Finding the Root Cause With Labs

Calvin and Brooke Masters: Thanks for tuning in to Master Your Metabolism. If you found value in today's episode, it would mean the world to us if you'd hit subscribe and share this episode with someone who could use a little guidance in their health journey. Ready to take the next step? Head over to www.mastersfitnesscoaching.com and you can book a free call right from the site. You've counted every calorie, tried every diet, spent hours in the gym, and still something's missing. You want more than just weight loss. You want your energy back. You want your confidence restored. You want a way of living that doesn't feel like punishment. Welcome to Master Your Metabolism, where we cut through the noise, ditch the fads, and give you a real plan to become the healthiest, strongest version of you. Brooke Masters: Hey everybody. Welcome. Welcome to Master Your Metabolism. Thank you so much for joining us. I am here today with the one and only Calvin Masters. So we kind of thought of a topic today that we wanted to share because more and more we are getting clients that are coming to us that they have had labs done because they weren't feeling like themselves. I had the same experience. I knew something was off. Doctors are telling me everything looks normal. Calvin Masters: up everybody. Calvin and Brooke Masters: so we can chat about your goals and how we can help support you. Don't forget to join our Facebook group where we're sharing coaching tips, support, and tricks to help keep you on track and continue making progress. You don't have to do this alone. We're here to walk with you every step of the way. Until next time, stay consistent, stay kind to yourself, and keep mastering your metabolism. hosted by our team of expert coaches with proven strategies, science-based tips, and real life encouragement, not just to help you lose fat, but actually create that lifestyle that you love. You've tried everything. Now, let's try what actually works. This is your turning point. Let's go. Brooke Masters: And it certainly wasn't, right? There was definitely something wrong, definitely something going on. And we hear this all the time. And when we're speaking to clients, they're like, well, my doctors ran a panel. But unfortunately, the way that the system is set up with medicine is that doctors are looking for disease. Doctors are not able to do preventative medicine, right? So finding issues and problems before they start. Calvin and Brooke Masters: Let's do this together. Brooke Masters: also looking at all the components in order to put the pieces together in order to figure out what is going on. Because someone will come to us, for example, and say, well, my thyroid is off. Your thyroid is like a check engine light. So why is that off? So really looking at all of the pieces to the puzzle, looking at all of the parameters with certain types of labs that may not be ordered. those are the ones that need to be looked at. So we can have the full picture and determine what the root of the issue is because rather than band-aiding with medications and giving you this supplement and that supplement, if you fix the root of the issue, many times, many of the symptoms will disappear because you've worked on the root cause. And I always explain it to people like, if you step on something and you hurt your toe, you're gonna start walking funny. And then all of a sudden your knee will start hurting, your hip will start hurting, and before you know it, all of a sudden your back hurts. And if you're treating your back, the problem is, that you never started with the root. And the root was that your toe was a problem and you started walking funny. So really looking at things that way and having all of the diagnostic information to be able to put these pieces together, we have found to be really helpful in order to help our clients finally start feeling better. getting the bodies that they want, finally losing weight when they haven't been able to, and really seeing a difference when nobody else could help them, nobody else could figure out what was going on. And we've spent a lot of hours with mentors and learning more and understanding the body in general to be able to help people because we found not everybody was able to just lose weight ⁓ because there was some underlying issue. So we wanted to take today to kind of go through, I mean, we could do a full podcast on line by line of going through the labs and what they show, but we really wanted to go through some of the things that you may not see on your labs and why that would be really important to see to be able to get that picture. Calvin Masters: Yeah, 100%. So that's ⁓ just to kind of circle back around to what you said before about the difference between doctors and say functional coaches, just so they understand ⁓ is doctors, their job is really just to kind of fix you and you've been broken, you know, so they're going to use Western medicine and they're going to treat what the issue is. But their concern is not so much what the root cause is. So they give you medicine to manage it. So that's important to understand the difference between managing the hormonal issue or any type of issue that's related to labs and actually fixing it. You know, so it's two different approaches. And this is where labs are very important because it's like a big puzzle. So, you know, you want to be able to put the pieces together and that can require a pretty extensive lab panel to be able to do that. You know, so it's it goes pretty deep. You know, this You know, back in our earlier years of coaching, you know, we thought we had it all figured out with the food and, we had the learned all the things, but then you would have certain clients that just were not responsive. And it just didn't make sense. It didn't make sense. They were doing the things we trust them. We're going through it and their bodies weren't responding. And this was the beginning of when we pursued looking into blood work, you know, so this grew into. A pretty big thing that really changed the dynamics of our coaching, you know, and put us more in the functional space because it does grow into some pretty huge things because a lot of people don't realize most people are affected in some way. Something can be off and it's usually stress related, you know, and not everybody feels stress the same way. They can think that everything's perfect, but there is a stressor, you know, cortisol is running high for some reason. And it could be outside stress. could be physical stress, but it could also be something that's going on inside you actually causing that stress, like a gut issue, you know, for example. And so this is where it kind of labs really kind of shine because you go in and you look for certain details and clues to what's going on and you can put the piece together, the puzzle together with it, as long as you have the proper labs. And this is something that we really want to stress to you guys and kind of talk about it so that you know, next time you to the doctor, ⁓ you want to find out if you're getting a full panel. I will say that usually you're not going to, they are going to test the basics. But there is ways to get panels done where you can actually get a full panel. So we'll tell you more about that at the end. So you have a link to go to if you want to get a full panel done. But I do highly suggest it probably once a year, I would say. Brooke Masters: And it's an important thing what you mentioned about stress because for some of us, we've just always dealt with everything. And many women that I'm finding that I'm speaking to in perimenopause and postmenopause, we've just always taken care of everything. We've always dealt with all the things. And so it doesn't feel like stress because it's always just been there. So when you're used to it, it doesn't feel like stress. However, when hormones start down regulating, your body doesn't have the same resilience to that stress. That's a problem. ⁓ and overtraining and under eating could be a stress. So there's lots of forms of stress, not just with the gut issues, not just with physiological stress, your central nervous system, you know, being able to recognize any of the areas that could be causing it. And there are ways, obviously you can't manage someone's stress that they're having issues with their spouse or issues at work, but you can manage stress in ways like adjusting training, adjusting food and things like that, that you can help a client. that might be having these things go on. So we're going to go ahead and get started. ⁓ Calvin, I'm going to have you pick kind of like your top number one. And also if you guys do ask your doctors to say, ⁓ I want this full panel. I want all of these things done. Just know that they will do it. I've had it happen and they will charge you because the insurance companies will not cover certain things. They need a certain diagnostic code in order to run those labs. So they'll go ahead and run it, but they'll bill you for it. So keeping that in mind and like Calvin said, if you are wanting to get a full panel and you're ever interested, our website is below. You can always send us an email or you can also just contact us on Instagram or Facebook and we can answer your questions and provide places that you can go to to be able to get those labs and you pay out of pocket, but it is a much less expensive way rather than getting a bill later from the doctor. Calvin Masters: Yeah, absolutely. And we can post ⁓ the panels that were actually, or the labs that were actually going to mention on here. So you have that list to use as a guide. You know, so, what was that? Brooke Masters: So the first one, yep. So your first one, let's start with the Calvin Masters: I think we should start with the thyroid. This is one that is very common that we're going to see just TSH on a lab panel, through a doctor. And maybe if we're lucky, we're going to see T4, but we're going to kind of explain this, what this is and why it's very important to also see T3 and reverse T3 and possibly TPOV, thyroid peroxidase antibodies. Brooke Masters: So, you know, like I mentioned earlier, your thyroid is usually ⁓ your check engine light. Something else is going on, that is what's causing it to be off. So your TSH, your thyroid stimulating hormone, that is something that when it starts running high, it is a sign of hypothyroidism. So you have to ask yourself, where is the problem? Is the problem that I'm not making enough hormone, ⁓ where you'll see that in T4, or is it that I'm not converting? that hormone to an active form that I can actually utilize, which is your free T3. That is the hormone that your body can actually utilize for its functions. There is something else called reverse T3. Reverse T3 is another inactive form. So your T4 is inactive, T3 is active. If it doesn't convert so you can actually utilize it, many times that will go to another inactive form called reverse T3. Now, unless you have that information, you will not know that where the issue is. Is it production or is it conversion? And if they are putting you on a medication to give you more hormone, but you're not converting, it may be the reason that you are not feeling better. No matter how much they're turning up that medication or your body gets used to it and you'll keep needing more and more. Whereas if you just fixed the issue and fixed the problem, that's where you can find it. That TPAOB, those are antibodies. That's showing your body has an immune function. Something is happening. So could it be a gut issue? Could it be something that is starting in the works? If we saw it ahead of time, that is something we can say, okay, there is something happening in the body. Let's look a little bit deeper because your active T3, the free T3, that shows us how your metabolism is working. That shows us why you're not able to lose body fat. So if you have very low conversion, okay, is there a gut issue going on? Is there something stressing the body? This is where we need to kind of dig a little bit deeper and understand what is happening so that we can help to start your metabolism working again, allowing you to lose body fat and lose weight. Calvin Masters: Yeah, this is a big one. This is a really big one. So I don't want you guys to sleep on this one. TPOB is very important to check. This is kind of tied in. This is the market they use to check for like Hashimoto's, for example. And I'll tell you that Hashimoto's is probably one of the most misdiagnosed of the means that there is. because they're basically just going off of TSH. Now here's the thing to kind of circle back around to them addressing the issue, but not the root causes. Now, if say TPOAB was being checked and you could see the levels, you can catch this before it becomes a problem. and, it's also important to understand the difference between something being clinical range and subclinical. So this is, most people don't understand this. So they have a range that you'll see in the blood work next to the numbers. And when the doctor sees it, if you're in that range, they don't say anything about it. You're within range, you're healthy, see you next year. What I can tell you is that range is based on the average of the country, the sick and the healthy. So you do not want to be in the top end of that range or in the bottom end of that range. And TPOAB is a great example of that because say if it is Hashimoto's, the range for TPOAB is zero to 34, right? Hashimoto's could be 300, you know, it could be 200 on there. That's hugely out of range, right? Obviously there's an issue, but here's the thing. If it's even just over 10, even though it's in, even though it's subclinical, it's within the range. If you're seeing that number come up over 10, that's pretty much the sign that you have a gut issue. A good sign of leaky gut, for example, or possibly H. pylori is starting to brew up. you can catch that and you can fix this before it starts to cause and push that TPOAB up and possibly turn into an autoimmune eventually. So if you catch this, you can fix it and it's very easy to fix, you know, relatively, but... what happens a lot is they don't check this. Then TSH goes through the roof out of nowhere. You had no idea. Now you're on a thyroid medicine for the rest of your life. And the problem with that is that your body adapts to that medicine and you just have to keep increasing it, increasing it, and you will have issues dealing with that your whole life, you know. And this could have been prevented. So, so the next one I would say would be Brooke Masters: Yep, for sure. Awesome. Calvin Masters: to go to ⁓ blood sugars. That's another big one. So most labs you're going to see, it's pretty much a staple that you'll see glucose being tested. And it's morning glucose. You should go fasted when you get blood work done, not having food for about 12 hours before. So they see your fasted blood sugar levels. I will tell you, ⁓ I don't put very much weight on this at all. You know, this is a snapshot what your morning looks like. You could have poor sleep the night before it can affect it. There's lots of things that can affect that number. So it tells you very little. What it can tell you is if it's very elevated, if you're over 100 on that, you're pretty much can assume that you're insulin resistant as long as you've been fasted. So yes, you would pursue and go deeper into the labs at that point. But just because it doesn't look out of range, and especially at a clinical range, it doesn't mean there's not an issue. So what you want to have when you have glucose being tested is you want to have insulin and A1C so you can put the three together and that tells you the whole picture. So your A1C is a three month average of what your blood sugars are. So your blood sugars may look good that day, but what have they looked like for the last three months? Have they been running high? You know, and if they have, what's causing those blood sugars to run high? Brooke Masters: Mm-hmm. Calvin Masters: Now the other thing with insulin because sometimes they'll see A1c is tested but they don't test insulin. So they just assume that insulin is just going to be congruent with what you're seeing with A1c. That's not always the case and this is very important to know that because you may see that your A1c is high. It could be pre-diabetic but your insulin is very low. Maybe tanked. Maybe 1.5 below clinical range even though A1c is high which doesn't seem like it makes sense, but what that tells us right away is that your insulin is not firing off appropriately. And this is causing a problem because blood sugars are getting released into the system. And that insulin job is to pick that up and take it to the where it's stored, to the muscle, to the brain, to the liver. If that's not getting delivered, you're going to have insulin resistance. You're looking at weight gain. You're looking at inflammation. You're looking at gut issues. You're looking at very difficult to build muscle. Brooke Masters: brain fog. Calvin Masters: brain fog, all the things because even though you're having carbs, they're not going to where they need to go to, float around the system, oversaturate your mitochondria, which leads to a load of health issues. So just by checking that one thing or two things really insulin with a1c You can see right away what's going on And so you should see if your a1c is a 5.7 You should see insulin up there. You should see it somewhere around 15 somewhere in that range But you know, there's and which is an issue in itself But you know how to handle that because you know that okay, we need to get that number down and bring it down It's just high blood sugars. Probably too much carbs who knows but when that insulin is low, there's most likely a stress aspect in there and you're probably releasing a lot of cortisol. So this is more we attack towards the stress to combat that. It may not even be diet. You may have a person that's eating perfectly healthy, but have this issue, but that's just because their body's stressed. Brooke Masters: And again, could be something from, you know, changes in hormones, a gut issue, all of the things. Cause you think about, you know, what happens is you eat something, glucose goes up, insulin comes, puts it into where it needs to go. But eventually what happens is when it's too much. So my chronic stressors that, you know, are constantly dealing with all of the things, eventually it gets to a point that your pancreas is trying to keep up and put everything away, but it runs out of spots. And then it keeps going and going. And when it has run out of spots and you have so much insulin now in your system, your body says, ⁓ we don't need anymore. There's a whole lot here. So that's where all of a sudden it will stop and you will see this excess glucose, excess insulin in the system. And generally some of the symptoms of this, when you see insulin resistance is that you will see more fat around the midsection, barrel-like. you know, you see it with women that have been perimenopause or menopause, it's more in the midsection and these skinny arms, skinny legs, guys too, same thing, that when they're, you see it a lot with drinkers, they have these big bellies and skinny arms, skinny legs, that is like a telltale sign that there is some insulin resistance. So that is something that you could use, not just labs, but also some things that you are seeing in the body, brain fog. You know, again, digestive issues, all of these things that you might start seeing, immune system dysfunction, people getting sick all the time, because remember, the glucose in there, the excess insulin, all of this in your cells, your body becomes inflamed. When it's inflamed, then all of a sudden, now you are not recognizing that, you know, insulin coming through. Your hormones aren't working properly. You're on HRT. I hear people that, my hormone replacement isn't working. I didn't feel a difference. Or my things got worse. Yes, because we probably needed to address something else first. looking at insulin, looking at how the body's functioning, looking at symptoms, looking at labs and putting all of the pieces together. This is just another example that you could be thinking carbs are the issue. It's not the carbs. It's that your body needs to be flushed, inflammation down so that you can actually utilize carbs and your body will work properly to be able to have your glucose. insulin come, put it away, we take a break and keep going from there. So some things that you can, again, kind of do, always tell people if you do have issues with glucose, if you do have issues with it, like thinking about the basics, thinking about food quality, thinking about pairing your meals and having protein, carbs and fats to make sure you're not having those big glucose spikes, walking after you're eating. These are just some basic, basic things that you could be doing. Before any supplements before anything just the basics and again lifestyle habits Just watching your sleep watching your stress managing and making sure your training is congruent with your nutrition To make sure that you are not adding more stress to a system. That's already stressed Calvin Masters: Right, so already there's a couple of inflammation markers that we would want to look at that let us know that there's inflammation like TPOAB and A1C both contribute to showing inflammation, but there's different types. So when we see what marker is off, it gives us a good insight to what's actually off. But there's a couple more that I just want to run with you guys. One is CRP, C-reactive protein. And the other one is SHBG, sex hormone bindin globulin. So C right after protein is a cardiac marker. And this shows more acute stress. So things that can make this increase would be plaque and the arteries is one. but also high blood sugars, you know, when that inflammation starts and goes in the body and I don't see A1C, I'm trying to find C-reactive protein and see what that looks like. And once I see that, I need to know what's causing it to go up because first thing I want to see is A1C, right? And I see if that's high to see if there's blood sugars being in there. So that is an inflammation marker that's very important to see because that's very dangerous if that gets above, you know, ⁓ the range. But I will tell you right now that if That's above one, even though that's subclinical and well within the range, it's pretty much a read that there's most likely a gut issue too tied in with that as well. There's an inflammation. So that should be addressed. So if I see that, your book sees that, we know to look into that, go into it deeper. right? And the other one is sex hormone binding globulin. So, almost a tongue twister, but that's almost like regulator for testosterone and estrogen. But it is an inflammation marker that usually increases through stress. And so when this comes up, what it'll usually affect that you'll notice is You have testosterone, which we'll get to shortly. You have total and you have free testosterone. And this is one of the reasons why you want to see both because sometimes in labs they'll just show you total testosterone, but not free, but it's very important to see both. say that your total testosterone, which is your tank of testosterone that have in your body, but that does not mean that you're using all that. So you could see a really good reading for total testosterone that looks like you're at a good level, but then you go to your free testosterone, which is actually what you're using. is actually what you're pulling from the tank and using in your body and that's what you feel, that could be low and very low and it's actually pretty common because most people are stressed out. Now most likely at this point the first thing I'm going to do is I'm going to look at SHBG and see what level that is. So if I see that that's elevated now we have a binding issue. so that the testosterone is not converting over to free testosterone because it's binding up with the SHBG. This is actually an easy fix. It's an easy fix to get it to manage it and get it working again, but you still want to go to the root cause of what's causing that to happen and fix that. Otherwise it can be repetitive, you know. ⁓ Brooke Masters: And some of the symptoms that you guys would notice that you see your testosterone in a good place, but you notice that the free testosterone is low because it's being bound up. This is where you will see low energy, low libido, low motivation, difficulty putting on muscle, difficulty building muscle. So that you're in the gym all the time, you're doing all the things, but you're not seeing any improvement. You're not seeing any change. ⁓ This could be a binding issue. So again, it's just super important to be able to, you know, see it. And there's binding hormones everywhere. There's thyroid hormones that, you know, there's a binding hormone as well. Again, could be a gut issue, could be something else having to do with stress, but looking at each of these markers and along with all of the other markers on the labs, we'll be able to show, okay, what's the root? Can we give you a temporary fix to make you feel a little bit better in the meantime and get your symptoms improved? Yes. but you can't just keep band-aiding things. You really need to find the root cause because then you're finished, right? Then you can feel better and you don't need to take things. Calvin Masters: Right and and I something that I see that's pretty common and I've seen this in practitioners even in clinics ⁓ where the total testosterone was in a good place or ⁓ the free testosterone was not in good place and so what they did is they actually increased the total the testosterone dosage to bring testosterone up more but the free testosterone doesn't budge. because they're not addressing what the root is on this. And this is very important to know because especially for a female, you do not want to keep pushing that testosterone up. Females do much better with androgens. Testosterone you want in a good place. Yes, you will feel it if that testosterone is low, but you don't want that out of range because this could now drive you into PCOS, which is a whole nother issue that you don't want. And this happens a lot when dealing with somebody, even if it's a practitioner. that doesn't fully understand why that free testosterone is not coming up. In most cases, it's just SHBG was high, but it was never tested. And when I say that's an easy fix, it's a very easy fix that could save a person a lot of problems. And we did have this happen not too long ago with a client who actually had gotten mad at me because I didn't suggest testosterone to her because of this issue. And we explained to her, you know, we need to fix what the root cause is on this. She decided to go in testosterone anyway through a clinic. And sure enough, her testosterone went up and was actually above out of range, but free testosterone did not budge. So one, she's wasting money. Two, she's not addressing the issue. And she's putting herself at risk of having other issues at this point. And was having side effects. Brooke Masters: and was having side effects. So you know the side effects of high testosterone in women, you are going to start seeing hair growth in weird places. You will start having acne, specifically around like the face and also your back. ⁓ Oily skin will start increasing. You can start seeing changes in your hair. Again, these are all things and different things that eventually if you let it go and it gets high enough, you can see some permanent changes in other areas. So it is something that you really wanna be aware of and always working with a practitioner that you trust and that looks at all of the information. Calvin Masters: Yes. And so to go into another one, I want to take a look at DHEA. ⁓ When we think about adrenals, know, adrenals is something that you really don't are not able to test on blood work. That would be more of like a Dutch test. ⁓ But it's a big issue. I can tell you it's a big issue for a lot of people because we burn the candle at both ends, not sleeping enough, under eating and going and going and going. That's going to pound your adrenals. And at some point they're going to tap out. So DHEA is connected directly to adrenals. So we can get a good read on how the condition of adrenals anyway, by testing DHEA, which usually isn't on a basic panel, you know, but there's that and also cortisol, those two things you want to take a look at. both. now a heads up with cortisol, it's again kind of like blood sugars. It's just going to be a snapshot of the morning, but it does give you some kind of indication. But if there is thoughts that, you know, looking at the other, at the other labs that adrenals could be off, I highly recommend doing a Dutch test because this is something that you don't want to spend out of control. It will impact you. If adrenals tap out, your energy's done. You're going to feel horrible. You're not going to sleep well at night and it's a cascade of issues. You know, so something that should be and when cortisol itself is high that lowers testosterone. It's like a seesaw effect. So when it's running high testosterone is down. when cortisol is chronically high testosterone is chronically down. So a lot of times you can fix your testosterone issues by regulating cortisol. And a Dutch test will show you different times of the day where your levels are. So you can be precise and adapt or adjusting that to where cortisol is higher in the morning, what it should be and slowly works its way down at night. So you're able to fall asleep at night. If you have issues of just waking up in the middle of the night and say you drink a lot of coffee or you're I feel like you're high stress this is a very good chance that your circadian rhythm is thrown off because cortisol is just running during the day and it throws cortisol when it's supposed to spike off and can be spiked in the middle of the night. So very important to address that because that causes cortisol to get increased even more. And you will notice some physical signs of high cortisol is carrying weight in your lower abdomen. And in the lower abdomen, you'll carry the weight there, which turns into the entire ab area because it starts to fill up, you know, the adipose tissue and starts to build up. But you might notice that your arms and your legs are still lean, just the belly. So you see this a lot with alcoholics, they become insulin resistant. And so they have the pot belly, skinny arms, skinny legs, they're very similar to that. But that is a form of insulin resistance as well, which cortisol will drive you into that. So seeing DHEA, ⁓ when cortisol comes up and say adrenals are running high, typically what you'll see is DHEA follows. So it goes high. So that starts to show that, okay, well, it's being worked. So it gives us a clue into what's going there. But then what happens is when it starts to tap out, see DHA drop and DHA will be very low. When DHA is very low, you're stepping pretty close in a stage three adrenal fatigue at this point. Even though the cortisol might not show it, but the cortisol will follow that right after. And what'll happen is you see cortisol drop. So a lot of people know not to have high cortisol. but not everybody knows that low cortisol is not good either. So you want to kind of be in that sweet spot, probably around eight to 14 is a good spot for cortisol. So that gives you indication on where your adrenals are on blood work. So why I say this is very important to have this on there because if testosterone is lower, you're having other issues, inflammations, it could very well be related to the adrenals. Brooke Masters: And just so you guys know that dried urine test that Calvin was talking about, the Dutch test is a test that actually shows the metabolites of your hormones as well as adrenal function, as well as cortisol. And cortisol is not bad. Cortisol is there for the purpose of fight or flight. You have something that happens, a bear chasing you, your body starts spilling glucose into your system so you have the energy so you can run away from said bear chasing you. Now, during that time, your body is in survival mode. So your body's not thinking about procreating. So that's why your testosterone is dropping, right? Your digestion starts slowing down because you're not going to be sitting down to have a snack when there's a bear chasing you. So all of these systems are in place because cortisol is supposed to be short frequent or short infrequent bursts when necessary for survival. Now, the problem is, is that we have said bears chasing us all the time with family, with work, with hormones, like everything that's going on in your world. And that chronic stress is what eventually your body's trying to keep up. And then eventually your body's like, I'm done. I cannot anymore. And that's where you start seeing the fatigue. So in the beginning, what you may see is I'm starting to drag at like three o'clock in the morning. I feel like I need a nap. Full adrenal fatigue, like when it gets really bad, that's the I'm living on caffeine, no matter how much I sleep, I'm still waking up like I'm dragging. I literally feel like I'm walking through mud. It's that, so it's almost like stages. So just to give you guys some tips of if you're feeling like that, the number one thing that I tell people to reset your circadian rhythm is to have a routine. Waking up in the morning, getting sunlight in your eyes will help you to produce your own natural melatonin 12 hours later. producing your own natural melatonin, that melatonin comes up so cortisol drops. That's what keeps you sleeping. In the morning, your cortisol raises, wakes you up, and it slowly drops during the day. That is natural rhythm. It's up with the light, goes down with the darkness, you stay asleep. So if you have that natural sleep and wake pattern, you are getting morning sunlight to produce your own natural melatonin. That is what is going to help to create that rhythm again. and understanding that there are people that take melatonin, but understand that the natural rhythm is the melatonin starts kicking in before a few hours before you are actually asleep. So you want to take it if you're going to take it minimal, smallest dose. This is not the place to be doing more is better because some people will take it and you'll say, ⁓ my gosh, I was wired from melatonin. Small, teeny tiny, small, teeny tiny. But I always tell people first to just try that setting that natural rhythm, creating your own first ⁓ and using something more like you could use like L-theanine, even ashwagandha some people have issues with. ⁓ There are different types of ashwagandha. Sensoryl is something for an evening, but L-theanine is something that doesn't make you drowsy. It just quiets your mind and allows you to rest combined with magnesium is called like the natural volume. So magnesium glycinate, 250 mgs and some L-theanine. I start people at a hundred and go up to 200. ⁓ That is the combination that can help you to rest. ⁓ are other adaptogens as well, but those are things that you can implement and making sure that you are staying away from screens. Your room is cold and dark, doing all the things for your sleep routine and the nightly routine. But that will help to reset your rhythm and get you back into a better place. But obviously, depending on how severe this is, how long this has been going on and what the root of the issue is, Those things need to be addressed, but those lifestyle factors are great for anyone that is trying to kind of just help their bodies to start. Calvin Masters: Yeah, and also too, like when DHEA comes up, it's a precursor for estrogen and testosterone. So normally when you see DHEA in a good place, you're going to normally see estrogen and testosterone in good place too. And when it comes down the same, it's going to most likely come down those areas as well. And this is very important to understand because I've seen this so many times, is people hear from their friends or the internet or whatever that just go supplement DHEA and that's going to bring it up and that's Brooke Masters: Yay. Calvin Masters: to fix the problem. This is very bad advice. Very bad advice. This is where it's very important to see the labs, right? So it your estrogen may already be in good place, but the testosterone is coming down. So you're basically converting more to estrogen at this point. So if you add that DHEA, one, you could shoot that estrogen really high, you know, or vice versa, you can shoot that testosterone very high, even though DHEA is over the counter, you can get it at vitamin shop, you know, any, any nutrition store, doesn't mean that it's not powerful and it can't screw you up. So it's very common for females to take DHEA to increase their testosterone naturally, but way overshoot it, which again can drive them to that position of having side effects from high testosterone. So always look at the labs to see the whole picture before you add a supplement like that. I recommend using a coach or some type of functional coach to get advice from on it to double check before you do that. next one, vitamin D is... ⁓ Brooke Masters: Yep. Good. Calvin Masters: This one, this one's like a such a sneaky one because this gets no respect on blood work. feel like people just see that they're like, yeah, vitamin D, whatever. You know? And so nine times out of 10, it's low, you know, especially if you live in a place, it's not that sunny. You know, we live in South Florida. We get to get out on the side. Well, you would never tell if I'm I tan, I don't get on the side as much as I should. I kind of avoid it, but um, But at the same time, we do supplement vitamin D, which is very important. And we use K2 as well to make sure it gets maximum absorption. So if you want to talk on that one, I broke about vitamin D and why it's important. Brooke Masters: Yeah, vitamin D, just so you guys understand, that is like the precursor to hormones. It helps with immune function, your mood, your energy. is truly one of those, like he said, it's just one of those like underrated types of things. And nine out of 10 times when we are looking at labs, people are deficient unless you are supplementing. And on labs, the majority of the time we're seeing it in the like 20s, 30s kind of range. You're gonna want it closer to like 60s like that's where you want it that you're actually getting the most use out of it and not just doing like some junky little Vitamin D that you're getting in like Publix but actually getting a quality vitamin D3 with K2 supplement ⁓ Typically a good maintenance is about 5,000 IU Would be the dosing of it But again if you're getting sick all the time if you have really low energy your mood is kind of just you know always in the dumps like It could be a number of things, but having a really good base of vitamin D3, that is kind of like where you want to get started and making sure that you're putting your body in a really good place. Calvin Masters: Yeah, and if you kind of right now thinking in terms of the gut that you want to see ⁓ and pay attention to, one is going to be alkaline phosphatase. That one gets skipped over quite a bit too. And when I see that that's low, low end of the range or below. This is a big indicator to me that either one, somebody's chronically way low calories and they're not getting nutrition. This is something I may see if somebody's been abused in like a GLP, you know, so they're just barely eaten and the stuff that they're eating is just garbage. They're not getting nutrients in. So this particular marker tells you how many nutrients, what nutrients you're getting in. If there's a deficiency like zinc and magnesium, but it also say you have a person that's eaten a good diet. But that's low. this tells me right away is stomach acid is probably low. You're not breaking food down and it's passing right through. So if you are a person that goes to the bathroom more than a couple of times a day, you may not be processing your food well. You want to check your alkaline phosphatase because it may be that stomach acid is low. You want stomach acid in a good place because that's what breaks the food down so you can absorb it. And if it's not getting broken down properly, it's just moving right through you and coming out the back end. And that's... Brooke Masters: and many people, sorry. Calvin Masters: But that's your place where you're going to see that. So that's a staple for us to check that one at any time we suspect like a gut issue, but we check it always. it's an indicator for sure. Brooke Masters: And I see a lot of people that have been put on PPIs ⁓ and things to help because they're getting reflux so they could put on PPIs. And many times your stomach acid is actually already low. That's why it's not breaking food down and it's starting to come back up. So doctors will think, you have too much stomach acid. So they will put you on a PPI. But then what happens is your already low acid is even lower. ⁓ So that could be a problem as well. ⁓ I see that as well, either it's a lots of processed foods, people are trying to get their protein up. So they're eating bars and chips, protein chips and protein pancakes and all the things, but they're not really getting nutrients from fruits, veggies, fish, olive oil, like getting the real key nutrients from their food and using it as fuel. And because it's nutrient lacking foods that they're putting in, they're not having it or that they're not like Calvin was saying, there's a gut issue. ⁓ you have low stomach acid, there are a number of reasons. And again, just one more kind of piece of the puzzle. And when you look at all of these things together and piece them together, you'll say, okay, what do we need to look at? What are we suspecting? Like, are we suspecting a GI issue? Do we need to go through like a GI map that will be able to tell us about bacterial overgrowth? You you're good commensal bacteria. Looking at H. pylori, parasites. I had someone recently that same thing. She wasn't really having any issues. She just wasn't able to lose body fat. We saw a couple markers that were off on her labs, like her white blood cell count was chronically low. That is because she had a gut issue and her body was trying to fight it for a very long time. So we found parasites on her GI map. And now that she's able to, you know, repair that and we can kill these parasites off. Now all of a sudden she can absorb her nutrients. Now she feels better, has more energy, no more brain fog. So understanding. food into your system and nutrients into your system. That is what allows you to have all of the processes that need to happen. If you're feeling brain fog, can be hormones, can absolutely be gut related. So you definitely want to look at all the components and figure out, okay, what do I need to look at next? Do I need to get a more, better picture of my GI function? Do I need to get a better picture of my adrenal function? Do I need to look at my cortisol? Is that where I'm thinking? So. Having all of these pieces, putting it together and determining what the next step is to be able to find that root cause, fix it so that way you can start feeling better and getting the results that you want of having more energy, being able to lose body fat, know, just being able to function, find your words, all of those things can all be related to something that is deeper than you think. Calvin Masters: Yeah, and an iron panel, you know, it's irons another one. TIBC, Faradayn, Faradayn gets skipped a lot. I will see iron and labs and I most of the time I see irons fine, but then Faradayn gets checked and is very low. And so this is another sign of a gut issue, you know, as well. It could be malabsorption, you know, this will directly affect your energy. So if you're seeing all the other things and you check all the boxes, check your ferritin. That I see quite a bit that that's low and that can be addressed and is pretty easy fix, you know, to do as well. But if you don't see it on the labs, you're not going to know. And then you're just guessing it's you don't really want to plow iron in either. know to bring iron up ⁓ i don't recommend really doing a supplement if you do supplement i would do it every other day not daily because you can't overshoot the iron very easily using a supplement which can cause ⁓ issues in your body as well so but every other day but ideally through food is going to be your best bet you know foods that are just high higher in iron you know, unhealthy is really the way to do that. But that's a good marker to kind of see too, if there is that things going on. A GI map really, once you kind of get some indications from the labs, a GI map is going to be the true tale of exactly what's wrong that you can specifically attack what's off. But I would highly recommend getting a regular blood panel first to know which direction you go from that point. That's your baseline. And so that's a priority. Did you want to add on that? Okay. So, all right. It's boring. Nobody wants to talk about that. ⁓ So, now we can move on to the sex hormones. Now, this is a big one because this is metabolism. Basically, when you're thinking in terms of like body composition, sex hormones are very important. Very important. I can tell you that when I have somebody on board to compete, they're not going to compete if I don't see a full panel show me the sex hormones because I need to know that that's in a good place before I put them in an environment that's going to be stressful and make things worse because some real damage can get caused if these are off. So that would say I'd say probably start. Well, we talked about testosterone already. This is most commonly talked about because low ⁓ does affect, you know, recovery, ⁓ libido, energy, all those things. Ideally you want that to be in a good place, you know, some people can function on lower testosterone and be just fine. So it is kind of relative to the person just because your numbers are a little low. Doesn't mean that, that you're going to have negative effects. have had a guy that was at the bottom of the range and I turned him pro in natural bodybuilding. without changing that. So it can be done, but I would say in most cases that wouldn't have happened. He just handled it well. And that can fluctuate too. So when you think ⁓ chronic low dieting, stress, it's going to come down. You know, so depending on when you test, may be low, but when you feed up and you reverse diet up and you do it properly with nutrients, so the other things are in place, you're probably going to bring that testosterone to a much better place. Whether it goes optimal or not, we just don't know if you're perimenopause, probably not, definitely not. ⁓ If you're a male that's over 40, probably not going to be the same level you used to see. but it can come up through just nutrition by itself, you know, and taking your body out of that stress state. But it's very important to see testosterone and free testosterone, not just testosterone that tells you have this story and it's not good enough. You need to see it all. And then estrogen, you wanna do that one? Estrogen, all right. Brooke Masters: Yeah, so estrogen, usually typically they test estradiol. So that is your estrogens that ⁓ just one of the estrogens, there are a couple. The one that I usually tell people that they don't typically test is if you have a history of female cancers ⁓ in your family, always test Estrone because those are those bad estrogens that are known to be cause cancers, right? So that is a good marker. So sometimes they will test estradiol and total estrogens, which will give you an idea. But estrone, I typically will tell people that tell their doctors that they are at risk because they have a history of female cancers and can they please test your estrone levels. ⁓ And that is something that you can look at. And the thing about estradiol and progesterone is in women, what you're looking for is the balance. So when you are having that tested, you want to have your hormones tested if you are still getting your cycle day 19 to 21. That is when progesterone, your calming hormone, should be the highest. So that way at that time of the month, you can see the balance of where your estradiol and your progesterone lie. If there is an imbalance where progesterone is very low and estrogen is very high, this is where you can see weight gain on the hips and thighs, brain fog. constipation, anxiety, you know, those are some of the side effects that you can see and you say, okay, if my progesterone is supposed to be the highest and it's very, very low and my estrogen is clinically within range, you're not going to start messing with your estrogen, right? You don't wanna pull that down. What you may just need to do is just pull up your progesterone. Now, over time, as we... women get older, your progesterone will naturally drop. is typically the first one that will drop in perimenopause. This is why you have anxiety, trouble sleeping, all of those issues and the weight gain and things like that. Insulin resistance, all the things start happening with your labs because estrogen is fluctuating. So again, you can see it at sometimes very high, sometimes very low, but if progesterone is tanked, this is what you want to kind of work with the progesterone. So whether you use something to bring it up naturally, but once you are past that time that you are no longer able to produce your own. ⁓ This is something that you really want to address and either through hormone replacement, if that is your choice. I always tell people, hormone replacement is a choice. isn't based on symptoms. I tell you, if you don't have any symptoms and you feel great, there's no reason to do it. But if you feel that your quality of life is impacted because you have anxiety and can't go to work, you have issues with sleep. and you start losing your mind because you're not getting any rest. ⁓ You start noticing brain fog, word finding issues, constipation. That also constipation will happen with that. And then estrogen that already is in a good place because you're not able to get rid of it out of the body now will build up. So you'll even have more in your system. And this is where things go haywire. understanding that progesterone is your calming hormone. First one to go after 40. Testosterone is usually the second one that tanks. And then estrogen will kind of do this for a little while. And then eventually tank as well. That's where you start seeing, the hot flashes because you have a high FSH and very low progesterone, very low estrogen. could see joint pain, ⁓ and have different issues like that, dry skin, things like that. So some of the symptoms, they will think it's thyroid. Some of them will think it's hormone. Some of them it's a combination because your thyroid will be thrown off when your hormones are off. So again, remember that check engine light. So understanding how all of the pieces work together is super important. And again, estrogen in men too is something that you don't want that too high either because high estrogen or very low estrogen will cause side effects in guys as well. You can see, you know, impact with sex drive. You can see impact with function. You can see impact with, you know, they'll start crying at the little girly movies, all of the things, you know, that you'll start. Calvin Masters: That's not out of experience. You're not saying that because you've that before. Brooke Masters: That's definitely not as experienced. you'll, you know, you could see some of these and you might just need to like backhand your husband and just say, go get that checked, you know. Calvin Masters: Yeah, it does. Because guys will have that issue. Let's be honest, guys will have libido issues, and they're supplementing testosterone, you know, and they maybe are overdoing the anastrozole, you know, something that's kind of suppress estrogen, or not taking it all. And this can have that impact. And so they think, I just need to supplement more testosterone. They just throw more testosterone, and that can shoot the estradiol even higher at that point. So it's it's important to kind of see all these things and pay attention to them. You know, then leading from that, would say the lipid panel, is, know, cholesterol, total cholesterol, LDLs, HDLs. ⁓ total cholesterol is normal to see like in perimenopause, you know, that can start to go up, you know, as, part of the down regulation of hormones. ⁓ if you do supplement testosterone, that can actually increase as well. ⁓ obviously poor diet, you know, we'll do that. ⁓ LDLs is what they consider, they call it the bad cholesterol. It's not bad. It's important to understand that that has a purpose. It is a good thing, but it's when the HDLs, the healthy ones, the healthy fats are low. That's where you run into issues. So if you think about LDLs, what that does is it puts ⁓ It goes in and kind of splatters on the arteries, right? So it kind of covers the walls almost like if you have some idea, a knockdown in the wall or something, they just splatter and it's messy. It's going through. And then what happens is the HDL has come in and Brooks Breyer can be able to explain this better. This is, is your easily explains it, but I'm going to take the wheel for this. That comes in and cleans it up and then cycles it through, but it leaves some residue on the arteries, which, which actually is, this is why LDLs are not bad cholesterol because that strengthens the wall of the arteries. but when the HDLs are low and it's not coming through and circulating that you can see how that reduces the inside diameter of those arteries and it can build up build up and then you're looking at strokes and heart attacks and things like that so ⁓ you want to look at the ratio between the LDLs and the HDLs so you say at least half of you know the total LDLs you want to see your HDLs at least half of that so did you want to add to that? Brooke Masters: And your good cholesterol, you're a good cholesterol again. ⁓ Those are the things that you're getting from healthy fats like salmon, like olive oil, ⁓ flaxseed, raw nuts, avocado, know, using those types of healthy fats to be able to bring that good cholesterol up. Your LDLs are what is like a precursor to your hormones too. So a lot of times men will be put on a cholesterol bed to lower their cholesterol. However, then they will start seeing that their testosterone tanks. So understanding a range that would be healthy, a range that is not healthy. Also looking at diet, like triglycerides, that is gonna be like an inflammatory marker. So looking at that also to see, well, is it caused from drinking? Is it caused from processed foods? Is it caused from too much greasy shit? So you definitely wanna be looking at. the big picture. again, if you have an understanding of how these pieces are working together, you can know, okay, what lifestyle changes do I need to make? What types of things do I need to do in regards to my nutrition? What things do I need to keep in mind with my stress management? All of these things, lifestyle, I always tell people, you can throw supplements, but if your lifestyle, your nutrition, what you are doing to stay active, if those things are out of whack, The supplements are not going to do anything. It's like you're brushing your teeth, but you're putting Oreo cookies in at the same time. So it's not going to do the job that you want it to. Supplements, GLPs, whatever it is that you're putting in your body to fix it won't work as well if you don't have the foundations in place. So you always, when we are coaching people, you need to coach the foundations first. Teach them what is going on in their body, educating people. My main thing is If you understand what's going in your body and understand what is happening and what those labs mean, then you can understand what the outcome will be, right? If I am telling you all of these markers are off, you have inflammation, and if you allow this to keep going, the preventative medicine that we are trying to do and preventing things from happen won't happen, and then you will wind up 10 years from now in the doctor having issues, you know, where... Recently seeing so many men that are coming to us at young ages in their 40s having strokes This is from so much more stress than there used to be so much more quick getting food and on processed foods and not having the time to de-stress the combination of all of these things is what is wrecking people's health it is Not something like crazy new. It is just understanding that when you are rushing around, when you have more pressure, when you have less money, less time, less nutrient-dense foods, and you're just going for the quick, this is gonna be the outcome. So being aware of why the lifestyle habits are so necessary as a reflection of what was happening in the lab work is what is going to allow you to implement the things that need to be so you can move your health and you have the ability and the power to be able to take your health and have control over it. So when we're coaching people, we're teaching you so that when you're done, you have sustainable change. You don't just change for a little bit, have the little GLP, you do that and you're good, because then you leave and you wind up back to where you started. So. Calvin Masters: Yeah, and I just want to put it in there too. Don't rely on that statin to fix you. Don't rely on that. You don't want that. That's going to create a whole nother area of problems for your body. The things that they don't tell you is when you take that, that will, like she said, it will drop your cholesterol is very low, which they're going to paint the picture like that's a good thing. But keep in mind that that cholesterol is what feeds your hormones. So when you cut that supply and make it very little, what do you think is going to happen to your hormones? You guys are going to go into mental pause. know, testosterone is going to drop down, like she said. But the other thing is your blood sugar levels are going to start rising probably into a pre-diabetic. So now you have high blood, you have high blood sugars, low testosterone. Now, because of the high blood sugar is turning insulin resistance. Now you got high blood pressure, lots of meds coming your way. All right. So what I suggest, double up on fish oils every day, two servings, one in the morning, one at night. That should by itself start to get things going in a better direction and the things that Brooke said in addition to that. ⁓ This is one area you don't want to sleep on because if you do get put in that medication, be ready. There's gonna be other problems that come with it. So you wanna avoid that, all right? So. Now that we got that in, let's see what do we have left here. FSH and LH. Not as exciting as the other ones, but this is a good one for the website. Yeah, yeah. But just so they know, that's ⁓ indicator free. It can tell you if you're going into menopause. You know, you look at those numbers. ⁓ It's also another one that we see, like if we can think that someone may have symptoms of like PCOS. Brooke Masters: I usually test those. I usually see those tested. Calvin Masters: we would see that these would be off, you know, so it's an indicator with that, along with testosterone. If we see a