Personal Protocols and Closing

Welcome to Everyday Wellness podcast. I'm your host, nurse practitioner, Cynthia Thurlow. This podcast is designed to educate, empower, and inspire you to achieve your health and wellness goals. My goal and intent is to provide you with the best content and conversations from leaders in the health and wellness industry each week and impact over a million lives Tod I the hor of connecting with friend and colleague, Nat Nadom. She's a certified holistic nutritionist and epigenetic coach, and she hosts the longevity with Nat Nadom podcast She is one of the most active lay and professional communities around peptide education and longevity protocols. Today, we spoke at length about tides actually are and why they are not the same as HRT The differentiator is between biore reggulators and signaling peptides The impact of peptides on neurocognitive health, gut health and more Specific peptides it can be beneficial for muscle health and longevity. differenterentiators between thymic peptides, bioregulators and immune modulation, the challenges around peptide hype and why discernment becomes critically important if you are considering utilizing peptides in conjunction with your licensed medical provider. and last but not least, specific topical peptides which be Helful for maturing skin This is one of these ast guest that as I have been asked for multiple times, I will definitely be bringing Natt back to deepen the conversation around a lot of these peptide therapies and why I think it's so important to be incredibly discerning about utilizing these and why I think it is critically important to be working with a licensed medical provider if you are considering these as well Well, Nat, I'm so glad we were able to make this come to fruition and welcome to Everyday Wellness. Thank you so much for having me. I'm thrilled to be here. For no other reason that I get to talk to for an hour However long we're gonna to be here. No, literally the other day in my free group, there were a bunch of women that were like, Ohh, you know, I'd really like you to interview. And I was like, Ohh, you are so excited to know. I'm interviewing her this week. So you know, I always love when The community identifies people that they're really interested in me interviewing and they're already on my schedule. I'm like, oh, I'm gonna make you really, really happy. I'd love to start the conversation Talking about the basics because peptides are bolstering business I think they can be incredibly powerful. But I think there's so much misinformation about peptides and bioregulators And especially when we're talking about the longevity space that you and I are both a part of So much misinformation, there's a lack of clarity. There are a lot of people that are super savvy and smart and what do they do? They're capitalizing on this interest. So What are they? Why are they so important? And what do you think is contributing to a great deal of the misinformation about peptides and bioregulators Yeah. well, thank you for that. It's a big question. So We'll start with the easy part is what they are, right? They are small proteins, essentially. The most common peptide that every single person here has heard of is insulin right So insulin is a peptide that is used by the body to Put your glucose away in a perfect world, right at the right time in the right amounts And so peptides are chains of amino acids. so amino acids are your building blocks of protein. And generally speaking, and people argue about this upside down and sideways. it's generally about fifty amino acids or fewer is considered a peptide I break down peptides into two categories because I speak of bioregulator peptides as well. So we have signaling peptides that they tend to be longer chained. There are exceptions there And this is your alphab Bet soup peptide. This is the BPC one hundred fifty seven, thymusin beta four, thymosin alpha one, TB five hundred, GHK copper, there's that exception, only three amino acids, but still considered a signaling peptide. And I could go on, right? On the other branch, we have the bioregulator peptide. So biore reggulators are even tinier. They are two to four Sometimes as many as five ammino acids long These are always naturally occurring in nature Whereas the signaling peptides for the most part, are fragments of proteins that are naturally occurring in our body, but there's exceptions to that But the bioregulators are naturally occurring in nature, they are actually found in every lifeformm you can imagine. They're found in plants, in insects, in humans, in like mammals, in fish, right? So reptiles, everybody's got some form of bioregulators naturally occurring. And what's interesting about the bioregulator is whereas the signaling peptide on receptors that are outside the cell to initiate chemical cascades inside the cell The bioregulator is defined by the fact that it can get into the cell, it can get into the nucleus, and it can act directly on your DNA. So that makes it an epigenetic switch. I think it's important. So we're talking about signaling peptides that are extracellular. And then we have these bioregulatory peptides that can go intracellularly. So I would imagine they tend to be a little bit more complicated by virtue of the fact that in order to get into the cell, there's a little bit more sophisticated machinery involved in order for that to actually come to pass The other part of my question was Why do you think pepttides are having a moment? What do you think is contributing to this? it medical misinformation? Is it consumers are just getting more knowledgeable and there's more information available Since you've been in the space for such a long period of time, I'm just curious because you've watched the evolution. What are your thoughts about the direction peptide therapies are going in? Yeah. I think that's a great question, and it probably has a number of answers. The truth is that so the biore reggulators were discovered, researched in Russia And they've been around forty years over there right? It took a long time for them to come to here. And to this day, you have very prominent physicians that claim They're nothing. They do nothing, which is hilarious because they have more human clinical research behind them than all of the other peptides put together The signaling peptides been around also for a couple of decades, they were probably the first people to use them were bodybuilders, right? So bodybuilders are in my mind, the quintessential biohackers. They were the first biohackers and they will do anything it takes to achieve a certain aesthetic. That's all they care about So they were using things like Melanatan to stimulate the melanocytes and generate a ten As it turns out, meelanatan also has appetite suppression effects, so it might help them to cut as they were getting closer They were using BPC one hundred fifty seven, which helped them to recover faster from workouts. So if you recover faster, you can work out harder and more frequently and get better results. So those guys knew about this stuff. It's taken a really long time for these peptides in particular, they've been simmering under the surface. And I guess when I first first started talking about them or when I first came across them, they had already started to show up in functional medicine Right? The first guy I heard personally speak about them at a conference was Dan Stickler out of Austin And, you know, he's standing on stage and he goes, you know, why I have this Jan because of he was talking about meelanitan, Th thenen he went on to talk about BPC one hundred fifty seven. thenen he went on to talk about a pitalon about lengthening telomeres and regulating circadian rhythm. My head is exploding. I'm going, oh my God, who is this person? What's he talking about? And so I tap the shoulder of the guy sittaling in front of me and I'm like, is this guy for real unknowingly tapping the shoulder of one of the biggest compounding pharmacies in Texas, and he turns to me and he goes Oh heck, yeah, this is going to change medicine And so I think what's happened is it's a very interesting thing because they never really got developed as drugs until we got to the GLP ones, let's say the GLP category. Because they never really got developed in drugs, where they've really evolved is under the surface. They've been just simmering in these early adopter functional medicine groups, but really also in the self quantified groups slash biohacker community. So these are people like these are the people that heard that this C sixty compound doubled the lifespan of rats. C sixty was an industrial lubricant that they were testing to see if how fast it would kill things It turns out it made rats live two times longer, so they instantly wanted to get their hands on it compleompletely missing the point that most of what works in animals doesn't work in humans. Now as it turns out, C sixty does have benefits for humans, It doesn't kill us. It's great, but it's not a peeppttide. We're not going to talk about it today. But all that to say that what's happening with the peepides is the cats have been getting let out of the bag progressively over the last few years. and the truth is that they can move the needle in ways that work with the body, right that enable the body to do that tap into the body's innate wisdom And so for that reason, first of all, they've developed this reputation, which I don't think is always well founded that they nothing could possibly go wrong They're super safe. We both know that there's some nuance to that And people and there's this other industry that developed alongside of these research labs that we're able to make these available to any Tom Dickon Harry and Susan. And so It's this unique situation I think, where This groundswell of use in just regular people has l, I think it's almost outstripped the functional medicine doctors, even though so many of them have now come online with them But you've got this massive body of anecdotal information And the other, and I think to me, the fuel accelerator here is social media Right? If we didn't have social media, it might still be kind of in little circles of people But what's happened with social media is the awareness has exploded. and now, I think sadly, it's turned into a gold rush in the wild wild West. And the reason for that is You can source very cheap peptides and resell them for a ridiculous profit and this is what's happening with all like you get a new If I had a buck for every new research lab that sent me an email asking me to be an affiliate or a representative, I'd be I don't even need to be an affiliate. I just could get rich off of that, you know? And I say no to all of them at this point. likeike I don't say yes to anybody anymore. And it's just become And so it's double thing. L on the one hand, there are so many great stories. And I interview people all the time, like physicians who tell me that these compounds, when they're used properly have literally cut healing times in half for their patients. Like they can move the needle in ways that they could never before or even if they could do it before, it would just take five years. Now it takes two So, but at the same time Everybody's gotten their hands on them. So and with the social media thing, you now have the influencer model who will get up in front of a screen and be really cute and have her line up, his or her line up of their vials in front of them. This is my morning routine, like I've literally seen this unbelievable. when they're midriff kind of little pajamas. I don't know who goes to bed wearing these things, why why bother? And then they've got their syringes and they're like, this is what I do every morning. you know, and I do this for my skin And I'm sitting there going, o my God, no, please stop No, it's interesting. It's money Something I hear constantly from women in our community and something I understand personally is this Nothing about your effort has changed and yet our bodies are responding differently Your midsection feels different. 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I just did an IG stories today talking about podcast sponsors because I've gotten two recent negative reviews and I can't call the people out there with the reviews because what they did is what they did, but I do read every review for the podcast because I take my podcast very seriously And they were complaining about podcast sponsorship. much too many ads for podcast and I explain on social media what I spend per month just for my podcast editing and the podcast team and why I have sponsors, but I am so conscious about veting people. Like we eag and th away ninety percent of what we receive And so my operational business manager approached me a couple dayso and said, oh, we've got this what I would essentially refer to as a Tlemed time and you know, HRT and Peptidees company and they would love to spponsor you and they would like to bring on their chief medical officer And The irony is when I got online and looked at their website, there was no testosterone available for women, I was like, that strike number one. And number two, literally that morning on sububstack, there was a physician talking about how some compounding pharmacies had been shut down because of sh shhoty work and this company was mentioned And I was like, okay, strike two, not even up for discussion. But I think for everyone that is part of this community knows that I'm super conservative for a reason. There are great compounding pharmacies out there There are just as many that are predatory. there are Clinicians out there that want to make as much money as possible. Hopefully they're the minority and they'll pay twenty dollars for a vial of a GLP one and then charge their patient one hundred dollars And. There was an individual who was sharing this with me at a party And I looked at them and I said, what makes you think you're actually getting a GLP one in that bottle? Like that's the other thing of this is I think most clinicians, most experts that are out there, want the best for their clients, their patients, et cetera There are a few that are not thinking thoughtfully about where they're sourcing from They're not thinking thoughtfully about which companies they're working with. I think what disturbs me more than that is even I'll see licensed medical providers that are part of MLMs and they're like pushing their type product and I'm like Now when we talk about there's no research on these things, I'm like, come on. I mean, it just becomes And I say this lovingly. L I understand people want to make money and people, you know are planning for things, but I think consumers just need to be careful about where they're getting information from and be careful about where they're purchasing things from. Like're purchasing it from a high quality compounding pharmacy, that's different But even I for myself, I was compounding BPC one hundred and fifty seven for myself because I'm always working on gut health And there's one company that I've purchased from that makes their product in the United States in a fully licensed lab. It's very, you know they're very conservative, they're very transparent about all of their prescribing practices In a lot of instances, it's like you could just be taking talalcum powder in a capsule. You don't even know what you're getting So when you're talking to your community net or talking on the podcast Are there things that you recommend for how people can source tides responsibly or Are there companies that you' like to work with? I mean, feel free to mention. I mean, there's I have no affiliation with any of these companies, but ye I just think that Women are looking for good information and it's hard in a noisy space. They're inundated on social media. You and I both know there's a lot of predatory advertising for middle aged women, many of whom are weight loss resistant, don't like the changes in body composition. becomes a very noisy space to navigate what direction we want to be going in when we're consumers. Yeah. It's tricky. you know, there have been a couple of high quality research labs that I knew personally that I worked with. and that I did recommend. One of them was the biggest in the industry and they packed up their toys and shut the door at the beginning of the year because they knew that they were in the crosshairs of the regulatory authorities and they were going to be made an example of Were these guys printing money they were in my mind They were too big to mess up There was too much at stake When they first started, that's where a lot of the physicians now were getting their peptides from The truth of the matter is If we're going to be really honest at this very instant Even compounding pharmacies shouldn't be compounding peptides. accccording to current regulations, BPC one hundred fifty seven is off the table, MTi is off the table, apidlon is off the table, HK copper I think they lifted the ban on CJC one two nine five or maybe it's hpp Marllen. Right? So It's a really tricky landscape. I think that If you're looking to use these compounds, Find a practitioner or a voice or someone you can trust who's not just out to make a quick buck. And it may be easier said than done, but it's possible. You know what? We can tell who has integrity and who doesn't We can tell who is running their Instagram account to make a bajillion dollars, who's really loud, who maybe makes up studies on the fly. And I'm thinking of a couple of big names off the top of my head. Those people are around. so I think you have to use your gut, you have to do some research and you have to listen to what the person's saying. If somebody is saying to you, All you have to do is this. and use this and it will solve all your problems Run Don't wal run away. becausecause the truth of the matter is that For the physicians who use peptides responsibly in their practice, they have a full clinical picture of the person sitting in front of them. Let's take Melanaan, for example possibly go wrong? It's a tanning peptide. Oh my God, it's amazing, right? It helps to thicken the skin. It may make me more resistant to the sun. I'm gonna to look fabulous in the middle of winter when I should be looking a bit green. L what could possibly go wrong? Well, the truth of the matter is that with melanatan, you are over you're hyperstimulating your melanocytes Well, if there's enough DNA damage in there, This isn't proven yet in court in the courourt of Research Trials, but there have been some reported cases of melanoma coming up in people using melanatan. Now there's not a lot of them. There's just a handful. Is it possible that those people had a melanoma brewing and it just brought it up faster? maybe did it cause those people who had a certain amount of DNA damage to trigger hyperstimulation that drove the melanoma Possibly. Was it a coincidence, given the numbers potentially But we don't know. So things can go wrong Right? And you can't And I'm you know, it's funny because I'm torn between, look, not everything needs to have a double blind clinical trial with crosssover in the whole nine yards because it's not feasible. It will hold us back. It's part of medicine's problem is it moves so slowly. And it's part of why people are jumping all over these things right now because they're like, I amm so sick of waiting for these guys to catch up in twenty years. I don't have twenty years to wait. I'm just moving forward. So I kind of get that But we have to find a more nuanced middle ground. If we just do And I think that's really important. This nuanced conversation, working with people that know you as a patient can properly counsel you on pros and cons And then you're making shared decision making Even I am super conservative about peptides. and it's interesting. I was telling someone I've always carried my own malpractice, even when I worked for a hospital system, even when I worked for a large cardiology group. So I've been an MP for twenty five years. I've always carried my own malpractice What we're finding is most malpractice insurance companies will not cover you for peptides. And I mean, they're deemed to be experimental. And so I was at an event this past weekend and there was a physician colleague talking about peptides And she was mentioning this group of physicians, o, this is the company I use to cover me for peptides. And she and I were speaking afterwards, and I said Isn't it interesting how the malpractice insurance carriers are even super conservative about this topic. So to your point about How long it takes research information to trickle down into clinical practice? It averages twenty years is what most people will say. You know we still are telling patients that total cholesterol is really important, that LDL is really important, that that's how we determine whether or not someone needs to be on lipid lowering therapy. when we know there's a whole constellation of evidence that suggests otherwise, LP little A, apolipoprotein B. And so I think that we can sometimes get in a vacuum where we just stop learning as individuals. And this is where I think peptides can be very exciting if we're being judicious, if we're being thoughtful in the approach And we're understanding that in some instances, we don't have a ton of clinical data. This really is When I use the term the wild wild West, it's because there's a degree of experimentation that's ongoing. and I think pulation We have access to more information now than we ever have Full stop We have the ability to connect with people we would never normally have the ability to connect with. So there's sharing of information across platforms on social media gosh, even AI, if you were to ask AI, I'm sure it would sound my gosh interesting peptide therapy and so I think there's a lot of confusion and hesitancy. And obviously we've talked a lot about GLP ones on the podcast. That is probably the podcast topic that we have discussed the most. But I would love for us to kind of pivot a little bit and talk about in your experience What have been some peptide therapies that have been particularly beneficial for women in that perimenopause to menopause transition? Let's start with Cgnition, brain health memory, learning, things that for a lot of women as estrogen is declining start struggling more with. And we were also talking before we started recording that sometimes my team and I can tell in communication patterns, middleed women the women that are struggling the most neurocognitively, So it is definitely a huge concern for many, many women Yeah. Well, I think that and at the risk of having people roll their eyes in their heads, I think we don't talk about peptides in any certainly in a situation like this until we've addressed those pillars that need to be addressed And we know that women in transition through perimenopause and menopause, they're not sleeping Hormones are whacked out They're stressed out of their minds. their inflammation' off the charts. like if they even had if they were lucky enough have good habits coming in if they don't have those habits anymore, now they don't even have that anymore. So until we've addressed Until women or meant until anybody has addressed these other things along the way You're throwing fertilizer into soil with no seeds, right? So before we go to something like, let's say a diehexa, which is people will refer to as miracle G for your brain, before we go there We owe it to ourselves to ask the question is Have we paid attention to hormones Have we solved the sleep problem And if we haven't solved the sleep problem, well maybe we use a biore reggulator and we've dressed things like sleep hygiene and eating away from bed, like all the basics, right? You have all the habits in place and you're still lying there, counting sheep and actually chasing the dogs that are chasing them with your busy brain Maybe we could bring in something like an epidon, like a Pineal Glen bioregulator, right? The Pineal Glen bioregulator is a compound that helps to restore function and balance to the pineal gland. And why is that important? Because our pineal gland is responsible for regulating our melatonin production Now To be clear, it doesn't mean that if you use the Pineil Glen bioregulator, you're necessarily going to make massive amounts of melatonin. And What the bioregulator's hallmark is modulation It's bringing things back to homeostasis. So this is why from a sleep perspective, the people that see and experience the most benefits from this bioregulator are people that are either elderly and they're not producing melatonin anymore and they've got dysregulated circadian, or people who have a dysregulated circadian rhythm, which is most of us We're not living lives that are in alignment, right? So I might be inclined to say Let's maybe we can help with sleep with something like a pineal gland bioregulator. Okay, we got the sleep thing dialed in. Okay, now let's talk about gut health because we know that as we go through perimenopause and menopause, frankly, through our entire lives these days, the integrity of the gut lining is being challenged every minute of every hour of every day, both by the choices we make things we're exposed to without choice. So have we taken care of the integrity of the gut lining We might bring in a peptide, like an oral peptide, like a BPC one hundred fifty seven combined with a KPV and a lurazitide. So these are this alphabet soup, if you will. Y BPC one hundred fifty seven helps with healing. Your KPV is going to help to manage inflammation in the gut. And then your lorazotide is going to help to seal the tpe junctions. At the same time, we're learning to manage our stress, we're changing our diet, we're doing all the things. So we're using these as We're kind of like bringing really skilled work people. Welome to the construction site. These are the guys that are going to make it look beautiful that are gonna to really help the whole design to sing So now we've talked about sleep, we've talked about the peptides that are going to help to heal the gut. We've looked at the microbiome and maybe introduced some fibers, insluble and insoluble, maybe we've introduced some probbiotics and prebiotics, if that's what's needed exercise and movement, right? Are we working out? Are we moving our bodies? Are we getting outside? Are we seeing morning light? Like all of those things have to be addressed because guess what? sometimes And then the hormones, we do all that And all of a sudden people start to experience clarity. The brain fog lifts, maybe we don't need But what we will bring the dxon for people who want to go that way is We might bring it on and physicians I know who use it in practice have the caveat to their patients What new skill are you going to train yourself to learn now because Dixa will help the brain to create new synapses, new neurons and build new infrastructure, But if you're not giving it a new challenge, it's not going to do anything with it. So really long answer to a short question But it's my philosophy on pepttides. If you're going to bring a pepttide in makeake sure that you're bringing it in as the next logical step in a sequence of events that are getting you to a certain destination. No, I agree with you wholeheartedly. I really think about peeptes as the icing on the cake and lifestyle is still critically important. And I would also layer in there. a lot of times and I feel like Elizabeth Earth does such a beautiful job talking about mitochondrial health, why it's so important ask that first. And, you know, people sometimes jump to you know, wanting to get rid of disease disordered mitochondria before they even think about repairing the mitochondria. And so I think on a lot of different levels, we sometimes jump way ahead of ourselves with good intentions. in many instances before we even get to peptides and biore reggulators and hormones replacement, Now those foundational elements that you're alluding to. Like I always say major in the majors, so sleep, stress, nutrition, exercise, gut health You have to focus in on those things because no amount of peptides and hormones are going to fix lifestyle related issues if you aren't willing to put in the work. Yeah. What we get away with in our twenties and thirties is not what we get away with when we're middle aged and beyond. Sadly. I mean, there's no quick fix, there's no magic pill. anyone that's telling you that is ling. Yeah, and they're making a buck. But you know, there is the cool thing about peptides is they can help sometimes. So BBC one hundred fifty seven is a classic on that one because when it comes to ut healing sometimes. With BPC one hundred fifty seven, at least at the beginning, people can start to feel better evenven before they've really made all the changes that need to be made And so this is a conversation with your physician and it's a bit of a deal, right? Because what'll happen is if somebody starts to feel better, all of a sudden, number one, It may be the first time that they haven't felt crappy in a really long time You get this surge of energy. You get this, oh my God, there's hope. What's the next thing I can do? So sometimes with and this is why peptides are so exciting is they can move the needle. The only thing is that if you don't now do your part, it'll only go so far And he won't work forever So it gives you kind of like it's a bit like the GLP once. It gives you a window of opportunity. It gives you relief from the grind of doing the work and kind of takes a bit of that load off of you so that you now have the energy to do your part and finish the job And so I think that's where the signaling peptides, you know, again, even with CJC and Iarellon, the growth hormone seecret agogs, a lot of people will and Sarah Marllin's another one, peopleople will talk about those to help with sleep. and they can be helpful for sleep. There arere also growth hormone secretagogs and growth hormone releasing hormones. And so We want to make sure so you want to make sure with your physician, like where are my IGF one levels? For most people they're going to be on the floor, right? Like you know you're tired, you're stressed, you're all the things. They can, again, also help to move the needle. for people To give everyone some perspective, IGF one is a proxy for growth hormes. So it's a snapshot of is your growth hormone levels decline very likely by middle age And IGF one can be an important part of the conversation. Now probably not routinely drawn with most conventional allopathic providers, but not a terribly inexpensive test and certainly one that I think can be very helpful Because in a lot of instances, when we're talking about growth hormone and we're talking about sarcopenia and wanting to maintain and build muscle mass. For a lot of women, this becomes a little bit more challenging in midlife. And you know some of these peptides that you just referred to Where have you seen tides play a role in maintaining and building muscle at this stage of life. Have you found ones that seem to be a little bit more effective, more helpful, again, on that kind of conservative lens that I think we're both on? Yeah. Well, I think that classic repair stack, the BPC one hundred fifty seven with whether it's Thymusin beta four, TV five hundred, I won't go into too much detail on those two, but just so you know, everybody They often TB five hundred and thymus and beta four are used interchangeably, but they are two different compounds. TB five hundred is a fragment of TB four. TB four has a bit more immune properties, It has a bit more functions. TB five hundred is the one that really hones in. It's the fragment that really hones in on musculoskeletal healing So When we're talking about helping people to build and maintain muscle It is possible that doing a cycle, let's say, an eight to twelve week cycle of BPC one hundred fif seven and TB five hundred or even thymusin beta four, with or without the growth hormone secretagogs. and we can talk about why you might do it or not do it What those peptides are, these are repair peptides. and so what they do is they help us to recover faster in between workouts. And so there's an argument that says if we can work out more often and repair faster in between our workouts, we're going to be able to get better results. So that's again, it's a decision you're going to make with your physician If you decide that it's right for you to bring in the growth hormone secretagogs, they can help to promote lean mass, and they, in many cases, can also help to lose fat And when you use them at night That's when you want your growth hormone circulating. BPC one hundred and fifty seven works really well with growth hormone because it up regulates the expression of growth hormone receptors. So now you've got more growth hormone hanging out. you've got more growth hormone receptors. That's part of that whole repair mechanism The growth hormone secretedgs at night can be helpful for sleep for some people for other people. It causes them to flush and it causes this transient increase in blood pressure. Sometimes that resolves. Sometimes it's a no go. It's a sign that the body doesn't want it. I also see a lot of people have histamine reactions to the growth hormone security dogs for some reason You have to be aware of that. You have to be open to the possibility that your body's not going to be on the same page as you The short answer to the question, is that stacked can be really helpful during a heavy training period to help the body to adapt faster to those workouts Would I use it all the time? Not on your life. I would probably use it maximum of three months. I would take one to two months off And if it's appropriate and needed, I might repeat it again for let's say eight weeks. But at that point, it's because you're working out really hard. You're not just going shaking your booty at the gym kind of doing the thing in the new outfit and saying, well, I'm using BBC and TV five hundred, and I'm going to become super muscular what you're doing is you're causing that micro damage to the muscle and you're creating a need for increaseed turnover And we want to make sure that you're getting all the amino acids you need in your diet And you know, like you're eating your protein and all the things. So that I mean, sorry, I can spin myself into another thing here, but you get the point No, no, I think it's so interesting. And let's touch on thymic peptides because The thymus gland There's a terrible world called word called involution. So thmous gland after puberty just kind of shrinks up and becomes a fatty ball of tissue and the shrinkage is caused is called involution. So when I was writing my book. and I was like, what a terrible word, shrinkage, okay. So These thymic peptides become very important. I find them very interesting, especially as immunocenescence, aging of the immune system really becomes an issue currently with this decline, especially in estrogen. It is also impacted by progesterone and testosterone, but I really think about estrogen and the immune system being very closely regulated by one another So these thymic peptes, just to touch on these real quickly. Thymus and alalpha is the one that I'm probably most familiarized with. but you're also talking about TB five hundred, TB four And when you're thinking about How you present information on thymic peptides in particular. And it's interesting, Elizabeth Yth loves thymeic peptides. She's always talking about it What is your perspective? Do you feel like the average middle aged woman benefits from additional immune support, immunore reggulatory support? Are you A fan of cycling these stymach peptides on and off? or is this something that we use kind of episodically and very targetedly? So this is a really nice segue to bioregulators becausecause there is a bioregulator for the thymus gland And so where is Thmuson alpha one, and I know Elizabeth you know, speaks beautifully about thymus and alpha one. It's a great immune system I mean, in some ways it's a modulator, but it can go the wrong way with people with autoimmune disease if it's really kind of bumping up the innate immune system so it can backfire. So you have to, again, use them with discernment. and the right amount at the right time on the right day But I'm a big fan of Thymosinpha one for sure Having said that, I mean, there was even during COVID, there were some incredible studies that came out of Asia using thymusin alpha one that were very complelimentary that got people booted off social media for talking about. But the thymus bioregulator is really interesting. And this is where, as I mentioned earlier, bio reggulators Look to restore balance become bring us back to homeostasis And the Thymus Glen bioregulator is one of the bioregulators that the man who discovered them, Professor Keavinson and did all the research on them, it is one of the two bioregulators that he used that showed that he was able to reduce mortality in elderly people. in one of his studies by two thirds compared to his control group. It's mind bending controled group of people who were seventy five to eighty five after six years, eighty eight percent of them had died. People who got the pineal gland bioregulator had a reduced mortality of forty five percent And the people who got the pineal gland and the thymus gland by a regulator were at thirty three percent Mind blowing, right? And all it's doing is helping it's increasing the number of natural killer cells. It's not necessarily boosting anything, it's not suppressing anything. It's just bringing things back to balance. And it doesn't hurt that the Pineal gland bioregulator has a balancing effect on the entire endocrine system, which also has an effect on the immune system So the two of them together, like so to me, if I'm talking to someone And they don't particularly have a they don't particularly have a pathological thing going on. likeike they're not sick, but they're We're getting older and we're maybe starting to see some slippage, if you will, in different areas. I'm going to use those biore reggulators strategically to help to restore right and rejuvenate function in different tissues and organs. And we can use them really strategically. like for a woman who's going through perimenopause. like so her hormones are kind of all over the place. She's still cycling, but things are kind of haywire You might want to think about doing something like using the adrenal gland bioregulator with the thyroid bioregulator and maybe even the central nervous system or the you know, central nervous system bioregulator. You might throw in the blood vessel bioregulator to give some love to the endothelial lining of all those blood vessels. And so we can see it's not going to boost her adrenal function and it's not going to boost or suppress her thyroid But what if it's bringing a little extra balancing support to the system to kind of I refer to it as smoothing the ride So in my mind I look at the biore reggulators as a tool to help people through Navigate through things and to age better Whereas I look at the signaling peptides really as therapeutic, almost like you would use drugs, but they're not drugs, right? Because they are still working with the body.'re still If you can figure out what to use when, in what instance, then you're essentially just optimizing and re reigniting the body's ability to do what it's supposed to do. I this also fascinating. Where does MOTC fit in when you're having these conversations? I think this is one of those more popular peptide therapies that admittedly I have not tried myself, but I find the information surrounding it pretty compelling Yeah. I think one of the things we have to acknowledge is there's a lot of hype around peptides too And so I think we need to be Cautious I love the way Elizabeth hears talks about MOTzI in the mitochondria. So MOTzi is a mitochondrial peptide. It is made by mitochondrial DNA in mitochondria But here's the thing about MTi is I think of MTzi as an accelerator And so it can be a great peptide if your mitochondria are in good shape And the engine' ready to be rerapp. But have we done the work of maybe making sure that the mitochondrial membrane is in good shape? right? Are we using our Are we taking phospholipids? haveave we paid attention to the integrity of the surrounding areas and the machine so that when we fire it up you've got a relatively clean environment SS thirty one is another really interesting peptide that addresses the mitochondrial membrane and the function of it. And so I really like to for me, I feel like there's a sequence of events there I prefer people to use SS thirty one at least alongside, if not before they start their Moti just to make sure that and do the phospholids feed that mitochondrial membrane or rebuild the mitochondrial membrane if it were, as it were. so that We now we're addressing the whole system. We're not just blindly pushing down on the accelerator Be ye, because M seen people will say, Ohh, you know, it helps you to lose weight, It gives you energy and, you know, all you hear all the things, right But what if you don't have energy for good reason? What if something needs to be fixed for that lack of energy? like Let's not forget that our body is pretty darn smart. and if you're lacking in energy, there's a reason for that. It's not just because your mitochondria aren't working all of a sudden. There's a reason for that. And we owe it to ourselves to answer the question What is happening before we push the system Well, and it's interesting because what you're saying is concurrent with what Elizabeth said when she was talking about why it's so important to repair the mitochondria first, because Yeah, the mitochondria should look kind of like a flower. They're beautifulional Exactly. If it's dysfunctional, the ATP can't actually generate energy as it's kind of bouncing off the intracellular areas. and so If you're jumping to upreulating mitophagy or jumping into SS thirty one, you don't actually have the functioning machinery to be able to generate energy properly and these peptides may actually not work as well. And so I just mentioned this. This is again why I think it's so important to work with a clinician or a peptide expert who actually can give you councsel on like what's appropriate to use for you. notot what for your best friend, not for the influencer on social media who, you know, it might work really well for them because they're twenty five years old and they're very metabolically healthy and their hormones are you know, hope optimized Yeah versus, you know, someone else. likeike I sometimes kind of am taken aback by all the MLO companies that are kind of pushing And I mean, I can think of four or five reallyally? Oh my head. Yeah, they're pushing tide related products. they may even be real People say, Oh I'm losing weight and I have more energy. And I'm like, well, it's probably because your blood sugar stabilized and there's probably some fiber in one of these things. I mean, there's a lot of things that can contribute to optimizing metabolic help, optimizing energy that don't necessarily involve a peptide. And to your point The foundational work still has to be done. Like we're not saying that you jump to peptides and that fixes everything. It's really have you majored in the majors? Are you mastering those properly? and then you can layer in something strategically in conjunction with talking and working with someone that's knowledgeable about peptide therapy? Yeah, for sure. You know, the one we haven't talked about is GHK. and I think that's one of the ones that the MLMs have grabbed and jumped all over. You know, there's these patches that supposedly, you know increase your GHK production. So GHK is really interesting because We have loads of it in our system when we're young and our levels tank And that's a shame becausecause GHK and you read the funniest things on social media. So Stanford University did a deep, deep, deep, deep dive on GHK. JHK Copper and they found It restored the youthful expression of over four thousand genes. So in humans And so Then I'm online and I'm reading through the comments of a doctor who does not, you know who completely dismisses peptides, which I think is comical at this point.'re You know, like, I don't think we should go to the influencer camp at all, but there are enough really smart, really good clinicians out there right now that have more than shown that these things work. and can be helpful And for someone to sit there and say, it's all Bogus is laughable. And this person was saying, well, yes, you know, and the university showed that it's triggering genes four thousand of them. And how do we know it's not triggering cancer genes? And I'm like Because if you read the study, they said in the study. it's restoring them to more youthful expression. So JHK is really interesting because it too is a repair peptide up regulates the production of collagen and elastin. It is it helps with wound healing, it helps to reduce scarring, it helps with gut. It even helps the brain. like there's so many things this thing does, which makes sense because we have so much of it when we're young So is there a world where there's an argument that says, we may want to keep those GHK levels Just like growth hormone, we don't necessarily want them as high as they were when we were in our twenties Maybe we want them higher than they're naturally declining as we age so that we can age better Right? So how do we find those lines? And that remains the question You know, I don't I don't think that slapping a some weird little jelly patch on your skin is magically going make your body produce GHK. I'm not buying it Yeah, it's interesting. My experience with GHK is in combination with hyaluric acid, str. as a topical. Yeah as a topical. And it's ironic that I was sent some free product, you know, compounded. And my eighteen year old who has managed to get his skin under control going dairy free And you know when you're eighteen years old, you're invincible. And so for a couple of months, I had so much of it. He was using the one that was just the copper peptides. Let me be clear. I was not encouraging him to use anything else on his skin. And I said, I have so much of it. It has an expiration date. goo ahead and use it. And he came to me after a couple of months, he goes, My skin looks amazing. Can I have more? And I was like, No In fact, make your own. you have your own. Exactly. I was like, you're very metabolically healthy, full of muscle and super healthy, but no, you can't. But I think the copper peptides, topical copper peptides are I guess where I've seen the most and generally compounded because then you can control the amount and how much. And yeah, there's a couple of skincare companies that are doing a really good job with the topical GHK that you'd like to share I think Vitalally skincare does a really nice job. And you know so again, they have their medical grade serum has three percent GHK copper And they have another lighter one, let's say, that has one percent GHK copper. And their formulations are based on the work of doctor Lauren Pickhart, who is the guy, the medical researcher who discovered GHK copper in nineteen seventy three. So he's an American dude. And his entire life's work is about this bptide. He's the funniest trustiest man I've ever met and he won't come on the podcast because I'm writing a book. I'm too busy. L but the researcher, yeah, I'm too busy. I can't do that. Yeah. Anyway, so GH K opper is so the topicals actually do, it is only three amino acids Right So it is tiny and it is of a molecular weight that it actually can be used topically and have benefit. And I would say that Vitality does a really, really nice job of formulating it with a few other key ingredients They do a great job. The other company that integrates JHK copper into their products. although not at high not in at as high concentration because they've got lots of other actives in their formulas is young goose So both those companies, I think do a nice job with the topicals. But there's also a story around GHK Copper for hair growth. But nobody's really cracked the code on that. You can't just go slapping it on your skin and thinking your hair is going grow Well, I think there's a whole community of women in midlife that are having hair growth issues and Oh yeah, whether it's low ferritin, whether it's, you know, They're on too much testosterone, whether, you know, there's a whole myriad of things that you know, micronutrient deficiencies that can all impact their ability to grow hair. And we've dedicated many podcasts to hair. So You can go Google, go right on the website and you can look for those because it's inevitably it's a pain point for a lot of people I'd love to know what your protocol looks like right now. What are you currently taking? What are you cycling in and out And what do you wish you had started earlier I wish I'd started taking care of my skin better earlier I mean, I'm lucky, like I have really good skin And but I think it would be a lot better if I had been a little more careful earlier in the game and maybe wash my face and put some moisturizer on once in a while. But I wish I would have started that earlier. I wish I'd known about the bioregulators a little bit earlier So my current protocol is and my protocol changes a lot People will open there's a particular pantry in my house, they'll open it up and they'll go, Oh my God, do you actually take all of this stuff? I'm sure you have the pantry as well. And the truth of the matter is what we do is we build stacks and we cycle on and off stuff. There are certain things that I take almost all the time. And things like spermidine, I'm a huge fan of spermadinas as a longevity compound, your foundations, you know, your omegas, things like that I'm cycling the biore reggulators pretty much most of the time You know, whether, but I don't use the same one all the time. Like I just finished a run of a pedalon on, the Pineal Glen bioregulator. I won't do it again for another three months That is one I'll come back to more often because I'm over sixty and I feel like I could use that little nudge every once in a while. I also have blood sugar I have a propensity to have blood sugar dysregulation just from a genetic perspective. So I will pay attention to the pancreas with through the pancreas peptide. b regulator, I mean. The actual signaling peptides I will use them as needed, only as needed. So I'm not currently using anything I am using a JLP right now because I had you know a bit of a health challenge in the beginning of the year, kept me kind of out of the gym and for five months. needing a little bit of help But I'm using a very low level low dose JLP at the moment And if I'm doing that, then I'm using essential amino acids, I'm using creatine all the things. So and then as from a face perspective,'s, you know, young Goose and Vitali are my They're my right hand and my left hand, those two guys. And so I'm always using these days one of their exxosome serums. almost I'm using the GHK copper serum most of the time, but not always, I take breaks from that as well. And I just, you know, the way I look at skincare and why I love young goose is they're bringing the bioactives that we're using internally to the skin Because the truth of the matter is your body could care less about your skin. As long as you have skin, it's happy. Doesn't really care what it looks like, right? So you know, I could be taking NAD precursors But my skin, it's not likely going be getting to my skin So I'm taking spermidine, it'll help my skin, but I think that if I apply it to my skin, there'll be more of it that gets there. So that's part of the reason why I really love a company like Young Goose that's taken the time to look at those compounds and say, okay, which ones will benefit our skin? giveive our skin the energy to remain youthful So that and you would think that they're paying me right now. They're not, sorry, but you asked. so that's what I'm using Thank you for that. I mean I always find it fascinating what other people are doing and using. and I think for myself, I'm constantly iterating on products I use, things that I try I'm a huge fan of Oneeskin. I've been using that for a while. Yeah. That's another great company, cost effective because I think my cleanser lasts I mean, they probably don't want to hear me have me say this, but I think a bottle of cleanser lasts me like eight months. So and I do double cleanses at night. I know that's what'm saying. It's very cost effective you know, I think for a lot of us, it's like simplifying before we do too much. skkinw is like it's so easy to get wooed by all these different items and I have a nurse practitioner friend in my neighborhood and she always benefits from the amount of stuff that is sent to me for free. And I'm like, there's no way I could use all of this. so let me give it to you and your teenage daughter and so they love it. too kind of run out the conversation If there's a woman listening who's never tried a peptide, is never whether it's been a subcutaneous, whether it's something oral, whether it's something that's topical If she doesn't know where to begin What would you suggest or advise her on? And we're talking about one thing Natt and I are absolutely in agreement is careful, judicious, not going overboard. I can't overemphasize this enough. that I think for anyone listening, whether you're using pepttides or not Careful judicious is kind of the main goal here. But if someone's listening and they're not as familiarized with some of these things we've talked about or they're interested in starting with something on a really basic level, what would you suggest to them as an honest kind of starting point Yeah, I think I mean the first thing I would invite you to do is really get educated. And there's two types of people in the world. There's the people that will and one is not better than the other. okay? We have people who and often they're engineers for some reason. There are people that are willing to go online and dig and dig and dig and really ask the hard questions and do the work parse out the information. And if you're that person, Do the work. Don't just go online and see someone raving about peptide, whatever it is and say, Oh, well, that sounds so cool. I'm going to try it. Ask the questions, who is this for? who is this not for? Are there any adverse events? You should be asking that question also of any supplement that you're taking, right? Have there been any reported adverse events? to this substance or this supplement. whatever it is If you ask the question about the peptides, if you ask for the downsides, sometimes you'll be like, oh That might apply to me. And if it does, then it's on you to really find a coach, a clinician, a guide, physician, someone who's going to then help to guide you ono whether or not this is for you. Then the other person doesn't have time to do the research. So for that person There are now enough physicians and clinicians and people out there who are well versed in these compounds who can give you good guidance. And you're going to have to look because if you go to your regular GP, they're going to look at you like you're absolutely insane So the bottom line is get educated and don't just ask your chatTPT or Pclaud What are the benefits of? Ask them, what are the downsides Ask your engine, who should not use this? or what are the cautions around this? Because these are the questions people aren't asking. They just want to know what the good stuff is. If we don't look at the dark side, we could sometimes end up in some kind of trouble Right So If you're the person that wants to get educated, there's also, I don't know if you've met Melissa Peterson, but there' she runs a beautiful platform called My Peptide University, and she educates clinicians, but she also provides consumer education Soce. That's another really good resource. You could join my membership community. We talk about peptides in there all the time. It's a mix of very knowledgeable individuals and clinicians in there. and I'll do like I mean tonight five thirty, I'm going to be doing a live Q and A with them There's some options like that. but bottom line, Do the work, find people who really you can resonate with, who you feel that you can trust. And maybe you can trust me and maybe you're like, h, I don't know, mayaybe not so much That's fine But you've got to follow your gut on this and it's really important to follow people or to take advice from people who don't have too much skin in the game. You know, we started this episode with the negative review you got on the sponsorship of your podcast. And there's a fine line like We do what we do because we love what we do, because we feel called to shine light in dark corners for people and help them to learn about things that will benefit their health. But this is a business and it costs a lot of money to run this business. So yes, we represent products, yes, we promote products, but we are, I mean, I'm like you I'm really, really careful about what I will put in front of people because I feel like it's a big responsibility. So hopefully people can accept that. and if they can't, that's okay. But you know, that's kind of how the world Yeah. Well, Natt, I've so enjoyed our conversation. obbviously, I know it'll be a first of many. for my listeners who will inevitably ask, what peptides am I taking? I'm just going to be transparent. I take personersalized dose, not the microdse, which is triggering to a lot of the alopathic community, microdose of Tzpetide I to keep all my autoim immune things in remission and I'm doing a little end of one experiment to see if it drops my LP little A, which nice We acknowledge not much does. Number two, I use copper peptides on my skin, probablyably every other day, just because I have so many other things that I use And then beyond that, I'm using BPC one hundred and fifty seven because I am always and inevitably will be working on the gut health And I do take thymic peptides because I travel a lot and that is why My integrative doc and I talked about, especially with the book launch and I just ordered some more oral thymeic peptides because I have a lot of travel coming up this summer. So transparenly Always willing to be transparent with my community. Natt, please let listeners know How to connect with the outside of the podcast, how to learn more about your work, listen to your podcast. And as I was complimenting that before we started recording Natt interviews some really interesting scientists and experts, even in some instances that are completely new to me. Nat mentioned to me, she does that purposefully because she doesn't want to be in a vacuum, which I think is really important Please let my listeners know how to connect with you