Integrative Women's Health Podcast

Many people live with depression for years and never feel fully better, even after medications, therapy, lifestyle changes, or countless specialist visits. What we rarely talk about is why these approaches often fall short and what it actually takes to create real change. Today, I’m joined by Silvia Covelli, founder of the Healing Depression Project, and Dr. Achina Stein, a functional medicine psy...

“Focus on the skill of listening to your specific body, your specific symptoms, and figuring out what your system is responding to.” - Cait Van Damm If you work with women navigating chronic illness, you’ve probably seen the “Doctor Roadshow” up close. These women have seen multiple practitioners without resolution and arrive at your practice exhausted and overwhelmed, with a list of protocols, su...

“My limiting belief told me I was limited in the outpatient world. But the truth is, I was already several steps ahead of most people, and that’s enough.” - Dr. Amanda Thompson Burnout is everywhere in healthcare right now. Productivity standards are climbing, providers are stretched to their limits, and rural areas in particular are left patching together care with minimal resources. For many pra...

“When your client says their body changed overnight, she’s not exaggerating.” - Dr. Jessica Drummond So many women arrive in perimenopause or menopause feeling blindsided by the changes in their bodies. They’re exercising, eating well, and they might even be using hormone replacement therapy (HRT), but no matter what they do, they’re noticing weight gain around the middle, higher cholesterol, or s...

“Perimenopause isn’t just about hot flashes and night sweats. It’s about the brain.” - Dr. Jessica Drummond Brain fog, anxiety, and mood swings are among the most common and frustrating symptoms for women in perimenopause and menopause. At the same time, they’re also the most misunderstood. For too many of us, these symptoms are brushed off as stress or just part of getting older when in reality,...

“Most programs train you for the simple cases. Confidence in Complexity trains you for the real ones.” - Dr. Jessica Drummond When women reach midlife, they rarely show up with one neat, easy-to-solve issue. More often, they’re managing layers like autoimmunity, trauma, long COVID, endometriosis, migraines, chronic pain, all of which are now intersecting with shifting hormones. These are the clien...

“Women’s health is never textbook. Complexity is the rule, not the exception.” - Dr. Jessica Drummond Right now, most health professionals are still being trained to treat simple, textbook cases of perimenopause and menopause, leaving millions of women without the comprehensive, evidence-based care they deserve. At the same time, there’s a growing wave of public awareness, policy changes, and cult...

“We all deserve good 85-year-old brain health, and that starts today.” - Dr. Mariza Snyder Between long workdays, parenting, and never-ending to-do lists, most midlife women feel like there’s no time left for their own health. Sleep gets pushed aside, movement is de-prioritized, and self-care is shuffled off the calendar in favor of more “pressing” tasks. But the habits we build now aren’t just ab...

“Most programs teach you the textbook cases. We teach you the real ones.” – Dr. Jessica Drummond There’s no such thing as a routine menopause client. Every woman brings her own history, from autoimmune disease to migraines, chronic pain, medical gaslighting, and more. That makes midlife care complex. And yet most training programs only cover basic scenarios, which don’t help us in the real world,...

“By addressing my nervous system, which also helped me heal my long COVID, I really healed my sleep.” - Chantal Traub Sleep isn’t a luxury. It’s the foundation of brain health, nervous system regulation, and the resilience we need to thrive in midlife. So many practitioners arrive in perimenopause already burned out and sleep-deprived from years of on-call shifts, raising kids, caregiving, or simp...

“These women aren’t just dealing with an injury. They’re living in a low-estrogen environment that changes everything about healing.” Musculoskeletal pain in midlife is often misdiagnosed. A woman presents with widespread joint pain, poor sleep, and fatigue, and she’s given a stack of prescriptions that never get to the root cause. But in perimenopause and menopause, declining estrogen and progest...

“Perimenopause can amplify and unmask complex chronic illnesses that were hiding in the background.” – Dr. Jessica Drummond When we skip the chronic illness conversation with our midlife clients and patients and go straight to hormone replacement therapy (HRT), we miss helping women feel fully well and stay well into their later years. While HRT can be an important tool, it’s not the whole story....

“Being a holistic practitioner is about focusing on the individual, not protocols.” – Carly Nadine So many of our clients come to us carrying complex histories, whether it’s years of period pain, medical gaslighting, trauma, chronic infections, or a sense of not being heard. By the time they reach midlife, we have to adopt a different approach. True healing requires slowing down, holding space, an...

“My limiting belief told me I was limited in the outpatient world. But the truth is, I was already several steps ahead of most people, and that’s enough.” - Dr. Amanda Thompson Burnout is everywhere in healthcare right now. Productivity standards are climbing, providers are stretched to their limits, and rural areas in particular are left patching together care with minimal resources. For many pra...

“I can’t just treat a knee or a shoulder; if I really want to make progress with people and they're not sleeping well or they're not eating well, I'm not getting anywhere with them.” – Megan Wells True healing requires a full-body, holistic approach. Especially in this continuing COVID world, many of our clients come to us struggling with conditions like chronic pain, fatigue, dysautonomia, or aut...

“Mental health and physical health can’t be separated.” – Julie Cardoza For many women, the first signs of perimenopause aren’t hot flashes or irregular cycles; they’re mental health changes like anxiety, burnout, irritability, and brain fog. In the conventional medical system, these symptoms are often treated in isolation, without anyone connecting the dots between hormonal shifts, nervous system...

“When we are so restricted and tied to all the things we have to do, we're not actually supporting longevity.” - Andrea Nakayama Health practitioners and clients are often looking for the same thing: the “right” tools and protocols for women in perimenopause and beyond. Social media tells women they should be taking hormones, eating lots of protein, and powerlifting, and the conversation gets redu...

“One rich relationship is more valuable than a hundred casual connections.” - Selena Soo As health and wellness professionals, our work is built on connection. Whether it's with our clients, referral partners, or fellow practitioners, relationships are at the core of everything we do. Unfortunately, when it comes to growing our businesses, it’s easy to fall into the trap of focusing on growing our...

*This episode is sponsored by Osteoboost* “The most important thing for fractures is to prevent them.” - Laura Yecies Osteoporotic fractures are one of the biggest threats to women’s quality of life as we age, and as practitioners, we’re in the perfect position to help our clients take action before it’s too late. Where cardiovascular disease is the number one killer of women, dementia and hip fra...

“It’s important to take a holistic approach to a person’s fertility.” – Liane Moccia Our clients’ fertility journeys are about much more than getting pregnant. They’re navigating stress, nervous system imbalances, environmental toxins, and often a healthcare system that doesn’t consider these factors. On top of that, many times the focus is solely on the female partner, despite the fact that male...

[TRIGGER WARNING: Sensitive topics, including suicide] “Our thoughts drive our nervous system, and when you’re in a sympathetic state, it’s very difficult to achieve true healing.” - Dr. Christina Bjorndal Diet and lifestyle are crucial elements of our overall health and well-being, but we have to consider that they’re part of a larger puzzle.  While you can help your clients make significant...

For many women, perimenopause comes with confusing symptoms that can’t seem to be explained and changes to your body that can feel like you’re losing control. Right now, only 4-6% of women in the US are receiving adequate medical menopause care, leaving the vast majority unsupported and confused about what’s happening with their bodies. This is where today’s guest, Stephanie Shaw, found herself in...

“A health coach is somebody who truly hears you and can help you navigate through this increasingly complex medical system.” - Dr. Sandra Scheinbaum Health coaches can’t replace medical doctors. When it comes to acute care, you need a doctor, not a coach. But what happens when you get discharged? For many patients, a health crisis comes with the need to make lifestyle changes to shift the underlyi...

“People make choices and they pay for what they value.” - Rachel Braun Scherl As practitioners, it often feels like we’re being pulled in many different directions. You're seeing clients, managing operations, creating content, and still wondering how to reach more people and make your practice sustainable without burning out. At the same time, the conventional healthcare system continues to miss t...

“Many women don't have the information they need to understand what's going on with their hormones.” - Kate Wells While the conversation around menopause and hormone therapy has progressed significantly in recent years, many women remain unaware of their options and lack access to practitioners who can guide them through these transitions. When you add the fact that many of the symptoms associated...