customers and listeners of the pod will get $40 off your first pair of heels, classic, kitten, bold block, or sexy slingbacks with special code MOMTOMORE40. And 10% off your first pair of boots and flats, so 10% off of each, with special code MOMTOMORE10. Check out your ally in fashion, who are reimagining how comfort and function support women every day. ally.nyc So let's also talk about strength training. I think a lot of my listeners know that I am super dedicated to fitness and working out. And since I am older and I am post-menopausal, I do know that after I went through menopause, my bone density really fell off a cliff. And so not really wanting to do any of the bone density medications, and that was my personal choice. I thought, I'm just really going to focus on strength training. And I believe that it is the fountain of youth.

  Erica: So one, bone density does decline naturally with age. So we have to work to prevent that and to keep that from getting worse. Strength training has been shown in studies to increase bone density. And the more muscle we have on our body, the higher our resting metabolic rate. We know that. And we know that muscle mass often tends to decline with age. So as you work to put muscle mass on, absolutely right. You're improving on your bone density. You're improving on your overall health. You're improving on your metabolism. So I applaud that, that you're showing that to your listeners. And I think that's missing a lot of times is that strength training component. People think you just got to go, you know, do two hours of cardio. You really need strength training. And you need more strength training in those decades, 40s, 50s and beyond. And maybe the more cardio component a little bit earlier on in life. So, absolutely. I mean, bone density is a big deal for women and so is building muscle. And really, testosterone has been shown to help with building muscle. And not just going to put muscle on if you're doing nothing. But if you're doing strength training, you're going to be able to build a little more muscle if you have testosterone. And for women, a little goes a long way. A lot of times, it's a transdermal cream. That's all that you need.

  Sharon: I mean, that's, that's actually what I'm on. The other thing I realized is I'm looking at my mom who's in her eighties and. She has lost, I mean, recently lost my father. So, you know, she just spent six months by his bedside. And I look at a lot of our senior citizens, our valued parents and grandparents and things like that, how vitally important it is. So you don't have that accidental fall and accidentally break a hip or something like that. I'm trying to get her back to strength training. And as you age, it just helps you to maintain your balance.

  Erica: Absolutely. And I mean, so I've had patients tell me like, I can't do strength training because I can't go lift a bunch of weight because my back or whatever it is. Just know that small steps yield big results. You can do yoga. And a lot of people think yoga and they think, Oh, I'm going to be twisted on the floor like a pretzel. You can do chair yoga. So women in their, say in their eighties, is that where your mom is at her eighties?

  Sharon: Yeah.

  Erica: Then she could do chair yoga. She could do resistance bands, training, body weight, strength training. It doesn't have to be like people kind of have this concept in their head, right? This like raising a dumbbell overhead, which they're thinking, I can't possibly do that. There's absolutely strength training that you can do that's body weight related. And I love yoga for that reason, because it helps with the strength training, but it really helps with balance. Pilates, same thing. The core strength is what helps us not only maintain balance, but catch ourselves when we go to fall. It's that core that helps us catch ourselves. If someone doesn't have a core, that's how they go to trip and then hit the ground. And that can be devastating at any age, but especially in those later decades.

  Sharon: In those later years. And also, you know, when we talk about strength training, that doesn't mean you're going to bulk up. You could start with three, five pound weights. It just means you're getting more muscle tone. And that is just so vitally important to maintain our bone density, maintain our bone health, our muscle health. So thank you for that. You touched on something a little earlier and I want to go back to it. Let's talk about finding joy in life and why it is so important and really must be a non-negotiable time for yourself. And I think as moms, especially moms who might have younger kids in the house, you think, I have no time to do that. But why is this so important to find joy and time for yourself?

  Erica: I love that question. This is a huge passion of mine. I love that we talked before the podcast and I found out that you are a dedicated ballroom dancer. I think that's amazing. I think it's just so great. I think women often lose ourselves when we are the caregivers and we're caring for everyone else. And that comes from a lovely place of wanting to take care of everyone. But we cannot pour from an empty cup. And I found that in times of my life where I've just been like the workhorse, I want to be the mom, I'm going to take care of everything. I'm more exhausted. I made my own story. I mean, 10 years ago, my kids were younger. I was 15 pounds heavier than I am now. I was working out. I was eating pretty healthy, but I was just seized with anxiety. I wasn't feeling good. I was irritable. I would snap easily at my kids. I was frustrated. And when I finally just said enough is enough, I'm going to make the time. And I got back into musical theater, which is like my passion and dance. I suddenly became so much less anxious. I became so much, had more energy. I dropped the weight, not rapidly, but over the course of a year, my entire physiology changed. And it led me on this passion of we can't live our best life without it. And to that end, my kids, if you're thinking about if the thing that's stopping you is thinking like, oh, I'm not gonna be there for my kids i'm doing this thing that i'm passionate about my kids followed their passion more when they saw me following mine so they got more into things that they were creative about and they felt that permission and remember i mean our kids are going to be parents themselves maybe one day. So they need to see what it's like for a parent to pursue their creative passion. And I really believe that kids are going to feel they're one day going to have to leave the nest when that time comes. They're going to feel a little bit more confident doing that if they have a mom that has all of her own things going on versus a mom that's just I mean, it's wonderful to center your life around your kids, but if that's her entire identity, maybe those kids are like, yikes, we may not be able to leave home because what's mom going to do? But if you have your own passions, then they're feeling a little bit more, maybe a little bit more confident about that. At least I think so.

  Sharon: Right. And I think that's one of the things that I've talked about, you know, on, on this podcast as well is when the kids start to get older, you know, for those, those women who have been the home parent, you know, you do have more time in your schedule and that is a beautiful time and an opportune time to really dig deep and go, okay, what do I want at this stage of my life? And so many women feel that we can't ask that question, but it's so, so important.

  Erica: It really is. I think the happier and healthier the mom is, the healthier the entire family is. I can't tell you how many times I've had a woman in my office, exhausted, in tears, telling me all the reasons why she can't work out, she can't meal prep, she's too busy, and I'm like, what happens if something happens too? And this mom, especially if they're the mom that has the home role, she is like, oh, everything would fall apart. then we have to take care of you. And part of that taking care of you, I was doing some research on this topic because I want to speak more on this topic. And I found this really cool study that showed that people who are having positive, happy feelings on the day of an immunization shot, when they took antibodies for weeks after that, they had a better immune response to that shot. It's like those happy, enlightened, joyful feelings affect our immune system. how often we get sick. So there is a total connection between our whole body health and doing the thing that we love. So I think moms should feel not only permission, but encouraged to find the thing they love and go for it. I mean, I think your whole family will be better for it and you'll be better for it. So I'm a believer.

  Sharon: I love that you're doing that. I think that is wonderful, wise advice. Why don't you give my listeners some tips on finding the right doctor for you and questions that they can ask a new physician to determine if they are indeed the right practitioner for them.

  Erica: That's a great question. I would say, first of all, I think women, we're the most amazing networkers. The patients that come to me, I started out my practice doing some marketing and I eventually just kind of stopped marketing because I really found that people were just coming in because they knew someone who had met me and had a good experience. So first, I would ask your female counterparts that are going through some of the same stuff and maybe who are willing to share that they're on bioidentical hormones or they've had some of the same trials and what helped them, what specialist they saw if they're in your area. If you're seeking out a provider, you can ask when you call if that provider writes bioidentical hormone replacement therapy. It's important to ask if the staff knows or if you get with the provider, they should know If they're using a compounding pharmacy, we didn't talk about this much, but compounding pharmacies are pharmacies that make their own, they put together their own medicines in-house that's tailored to what the provider wants for that particular person. They don't make a lot in batch or in bulk and they make it in-house and they're inspected by the state and they're under the same laws as far as the FDA that govern your Walgreens or your CVS. So if they're using a compounding pharmacy, what compounding pharmacy is it? They all have to be inspected, but it's good to know which one it is. And do they believe in hormone replacement therapy? Number one, if you're more comfortable seeing a female, I encourage that in general. My own personal experience with male providers has been a little bit different. My patient's experience with male providers, I'm not saying they're bad, but I've definitely found a little easier time connecting myself with a female provider. It's not going to be something your listeners might want to consider. Definitely ask if they believe in hormone replacement therapy. If they're going to check labs, it's totally okay as a patient and encouraged to say, what labs are you checking? And this is what I want checked. Because a lot of providers have in their own heads, I'm going to check cholesterol, blood counts, they have their own things. But if you say to them, I want my hormones checked. Your vitamin D is the most common deficiency I see. Vitamin B12 is probably the second most common. So ask your provider to check those things. A lot of times if you just ask, they'll be like, all right, and they'll check it off on the lab slip. And there's a lot of concern providers have with good reason, like, oh, I'm afraid the insurance company may not pay for this lab. But I think it's worth asking for in a shot. You can always check with your insurance to see. I don't think the cost for a vitamin D lab or vitamin B12 lab is going to be so high that if you were to get a bill, it would be terrible. And it's probably better to know. And just how much time, on average, is that provider going to be able to take? I will never forget, I had a patient call me recently from her GYN's office. She had lots of hormonal questions. She had lots of symptoms. She went to her GYN. She had looked at me, and just by way of knowing about me, I take cash and cards. I don't operate under insurance. She really didn't want to do that. She wanted to use her insurance. So she went to her GYN. She paid a $45 copay. And she had to wait and she got 10 minutes with this person who happened to be a male and she basically kind of wrote off all of her concerns. He gave her a synthetic estrogen. He didn't want to check her labs. He just didn't want to hear it. And she called me from the parking lot and was like, I'm coming to see you. And I'm like, I will take an hour with you. And not all providers do. But if you look into it and you look at the cost of the provider that may take more time and the cost of the provider that may not, I think all the training in the world is amazing, but how much good is that going to do for you as an individual if that provider definitely has 10 minutes? If the person at the front desk says this provider has 10 minutes they can spend with you, how much can they really get into with you and your specific individual case, because we're all different.

  Sharon: And you know what? At this stage of the game, we deserve to have a doctor spend time with us. We deserve to have someone who is going to take a vested interest in who we are and our bodies and our healthy aging. And we deserve that. And again, this is just ideas to think about when you are starting to feel like maybe things are amiss and awry and you might be going through a perimenopause without even knowing it. So do you want to give just like maybe the top five perimenopause symptoms where a mom may go, Oh my God, I didn't realize that was a perimenopause symptom.

  Erica: Yes, definitely. Hot flashes, periods becoming a little bit different than what you're used to. So they're longer, they're a little more irregular, they're heavier. They tend to be a little bit irregular at the beginning of a woman's life of having periods and a little bit irregular at the end. So if they're already starting to get different than what you know to be normal for you, that's a sign. Fatigue and then weight gain, that kind of seems to come out of the blue. Like I'm doing what I've always done and then suddenly this weight is coming on. And then irritability. People call it mood swings, but what it really is is irritability. A mood swing would be your mood is really high and then really low. For a lot of people, it's just snapping easily. That's a common menopausal symptom.

  Sharon: And it's also something you do with kids, but okay.

  Erica: Yeah. I mean, it can be part of normal life, but if you find you're doing it a lot more often than what you used to or you snap and you're like, that wouldn't usually bother me. And now it is. It's not all in your head and it's not your fault, but it's a good idea to see somebody and talk about it and get like everything checked because if your vitamin levels are at their best, like I like to call it optimized. It's why I use the word optimized in the name of my practice. I don't just want like normal, like, A lot of providers will say, well, if your B12 is at the bottom of the normal range, then you're normal. You don't need it. No, let's get it optimized the highest we can safely get it. Same with hormones, same with testosterone. If all those things are optimized and you're still having mood problems, maybe you do need counseling, medication, other resources, and that provider should be able to point you in that direction. But optimize all those things first that are natural, if at all possible.

  Sharon: I would like to have you as a resource on my website where moms can go and determine here are the questions you should be asking your physicians. Here are some precursors to let you know that you might be entering perimenopause, you might be in perimenopause, so that women can look at that and then have a whole list of questions that they can then take to a provider that they are interviewing.

  Erica: I would love that. I really think women should be treated totally different than men and children. We're a different population. We require special attention, and I'm biased here, but I think we require the most attention because the health of the mom influences the health of the whole family. They're the caregivers most likely. I know we have men that do care for families, but a lot of times women are the caregivers. So if we take the best care of women and women take the best care of themselves, the health of everyone around them is going to follow.

  Sharon: I would like to ask you, where can my listeners find you online? And I'll make a note that all of this information is going to be included in the show notes.

  Erica: Great. So my website is OptimizedLifeHealth.com. That's the name of my business. I'm also on Facebook. It's just Optimized Life Health and Instagram Optimized Life APRN, which is just the abbreviation for nurse practitioners. So I'm happy to point anyone in the right direction. If they just want to message me with questions, I'm happy to answer them. I'm an open book. I really love just helping people. This is what I do. So.

  Sharon: Terrific. Well, thank you, Erica. This has been so enlightening. This is such a vital and important conversation that women need to have, you know, even when you're younger to know what you need to be looking for, you know, as we age. Thank you for your time today.

  Erica: And I want to thank you for having me on the podcast. And thank you for the work that you are doing. I've watched some of your episodes. I love them. I love what you're doing for women. And it's just it's incredible to watch. So I'm really I admire you very much.

  Sharon: Here's another five-star review by Charcuterie Lady, and here's what she wrote. Love the Matriarch podcast with Myra, your mom. How beautiful that you were able to interview her, showing us how exciting a life can be as a mom, but with so much more to offer. Shows all of us that we can do whatever we want, as long as we put our minds and our hearts into it. I say, follow your passions wherever they may lead you. Kudos, Sharon. I was in it to the very last second. Thank you, charcuterie lady. And if you keep writing the five-star reviews, I'll keep reading them. Before I sign off, a quick favor. Following the Mom-2-More pod means you'll never miss an episode and it really helps the show to grow. And if you'd be willing to leave a five-star rating and review and share an episode with another mom, I'd be super grateful and appreciate your support. Thanks for listening and see you next time.