Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:05] Speaker B: Welcome to another episode of the Worst Advice I Ever Got. I'm your host Sean Taylor, along with my producer, JB and today our guest is Allison Blood.
Allison is a registered nutritional.
3, 2, 1.
Allison is a registered nutritional therapist and hormone health expert who works primarily with women, navigating the ups, downs, and often overlooked challenges of menopause.
She's based in Sweden, but works globally, helping women understand their bodies, their nutrition, and how to advocate for their health in a world that often tells them to just deal with it.
Today, she's sharing the worst advice she ever got and how ignoring it led her to a career focused on empowerment, education, and breaking down stigma around aging and hormone health.
Allison, thanks for joining us today.
[00:00:54] Speaker A: Oh, thank you. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me.
[00:00:58] Speaker B: Well, Allison, I would love to know. What's the worst advice you ever got?
[00:01:02] Speaker A: Diet doesn't affect your hormones.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: So, Allison, let's talk more about where you got that advice from and why it is your worst advice.
[00:01:13] Speaker A: Well, it was really. I mean, I'm a nutritional therapist, so obviously I understand that now. But when I was growing up, you know, when I was a teenager and, you know, my early 20s, there was never anything spoken about how, you know, your diet and your lifestyle affects your hormones. I had bad acne when I was a teenager, and I was trying to. I always was looking for solutions for that, hormonal solutions and looking at my diet and lifestyle, you know, and people would just say to you, oh, don't be so silly. You know, your diet and your lifestyle doesn't have anything to do with your skin, for example.
[00:01:48] Speaker B: Wow. Well, I can. You're. You're talking about pain. I had terrible acne growing up. I remember going to the dermatologist and they would push that little device on my face, and I felt like I was gonna die. If I had known all that pizza I was eating was the cause of it, maybe I would have stopped eating it soon.
[00:02:02] Speaker C: When you say hormones, like, tell our audience, what do you mean by hormones?
[00:02:06] Speaker A: Yeah, good question. What is a hormone? A hormone really is what we call a chemical messenger. So it is a messenger that your body releases through your. What we call our endocrine. Endocrine system.
And this hormone goes to a specific receptor on your body. We've got receptors all over and sends a message to that receptor, something that it wants it to do. So it's a. It's a chemical messenger.
[00:02:36] Speaker B: How does nutrition affect the messenger?
[00:02:40] Speaker A: In our diet and in our environment, there are things called endocrine disruptors.
And these have an effect on our hormones and they can be found in foods. They can be found in many different things like pesticides, herbicides, plastics. You know, there's many different other sources of these endocrine disruptors, but in nutrition, you know, it can be in ultra processed foods, for example. And these certain ingredients can have an effect.
One in particular, what is called xenoestrogens. And what they do is they, they mimic estrogen. So they can have a detrimental effect on men and women due to the, you know, they disrupt things. You can become estrogen dominant, which means you have higher levels of estrogen. So it just really imbalances everything in the body. You know, our bodies weren't meant to have these endocrine structures, like messing all our hormones and regulation of the metabolism.
[00:03:50] Speaker B: Can I go back to where you got the advice and sort of how it affected you? Like did when you first got it, did you believe it? Did you take it? And it. Did it take you down a bad path? I'd like to know more about the advice background.
[00:04:03] Speaker A: Sometimes when people give you advice when you're teenage, you're automatically very against it, aren't you? Like, if your parents tell you to do something, you'll always be like, oh, I'm not doing that. You're completely against any sort of advice. And when I put that question forward, like, why is my skin, why have I got acne?
Could it be something I'm eating? Could it be something in my environment and people, you know, the many people at school, I think my parents as well. No, absolutely not. You know, diet doesn't affect your hormones. It's your age, which of course there is a big thing going on there with puberty as well, with hormones.
But the fact that diet and lifestyle comes into play with your skin, you know, nobody ever really told me that. And it was, I think it was just my stubbornness.
I was thinking, well, you know, I'd read some of that sugar maybe isn't so good for skin health and, you know, acne, etc.
So I did, I just was very stubborn and cut out these products in my diet and saw a great improvement in my skin.
[00:05:12] Speaker C: It feels like very obvious, right? Like, you know, the, the connection between these two things, this chemical messenger that you have and the food you put into your body. But this is obviously something that was going on when you're a teenager and still you're dealing with it today as you're, you know, talking to people as a nutritionist.
[00:05:28] Speaker B: Why?
[00:05:28] Speaker C: What's up with that, Yeah, I mean.
[00:05:31] Speaker A: The, I think the thing is not many people realize in general do they, that, you know, the endocrine disruptors do affect our hormones, our system, how we are, you know, everything, they have an effect on everything.
[00:05:43] Speaker B: When, when you look at our diets, what are the diets that are more harmful to our bodies from the standpoint of our hormones specifically?
[00:05:53] Speaker A: Yeah, diets that tend to be more, I mean, this is what the research is saying that tend to have a, an effect, a negative effect on our hormones is diets that contain more ultra processed foods. So when I say ultra processed foods, it's foods that are produced in a factory, you know, a lot of ingredients and chemicals in there that you don't really understand what they are. I'd say to clients, if you can't make it in your kitchen, then it's most likely an ultra processed food. Us as humans, we weren't supposed to eat like that. You know, we're hunters and gatherers.
[00:06:31] Speaker B: I mean, we live very fast lives. So are there certain processed foods that are worse offenders than others?
[00:06:37] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, I think a very good example is cereals. You know, some of the, the cereals that you can see, like the Cocoa Pops and there's that one, I can never remember the name of it with the, the marshmallows in.
[00:06:53] Speaker B: Lucky Charms.
[00:06:55] Speaker A: Thank you. Lucky job is they're just, they're like a dessert. They are so high in sugar. They are highly, highly refined, ultra processed foods. You know, the, the, the product in there, you know, you can't see what it is. It's been processed so much and they, you know, cause inflammation, they have a detrimental effect on our hormones and you know, they're just not nourishing foods. That cereals, Another good example is like that some people think, you know, health is like yogurts. You know, there's, there's nothing wrong with plain, like full fat Greek yogurt. But when you kind of go down that route of flavored yogurts, added sugar, lots of preservatives and E numbers and all of these things, you know, you're getting onto an ultra processed food that will have an effect on your, your health negatively.
[00:07:55] Speaker C: How many people would say would agree with you in your field about this diet doesn't affect your hormones being bad advice?
[00:08:02] Speaker A: Well, I think that most people now, because we know so much more now that the people in my industry would, would agree with me.
[00:08:09] Speaker C: So then why are we still making all this ultra processed food?
[00:08:12] Speaker A: Good question.
Why, why do we still produce this food when we know that it is detrimental for health. I mean, we, we see a lot of the, the fantastic functional medicine. Doctors have really got behind this now and are saying, you know, this food is toxic.
We've got a huge obesity epidemic in, in the world. You know, we've never been so unhealthy. Chronic disease is, is, is everywhere, yet we're still eating these foods. The first thing that we have to think about is that there's, it involves a very large amount of money.
[00:08:50] Speaker B: I agree with you, Allison. I think the answer to a lot of these questions is follow the money.
[00:08:54] Speaker C: And if you, you know, if you got a long shelf life for some food that can sit on the thing for three months instead of three days, you make more money. So why wouldn't you just throw the chemicals in there, you know?
[00:09:04] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. And I mean, they, and they engineer the foods to be addictive, you know, so ultra processed foods are designed to kind of trigger cravings and overeating and they lead to very poor metabolic health. But they're very clever, you know, they know that this kind of combination of very palatable high sugar, high fat, that's what your brain wants. So it's difficult because these products do become addictive.
[00:09:34] Speaker B: Alison, beyond just the obvious sense of how processed foods affect obesity. But let's get back to like, hormones.
I've done panels of blood work and they've talked about all these readings. Right. And, and you know, how food affects them. What are some other things that our bodies get out of whack on because of, because of diet?
[00:09:56] Speaker A: Yeah, there are many other things that, you know, when we look at our hormones, they're responsible for so many different things.
So when we, you know, if we find that hormone, endocrine disruptors are coming into our world and, you know, we're having effects from. It can affect your mood, you know, it has an effect on cognitive health.
Now you can find that you become more irritable, you get headaches, you know, all of those things.
Also, interestingly, male levels of testosterone, even in like younger males, is for some reason lower than it ever has been.
[00:10:39] Speaker B: There's a big push now for packaged foods that are healthy, though, that healthy.
[00:10:45] Speaker A: You know, because some ultra processed foods, they're very clever.
You know, they package it in a way, you know, it's kind of green looking.
It looks bit organic.
You have to be careful. There's so many different products out there on the market. You really need to look at the label because even though it might look healthy due to the packaging, it doesn't mean to say that.
[00:11:10] Speaker C: That it's for everyone who's listening and just kind of freaking out because it seems like an impossible task to do this because everything is basically like you said, they are working against you. They're trying to. They're making it addictive, they're making it cheaply. They're making it so they can make the most money and not really caring about you. What are you supposed to do?
[00:11:29] Speaker A: Yeah, what are you supposed to do? That's a. That's a big question. And the thing is, there are many things that you can do. It's just taking one step at a time and not becoming overwhelmed. The one thing that I would say, if possible, I do appreciate that organic food can be more expensive.
But trying to buy as much organic food as you can that hasn't been sprayed with as much pesticides and herbicides. There is actually something called the Dirty Dozen and the clean 15.
And these are lists that are produced by the agricultural company. And it gives you the list of the products that sprayed the most and the ones that are sprayed, you know, the least.
[00:12:16] Speaker B: Alison?
Yeah. Organic foods cost more. We try to buy organic foods in our house, but I got to believe you're right that it's vastly important to. To go more organic.
[00:12:27] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, how. It's your health. Is it. What price can you put on your health and buying and choosing foods that are organic and more healthy for you? You know, your health is priceless, really.
A lot of the big food companies are owned by big pharma.
So it's kind of like this vicious circle, isn't it? We're going to fill these people full of all this toxic food till they get really ill. And then when they need help because they're either a diabetic or, you know, got some other chronic disease, we're then going to give them all the pharmaceuticals and the medication that they need to feel better. But it's with pharmaceuticals, of course, there are certain medications that are fantastic. So, you know, I'm not knocking it. However, we want to look at prevention, you know, and I see this every day with my clients. When you look at lifestyle medicine, when you look at what you're doing with your life, what you're eating, you know, taking control of the back of your health, it can cut down on many different medications. I think what's happened is because we're living in a society with so much chronic disease, our medical systems are really fantastic when it comes to the needed care. If you've been hit by a Car or you need that real sudden care, we're brilliant at that. But managing long term chronic diseases, it's not what our medical systems are doing.
And that's what has to change really because so many people are suffering from chronic illness at the moment.
[00:14:01] Speaker C: Every time we kind of do an episode we always end up a little bit touching on advice. So you said, you know, there's some things you can do. What's the, what would you say? The number one thing is one thing.
[00:14:12] Speaker A: Which that would be very helpful for many people that's quite doable is to remove plastics from your kitchen. It might sound a bit overwhelming.
I did it a few years ago, very gradually. Basically, if you store food in plastics in your fridge, for example, the BPAs, which is the chemicals in the plastic seep into the food, gradually remove things out of your kitchen that are in plastic and replace them with glass or stainless steel.
[00:14:42] Speaker B: That's interesting.
I think in a sense our society looks at companies and government as being there to keep us safe. But the fact is it's really, we have to be our own app.
[00:14:58] Speaker A: You definitely have to be the own advocate of your own health because unfortunately we can't really think like that, can we? Money comes first before the health of the nation.
[00:15:09] Speaker B: My concern with self care products or other things is people market things in a way that makes me feel like, oh, I should buy that, I should do that, that's good for me. Well, what's misleading marketing and what's fact? How do we try to. That's. That seems very confusing.
[00:15:24] Speaker A: Yeah, it is confusing and you know, it's not easy. But the products like body lotions. Because what you have to remember is when you put something on your skin, your skin is an organ, you know, it absorbs into the skin. I don't think people necessarily think that and you know, they can, it can have a detrimental effect on, on your body. What you need to be aware of is the ingredients that you, you know, you need to maybe think, oh, I'm not going to use products with these ingredients in. So you have to, you basically have to look on the back of the product, like the aluminium for example, in deodorants, you know, aluminium has been shown to have a detrimental effect on our, on our hormones. There are products that you can see where it says on the deodorant, antiperspirant, you know, doesn't contain aluminium.
[00:16:13] Speaker C: And now you're like, oh, I guess all the other ones do maybe actually look at that.
One of the things I heard, I remember hearing a quote about every time you go to the grocery store and you buy something, you're voting for that product to be more available. So just by making these choices and going and, you know, buying the whole foods, then more whole foods are going to become available because more people are buying them, which is going to bring the price down. Right? Because it is all about money. So there is something you can do from, from that aspect. What is like the, the big products that you, that you suggest for your clients?
[00:16:44] Speaker A: I mean, I've, I'm actually a beauty therapist as well. You know, I've got access to fantastic professional products.
Toothpaste, we haven't actually spoken about that, have we?
That's another product that you can be careful with. I use one that contains coconut oil because it doesn't contain so much fluoride and it also doesn't contain the detrimental ingredients that some toothpaste can contain.
[00:17:11] Speaker B: How do we make cooking and health fun?
[00:17:15] Speaker A: Great question.
It's important, isn't it?
The main thing is to cook and eat together with your family members or your friends. And this is shown in research that how beneficial it is that us as humans, you know, meet and sit down and talk and eat slowly and breathe, you know, when we're eating. The worst thing that you can do is, as you were saying, running around, you know, grabbing something to eat as you're dashing off somewhere because of the stress response, your body can't digest it the same. It doesn't need to be complicated.
Buy simple ingredients, you know, chop them all up. I'm a great fan of one pan dinners.
Basically you just take your protein sauce and then just chop up a, like a load of vegetables round the outside of the pan, olive oil, bit of salt and pepper and herbs and in the oven for 20 minutes. So like super simple.
[00:18:14] Speaker B: Allison, a lot of helpful information here. Any final thoughts as we wrap up the podcast?
[00:18:21] Speaker A: Yeah, it's a lot of information, isn't there? And you know, I just really want people to realize that this is something that is happening. It's awareness is everything, isn't it? But there are many things that you can do, as we've discussed, but final thoughts would really be just take it one step at a time. You know, as I said, remove plastics from the kitchen slowly.
Be mindful when you buy products in the grocery store, have a look at the labels, you know, find yourself a list of endocrine disrupt, disruptor ingredients and maybe have that with you in the supermarket. But it, it's just being mindful and aware of these things and Trying to avoid them as much as you can.
[00:19:07] Speaker B: Well, talking about making cooking fun and nutrition fun, you've made our podcast fun. You've been a great guest today, Allison, and I'm so glad that you came to join us today. I think this is a. A very important topic. I think our world's becoming less and less healthy. We're relying on others to fix it for us in a fast way. And I think you've opened our eyes to some of the realities of what we really need to do.
So thanks for coming on the show today. Thanks for sharing your knowledge and your experience.
[00:19:37] Speaker A: We're just.
[00:19:38] Speaker B: We're really happy that you joined us, Allison. Thank you so much.
[00:19:41] Speaker A: Oh, thank you. It's a pleasure. Thank you for having me.
[00:19:44] Speaker B: Okay, JB I'll admit when Allison said her worst advice was diet doesn't affect your hormones, I thought this might be a pretty narrow, niche kind of topic.
[00:19:55] Speaker C: Oh, for sure. I mean, I figured we'd be talking about, like, smoothies and supplements, but this episode ended up being about a lot more than that.
[00:20:03] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. This was more about how early advice, especially dismissive advice, it can shape your whole approach to health and how long it can take to unlearn that. Allison, you know, she. She wasn't just told food didn't matter. She was shamed for even asking the question.
[00:20:21] Speaker C: Yeah. She highlighted so well, like, how this bad advice actually baked into the culture. You know, it's just puberty, and your skin has nothing to do with what you eat. And, you know, she said nobody ever told her the truth, and she said she actually had to be stubborn to try to find a real answer.
[00:20:35] Speaker B: That's the part that really, that, you know, as I think about it, it really gets to me how relevant this all really still is.
She's a nutritionist now, and she still, even to this day, here's the myth out there, and we're not talking about acne anymore. It's. It's connected to mental health, sleep, fertility, inflammation, testosterone, even endocrine disrupting chemicals and plastics, for sure.
[00:21:04] Speaker C: This is absolutely the most I've ever heard the term endocrine disruptor in one place.
You know, that's how deep it goes. You know, it's not just about what's in your cereal. It's the lotions in the food containers and your environment. And honestly, if you're not careful, you know, trusting these systems that you assume are taking care of your health, you can get in some trouble.
[00:21:24] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. I have to believe this episode's scary.
It's almost like you feel like there's nothing you can do because once you hear how widespread these hormone affecting products are, just feels like they're everywhere.
[00:21:36] Speaker C: Right. She didn't. Shouldn't leave us stuck in fear. Exactly. You know, she gave us a few steps. You know, everyone's. Replace your plastic containers with glass.
You can look up the dirty dozen and the Clean 15 list for when you're buying produce.
You can buy whole, unprocessed foods whenever you can. You read the labels. It's, you know, ask questions and start small.
[00:21:56] Speaker B: Yeah, definitely. I think the takeaway is you don't have to do it all at once, but you, you, you do have to start.
[00:22:02] Speaker C: Yeah. Maybe the worst advice of all is the subtle stuff that we've heard for years and the things they told us, you know, don't worry about it. It's not all connected.
[00:22:10] Speaker B: Yeah, well, Allison just reminded us it. It is connected. And that awareness isn't just knowledge. It's.
It's power. And, you know, if you, if, if you feel like you're a little more connected to reality after this episode and you've. You've acquired some power from it, then great. That's what we hope to accomplish with our episodes is bringing you something that emp to feel better about yourself and better about your future. So be sure to join us next week for another episode of the Worst Advice I Ever Got.
