Are You Feeling Blah? Exploring Testosterone in Women – with Dr. Amy Killen

Mindy Pelz  

On this episode of The resetter podcast, I bring you Dr. Amy Kellen. Oh, this is a juicy one. I am so excited to bring this conversation to you because it’s all around of course hormones, but specifically testosterone. We’re gonna dive into everything you need to know about testosterone haven’t done a full podcast episode on that. Then we move into everything I hope you need to know about navigating bioidenticals This is such a hot topic right now. And I wanted to dive in with Amy and talk about creams versus trophies versus patches versus pellets like dosage, what do we need to know about leaning into bio identical hormones. And then we landed on skin health, and slowing down the aging process and longevity. Seriously, this was such a juicy conversation about the journey from pretty much 35 all the way into the back half of our life, all the hormonal changes that are happening, all the symptoms that are happening, and what can we do about it? So I really look at this as a go to episode for you all to answer those kinds of questions. So let me tell you a little bit if you’re not familiar with Dr. killin let me tell you a little bit about her. So she’s an international speaker, she does have a clinical practice. You’ll hear us talk about it at the end. She is very much into regenerative medicine, integrative medicine and lifestyle, which is what I love. I love that she brings lifestyle into the conversation. She was a former emergency physician. And she is now in practices in Utah and Park City where she has pioneered a full body stem cell makeover, and which is one of the most innovative regenerative treatments currently. So she has this brings is really interesting perspective of the cutting edge longevity therapy that we have mixed with this deep hormonal knowledge of what’s actually changing in our body during these different phases of our life, mixed with an appreciation for an important lifestyle. So this is why I wanted to bring her to you is she just had this very holistic approach that I think we all can benefit from. So here you go. If you want to know about testosterone, you’re curious about creams and turkeys and patches. And how do you navigate that and you’re wanting to slow down the aging process. This is the episode for you, Dr. Amy killin enjoy. Welcome to the resetter podcast, this podcast is all about empowering you to believe in yourself. Again, if you have a passion for learning, if you’re looking to be in control of your health and take your power back. This is the podcast for you. So let me start by welcoming you to the resetter podcast. Thanks. So excited to have you here.

Dr. Amy Killen  

I’m excited as well. It’s gonna be a good talk.

Mindy Pelz  

Yeah, you know, it’s funny, I have to tell you that I have an affinity for certain Instagrams. And I have certain Instagrams I don’t love when it comes to hormonal, but I love your it’s like, when I when I go through and I look I’m like what is she gonna say now? What is she doing now? Like you already you’ve taken this concept of of hormones and have brought in some life to it on your Instagram. So thank you for keeping it entertaining for all of us. Oh, thank

Dr. Amy Killen  

you. That means a lot coming from you. I appreciate it. Yeah, of course, of course.

Mindy Pelz  

Here’s where I want to start this conversation today because we’ve never done this before. And I think my audience really needs a deep dive into testosterone. And it’s interesting because I’ve had multiple conversations with many functional medicine doctors about, you know, is testosterone supposed to deplete as you go through menopause? You know, what’s the difference between the aging testosterone of a man and an aging testosterone of a woman? And I think more importantly, we tend to attach testosterone as this, this hormone that affects libido, but it does so much more. And I can tell you as a postmenopausal woman like whoa, when I started to lose it, it was a lot more than libido and I want to talk about why that is and what yeah, what are the other symptoms? So let’s start off enlighten us about testosterone.

Dr. Amy Killen  

Yeah, I mean, testosterone is it’s fabulous. It’s obviously we all have testosterone. Women have about a 10th as much as men in general. So it’s it but interestingly enough, women have more testosterone in their bodies and they do estrogen. So even though we think of it as being a to a male hormone, it’s an everyone hormone. And it is made by the, you know, the ovaries and women, women and testes and men as well as the adrenal glands, and some peripheral tissues. So you have testosterone, this kind of just like marching downward as you get older men and women. So it’s like kind of the slow march starts, especially around 35 or 40 for men and women. And there are some circumstances where levels can go down more abruptly. Menopause is one of them. So you do have a little bit of a dip because you lose ovarian function, although you still have adrenal function of testosterone. But yeah, I mean, just like you said, it’s I mean, it’s libido. Yes, it’s interest in sex, for sure. But it’s also sexual function. So it’s also arousal, you know, getting erections men and women. But it’s also motivation, like getting off the couch, go to the gym, like it’s, it’s building muscle, which as we know, for women, especially is is more important as we get older, it’s getting rid of a fat like burning visceral fat, and like, you know, getting rid of your, the tube around your belly. And it’s also brain health. There’s, there’s so many things to testosterone, beyond just libido. And I think that especially as women, we don’t hear about it a lot for us, because there are no FDA approved testosterones for women still. And so that’s something else to talk about.

Mindy Pelz  

So on that note, I’ll tell you my own personal experience going through my Peri menopausal years. So my background was as a competitive athlete, I played on the University of Kansas on a college tennis scholarship, and I’ve just been athletic my whole life. I have literally craved exercise, the majority of my life, somewhere in my late 40s, that craving compulsively went away. And I was having to like force myself to go out and work out. And one day I was sitting in a, you know, conference on test all hormones, but they were talking specifically about testosterone and how it relates to DHEA. And that talked about how when DHEA makes cortisol, progesterone and testosterone. So when your stress is high, you lose that DHEA you lose your testosterone. So I, you know, I know, you know, all this, I’m just I just bring into the conversation. What shocked me was it wasn’t just the process of Peri menopause that was causing my testosterone to tank, but it was actually my stressed out life. And the combination of those two, would you agree? And can you give me more context for that? Because that shocked me,

Dr. Amy Killen  

it’s that’s completely true. And it goes even beyond that. So imagine you’re in perimenopause or menopause, you’re not sleeping? Well, for various reasons. progesterone is low, you’re having hot flashes, etc. And of course, men as well, if you’re not sleeping, well, a lot of testosterone is made at night. It’s like growth hormone. So it’s made at night. So if you’re not sleeping, well, then you’re not making testosterone. So then that is making you even like more stressed out. So it’s like this vicious loop. So between the high cortisol of stress between the not sleeping well and not making testosterone that way, and the fact that you’re also going through all these changes, where your body is just not making as much testosterone. It’s like, all these things come together in the perfect storm that lead to, you know, lack of motivation, like you said, and I also see a lot of just kind of mood being when I ask people that they describe their mood as being like black. Like, I’m like, How are you feeling? And when they have low testosterone, men and women, they describe their moods as being like, like, like, I’m not necessarily super depressed, but I’m also not feeling very good. Like, I’m just kind of in a space where I don’t really enjoy that much. I don’t feel that much. So that’s something else that I see as well as kind of an early indicator that maybe testosterone is a problem. What is

Mindy Pelz  

it supposed to do through menopause? Is it supposed to decline?

Dr. Amy Killen  

I mean, it’s supposed to I mean, yes, I mean, it we are designed to lose all a lot of good hormones at menopause, whether that design was a good one or not.

Mindy Pelz  

I like to go back to the maker have a conversation? Yeah,

Dr. Amy Killen  

I think, you know, I think we weren’t designed to live beyond you know, 50 or 55 or so. And so now that we are we’re spending half of our lives in this post, you know, this menopausal state, obviously, we wish we had those hormones back. And I think we both agree on that. But yeah, it’s it goes down. It’s supposed to go down with age. And that’s what happens with men and women. But I think that we both agree that there’s there’s not a lot of good that comes from testosterone going down with age, like I can’t think of anything good that comes from it.

Mindy Pelz  

No, I can’t think of anything, either. So So is there any way we can slow the that declined down? Like if you know, I always think my big play in life is to turn around and tell all the 30 year olds and people going into their 40s Like, Oh, you got to know what’s coming. Because in but I say it with with love because I feel like if we knew what was coming, we could change our lifestyle to soften the ride. So is there anything we can do to make sure that testosterone doesn’t tank? Yeah, I

Dr. Amy Killen  

mean, I the research is more in men than women. And so in Man, I think it probably a lot of it probably holds true for women as well. But we just don’t have as much. But you know, lifting heavy weights, for instance, we know if you lift heavy weights and using a lot of those big muscle groups and keep what that will help boost testosterone limiting, you know, a lot of sugar and kind of getting rid of belly fat, visceral fat, that will help as well, there are some vitamins like vitamin d3. So you know, get out good and get a little sun if you can cover your face, but get some body sun that can help testosterone against sleeping, reducing stress, you know, all the things that we know are healthy for us, in general can help you be able to make testosterone. But even with the best of intentions and the best lifestyle, there does come a point usually, usually for both men and women, but I think especially in women where your levels just kind of keep marching down, and you may need some help.

Mindy Pelz  

So are there foods we can eat to stimulate testosterone?

Dr. Amy Killen  

I don’t know if I’ve seen anything. And maybe you have I haven’t seen any, like studies on specific foods. I mean, there are some nutrients like selenium and zinc and vitamin D and some of these things that you know, if you’re if you’re deficient in those and you take them, then they may help but you know, most people aren’t deficient usually, you know, for the basic building blocks of testosterone. But yeah, I mean, you can try some some of those, you can eat some Brazil nuts and see what happens. Right? Well,

Mindy Pelz  

it’s funny because Dr. Kerry Jones and I have had this conversation multiple times. And I always come back to and I think there has to be a food, like strategy for testosterone, because what I can find is there’s a strategy for estrogen and progesterone. Why would there not be a food strategy for today? Testosterone, other than the fact that you want to keep your microbiome healthy, so you can break down all of these hormones? Yeah. And she claims No, I’m like, What have what what’s the oyster? What about the oyster? And she’s like, well, the only reason is because it’s high in you know, in zinc, so people think of it as an aphrodisiac. Do we do any other thing about the

Dr. Amy Killen  

oyster, I would think I can only I think making sure you get enough protein. So you can build the muscle, you know, to to because that is part of being able to make a sauce Verona’s if you have a lot of muscle and you’re working out, that can be helpful, but I don’t know of any other like foods that are going to really be super helpful, unfortunately. Right. Okay.

Mindy Pelz  

And then I’m going to ask you, I don’t know if you know the answer to this, but it’s one that I’ve been just curious about is the effects of fasting on testosterone in women. There’s interesting new science, conflicting science about fasting and men for testosterone, which is, you know, conflicting of what we learned years ago, we know that fasting can help growth hormone. And we know that when we’re growth hormone spikes, other hormones tend to follow. But I’m curious if you have an opinion on fasting for testosterone, you

Dr. Amy Killen  

know, I really haven’t seen anything about fasting and testosterone and women myself, I do think that fasting is beneficial in a lot of cases. But I also think, especially as we get older, and especially as we lose muscle mass, and we have to be a little careful with with that, depending on the person was

Mindy Pelz  

why we cycle it. That’s why we like, you know, I don’t know if you see this on socials, but everybody wants to go into absolutes. Like you have to do this. Don’t do that. And and you miss the whole premise of hormones, hormones, the way I look at them is they’re always adapting to your environment. And so when the environment changes, the hormones are going to change, and there’s always going to be a need for different tools at different times. So that’s where we get lost, is looking for the one magic bullet that’s going to ease all of this. Would you agree that you did just need a big toolbox?

Dr. Amy Killen  

Yeah, absolutely. And I think, you know, as you know, hormones are so nuanced, like, you know, people ask all the time, like, how do I how much estrogens Should I take? Or, you know, it’s like these questions. I’m like, I don’t I don’t know you. Like there’s so many different things that go into this. I wish that we have like little, you know, one line sound bites that we could use to explain this. And I try on social media, but it’s this is all very complicated stuff. A

Mindy Pelz  

great a grade. So one of the things I like to do is look at like the, the way that we are primarily designed and one of the things that shocked me about testosterone as I started to study it is the first thing is that we get the most testosterone during ovulation. Obviously, that’s to repeat it is, but is, is there. What Why do you think it comes in in this one moment? And then it goes away? You know, it’s still present, but not to that degree at the rest of our cycle. Do you think it’s purely around reproduction?

Dr. Amy Killen  

I do. I think it’s just it’s you get the surge, like you said of testosterone right before you ovulate. And it’s because you’re, you know, if you’ve taken testosterone, especially if you’ve overdosed yourself ever, which I have, like, it really does increase your libido and all of a sudden your brain is like, it like turns your brain from like, I could care less. And then also you’re like, oh my gosh, I need to have sex like it’s a very like specific thing. If you haven’t done it, I highly recommend it. I highly recommend it. Yes. Well, I think it’s just your body your body is like trying to it wants to have babies and so that’s that’s the way it that brings about it. But the thing

Mindy Pelz  

once I started to understand hormones, I was like, But wait, this explains why I appear at times to be a mismatch with my partner who is getting testosterone, you know, into his system dripped in throughout the day. I’m getting it dripped in one, you know, at one part of the month. And I think that part of the conversation would be so helpful for so many women. Which leads me to that question of, you know, when you’re dealing with men and women, I know there’s lots of variations of relationships at this point. But when we’re dealing with men and women, aren’t libidos are a mismatch? Just based off of testosterone? Yeah, yeah. And

Dr. Amy Killen  

men, I know, in men, you also have higher levels in the morning. So like, when you first wake up, those levels of are going to be higher than they are the rest of the day. So knowing that course everyone has their own preferences. But that’s something to take advantage of, if you are in a relationship and your partner has morning desires. But yeah, I mean, it is interesting. I think that, that we continue to reproduce and to have sex until it keeps working out somehow. And we haven’t learned or mismatches like you said,

Mindy Pelz  

yeah, yeah. So so let’s let’s take that idea. Because one thing that I’ve been trying to figure out as to how to help, not just you know, perimenopausal menopausal women, but the cycling woman, like once you realize, oh, wait, I only get tested, I get this big surge of testosterone during ovulation. But my male partner if you’re in a heterosexual relationship is getting this all day long. How do we create a congruent sexual relationship with with mismatch? Testosterone? It? Are there strategies to be able to improve that part of our relationships, despite we have vastly different times testosterone comes in.

Dr. Amy Killen  

Yeah, I mean, a couple of things. I mean, one thing I think is important to think about is the role of birth control pills on testosterone and women. And that’s something that it hasn’t been talked about too much. But we know that when you take oral birth, birth control pills, you’re increasing sh VG, which is your serum hormone binding globulin, which is going to bind up more of your free testosterone. So in peep in women on birth control, you have lower free testosterone than you would otherwise. And so that’s one thing. So even just being on birth control, you can see a big dip in your, in your desire because of that low testosterone. But if you’re not on birth control, you know, I think you you look at other things, you know, that you can that make for a good relationship or a good you know, interaction. For women, especially a lot of times it’s, there’s a lot of stress, and there’s a lot of like long to do lists, and I can’t get this I can’t get my mind to quiet down. So I talk a lot about this idea of you know, we have the sympathetic nervous system, and we have the parasympathetic. And the sympathetic, of course, is like the go Do you know, be you know, do this, all the things. And the parasympathetic is like rest and digest, which I think of it as being rest and receive. So how can we activate that rest and receive and I think that’s hard for women, but like, be in a space where you’re able to receive compliments and touch and adoration and massage and pleasure and all of these things. And if we can activate that parasympathetic that in women, I think goes a long way. Either testosterone isn’t where it needs to be.

Mindy Pelz  

Yeah, you know, years ago, like when I first started this podcast, one of my first guests was Zack Bush. And he gave us a list of things that he we could talk about, or to talk to him about, and one of them was about sexual health. And so we started talking about the differences between men and women. And he brought up a really interesting point. He said, foreplay for a woman begins at breakfast. If you want to get with your with a woman at night. You’re gonna need to start at breakfast, too. Absolutely. Yeah. So and I think it ties into what you’re saying, which is if we’re if we’re stressed out, don’t touch us.

Dr. Amy Killen  

I have a friend, a friend of mine who tells what she told me the story, which I think is hilarious. So she was she and her husband had been kind of fighting a little bit like just weren’t seeing each other very often, you know, just not really getting along. And one day, she came back from work and her husband met her at the door. And he said, Honey, I have done the laundry for the entire week. I have washed everything I folded I put everything away. It’s all done. And now I want to give you a 15 minute clitoral massage. Wow. And my friend this these had never happened either at these things had never happened before. And so she was like, Oh my gosh, and so but later I was talking to her and she said Amy, I don’t know what turned me on more.

Mindy Pelz  

It’s so true. I know men listening. Get this. It’s so true. So what what is it about the female brain like it’s really true? Like if you do the dishes, you clean up like you do things that feel in service to us. Our libido goes up. Like is that all parasympathetic? We’re just moving. We’re not stressed out about our to do list.

Dr. Amy Killen  

I think it’s part of it. I think there’s the there’s I don’t know. I mean, I think there’s a lot of questions. I think there’s there’s six any piece of it and you know, feeling more secure, so that you can kind of let go. Because if you’re not, if you don’t feel like you’re secure in terms of like, you’ve done all that you need to do for the house and the kids and the, you know, all the things and you just don’t, you’re not able to really relax. And I think, you know, it’s different for men and women, like we both need parasympathetic and sympathetic, you know, to have to have sex in general. But I think for women, especially, it’s a lot harder to, you know, to reach the climax or to reach kind of where you want to go. If you’re not able to get into that parasympathetic, like really relaxed, trusting secure, not thinking about 1000 Other things, headspace.

Mindy Pelz  

Yeah, yeah, it probably worked out better in the cave days. Right now we have too much to think about. Yeah, exactly. I think our brains are a little overwhelmed. So okay, so that leads me to the other question I have about testosterone that I haven’t been able to answer is what if it was, if it’s declining for both men and women as we age? Does that decline? Also need to? Is that going to match a decline in libido? Because I’ve heard a lot of women going through the menopausal experience will tell me like, Oh, my God, my libido went through the roof. Now, and I know a lot of women, they’re like, I’m not interested at all. So I want to know, like, primally Well, I don’t think we’re designed to just lose our libido into those postmenopausal years. But if we lose testosterone, are there other hormones that kick in that give us that? libido? You know,

Dr. Amy Killen  

I don’t know. I mean, yeah, though, estrogen is involved in libido also, but of course, that goes away, as well as menopause. And interesting, I know women with with testosterone, some people, some women seem very sensitive to testosterone, you know, when their levels go down. They they notice it, and when we replace testosterone, they notice it. But then some women aren’t really that sensitive, like I have some patients who have low testosterone and they have libido and vice versa. I think that’s different than men and men. I see, you know, when you have low testosterone, almost all of them feel it. And when we when we replace it, almost all of them feel it. But you know, women are a little bit trickier that way. It doesn’t always work as well and women as it doesn’t men in my experience.

Mindy Pelz  

Do you think there’s a toxic piece to the decline of testosterone I at one of the women that I had on here was Shawna oh my god, I can’t remember her last name. She wrote countdown, amazing book. She’s a researcher about how just in general as the human population, our testosterone levels are going down, and she specifically equated it to phalates. High in in our system. Do we? Is there a toxic piece to the changes in testosterone from the lens? You look at this? Yeah,

Dr. Amy Killen  

I think definitely, I don’t know, again, if it I haven’t seen it in women studied, but we’ve certainly seen in men, because people don’t even measuring women’s testosterone, right? Very few doctors even measure it. And even when they do, they don’t know what to do with it. So they just so but in men’s testosterone, we definitely see you know, 40% or so reduction in the last 50 years. And I think part of it is environmental. So I think it’s part of it part of its toxins, like you said, and then the other part is lifestyle. You know, we’re bigger, we’re lifting less, we’re outside less, we’re stressed out more. So I think it’s both of those things. And it makes sense that if it’s affecting men that way, it probably is women, but I just I don’t know, right,

Mindy Pelz  

right now, I’ve heard you say this now three or four times it’s like, yeah, we don’t know because we don’t study on women.

Dr. Amy Killen  

Yeah, who needs to know about women there? Exactly.

Mindy Pelz  

Oh, my God. I just had Lisa Moscone on the podcast. And we talked about some of the research she’s doing and she was even talking about how difficult it’s been to get her her research published in journals. Because they tell her she’s too niched. And she’s like, Oh, I’m studying 50% the population and that’s too niche.

Dr. Amy Killen  

It’s so crazy. Yeah, I was trying to get into a study, there was a growth hormone study that was going on. It was like the the trim acts like the next phase of that. And I was talking to the researchers, and they were, they were like, Oh, you’re a good candidate. But you know, but you’re a woman. And you’re you’re not you’re a pre menopause because I’m still pre menopausal. They’re like, Yeah, we don’t we’re not going to deal with all those hormones. So we’re not taking any women, you know, unless they’re menopausal. And I was like, yeah, that’s kind of like a lot of that’s what a lot of people think, as they’re doing research. The hormones are so complicated. They don’t want to have to, like, you know, deal with them or control for them or whatever. And so they just don’t include us.

Mindy Pelz  

That’s so crazy. I hope I live to see the day that all changes. So it’s so crazy. I know. So okay, so what if we are losing testosterone? We have certain things like stress and toxins that can accelerate the loss. Is there a time you would recommend that women add testosterone in like, you know, there’s a lot of conversation right now that we should be adding these hormones in before we lose them too much, and there’s too much damage. And on the same lines of that is, gosh, with testosterone, there’s trophies, there’s pellets, there’s creams like and believe me, I’ve tried them all. So I’ll share with you what I’ve noticed a difference, but I’m just curious like how we would look at bioidenticals and where to We put that into the peri menopausal journey. Yeah,

Dr. Amy Killen  

I think, you know, testosterone and progesterone are the two that I start, you know, replacing the earliest and most women are estrogen a little later because it’s, you know, it’s going down, but it’s not going down in relation to progesterone as much. But yeah, I think perimenopause, you know, 40 ish, you know, it depends on the person obviously, depends on symptoms, what else is going on, as well as lab tests, but that’s a good time to at least check levels and see how you’re doing. And if nothing else, you can follow, you know, follow total and free testosterone over time, because it’s, you know, it’s pretty easy to replace, even though there, there are a lot of options. But that’s, that’s good, it’s good and bad, traditional doctors won’t replace it, because they don’t, there’s no FDA approved options. So they’re, they’re just like, oh, it’s it’s illegal to give testosterone to women, which I think is obviously wrong, but it’s crazy that they would say that, but they do. But once we make

Mindy Pelz  

it, they want to keep us horny, I’m gonna say might be to the patriarchs advantage, if they would just keep those horny for a moment. But go ahead. And

Dr. Amy Killen  

doctors Yeah, I think they’re just like, I don’t want to learn about that. But there are real you can do, obviously, lots of there’s compounded options, you can you can take some of the male testosterone versions and just use lower doses. So I think that, you know, I’ve tried various forms as well. And we can just discuss which ones we liked the best. But the pellets, which have some downsides, but women love them for testosterone, as well as creams that can be compounded. You can do injectables that was great about that as you can use just a regular sort of men’s testosterone sippy and eight, or Ananth, eight, and you just use a little insulin needle. And you can just draw up a little tiny amount injected a couple of times a week. And it’s a very, very simple way to do it. And then there’s trophies that dissolve in your mouth, and there’s various forms of those. And there’s even oral pills like of oral micronized testosterone pills that you can do that some that some pharmacies will do. So there’s, there’s 1000 ways to get testosterone into your body. Yeah, so

Mindy Pelz  

I did I did trophies for a while and really liked it, like, definitely start to get my motivation back and for working out definitely helped with libido, I definitely noticed the fat loss that you’re that you were talking about. So I became a big fan of it. What I noticed was, I needed to come up with a pattern where it that if the dose got too high, I got aggressive, like I got irritable and angry. And like I didn’t recognize myself is there. And so it took me a couple of months to realize like oh my god, this might be the rage that men feel like I don’t I never I’ve never been so angry. And then a friend of mine said, Well, if you knew that when I was taking the trophies, I was also in a cortisol saturated state. And she was like you the minute you have cortisol up and testosterone up, you’ve got rage. So I switched to the creams, which has been a lot better. And I just do a small bit once a week or a couple times a week. So is there what are your thoughts on that? And is there a better way? Is that all very unique, like some of us like it this way? And some of us like it that way? Yes.

Dr. Amy Killen  

I mean that the short answer is yes. It’s very unique. And I mean, certainly you always want to work on stress and always work on you know, the cortisol response and that the adrenal kind of when you look at the pyramid of hormones, you know, the adrenal gland, and then the thyroid gland, then you kind of have the sex hormones, as you’re approaching that getting those those foundational pieces established is important for whatever hormones we’re replacing, you know, one of my favorite ways to do testosterone is a as a cream applied to the labia and women. And because you can use half the dose, like you know, the concentration can be much less, or you just use less of it. And it works great. And the problem with testosterone creams is wherever you put them, if you do it over and over again, you will usually see increased hair growth in that area or darkening of hair. So like if you put on your forearm every day, then you might see darkening of the hair in that area on your forearm. And so we tell people you know, put it in areas where you don’t have a lot of hair like maybe your upper inner arm, or like your inner thighs where maybe you just don’t care as much if you know you have a little extra hair growth there. Or the labia is great because hardly anyone seeing it

Mindy Pelz  

darkens who cares. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So and is it I always thought that we did it on the labia because it’s so porous and like it and there’s you could just get is that another resort?

Dr. Amy Killen  

Yes, it’s absorbed very well you just get a little tiny amount you do have to make sure that the formulation that you have is it doesn’t doesn’t cause irritation there are certain types of bases that they use when they compound it that are that are better for that area versus like you wouldn’t want to put like an alcohol gel in that area. Yeah, that would be a bad idea. Like you have to make sure that you talk to your doctor and it all works but that’s one of my favorite ways to give it to women because it’s just super simple, you know, put it on before bed and just need a little tiny little tiny bit.

Mindy Pelz  

And is there a there a dosage that you would recommend?

Dr. Amy Killen  

Or is it I mean, everyone is pretty different? Yeah, I mean, it ranges from you know, a couple of milligrams A day to you know, 10 or more milligrams a day, depending, depending on your route, like each route is going to have different dosing. But I like to get the free testosterone levels up into the higher the higher end of the range. And there’s actually some interesting work. I don’t know if you are familiar with Dr. Rebecca Glaser who was a, she’s a surgeon, and she’s a breast surgeon. So she does a lot of surgery for breast cancer patients. And she’s published some very interesting studies over the years using testosterone helots, primarily, but she treats menopausal women who have had a history of breast cancer who can’t take estrogen. She treats them with testosterone, and like an estrogen blocker, but she uses very pretty high doses where your testosterone, your total testosterone range is, you know, in the 200 to 300 or more range, whereas normally for women, it’s like, you know, less than 70 or something, and, but is able to get rid of menopause symptoms, you know, almost entirely, and testosterone is also anti breast cancer. And so she’s used it and shown some interesting studies on and using it and people who have active breast cancer to to reduce the tumor itself. So lots of fasting Glaser de la ser, if you want to look her up, really, I

Mindy Pelz  

will definitely look her up. Do you think that when we take an exogenous hormone, that it slows down the production of our own endogenous hormones, like if our body goes, Oh, I’m getting testosterone from this outside source? I don’t need to make as many as much like once you’re on that cream, now you’re on it. Yeah,

Dr. Amy Killen  

definitely. Yeah. Yeah.

Mindy Pelz  

Because of that, I have to be doing a full transparency I delayed going into bioidenticals a really long time. And it was actually carried Jones that at one point said to me, yeah, we need to keep your mind sharp, Mindy. Let’s look at some options here. So it wasn’t until my early 50s, that I was actually willing to like, Look at this. And now the conversations changed quite a bit. But my number one concern was exactly that. Like once you’re in, like, now you gotta go in because the body is expecting it to come from this exogenous store source. So if we give it to a 35 year old, if we give it to a 40 year old is that too? Like, is there an age at which we want to be prudent to not give it to young so they don’t tank their own stores?

Dr. Amy Killen  

Yeah, I mean, I definitely think less than 35 You don’t for testosterone, that’s kind of like my mental for men and women’s kind of like my mental cutoff of like, I don’t really want to be treating younger people with this. Certainly, there are ways to do it, you can go do low doses, you can do kind of like you’re doing like every other day, or you know, like kind of post on an off doses. And in, in theory, when you stop taking these hormones, like testosterone, for instance, in men and women, your production will continue will go back to where it was. But it can take several months, and so that you do want to be a little bit careful. And obviously also with with with men, especially with fertility, you don’t just dosterone can reduce fertility, when you’re on it. And there have been a few cases where it seems like it continues even after you’ve, you’ve stopped it. So there are there are pluses and minuses, I think with regards to things like estrogen or progesterone. I don’t see your worry with starting those, you know, again, not early early, but you know, 35 ish progesterone is can be given earlier than that. Because you’re you’re not making you know, we give it because you’re not making it because of perimenopause or other reasons. And so it’s it’s you and you’re not going to just snap into making those hormones after menopause. Right? Like, unfortunately, there’s not much we can do. It’s just they’re just gone. Like they’re just gone. So I think that that’s a little different than testosterone. Yeah, yeah, I

Mindy Pelz  

would agree on that. So which leads me to progesterone. So I, you know, mid 40s, late 40s, I started experimenting with all these bioidenticals. And you know that when we get to estrogen, I’ll share my experience there. But the one that was like the hero for me was progesterone. I swear, like the first time I took a progesterone pill, I was like, Oh my God, I don’t remember what this felt like, I could actually relax my body. I could sleep like It was miraculous. So I would also agree these earlier on doing progesterone, but I what you’ve been talking about on Instagram, which I think is really interesting is the cream versus the pill and that there may be a difference in how your body absorbs both of those. Can you speak

Dr. Amy Killen  

on that? Yeah, so first of all, I’m a big fan of progesterone, I think it is the unsung hero of the hormones. And progesterone is something where even if you are, you know your 30 year old you’re you’re a pre menopausal like you. But But But maybe you have PMS symptoms, you’re getting a lot of pain or heavy bleeding, or migraines or anxiety or all these things before your period. A lot of times that’s because you don’t have enough progesterone. And so you can give progesterone just during that second half of your cycle or before your period. And that can make a huge difference in how you’re feeling and how you are able to go through your period. And then just a side note on that. I encourage everyone who’s still cycling, especially if you’re a regular to get checked to see if you have polycystic ovarian syndrome. because that’s something that if you don’t diagnose it, so basically, that’s something where you’re not ovulating regularly, you’re you’re ovulating sporadically, which means you don’t have progesterone during half of the month because the progesterone is made from the egg essentially or the follicle. And so that’s something that we can Trina we give progesterone it makes a huge difference, not just in fertility, but also in reducing your breast cancer risk later on, also in reducing your uterine cancer and all these things that we can do. But progesterone is a key piece of that. And then to answer your question, I am I like to start with, you know, if you’re, if you’re Peri menopausal, I don’t you can do anytime kind of progesterone you want, you can do pills, you can do turkeys, you can do creams, you know, it doesn’t matter as much just kind of based on your symptoms, see what works, and that’s fine. But if you’re menopausal and you’re taking estrogen, I think it’s really important not to rely on progesterone creams for your uterine protection from the estrogen because the creams are, they don’t get in the blood reliably, and they don’t protect the uterus reliably. And you need to have that uterine protection if you’re taking estrogen. So creams are fine. If you’re not relying on them. Like if you’re pre menopausal. Peri menopausal. But after menopause, I think that just an oral micronized. Progesterone pill is probably my first choice. Yeah. And that was the one that I really when I started taking that I was like, Oh, I feel like myself again, like it really I would.

Mindy Pelz  

I would, you know, anecdotally, it was really great. So, okay, then that leads me to the other question that I’ve thought about with all of these hormones, is if we look at progesterone at 35, she’s just going down going down going down? So would it be that at 35? You would take one dosage and at 40 You’re going to up your dosage and of 45 You’re going to up your dosage a little more and at 55, you’re like do we need as to be looking at the dosage increase over time because our natural stores are going down? Yeah,

Dr. Amy Killen  

to some degree. I mean, I think that in my mind, there’s just kind of a, you can think of like maybe essentially two, two primary doses and two primary ways of taking it. So there’s there’s cycles taking it, which is basically means you take it from day like 14 to 28. So just that second half of your cycle, where if you’re having regular periods, but you’re having like PMS or you know, anxiety or those kinds of things, then the cycled progesterone is perfect. Like you don’t need it every day, just in those two weeks. And then the dose is most commonly going to be 100 or 200 milligrams capsules. And so there are other doses, like there’s other things you can do. But if you want to keep it simple, which I do, then, you know, one to 200, somewhere in that range, either cycled if you’re having regular periods, or if you’re not having regular periods daily. And that’s pretty much

Mindy Pelz 

Okay. And so here’s an interesting byproduct that I’ve noticed of progesterone, as I’ve been playing with the dosages, if I go up too hot the next day, I’m really depressed. Yeah, what is that?

Dr. Amy Killen  

So winning progesterone works on your brain, this is one of the reasons we give it so you know, we give it to anyone, woman, even whether you have a uterus or not, because it works in your brain. And it has several, especially oral progesterone. So the the pill, the pill form, is going to help with sleep, because it’s going to, you know, kind of help relax you. The other form of the test of progesterone won’t do that, by the way, just the oral form. But it’s also going to kind of bring you know, it’s bringing you down a little bit like It’s like this like, it’s like the opposite of estrogen. So it’s like bringing you down. And so if you get brought down essentially too much, you can feel depressed, or you can feel very tired. A lot of women if they get too much oral progesterone, or just like groggy the next day, versus some women can take hundreds of milligrams, and it doesn’t even faze them. So it’s very different from woman to woman. Mm.

Mindy Pelz  

Yeah. And I’ve noticed now I’m a year and a half without a cycle. And I noticed that it doesn’t have as happened as much. And I’ve been actually increasing my dosage a little bit because the only reason to not increase it is because I didn’t want the depression and low energy the next day. So I kind of use that as my gauge of Where did I go and how much should I do so so it’s yeah, it’s interesting to hear put words to it. Okay, we got to talk about estrogens. That this was the hardest for me to I and I’m still trying to find my right path with it. So and here’s why. Every frickin time I do estrogen cream, I gain weight. And every time I get off of it, the weight drops. And, and so I finally narrow I do the same kind of thing where I do like a low dose every couple of days, got off alcohol started supporting my liver started really working on upping my fiber for my gut because I just figured my body’s not clearing it so it’s storing it. Yeah, and I hear this from a lot of women and it’s the thing where your is so frustrating where you’re like, I’m sleeping better I’m happy. I’m my motivation has gone up. And yet I’ve now gained 15 pounds around my belly like you it’s like a decision that so many women are having to make. Yeah, how do we avoid that when it comes to and I just narrowed it to estrogen. Maybe you’ll tell me it’s the other ones too. Or maybe is the balance of all of them. But that’s the one that trips me up every time.

Dr. Amy Killen  

Yeah, it’s interesting. So yes, I definitely hear this from women that estrogen will will feel like they’ll you know, it’ll make them gain weight. But when we look at the large amounts, like the large datasets, estrogen is actually I get once you get on a dose that works for you, estrogen is actually is actually going to help you burn visceral fat and it’s going to reduce your, you know, your, at least your fat or fat mass over time. So it has a lot of benefits, I think there are a couple of things to keep in mind. One, it’s important to start low and just super slowly increase and because your body gets used to it, but like if you started a high dose, you could get away your breasts are super sore, your pelvic floor is like hurting like you feel full, like it’s a whole bunch of stuff. So you do want to start at a pretty low dose, and then just get let your body get used to it, make sure that you have enough progesterone on board. So you want to have an impairment, post, menopause or menopause, I’m usually doing about 200 milligrams orally before bed, because we know that’s a good amount to protect your uterus. But it’s also enough to counteract the estrogen effects. So you make sure that you have those two things in balance. And then I think that everything else you said is really important to you know, really looking at what else is going on in my lifestyle, what am I eating, you know, moving all of that. But if you start low and have progesterone on board, and testosterone, you need it and then go really, really slowly, you can get to a good dose that shouldn’t cause those symptoms.

Mindy Pelz  

Is there a dose number like I like how you’re explaining progesterone, like we want to get to 200 postmenopausal is our dose not for and it’s an a combination, because you’re doing extra dials, you know, to Austria. Yeah, right. Yeah.

Dr. Amy Killen  

I mean, I will, I’ll tell you my rep my doses, I don’t I will say that this is not agreed upon by other doctors. This is not something where people are like, this is the dose i or for brain heart and bone protection for estrogen. I like that serum estradiol blood test to be over 75. And you know, the normal level in menopause is less than 30. Just to give you an idea, like what that range, but the normal level, when you’re cycling, it can go up to 300 400. You know, it’s going up and down. But if we keep it over about 75, that seems to be where you need it for, especially for heart cardiovascular disease protection, for bone protection, that dose is going to be lower, probably more like 5060. You know, you don’t have to get it as high just for bone protection. And then for progesterone, I like to be over 10 for again, blood blood tests for progesterone, because we know that’s going to be offering you uterine protection. So if you decide, for instance, that you want to use a cream for progesterone, because you’re just like that Dr. Amy doesn’t know anything, you want to use a cream, that’s fine. But you still have to get your serum blood progesterone levels to 10, which is very hard to do with the cream, because then we know you’re protecting your uterus. Okay,

Mindy Pelz  

so that leads me to the question of once you get into these bioidenticals, then we now need some regular testing to see where you’re going, would that be helpful? Yeah,

Dr. Amy Killen  

it’s helpful. And you don’t have to do it all the time. But at least the beginning, you know, maybe testing every three months or so as you’re kind of figuring a lot of this out. Because you’re very you’re right, I mean, estrogen, especially there are so many forms of estrogen, and so many doses of estrogen, and everyone is very different. So it does take some time to get into the place where you’re like, Okay, this is working, I feel good, my labs look good. Like there’s I’m not yelling at my children, and I’m not gaining weight, and you know, all these things. Once you get to where you feel pretty good, and your labs look good, then we can space the testing out maybe every six months, or even longer versus you know, three months at first. And

Mindy Pelz  

what do you feel the difference between blood and like, urinary tests, like a Dutch test? What are your feelings?

Dr. Amy Killen  

I’m most familiar with blood testing. And the reason I’ve chosen to do blood I have in the past done urinary testing and saliva testing. That’s how I first started doing it back 11 years ago. But my concern with those tests are I just don’t find that there as clinically validated as the blood tests, like we have large studies in good journals, mainstream journals, you know, that look at blood testing. And so I and I usually with most patients can learn enough from blood. I do think that there’s probably some value in in like the Dutch tests, if you have a complicated patient, or you’re not tolerating estrogen, or you don’t know what’s going on and figuring out those metabolic pathways. But I think for most people, at least, occasionally getting blood is an easy enough thing to do. Yeah,

Mindy Pelz  

I’ve done both. And I the thing I love about the Dutch test, is those the breakdown in the metabolites. I think it’s really helpful. So you can see what your estrogens breaking down into. So and I’ve made recommendations that as women get on the bioidenticals, they do the Dutch, you know, at least a couple times a year to sort of see what that breakdown is, although I know there’s a lot of our fear around breast cancer and these things have is starting to go away, which is really good. It’s like wow, how did we end up here? Like how did we get to 2024 and we’re finally having the discussion of maybe it’s okay for women to do HRT identical 22

Dr. Amy Killen  

years after the Women’s Health Initiative I mean, I’m But although I will say if If I if I ask a poll does does estrogen cause breast cancer? I guarantee at least 70% of people would say yes, like, just out in the world. So it’s still very my own mother still thinks it does, even though I’ve convinced her it doesn’t. But we can work to do so yes, yes, we do.

Mindy Pelz  

This is my phrasing is that we’ve gone from a cultural hush around menopause, to or in cultural chaos now, which is a big reason I wanted to have this discussion, because we’re finally people like, oh, I can take something to make this better. What do I take? And then it’s like, nobody knows. So I, you know, do you feel like we’ll ever find a one size fits all? Or do you feel like this, this journey with bioidenticals. And HRT is always going to be an individual one,

Dr. Amy Killen  

I think it’s always going to be individual. But I do think it’s possible to create algorithms that can be more helpful than they are, then we have right now, one of one of the projects I’m doing is I’m working on building out some longevity clinics, and we’re opening starting in Texas, and I’m the Chief Medical Officer. And so I’m in charge of all these, you know, these protocols and algorithms and, and then being able to scale that and teach it to, you know, all the different providers wherever we go. And I do think that even though it’s complicated, if we sit down and have, you know, flowcharts, and if this, then this, you know, it is possible to do a lot of this stuff in a better way than we’re doing it, and hopefully get that information out to all the different doctors out there. Who, because you’re I mean, everyone does hormones differently, you know, if I follow 10 hormone accounts, and every single one is saying different things. And I, I understand this stuff, and I still, I’m still learning new things every day. And so it’s hard to be a woman in this in this.

Mindy Pelz  

Like, how do you know who to believe? Yep, that’s what you have to learn to be your own doctor, you know, you have to, like, find doctors like you that will like partner with you and like help you figure it out. But I think one of the damages that our healthcare society has done to us is really say that there’s one problem, and there’s one solution. But when it comes to hormones, we’re never going to find one and we have to bring it, you know, my passion is bringing lifestyle into the community into the conversation, because that has to be brought in. You can’t just put a patch on and you know, all your problems are gonna go away the way I’ve seen it, you know, every once awhile, I’d meet a woman who’s like, Oh, I just put a patch on and then like, it was all good. Yeah, really,

Dr. Amy Killen  

that doesn’t? Well, and you know, one of the things I say is I liked it, that kind of reframe of that you’re actually, as a woman, you’re actually lucky if you have pretty bad menopause symptoms, because it’s telling you that you need to take action, and you need to find a provider and get on some hormones and stop I know, stop this from happening. Because it’s your body like screaming out and say, you know, all of your, all of your organ systems need estrogen and progesterone testosterone. And so it’s the women who don’t have symptoms that I worry about, because then they go, you know, they’re, they’re 10 or 15 or 20 years in the menopause. They’ve never been on hormones, because why would they? And now they’ve got heart disease and osteoporosis and dementia, and you know, and all this visceral fat and all these problems that, you know, some of which could have been prevented if we had started hormones earlier. Yeah,

Mindy Pelz  

agreed, agreed. So okay, then I have to say, I’ve got a longevity expert here, I’ve got to go into some of the long term, I don’t want to call them side effects, because they’re just part of the process of aging. And that let’s start with skin health. So you know, the loss of as, hopefully people know, the loss of estrogen creates a loss of collagen, and then all sudden, all the wrinkles show up. So I know in your clinic in Utah, you’re still in your clinic and Utah. Yep. Yep. Yeah. So you do a lot of anti aging tricks and techniques. What my question on skin is really twofold. Is there anything we can do to prevent the wrinkles and the as estrogen and collagen go down? And then once we’ve hit this spot, where all of a sudden the wrinkles and everything are showing up? What what do we have that safe and effective to be able to change the aging face?

Dr. Amy Killen  

I mean, unfortunately, we can’t prevent it yet. I wish we could. And we can’t You can’t totally reverse it. But I do think that the starting hormones early can be helpful for sure. Like you said, like a lot of people when they lose estrogen a lot of women like in those couple of years after they noticed a huge increase in loss of elasticity loss of hydration, you know, structure of the skin that’s just like, so if you if you never lose that estrogen, and you just kind of maintain it, and that is super helpful. There are some things that we can do like you can apply a low dose topical estrogen to the skin separate from what you’re doing for the rest of your body, or whether you’re taking estrogen. You could do that because it doesn’t get absorbed. It doesn’t get absorbed systemically so that’s something that’s pretty much safe for most people. There are some kind of cool like other peptides for skin like GH K copper is great for skin that’s been around for forever, but it’s in some of the creams now, there’s some interesting studies looking at rapamycin for skin which is a which is a longevity drug? Well, it’s being touted as a longevity drug and being repurposed, potentially for that purpose. So there’s some, there’s some interesting topical formulations out there. And then I know I also am a big fan of doing, like lasers and and you know, there’s, I do stem cell procedures. And so you do like,

Mindy Pelz  

didn’t you do vampire facials? And that

Dr. Amy Killen  

we do, I do kind of a modified vampire. It’s basically injections and micro needling. But instead of using platelet rich plasma, which comes in your blood, we use like placental stem cells, or exosomes, these sort of growth factors that are coming from stem cells, and so they’re more potent form, but you’re gonna get still, you’re still get a very natural effect, you’re not going to get you know, it’s not anything that you’re that you’re putting in your face that makes you look crazy. And it’s not stopping your muscles from moving, but it’s helping your skin to continue to make collagen and elastin. So we do that in my Park City clinic also. Yeah,

Mindy Pelz  

I mean, for me, I think that would be the smarter thing to do and go in with I do, it does bring up the conversation of Botox and fillers and all of that. And I’ve heard both sides of the equation, I’m personally against any toxin you put in your body, I’m just not going to do it. I’m also personally against freezing my face because then there’s no emotional you lose that emotional connection to other humans. But I mean, that’s a personal just a personal personal ethos of what it Where do you stand clinically on looking at some of these? Is there a safe way to use them? What do we know about some of those? I

Dr. Amy Killen  

mean, you know, I think I’m, I’m, I’m kind of the opposite. I squat, that’s fine. I, I think that I respect everyone’s ability to do to choose what they want to do, and how they want it. You know, I don’t think anyone should be pressured into any of this stuff. But I do think that Botox and other neuro other toxins like that can be beneficial. I do think you have to use them lightly. Like yeah, you don’t want to crazy because you can stop the muscles from able to move, and that your right is not, it’s not great, you look crazy and you’re not moving, you’re out your your forehead at all. I think that you know, fillers, like hyaluronic acid fillers and things like that can be used safely as well. But that’s something especially that if you’re going to do that, you want to have a doctor who is very well versed in that because those can actually cause some pretty serious side effects. If you if you do the wrong, Botox, not usually you may have like a drop brow for like a few months, which looks bad, but it’s not going to hurt you like that. But fillers, if you do them incorrectly, you can, you know, can cause blindness, they can cause your skin to necrosis a lot. Like there’s some serious stuff that can happen. So just be careful when you choose providers.

Mindy Pelz  

So if if a woman came to you, who is postmenopausal? And she’s like, Okay, I’m tired of the wrinkles, is there a door in like, don’t get me the big stuff. First, I just need sort of a small dose of let me slow this down is that Doron procedure that you like

Dr. Amy Killen 

I mean, like micro needling is a great is a great like Dorian procedure. So you know, little device that has 10 or so little needles, they just go up and down really quickly. And they don’t go more than about two millimeters deep. So they create these little channels. And then you can apply whenever you apply to your skin afterwards, it gets sucked into those channels. And that works better. So you can apply hyaluronic acid or vitamin C but also, you know, stem cells or regenerative therapies. So that’s something super easy, you’re never going to look insane for more than a day or two afterwards. And I like to do that a couple of times a year for myself and for patients. And then the other thing I’m really a big fan of is is taking nutrients ingredients that can be helpful for scan taking them orally. So you know I have so I have a supplement company called Hof and we have a formulation that’s 19 ingredients and several of those are specifically for skin health. So like acid Xanthan is great for skin and that hydro Berberine keeps your blood sugar down which is going to improve your skin health and your college and over time at spermidine is really good for skin so there’s several things that we can take even oral hyaluronic acid hyaluronic acid is traditionally given as a you know as a gel or serum but doesn’t get absorbed very well and so there’s it’s actually better to take it as a pill and it ends up going to your your skin eventually and you can make hyaluronic acid which is what gives your skin that do we plump like I just got out of the shower kind of look. So but so I think you know aside from healthy diet and all the things that you want to do with that adding in some key ingredients can be helpful as well. Yeah, I

Mindy Pelz  

love that and talk a little bit more because you did you and I chatted about this before we popped on about the your hotbox and the idea behind it is that it’s anti aging or is it also to help with the hormonal swings that we go through?

Dr. Amy Killen  

We can you know I say that it’s my it’s like a longer longevity, longevity longevity stack in a pack. So it’s little tiny packs like they’ve they’re just these like little packs like this. There’s no q&a. It’s like my personality in a box.

Mindy Pelz  

Thank you. Thank you for using bright colors I placed but

Dr. Amy Killen  

I chose 19 Different ingredients that are not typically found in high enough doses and foods with not a multivitamin but things that can potentially get to the root causes of what’s causing the aging process. So we’re looking at targeting, you know, stem cell exhaustion and mitochondrial dysfunction and telomere shortening and inflammation, all the things that are causing you to age, with the idea being that instead of treating every symptom that we have individually, our joint pain our skin, you know, our drooping skin, or whatever it is, all these symptoms are because we’re aging. So instead of treating each symptom separately, what if we just treated the root cause of the aging and try to slow down the aging process? And so it’s, you know, I formulated kind of for myself, and because I was getting tired taking all these pills all the time. Yeah. And then all of a sudden, you know, friends and family were like, What are you doing? Like, what are you taking? But so yeah, to answer your question, it’s not going to replace lost hormones. But there are a lot of ingredients that are very beneficial for helping your youth to be able to navigate, perimenopause and menopause, you know, keeping your insulin down. So you’re not getting extra visceral fat and your metabolism stays, you know, faster and things like that.

Mindy Pelz  

I love this. I can’t wait to try it. I haven’t, you know, full transparency. haven’t tried it yet. But I’m sending you one, I

Dr. Amy Killen  

think we’re sending, you know, I

Mindy Pelz  

can’t wait to try it. I’m really excited about it. Because again, I slant towards the natural stuff. It’s just my personal belief system. So but I love that you’ve already done the research on this. And I think you’re you have like, we’ll leave a code for an app for you all for people to order and they can find it directly. So I’ll make sure in the notes that we do that and but I think was there like a website that people could find it at? Yeah, it’s just hot box. So

Dr. Amy Killen  

H O P box dot life, and your code is PELZ, P-E-L-Z. So if you use pills, you get a discount. And you know, you can also find me on Instagram. And if you have any questions about I’m happy to answer answer those questions.

Mindy Pelz  

I love that. I love that. Okay, before I am I asked you that. My last question. Here’s just sort of a literally something that I’ve thought a lot about, and I don’t really have an answer. So I’d be curious your answer on it. What I’m seeing trending in the hormonal world right now is there is this desire to a not suffer, which I agree with like you don’t as we start to transition through the peri menopausal years, all the discussion we’ve had about creams and things like that is like, okay, we can minimize the suffering. And we can slow down the aging with some of the strategies that you mentioned. But I think a bigger question is where are we going? What are we supposed to look like and act like and be like at 80 and 90, and I’m planning on living to 100. Like we at some point, there’s we can’t slow it all down. You know it, there’s going to be a point that we age. So what do you think’s gonna happen? Or what needs to happen to our mindset? Because right now, everybody anti aging, slow aging down? Everybody’s trying to put the brakes on that. But it’s still happening. It’s still happening.

Dr. Amy Killen  

Yeah, well, first of all, we don’t have a we still don’t have a good way to stop aging like that. Right? Might in 510 15 years. There’s a lot of research, but we don’t actually have a good way to to stop it, we may be able to slow it, but we can’t stop it. I think the more the more important thing to think about right now is how can I increase my healthspan? How can I increase those number of years that I feel healthy and vibrant, and I’m out hiking with my kids and playing in the yard and those kinds of things? I heard I heard Dr. Marie Claire today on an on an interview, she says I want to die like a man. I want to like just work out in the fields and like be super strong, and then have a heart attack and die. Like I don’t want to be in my bed for 10 years and weak in my boat. I broken a hip and now I can’t walk and like you know, some of these, these things. And so I like that idea. We don’t have to be like a man. But I like the idea of just being super healthy, healthy, healthy. And then at some point, you know, we die. And that’s, that’s natural.

Mindy Pelz  

Yeah. And then what will it look like? Like, the other thing that I really do love are those pictures of the indigenous women with all the wrinkles. Because when you see that you’re like, there’s a story there. And I so I do fear if we totally smooth out our faces, and we prevent all the aging, like where will the stories come from? And, you know, I’ve been in conversations with people whose faces are frozen. And I’m like, Are you you know, Are you understanding what I’m saying? Because that emotional connection. So I like your approach where it’s like, let’s do it, you know, let’s do a bit of it so that we can slow it down. But I also love this idea of the wise elder who you look at her face, and you’re like, teach me like that’s what I see when I see those indigenous people. Tell me what you know,

Dr. Amy Killen  

those those repeat those people are amazing. You know, I don’t think we’re anywhere close to actually being able to stop your face from wrinkling as you get older. Like there we have some tools, but there is no doubt that when you are I are 80 years old, we will look like we’re 80 years old. Even if we look a little bit better than we could have in the past that age. We’re still gonna look like we’ve been on the earth for 80 years. That’s my

Mindy Pelz  

goal. I like I like where Mary Claire is going with this but my goal also is to die looking like my age too. So I in the field looking like my age. I’ve accomplished it. So We have goals now. That’s right. That’s right. So anyways, this was thank you so much. I really appreciate this discussion. I know a lot of my audience is gonna love this. This is really a conversation that we’ve been wanting to have and really make sense of this cultural chaotic moment, and what we can do. So yeah,

Dr. Amy Killen  

this is so fun. Thank you. I

Mindy Pelz  

really appreciate it. Okay. My last question. And this one also is a personal curiosity. One of the things I feel like about health is we don’t have a good definition of it. And so everybody’s chasing something we haven’t been able to collectively define or is a personal definition. So do you have a definition of health for yourself? And where you sit today in your life journey? Do you have a health goal that you’re shooting for?

Dr. Amy Killen  

Alright, I love that question. You know, to me, it’s, it’s super simple. It’s just waking up without pain, having a lot of having enough energy and desire motivation to do all the things I want to do. And then being able to do them without hurting myself or being in pain afterwards. And continuing to do that day after day. And I have a lot of things that are for my personal goal for this year is to build more muscle and I feel like I just keep trying and I’m just like, I have this little he’s like skinny little muscle. So I need to increase my protein legitimately and, you know, continue to increase my weightlifting and all of that. So I want to like have like some arms that like my my daughters who are 16. And they they rock climb. And so they’ve got these like awesome arms. And they’re always kind of teasing me and be like, Hey, you have skeleton arms. So I want them to stop teasing me and I want to beat them in some arm wrestling contest. Oh my god, I love that I

Mindy Pelz  

have a 24 year old daughter that super buff. And I’m like, I used to be like that I look at a weight. I didn’t even have to pick it up and I built muscle. So I do it is a really interesting phenomenon. But it leaves me very curious as to if we get to the other side of menopause when we get to the other side of menopause. If there’s a fitness rebound, and there’s ability to build muscle that we are not seen in those Peri menopausal years. Do you have do you have any idea?

Dr. Amy Killen  

I haven’t seen it. I mean, certainly there are women who can build muscle after menopause and there are badass, but in general, I you know, after 50 or so most we lose the ability. But I love the idea, but yet there’s a secret button somewhere that I can just push on myself and and I get strong?

Mindy Pelz  

Yes, I’m gonna find it. I’ll let you know when I find the secret button. You’ll be the first one I call. So this was awesome. How do people find you so they can go stalk you I mean, I already promoted your Instagram, which is where I thank

Dr. Amy Killen  

you. Yeah, I’m very active on Instagram. It’s Dr. Amy B. Killen. I’m also on the other other things as well. But Instagram is kind of where I play the most. And then my website is Dr. Amy kellen.com. And that will have link to I have a couple of different clinics and a couple of different brands that I work with that are there, my brands and companies and things. So kind of has like a link to all of that stuff. Amazing.

Mindy Pelz  

Amazing. Well, thank you for everything you’re doing in the world. Let’s just start off there. I think the more voices that are out there and expressing what you’re seeing as a helpful resource, or helpful resources for the menopausal process. I just, we need more of our voices screaming this. So thank you for doing that. And thank you for creating all the anti aging products that will make sure that we enjoy looking in the mirror as the years go on. So appreciate you and appreciate your time, too. I know you’re really busy. So thank you for coming on now. This

Dr. Amy Killen  

is fantastic. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. Yeah, my pleasure.

Mindy Pelz  

Thank you so much for joining me in today’s episode. I love bringing thoughtful discussions about all things health to you. If you enjoyed it, we’d love to know about it. So please leave us a review, share it with your friends and let me know what your biggest takeaway is.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai