Transcription of Replenish #4
Speaker 1: You are listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast. Recorded at the studios of Maine Magazine in Portland, Maine and broadcast on 1310 AM Portland. Streaming live each week at 11 AM on wlobradio.com and available via podcast on doctorlisa.org. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 1: The Dr. Lisa radio hour and podcast is made possible by generous donations from the following sponsors: Maine Magazine; Tom Shepard of Ameriprise; Mike LePage and Beth Franklin at RE/MAX Heritage; Whole Foods Market and Akari Salon.
Dr. Lisa: Hello. Welcome to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast for October 9th 2011. The theme for this week’s show is Replenish.
Today on our Food and Sustenance segment we are joined as always by Genevieve Morgan, the wellness editor for Maine Magazine.
Hello?
Genevieve: Hi Lisa. It’s always so much fun to be here.
Dr. Lisa: We enjoy having you. We’re talking today about locally grown foods. We always talk about locally grown foods because this is what the people at Whole Foods Market are so generously providing us, Barbara Gulino who will be in in a few weeks. She helps me find this locally grown foods. This week we have an entire array of local greens which is exciting for me.
Genevieve: They look really great. They look fresh and like you could just throw them in the salad bowl and eat them right now.
Dr. Lisa: What I like about the locally grown greens is that you can find them a little bit further into the year than you might have otherwise been able to. The people up at Locally Known which is near Merrymeeting Bay, they have these greens into the fall a little bit longer. They come out in the spring a little bit sooner. They are expanding our definition of availability.
Today’s segment we’re focusing on replenishing and we will be talking with Marcelle Pick who has written this book called ‘Are You Tired and Wired?’ As I talk about on the blog, being tired and wired has this long standing tradition in Chinese medicine and has everything to do with a lack of kidney energy. The kidney energy is so very foundational and we get this when we’re born from our parents. We go into life with kidney energy.
What happens overtime is we just drain ourselves at this energy. We don’t replenish ourselves. We keep doing things that are taking away from this energy. I talked about this on the blog, this bang for your life buck. Are you getting out of your life what you’re putting into it?
Genevieve: Is it the kidney energy … energy that goes out, is it a caregiving energy? What is it?
Dr. Lisa: Often times it is, it is a care giving energy. In traditional Chinese medicine when your kidney energy gives out it’s when you start to age. You start getting back pain and knee pain and your hair gets a little grayer. It really is something that you can see visibly.
We’ll also talk with Charlotte Clews later on in the show and she’s going to talk about how you can replenish and refortify. That’s what I love about this food segment. It’s all about our ability to do something, eat some foods which are going to replenish us.
Genevieve: It sounds almost like a plant that’s withering and then you give it some nutrients and it comes back to life or give it some water and some nutrients.
Dr. Lisa: That’s right. This is a perfect segway into one of the things that Whole Foods Market is doing and that is the ANDI score which is “aggregate nutrient density index” which was created by Dr. Joel Fuhrman who’s with the organization Eat Right America.
He took foods from across the spectrum mostly whole grains and produce because it’s harder to analyze processed foods. He organized them by their ability to give you bang for your buck. What are you getting out of what you’re putting in your mouth?
Genevieve: When they ask, “Would you like fries of coleslaw? Spinach or …” We’ll finally know what to say.
Dr. Lisa: This is one of many ratings systems. This is one that Whole Foods market has embraced. Certainly, I believe that there are others in the community. This is a good one. This one, they take the amount of calcium and beta carotene and alpha carotene, niacin, magnesium and just a whole list of things and they find out how much is in each calorie of a particular given food and it’s rated from zero to a thousand.
There aren’t any foods that are zero. They saw Cola is at .6, so that’s about as close to zero as you can get.
Genevieve: I have to tell my kids that.
Dr. Lisa: Yes, right. I’m sure your kids never drink cola.
Genevieve: Oh! Never. Never!
Dr. Lisa: Of course not. Kale is at a thousand. Isn’t that great? We have this baby kale over here which is not … it’s local, it comes from Olivia’s Organics and I believe they’re out at Massachusetts. If you expand your definition of local then we have these greens and you can eat them.
In fact, what I like about baby Kale is I tell people to eat kale all the time and they say, “Oh my gosh! That stuff is so bitter. It’s so hard. It’s so hard to cook.” How do you actually make it?”
What I love about this nice cold washed baby kale is ready to cook, ready to go.
Genevieve: It looks like lettuce.
Dr. Lisa: It does look like lettuce and it tastes like lettuce too. What I made yesterday as I was thinking about this segment. I took some garlic and some onions, both were locally grown. I put them in a little olive oil, I threw in a red pepper from last week’s show which was still good. I wilted a couple of cups of the arugula, the spinach and the baby kale, put some salt and pepper and about maybe a quarter cup of cider and I’ll put this recipe on the blog. I just wilted the greens.
You get a little bit of … you warm them up a little bit, you cook them a little bit so they’re not quite as hard to digest. Then I put in some tomatoes and just cook those through and it was absolutely delicious. It took away the bitter that sometimes you can get from not only kale but from arugula. It’s so easy, it’s such a good way to get the kale into your diet with these thousands points on ANDI index.
This is what we always talk about, how you can get things into your diet that taste good that are worth eating, bang for your buck.
Genevieve: It makes a lot of sense.
Dr. Lisa: It’s interesting too because we talk about this ANDI index and it’s all these vitamins and nutrients and things like that. In Chinese medicine different greens do different things. For example, kale, in traditional Chinese medicine is warming. It’s good for the stomach and the lung meridian.
Arugula is bitter, it’s good for the liver meridian which I don’t think we discussed last week in our breast cancer segment.
Genevieve: No. I have a question about the warming foods because you hear about that a lot in Chinese medicine. That idea is that warming foods, are they replenishing? Explain that, I don’t really get it.
Dr. Lisa: In Chinese medicine it’s always a back and forth between problems that are more cold, problems that are more hot, problems that are more damp, problems that are more dry. When you have a food that’s warming then it’s going to be better for a problem that’s more cold.
For example, we were just talking about cold. If you have cold in the lung, in the sinuses and you get a congestion or some sort of a sinus infection.
Genevieve: Which we’re coming to the season where that would be common for a lot of people.
Dr. Lisa: Absolutely. The kale is a good way to warm up that lung meridian this is what the Chinese medicine people believe and also the stomach meridian. When your stomach is warmed up then it actually helps you move your … what they call the gu chi which is the chi that comes from the food that you eat. It helps move that around the body.
The arugula, it’s a different sort of grain, it’s bitter and it’s good for the liver meridian. As we just started to talk about the liver meridian, it’s interesting in Chinese medicine, it runs right down through the breasts.
Last week we talked about breast cancer and one way to keep preventing breast cancer or help people have breast cancer is to eat things that are bitter, like arugula, like dandelion greens in the spring. It’s very interesting whether you believe in Chinese medicine or not you can still eat these foods.
Genevieve: If you know someone who has breast cancer you can bring them an arugula salad.
Dr. Lisa: That’s right. The spinach that we have here also, I think we eat a lot of spinach in our culture, we’re very familiar with spinach. What we might not realize is this is supposed to be known to moisten and lubricate the intestines.
Genevieve: I did not know that.
Dr. Lisa: No. Sometimes we get a little far field in our discussions but it’s a Chinese medicine thing. It’s always good to … Yes, if you … Yes. We have the John, the sound person over to the side is making faces at us so maybe we should get back on topic a little bit.
What’s interesting is we’re going to talk to Charlotte later on in the show and I know that one of the things she discusses is living foods. These greens are, they’re living foods. It’s the type of foods that live. They’re as close to living as you can get.
What sometimes people will talk about is raw foods and having salads and in our culture we get vegetables into us by eating salads.
Genevieve: Yes, and a lot of people go on raw food diets and put their pets on raw food diets and it’s a big craze for a small part of the population.
Dr. Lisa: What we don’t really always focus on is the fact that if you’re eating raw foods they’re not always that easy to digest. You might be eating raw foods if your body is not assimilating the nutrients involved then you’re not getting the bang for the buck.
Genevieve: That’s a really interesting point. Can you just quickly talk about bio availability of nutrients because that makes a lot of sense?
Dr. Lisa: It’s true. The body can only metabolize certain foods well and when these foods have fairly tough and substantial cell walls then the body isn’t going to be able to get the nutrients out of them quite as well.
This is why for example most of us don’t eat raw meat because we aren’t going to be able to get out of the raw meat what we would get out of cooked meat.
Similarly, the foods that … like greens or vegetables, it’s better in many cases if you can just give them a little bit of heat, a little bit of cooking time. Even the raw foods enthusiast will tell you that they have ways of helping break down the cell walls so that you can get more of the nutrients out of them whether it’s fermenting or exposure to acidic substances.
This is one of the reasons why with the greens, I do eat salad in my own life but I would prefer to have them slightly wilted, not completely cooked down with all the nutrients gone. The food that I described making yesterday it was wilted and it was delicious, even better.
Genevieve: It’s great, it sounds good. I wish I’d come over for dinner.
Dr. Lisa: I’ll make you some sometime.
Genevieve: Okay, thank you.
Dr. Lisa: I know one of the reasons that you didn’t come over for dinner though is that you’ve been working very hard lately with the Telling Room.
Genevieve: I have.
Dr. Lisa: There’s an upcoming event which begins I believe the 16th of October. I know we can find more about this on your website.
Genevieve: Yes, it’s called Slant and it’s a live storytelling series in collaboration with Space Gallery, beloved space gallery. We started the series a year ago and we have four or five members of the community and they don’t have to be writers, they’re just people you might have heard of or a policeman or a nurse and they will come and tell a story based on a theme and it’s had a huge, huge success rate and people have just loved them and we’re starting it up again this year.
Dr. Lisa: It’s free and it’s open for all ages.
Genevieve: It is free. Yes. If we’re talking about replenishing, it is funny. Many of the stories poignant and moving but it’s really funny to hear people tell live stories and they’re great.
Dr. Lisa: One of the people on your list is Sonya Tomlinson who’s is a hip-hop artist and teacher.
Genevieve: Yes.
Dr. Lisa: I would imagine that she would have a slightly different take on the world. That could be amusing.
Genevieve: Absolutely. She has been a teacher at the Telling Room, a volunteer teacher at the Telling Room for many years now and works with our young writers and readers group. She did huge workshop last year that the gifted artist Spose who’s also comes from Maine and went to USM.
Dr. Lisa: Spose is the name of the person?
Genevieve: Spose is the name of the person. I’m not going to out his real name.
Dr. Lisa: Okay.
Genevieve: That’s his street name.
Dr. Lisa: She was involved in this.
Genevieve: She was involved and he consulted and they taught these 14, 15 high school students all from different countries, all immigrant kids to rap. They each wrote a wrap and they performed it at St. Lawrence Center for the Arts to a great acclaim.
Dr. Lisa: This is a way to nurture yourself as we talked about in our very first beginning show. This is a way to nurture yourself is by going to your Telling Room event. Another way that you can replenish or nurture yourself is at our very own John McCain, the sound engineer for our Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is opening at the Cambridge Coffee House on 740 Broadway in South Portland, occurred recently and they’re having a reception on Wednesday, October 12th.
This is a joint exhibition with artist Molly Anathan, it’s called the Dreaming of Worlds. I’m fascinated by this.
Genevieve: Yeah, I had a chance to stop by the coffee shop a couple of days ago and the paintings are really beautiful.
Dr. Lisa: What I love about Maine is not that only we have these locally grown greens, we’ve talked about locally grown peppers, we’ve talked about locally grown people and artists. Also, we’re continuing to nurture organizations such as the Camp Susan Curtis Foundation, the Camp Susan Curtis and the Susan Curtis Foundation and we’re going to be talking to her later on in this hour as well.
I know that there’s an affiliation between Susan Curtis and the Telling Room.
Genevieve: It’s true.
Dr. Lisa: There’s a lot of mutual growing that’s taking place, mutual replenishment and nurturing and feeding.
Genevieve: It’s true. Collaboration and connection is one of the ways even when … I think there’s a thing that happens in yoga class where people go into balancing poses like tree and the instructor will tell you to close your eyes and everybody tips over because they’re standing on one leg and they close their eyes and they tip over.
If the instructor says put out your hands and you touch the people on the either side of your mat, all three of you can stand firm because it’s the power of connection that helps you stand straight.
Dr. Lisa: Which is why we do this every week, the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is that we’re trying to connect people with something a little bit bigger, not just eat your kale and your arugula but also connect with people in the world that are doing things that might prove helpful, that might prove replenishing to you.
Once you get to the place where you are replenished then you could do things like giveback, you can work with the telling room, you can work with Camp Susan Curtis. There’s a method to our madness. We know exactly what we’re doing here on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour …
Genevieve: Most of the time.
Dr. Lisa: Okay, right. Everything is connected and this is what we truly believe about health and wellness. We’ve said this on prior segments that the type of medicine that I practice, the type of wellness that you write about and the type of wellness that’s espoused by Maine Magazine and a lot of people in Maine, it’s about connection and it’s about reconnecting people with themselves, with the people around them and with their world. Whether it’s by eating greens or going to a Telling Room event or supporting an artist like John McCain and Molly Anathan. There are lots of stops you can take to work towards a healthier, more well self, family community and world.
Thank you for coming on and talking with me about this again Genevieve.
Genevieve: Thank you for having me. It’s always a pleasure.
Dr. Lisa: It’s certainly great to have several minds in the room that can just be synergistic and keep replenishing one another.
Genevieve: Yeah, we’re all going to hold each other up.
Speaker 1: The food segment of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is brought to you by Whole Foods Market of Portland, Maine. Whole Foods Market where you will find the highest quality natural and organic products available. Follow them on Facebook and go to wholefoodsmarket.com to learn more about their whole foods, whole people, whole planet vision.
Dr. Lisa: Today in the studio we have Marcelle Pick. Marcelle Pick co-founded Women to Women in 1983 with a vision to change the way in which women’s healthcare is delivered.
Marcelle earned at BS in nursing from the University of New Hampshire School of Nursing. A BA in psychology from the University of New Hampshire and her MS in nursing from a Boston College Harvard Medical School. She is certified as an OBGYN nurse practitioner and a pediatric nurse practitioner and serves on the advisory board for the integrated healthcare symposium as well as the renowned Hoffman Institute and lectures on a variety of topics including weight loss resistance, infertility, stress and illness and adrenal dysfunction.
She hosts a weekly radio show, Core Balance for Women’s Health on hayhouseradio.com. Marcelle published her first book, The Core Balanced Diet in 2009 and her second book, Are You Tired and Wired? earlier this year. We’re so grateful to have you here.
Marcelle: I’m delighted to be here.
Dr. Lisa: I also have next to me, Genevieve Morgan who I know spent some time in the last few years with you doing this exciting project, The Core Balanced Diet.
Genevieve: And much more. I was just saying to Marcelle that she was one of the first people who got me interested in topics around alternative medicine and self-care and self-help. She’s my guiding light in the field of wellness.
Dr. Lisa: I’m fascinated by this because in 1983, that was a long time ago.
Marcelle: It was a long time ago.
Dr. Lisa: You’ve been putting a lot of time and effort into a field that very recently has had a lot of success but you were doing this before other people were finding this as interesting as they do.
Marcelle: A lot of the things that we actually did in 1983 have actually proven now to be probably more accurate now than they were back then. We weren’t really well accepted back then so it’s definitely hard for us back then but we were persistent about following through with what we believe to be true. Also, science was supporting us although there was not a lot of literature to do that but there is now.
Dr. Lisa: What did cause you to be so sure of yourselves back in 1983, so sure that even though the science may not have been there you wanted to follow through, you wanted to push through?
Marcelle: A lot of it I think comes back to my background. I grew up in Australia and I spent a lot of time in aboriginal caves. I was very committed to the notion that there’s something a little bit bigger than we are that we don’t always, we can’t always rely on the absolute gospel of science to be so sure of things.
I came very early to understand that nature and connection to the earth is very, very important and that the healing modalities are also about connecting with yourself as well looking at nature for some of the answers, not always looking from the scientific model. I didn’t understand that until I was older but that was the foundation of what I grew up, it’s what I lived and breathed until I came to America when I was 11.
Dr. Lisa: I completely agree with you and this is one of the reasons why I started doing traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture, I’m looking at other healing traditions because for me it is about what works, what works for the patient. Just like you, we are finding more and more in traditional Chinese medicine and even Ayurvedic medicine that the studies are backing it up which is what we were saying, right? Before we went on, that you went through 700 studies, something like this to create the background research for your book Are You Tired and Wired. Tell me what that was like.
Marcelle: One of the things that I saw in my practice, we have a culture of women that are burning the candle on both ends that are exhausted, they’re getting sicker more than they have before in their lives and I got motivated to write the book because there’s a lot of books on adrenal issues out there but they all talk about the quick fix.
When I started to understand is I would see the same people over and over in my office. I give them the supplements, I’d encourage them to exercise, change their diet and they were back in my office again.
I realized that if I didn’t write a book to help you understand if you don’t change your lifestyle, if you don’t change your script, if you don’t change your patterns of behaviors you’re never going to be able to get those adrenals well on term. That’s what motivated me to write the book is too many people were staying sick.
Dr. Lisa: Will you tell us about the adrenals, where are they and what do they do?
Marcelle: The adrenals I think are a very often not talked about and we never talk about them unless people have huge issues like adrenal cancer, adrenal problems. We never really talk about the fact that adrenals are crucial. If you don’t have adrenal function you can’t function, we have stress in our lives every day but their problem is that they were meant to work so that we had stress with a battle or war and the war would be over and we’d go back to life.
Now we have computers, we have iPads, we have iPhones, we have Blackberry’s, We have work, we have kids, we have parents that are aging and women now feel like they have to do it all.
They’re working and trying to be mothering and perhaps not mothering but working extra hours and they can’t do it all. What’s happening is that the adrenals, which is so important to deal with stress but they also produce 50 different hormones, they can’t keep up with the pace. They’re continuing to have to push out cortisol which is one of the things that they produce.
Ultimately they produce it for so long they get deplete and then they are exhausted and they can’t do their day.
Dr. Lisa: Did you find this relevant in your own life?
Marcelle: Are you kidding? Of course, who hasn’t? I had a one year old and then twins three weeks later. I had twins, I had a full time practice. I was on call. I was the person that was making the money in the practice and I was trying to be a mother. Oh yeah! Absolutely, who hasn’t?
It’s learning from yourself but also seeing it in your patients. I think one of the things I say a lot is I think the feminist movement was wonderful for us but it also cost us because we had to do both and I’m not sure you can. I’m not sure you can do it equally well, it’s just very difficult. Something’s got to give.
The thing I think happens for women is that they don’t take care of themselves and that’s ultimately what happens especially with the adrenal issues.
Dr. Lisa: Gen and I both understand exactly what you’re saying, both of us as parents, as mothers, we, and working women. We’re doing exactly as you’ve described. I think growing up in a time when we were told, go to medical school, go to college to get these degrees. At the other side somebody, not only does somebody have to take care of the children and the household but somebody wants to. For me, that was the bottom line is I gave birth to my children and I wanted to be there for them.
Genevieve: Then you’re also pulled with the work and you want to do that well too. It’s how do you find the balance and how do you find the dance of that?
Dr. Lisa: How do you? What is your solution?
Marcelle: I think the biggest solution is starting to understand that there are things sometimes if you’re a perfectionist, which many women tend to be or a multitasking, there’s things you’re going to have to prioritize. There are some things you just can’t do. Maybe the dishes don’t get done. Maybe you can’t do that extra thing. Maybe you have to say no to something at work but it’s learning to set those boundaries for yourself. Sometimes it takes you understanding what is it that I do consistently? What’s my pattern that I’ve learned that I need to unlearn and do differently? I think that’s where women have a hard time because they want to do it all and do it all well and you can’t. Something’s going to give.
As women, our adrenals tend to give. Ultimately what happens is when you have adrenals that are working too hard for too long. What people don’t understand is when you have adrenals that are not working it actually dis-regulates the hormones, it causes tremendous problem with blood sugar dis-regulation, GI issues that affects the immune system, down regulates thyroid functions. We’ve got this whole system including the GI system that then is not working the way that it should and people wonder why they’re sick more often. A lot of it we talk about, “Decrease your stress.” It’s much more complicated than that.
Speaker 1: We’ll return to our interview after acknowledging the following generous sponsors. Akari Salon, an urban sanctuary of beauty, wellness and style. Located on Middle Street in Portland, Maine’s Old Port. Follow them on Facebook or go to akaribeauty.com to learn more about their new boutique and medispa.
By Robin Hodgskin, senior vice president and financial advisor at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney in Portland, Maine. For all your investment needs call Rogin Hodgskin at 207-771-0888. Investments and services are offered through Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC. Member SIPC.
Dr. Lisa: The stress always exists. Gen you have a son in high school and a son in middle school.
Genevieve: Yes I do.
Dr. Lisa: I have a son who just graduated and then I have a daughter in high school and a 10 year old. This has been ongoing. You think, “Well, when the kids get a little bigger it’s going to get a little easier.” It does in some ways but not in others. The stress is always there. You can’t get rid of your kids. You can’t necessarily get rid of your job, and we don’t want to. Most of us want to be able to do lots of things to have a very rich and fulfilling life.
Marcelle: Of course. There’s things we can do in the day time. For example, not rushing for breakfast. Making sure that you have five to 10 minutes to sit down, breath and eat your food, to chew your food two times a day for two minutes, breath.
There’s small things you can do that have huge impact. There’s concepts of taking time for yourself and it doesn’t have to be ours but it’s just moments in which you really sit and smell the roses. If you have five minutes, great, if you have 15 minutes that’s even better. The more you fill yourself up the more you’re going to have for your children.
That’s the notion we talk about on airplanes putting the oxygen mask on yourself first. That’s really true. The more you have energy, the more you can give to others including patients. If you don’t fill this vessel up, you don’t have enough left over.
I think that happens a lot to women. Women to try to do it all, it does happen to men for sure. Symptoms, I classify them in three ways. I think there’s more but I want it to make it easy in the book. I talk about the person who’s the race horse, the person who’s running all the time, burning the candle on both ends, can’t stop, has lots of bounding energy until sometimes they hit the wall. When they hit the wall they might be the person who then becomes the work horse, exhausted in the morning, can’t get to sleep at night or falls asleep and then can’t get back to sleep.
We have the person that I call the flat line who is just exhausted all the time and they’re usually the ones that whose cortisol levels are really low. They don’t fit the criteria that we call traditional medicine, Addison syndrome which is definitely a disease or cushing syndrome which is too much cortisol.
There’s so much room in between which people are on either extreme in which they really feel horrible because of all the things when the adrenals don’t work that it causes problems with.
It’s really important that all of us pay attention and to say, “What I am doing in my life that maybe contributing to my poor adrenals having to work too hard for too long?” The really interesting thing is 30% of estrogen and progesterone is produced by adrenals prior to menopause. 50% is produced after menopause.
What you see in women perimenopausally is the more stress they have, the more symptoms they have as they journey into menopause. The thing that they can work on then is working to shift that stress level. Again, it’s not that simple, it’s looking at, “What am I doing consistently that’s making me feel like I’m just always on the run. I never have time. I’m always exhausted. I’m not sleeping well. What do I need to change in addition to nutrients on my diet?”
Dr. Lisa: One of the things that I love to see is the rise in yoga, tai chi, qigong, all these very restorative, what we call yin practices. There’s yin and yang and yin is the very quiet energy, the nurturing energy. Is this something that you suggest people take advantage of?
Marcelle: Absolutely. The thing that’s so important is people have to find what works for them. Sometimes when I say it in my practice and say, “What about this? It’s just too much for people to take on because they’re so busy.” It’s an add-on.
I talk a lot about bursting exercise, but again, if somebody is the flat liner and they’re so tired, that’s not going to work. I don’t want their pulse rate over 90 until they’re healed first.
For other that might be the race horse, got a little bit of energy, they feel better after they exercise. I would give them small amounts of exercise to do so that they actually do it.
Sometimes when I say yoga it’s like, “Oh my God! It’s too overwhelming. I don’t have time for an hour.” It’s like, “Okay, how about 10 minutes?” Can we just start with that? Find something you love that makes you happy that you want to do often.
Genevieve: Lisa, you must see something like adrenal fatigue in your traditional Chinese medical practice. When I go to a regular doctor and talk about adrenal fatigue, a term I learned through my studies with Marcelle, they look at me askance and they say, “Well, that doesn’t exist.” I’m wondering, there seems to be some controversy about adrenal fatigue.
Marcelle: I think that whenever we start something new it takes about 30 years for medicine to catch up. At this point I agree with the notion that adrenal fatigue is probably not a great definition. It’s really more that the adrenals are hyper or hypo, they’re producing too little or too much cortisol. I think we really need to name it that and call it what it is. The reality is scientifically we know from the studies that when you have too much cortisol it has consequences and when you don’t have enough cortisol it has consequences.
The example I give is if somebody is diabetic and when they come in your office and they’re diabetic. If you look back at their blood sugars they didn’t become diabetic overnight. There was a trending that you could see. What I’m looking for with adrenals and the cortisol is what’s the trending. If I’m seeing high production all the time, what I know is that’s going to have a consequence. Let’s not call it adrenal fatigue, let’s call it something else. Hyper or hypo cortisol production or we’ll figure out a fancy word for it. That’s probably more appropriate. I think we call it that then maybe we won’t get as much pushback from the medical community.
I think the pushback is coming from the notion, a new age notion of adrenal fatigue. Fatigue doesn’t really describe what’s happening. There’s something even more important here and that is that we don’t tend to, in our practices, generally in medicine, talk about emotions very much.
Emotions was part of what drove me to write this book is that if we don’t understand some of the ways we hate the patterns that we have which are founded in emotions we’re not going to change.
They did a very large study that was not given much publicity in 1998. It was 50,000 men and women that were evaluated with Kaiser Permanente and the CDC looking to see if they had adverse childhood events in their childhood, did it impact health later on life? Things like heart disease, diabetes, breast cancer. Those are pretty big problems in our culture. The answer was a resounding absolutely. The more the adverse events including just verbal abuse or neglect or criticism, judgment, perfectionism, that affected health outcomes later.
We know scientifically that there’s a direct relationship but we don’t talk about that very often in medicine and that’s another piece to the puzzle. Certainly with the adrenals is if someone’s pushing themselves so hard, who they’re trying to prove themselves to and how can they change that model and start loving themselves enough that they’re going to change what they do and how they do it, just in baby steps. It doesn’t have to be big things, just baby steps.
Dr. Lisa: I feel like this notion has been around long enough that maybe we should be a little closer to this. Does it sometimes frustrate you that this has been out there so long and you’ve been talking about it for such a long time and yet these issues are still there?
Marcelle: Yeah, of course. I sometimes, I’m always surprised doing my own practice when I see a very complicated person that’s been to 15, 20 people because I see it often, they come to see me from all over the country and I look at the record and then I sit down with them and I look at the tremendous pain they had as children. Huge amounts of pain, horrible, horrible things.
We talk about it, what are some avenues that we can help you heal with yoga, with body work, and of course physically to support the adrenals because that’s usually the organ system that gets depleted the fastest. Those people then start to heal.
I don’t know the answer to why in medicine, we’re not talking about it. It’s crucial that the A study should have been on the front page in New York Times. I actually called the New York Times and said, “Why is this not front page material?” Any drug that had this impact would have made headlines.
It doesn’t have to do with money, it doesn’t have to do with politics. I don’t know the answer to that, I’m suspicious but I don’t know. It’s definitely something we know is true and many people don’t know this study exist.
Genevieve: Marcelle, how did people find practitioners in their community? How did they find a clinic like women to women?
Marcelle: Are there people out there doing the work you do? The good news is yes there are a lot of people that do it but I’m also cautious because I think some people really need to have the bigger perspective.
I practice functional medicine which is means that I’m trained to look at if somebody’s having a problem what’s upstream, what’s going on to cause that problem instead of figuring out what the diagnosis is. I’m not always so concerned about a diagnosis. I’m concerned about a symptom set.
I have a practice in Yarmouth, Women to Women, and we’ve been around since 1985, a long time. That’s one of the options they have. I have a website, womentowomen.com, I have lots of information there. Also, there’s ways to find practitioners that practices Chinese medicines really important. There are acupunctures that are around that are great. There are MDs, DOs that are practicing this kind of medicine too. It’s finding somebody that knows how to look at the big picture not just the diagnosis.
Dr. Lisa: Speaking of the bigger picture, you had rather interesting experience a few weeks ago, I understand with another famous doctor and you’ll be able to give us a little information on that.
Marcell: Yes. I did a taping last week for Dr. Oz and that will be aired probably in the next week or two and you can go to Women to Women and look at it to see when that’s going to see when that’s going to be aired. It’s a live audience but not live that day so it will be taped in the next couple of weeks or shown in a couple of weeks.
Dr. Lisa: Also, it will available on your Facebook page for those people who …
Marcelle: It will be available on my Facebook page and there’s also an interview with several questions about adrenals on there, as well as a chapter of the book will be on there as well as on the website, Dr. Oz.
Dr. Lisa: I’m feeling very grateful for having had the chance to speak with you today Marcelle. Your name comes up often. Like Genevieve, I feel like you’ve done a lot of work that has built a foundation for many of us who are now practicing to continue to work with. I thank you for coming in, taking the time to come in. Thankfully you had time to write these books and go out there and speak your part and I appreciate it. Thank you very much.
Marcelle: Thank you very much.
Dr. Lisa: Each week we feature a segment we call Maine Magazine minutes sponsored by Maine Magazine. This week we have a very interesting guest who I will let Genevieve Morgan, the Wellness editor for Maine Magazine introduce it to you. Thank you Genevieve.
Genevieve: Thanks Lisa. I’m very excited today because we’re joined by Charlotte Clews who is a popular certified Anusara yoga teacher living and practicing in Blue Hill. She is the creator of Wild Open Heart Yoga, a physical and spiritual practice that combines yoga, ancient ayurvedic practices, barefoot running and wilderness submersion.
Hi Charlotte.
Charlotte: Hi there.
Genevieve: Thanks for driving down from Blue Hill.
Charlotte: It was nice.
Genevieve: I’m so impressed by everything that you do. Wild Open Heart Yoga, even the name is exciting. First I want to say congratulations on becoming a certified Anusara yoga instructor. That takes a lot of work.
I remember doing a yoga class with you maybe eight years ago, a workshop and you’re pregnant with your first child here in Portland in a studio that doesn’t exist anymore. As I was saying to you, you must have to have done yoga every day since.
Charlotte: I do practice every day. One way or another I practice and it is the backbone of my life, it’s fantastic. The certification process in Anusara is a really fantastic process too.
Genevieve: How did you come to combine all your other interests with your yoga practice?
Charlotte: I grew up in Down East, Maine. I always grew up in a wild landscape and I love wilderness and I love being outside and I love the natural rhythm and I’ve just had this attunement that even from a very young age. Being out on the beaches, being barefoot, I’d take my shoes off and march and try to keep them off until November.
That really resonated with me and when I have stepped away from that and live in big cities and I have travelled all over, I lose something and I feel busy and distracted and even a little bit disconnected and sad.
For me, bringing yoga and bringing wilderness to people is a really fantastic way to awaken and enliven their connection to self and to, really, that life force that bubbles up in all of us. There’s really this sense of joy and a sense of freedom that we all long to connect with and that is what Yoga does and that is really actually what being in wilderness does for most of us. That’s where I’m coming from.
Genevieve: This is really interesting to me Charlotte because you have this wilderness background, you have this Maine background and yet you chose to incorporate something that is actually quite different, i.e. Ayurvedic medicine. Tell me a little bit about Ayurvedic medicine.
Charlotte: Yeah. Ayurveda is actually the way that I learn it and practice, it is really much about attuning to the natural world. That attunement takes a great deal of sensitivity that we build up over time through attuning to the life force that’s in everything. Both in the plants and trees that we’re wandering through just as visitors but also in the plants that we’re eating.
It’s about regaining our relationship to the world. Eating is essentially the medium in which we relate to our ecosystem. Ayurveda is right in line with that.
Genevieve: I find the same thing is true in Chinese medicine. It’s interesting those are very related practices, they are related to the silk trade route, the traditional Chinese medicine, Ayurveda. There’s so many parallels and they believe the same is true that food has an essence. This idea of living foods is really important.
Charlotte: Yeah, and really waking people up to the deeper relationship that they already feel but that they maybe can’t articulate or is damped down or a little bit cloaked in our culture and just trying to have that authentic relationship for ourselves.
Genevieve: Our theme of today’s show is Replenish. How do the diets techniques and the advice that you give, how does Ayurvedic diet relate to refilling your gas tank or getting ready for the change of season and particularly as we’re heading into the darker months and winter?
Charlotte: Think of it as a little bit like surfing. For most of my, into my early 20s, actually probably late 20s, I was swimming against the current, pretty strong. I liked the sensation, I liked to work hard, I liked difficulties. I would swim super hard and then I’d be really burnt out and I got a lot of … I was pretty sick in my 20s.
What I learned though Anusara and through Ayurveda is if you turn yourself around and you surf with the waves, it’s fun, it’s great and you’re not working so hard. The life force is fueling you. That way what I’m teaching people to do is align, align with life, with the current of life and it’s much easier, you’re going to feel better and you’re not going to get burnt out.
Dr. Lisa: I want to point out to people that you can’t see Charlotte but there’s a sense of joy that just permeates the entire room by her being here and that is something I’m struck by is people who practice this type of life living they have that sense of joy. Do you find that in your own life?
Charlotte: Absolutely. For me, the freedom that have found in … Really, just giving myself permission to align with what I am, you know to be true is just, like I said, so much easier and I do, I wake up happy most days.
Genevieve: I’m hoping that’s true because I’m about to embark on a journey with you. I’m a little frightened because I’ve never done something like it before. You are about to launch your annual Ayurvedic fall cleanse on October 16th? Is that right?
Charlotte: 26th.
Genevieve: October 26th. Do you want to give me a sneak preview?
Charlotte: Yeah. October 26th and November 16th, three weeks, we’re going to take to hone in on this relationship with food. One of the things that damps down our sensitivity is this and we’ve eaten a lot of what I call dead or dumb food in the past, or we’ve eaten out of sync with the seasons.
We’re just not … our sensitivity is not so refined and so it’s hard for us to make intuitively intelligent decisions freely. What I like to do with the cleanse, I recommend it for anybody, is that you’re then really just clearing the way for you to feel what is intelligent to nourish your body. I don’t believe that there’s anyone dietary system or one magic food that’s going to heal us and lead to enlightenment. I do think that we can uncover our own intelligence.
A cleanse in this three week cleanse is going to be … we have three weeks of menu plants so every day is planned out. You get a shopping list. We incorporate some spices and herbs that are traditionally used in Ayurvedic cleanses. They work particularly well when you’re lightening up your food.
This time of year, any shift in seasons you’re going to have a weaker digestive system so we’re really trying to nurture that and baby the digestive system to make this shift. Fall and spring are the times to do cleansing so that we’re staying in line with the seasons, we’re not swimming upstream. That’s what we’re going to do, we’re going to line up.
Genevieve: Charlotte, what are the benefits of doing a cleanse like the fall cleanse?
Charlotte: Aside from really clearing your channels, you have a greater sensitivity to what foods are going to nourish you. It makes you more resilient to being sick. For the next coming months when we go into the holidays, it’s going to help you out big time and I find that success of cleanses aid that process quite a bit. It helps you attain a more ideal weight as you start to, again, maybe not, during the cleanse you’re not trying to lose a ton of weight but then overtime it allows you to become more sensitive to what will nourish you and what’s appropriate. It refines your taste, so you start to have natural cravings for what’s naturally good for you.
Genevieve: How do people find out how to reach you and if they want to take a barefoot run or an Anusara yoga class. I know you have a lot of workshops and a lot of interesting things happening.
Charlotte: Yeah. I teach Anusara, I teach the barefoot workshops, I do wilderness yoga adventures and then cleansing. I’m at wildopenheart.com and you can register for my e-mail list there and then I send out a newsletter about once a month, maybe once a week if things are really hopping.
Genevieve: We will link through to your website through the doctorlisa.org website so that people can find you there as well.
Charlotte: Yeah.
Genevieve: Maybe there are a few of you out there who want to join me on the fall cleanse, do the fall cleanse challenge.
Charlotte: It’s a fun group. We have a really good time honestly. It’s probably the most fun you can have doing a cleanse. I won’t say that it’s not hard, so fun and hard are not opposed to each other but there’s some tough days and then you really do, everyone feels fantastic. It’s really fun to see people’s eyes afterward. Everyone’s eyes just sparkle, it’s great.
Genevieve: Well, I can’t wait. Thanks so much for coming down to the studio.
Charlotte: Yeah, you’re welcome. Nice to talk with you.
Genevieve: To sign up for this year’s fall cleanse with Charlotte Clews visit wildopenheart.com. To read more about Anusara yoga and it’s connection to Ayurvedic tradition read my article Om State in the June issue of Maine Magazine. Available online at mainemag.com.
This month’s edition of Maine Magazine is available at your local newsstand across the state.
Dr. Lisa: Each week on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast we feature a segment we call giveback and we begin with reading our daily tread. Our Daily Tread was written in honor of our late friend Henley Denning and all proceeds benefit her organization Safe Passage.
Safe Passage provides approximately 550 children with education, social services and the chance to move beyond the poverty, their families have facedfor generations at the Guatemala City Dump. Visit them online at safepassage.org.
Today’s quote comes from Rene Daumal. “You cannot stay on the summit forever, you have to come down again. Why bother in the first place? Just this: What is above knows what is below but what is below does not know what is above. In climbing take careful note of the difficulties along the way for as you go up you can observe them. Coming down you will no longer see them but you will know they’re there if you have observed them well. There is an art in finding one’s direction in the lower regions by the memory of what one saw higher up. When one can no longer see one can at least know.”
Speaker 1: This segment of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is brought to you by Thomas Shepard of Hersey Gardner Shepard and Eaton, an Ameriprise platinum financial services practice in Yarmouth, Maine. Dreams can come true when you take the time to invest in yourself. Learn more at ameripriseadvisers.com; and by Mike LePage and Beth Franklin of RE/MAX Heritage Yarmouth, Maine. Honesty and integrity can take you home. With RE/MAX Heritage it’s your move. Learn more at rheritage.com.
Dr. Lisa: We’re joined on today’s Give Back segment by Melissa Cilley, director of the Susan L. Curtis Foundation and Camp Susan Curtis.
Susan L. Curtis Foundation and Camp Susan Curtis has been providing life changing summer programing for some of Maine’s neediest boys and girls since 1974. At Camp Susan Curtis campers participate in a strength based experiential curriculum tied to the Maine learning results and designed to minimize summer learning laws, teach and enhance critical life skills and develop key assets into leveling the playing field for this vulnerable population.
There’s no doubt the Camp Susan Curtis campers build wonderful memories. They also build the framework that allows them to reverse the generational cycle of poverty and take ownership of their lives, their communities and their futures.
Camp Susan Curtis must raise approximately 80% of its budget including camper tuitions through fundraising. This year they will hold their first annual fall foliage fun ride on Sunday, October 16th beginning at 8:00 in the North Port Business Complex at the corner of Allen Avenue and Washington Avenue in Portland.
Riders can choose between a 50 mile ride and a 15 mile ride. To register or for more information log on to their website at www.susancurtisfoundation.org.
Thank you for coming in today Melissa, it’s so great to have the chance to talk to you about this organization.
Melissa: Thank you for having me.
Dr. Lisa: I have Gen Morgan sitting next to me, the wellness editor for Maine Magazine.
Genevieve: Hi Melissa.
Melissa: Hello.
Dr. Lisa: It’s interesting to me that earlier on in the show we were talking to Marcelle Pick who’s just written a book called Are You Tired and Wired. She was talking about this phenomenon that occurs, adverse childhood events that really impact people for the rest of their lives. Now you’re here and you’re talking about exactly that and something that’s happening right now as we speak, we are really doing things for children who have this impact on their lives. Tell me about some of the things that you’ve experienced.
Melissa: Absolutely. I just joined the organization in April and coming in to an organization like Camp Susan Curtis and meeting the children that we work with is a tremendously humbling and eye opening experience.
A lot of the children that come to Camp Susan Curtis have difficult lives, they have really difficult lives. To meet a child and have a conversation with that child and slowly come to the realization that that child is living a completely different life than any life you’ve ever known and slowly come to the realization of the strength and the resilience that that child has is a pretty amazing realization.
When they come in to the camp and they are already children who are ready for that experience. They’re primed, they are excited, they want to be there and it is a thrilling place to be. That is another piece that is so incredibly humbling because these children know what they have.
They know that this is an opportunity that they are getting tuition free. They would not have this opportunity but for the generosity of our donors. They realize that they appreciate that. They are so grateful and so thankful. It’s quite touching.
Beyond that, as you see them develop through the curriculum, as you see them grow, as you see rally beautiful things take place, like a child who has never learned to dream, or perhaps learned at one point but then forgot through life’s challenges of just trying to get through that day and watching their family members just trying to get through that day. That process that many children take for granted of dreaming, “What do I want to be when they grow up?” is submerged for some of these children. They begin to examine that and it’s very exciting.
Genevieve: Melissa, how long is the camp? Is it an all-day summer camp? An all-day summer camp all summer camp? Where is it?
Melissa: It’s in Stoneham, Maine, which is outside Lovell if you’re familiar with the Lovell area. That’s where Kezar Lake is located and it’s not far from Lovell. It’s a lovely little community and we’re very, very fortunate to be on a huge parcel of an easement conservation that is protected by the state department of conservation. Which means we have an absolutely pristine environment for our campers. It’s state of the art facility, absolutely lovely setting where we’re the only development on the lake. No power boats. It’s truly magnificent. Depending on the program that the child is enrolled in, they might be there anywhere from two weeks to the entire summer.
Dr. Lisa: Melissa, how can people get involved in Camp Susan Curtis? What are ways that they can support your organization and support the children?
Melissa: That is a great question. There are quite a few ways. Obviously, one of the most critical factors since all of our children attend tuition free, is we really, really need financial support. I hate to be crass about it but that’s what we desperately need.
We are serving greater numbers of children than we’ve served in the past and out expenses and our costs are skyrocketing, food cost to feed the children are going up. That’s probably the most important thing.
Beyond that, we have opportunities for volunteering. There, we have a camp cleanup every summer which we’ve really, really need help from the community. A lot of the corporations will send folks. We have some wonderful consistent groups that will come out again and again. It’s a wonderful opportunity for them to see the camp.
We have friends and trustees day where people come out and actually are at camp when the children are there, when the campers are there which is a wonderful opportunity for them to get to see camp in action.
Beyond that, we have some several fundraisers. For example, coming up on the 16th of October which is a week from Sunday. Beginning at 8:00 in the morning is our first annual fall foliage fun ride. That will include a 15 mile ride as well as a 50 mile ride. Whether you’re a real big bicycling enthusiast or just someone who likes to ride a bit more casually, we’re hoping that folks will want to get involved there.
That’s a really easy process. You can register over the internet by going to our website which is www.susancurtisfoundation.org or you can register through a registration form that we have available at our office. There are also registration forms at most of the bike shops across Portland and the greater Portland area.
Dr. Lisa: Melissa, was there something specific about this organization that drew you as an individual and to become the executive director?
Melissa: Absolutely. There most definitely was. This is one for me … Anyway, I believe that there are often opportunities in our life that we are meant for those opportunities and they are meant for us. I think this is one of those opportunities where the first time I saw it, it was very compelling to me.
It’s very compelling to me that in 40 years, which is how long it’s been since the foundation created the mission and created the organization. 40 years, the mission has not changed. I find this to be remarkable and tragic, frankly, that in 40 years, the mission for Camp Susan Curtis is equally compelling and that was 40 years ago.
Dr. Lisa: That we still have children with these needs that are still being impacted by poverty and educational problems.
Melissa: Absolutely. The generational poverty, there appears to be a very small impact despite all of the efforts. Despite so much work that’s gone into stemming generational poverty that there still is such tremendous need in that area and that generational poverty is a really difficult thing to break.
Dr. Lisa: I really appreciate your coming in and talking to us today Melissa. I know we could talk for a really long time on this subject because it’s an enormous subject and it’s an enormous issue in our society, in our culture. What’s wonderful is when you see people actually working on the problem and I know that that’s what you’re doing with the Susan Curtis Foundation and Camp Susan Curtis. I wish you all the best in the fall foliage ride and people who are interested can go to your website which is the www.susancurtisfoundation.org website and I encourage people to do that.
Melissa: Thank you. Thanks very much. Thanks for having me.
Dr. Lisa: Yes, thanks for coming in.
Speaker 2: On today’s Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast, we discussed the theme of replenish. It’s important to remember to replenish what we may have lost in our lives or to maintain what we’ve already had.
As Marcelle discussed, we define exactly what it is that worked for us and do it often. As Charlotte discussed, going back in nature is one way of doing just that. Melissa suggested that giving back to others is one way which we may also be replenished.
Replenishment was the theme of today’s bountiful blog. Are you getting enough bang for your life buck? Many of us don’t realize that we are giving more than we are getting until we no longer have anything left to give.
In traditional Chinese medicine, the kidneys are considered to be the basis of our most fundamental essence. We are believed to inherit our essence, which is called jing, from our parents. That jing become the source of energy or chi for our early lives. The better able we are to preserve our jing, the more gracefully we age. The better we are able to maintain and build our chi by eating good foods and engaging in restorative life practices, the healthier we will be.
When our lives become so busy that we are spending rather than building and maintaining chi, we become depleted. We become tired and wired. We are so exhausted and so fuelled by survival adrenalin that we cannot even get the restorative sleep we so desperately need.
This is when we need to decide. Are we getting enough bang for our buck? In other words, is what we are giving worth what we are getting back? If not, we need to stop giving quite so much at least until we are repleted. We also need to replenish.
This week’s Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is about that very thing. It is about nourishing ourselves. It is about rebuilding our chi. It is about finding the sources of energy that will enable us not only to survive but thrive. It is about getting whenever possible bang for our life buck.
Read more bountiful blog posts on bountiful-blog.com. We hope you have found some sources of replenishment from our Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast this week. May you have a bountiful life.
Speaker 1: The Dr. Lisa Radio Hour in Podcast is made possible with the generous support of the following sponsors: Maine Magazine; Tom Shepard of Ameriprise; Mike LePage and Beth Franklin at RE/MAX Heritage; Whole Foods Market; and Akari Salon.
The Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is recorded in downtown Portland at the offices of Maine Magazine on 75 Market Street. It is produced by Kevin Thomas and Dr. Lisa Belisle. Editorial content produced by Chris Kast and Genevieve Morgan. Audio production and original music by John C. McCain. For more information on our hosts, production team, Maine Magazine or any of the guests featured here today, visit us at drlisa.org. Tune in every Sunday at 11 AM for the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour on WLOB Portland Maine, 1310 AM or streaming wlobradio.com. Podcasts are available at doctorlisa.org