[00:00:00] Carl Lanore: [00:00:00] Welcome back to superhuman radio. Today is November 11 2019 for those of you listening to this show a hundred years from now, and it's going to be an interesting discussion so. If you're on Instagram or Facebook or really any social media, you know, that women's bodies are changing. Um, and these changes are purposeful changes.

[00:00:25] When you look at the, uh, majority of women today who find themselves within the fitness side of things. Obviously we have another side of things with women are getting bigger and bigger body fat wise, and they're being embraced for their uniqueness. That's one side. The other side is that women are becoming more conscious of being athletic, looking athletic, and as a result of that, they are starting to, um, not starting to, they have used, uh, lots of different performance and [00:01:00] appearance enhancing, uh.

[00:01:03] Drugs are not unlike what menus to achieve these bodies. And my guest today is Victoria fell car and she actually, this is a special area for her. How are you doing Victoria? So, um, we see a more extreme looking woman today. I obviously use that Photoshop designed to look like a guy with a, you know, a woman built like a guy.

[00:01:31] To draw attention to, uh, some of the more extreme areas. But the reality is that there are a lot of women today who are not, uh, trying to win a competition of any type, but they are using these different types of drugs, uh, to achieve a certain body type. First of all, what even made you want to study this?

[00:01:53] Where, where, where do you find your Genesis.

[00:01:55] Victoria Felkar: [00:01:55] Okay. How does all that, that's a long story, but I will try to be [00:02:00] concise on that. So I, um, I was an active individual growing up and I was also gone to the gym really young, so I got 15 when I started weight training. And at that point in time, um, it was still very, I guess porn.

[00:02:17] For lack of a better word for women to be in the weight room training. It was still very much a kind of like a sacred gated fitness industry where you had the coat cardio bunnies and then the bros. and so I kind of crossed that boundary and I was really strong. And so right away I got plagued with kind of comments around like, Oh, this girl's on gear.

[00:02:36] And I didn't know what that was at 15 year old back like 15 years ago. Didn't, it didn't Dawn on me what that even was. Um, and then fast forward, I started, um, I guess there was a kind of a sum of all things. So I got sick myself. Um, I had a bunch of hormonal issues that kind of erupted when I was 18 and 19.

[00:02:54] Um, and as a result of that, my adrenal androgen production, which I'm sure we're gonna get into some of that stuff, went up [00:03:00] really high. Um, and I experienced similar, uh, symptoms to what is associated with. Anabolic androgenic neck surgeries for women and Again, people confronted me going, Oh, she's on gear.

[00:03:12] And I was like, but no, I'm not, like, why would they think that? Where did these ideas come from? And so I started digging and that, that also aligned with, um, my undergraduate degree in kinesiology. And this was around the time that bigger, stronger, faster came out. And, uh, we'd watched it right after it was still kind of in the, um, the, I'm not quitting like mainstream yet.

[00:03:33] It was still kind of in like the dome festivals. And. And again, the whole conversation after the movie was, is steroids are bad. Don't take them, especially if you're a women. And that was kind of the, the rhetoric. That was what the, the overall kind of, I guess is ambiguous as it is. That was the conversation, and I didn't understand it.

[00:03:52] I was like, but if they're saying that, you know, there's not that, it's not that art is not as bad as socially. Um. [00:04:00] I guess, so she's been accepted as the normal conversation on steroids. If they're not that bad, then why are they so bad for women? And again, so I just started digging and digging and digging.

[00:04:09] Meanwhile, I'm still in the fitness industry. I'm still doing my multiple degrees and in the more of that medical world as well, and learning about the effects of hyper androgens in women from an endogenous standpoint. Um, continue to go through, started to then see is this kind of. Shift in the industry, um, especially with the, I guess the overarching explosion of social media and fit bodies and going like, this is really interesting because I knew of the history of female muscularity at inside out.

[00:04:38] My, my supervisor from my master's was, I mean, an expert in that and that never before was there. This acceptance of female muscularity, um, as there was starting about 2010 ish and then obviously through to today. Um, and so there was all these different factors happening. Um, but the main, I guess the main [00:05:00] reason is there's not a lot of information out there.

[00:05:02] Right? I was so frustrated with that personally, trying to find information, not only for my own health. Um, and trying to figure out and navigate my own area, but also just with regards, and I use the word steroids, kind of an overarching umbrella, right? Um, to discuss compounds that are

[00:05:18] Carl Lanore: [00:05:18] And that's actually part of the problem.

[00:05:20] We have just one word for something, but I want to go back to your personal stories for a second. So, um, did you, what, what did you determine? I mean, you didn't have like a pituitary at adenomas, you weren't over producing androgens. What were going on with you.

[00:05:34] Victoria Felkar: [00:05:34] Well, that actually brings me to the other word for reproductive steroids.

[00:05:39] And so I was put on, um, oral contraceptive at a young age as I was a ballet dancer with heavy periods, and that is still to the state practice. Um, and that, that is a steroids. And as a result, I also had an eating disorder simultaneously. And so, um, as I was. Having this kind of synthetic hormonal cascade happening each month with being on the pill.

[00:06:00] [00:06:00] I also didn't actually have a hypothalamus, pituitary adrenal, a proper signals happening happening because I was overtraining and under

[00:06:07] Carl Lanore: [00:06:07] eating. We saw, we talk about this and men using a aromatizing androgens that, Oh, there's the negative feedback loop, but we never, ever think about this. And in fact, the reality is that the purpose of.

[00:06:21] A hormone based birth control is to actually leverage that negative feedback loop.

[00:06:27] Victoria Felkar: [00:06:27] Yeah, it's, it's essentially chemical castration. The whole goal is to shut down the hypothalamus pituitary ovarian access.

[00:06:34] Carl Lanore: [00:06:34] And do you still ma I, this is a question I've never asked before. Do you still menstruate or even a small amount when you're on the

[00:06:41] Victoria Felkar: [00:06:41] pill?

[00:06:42] So. Um, funny you should ask that because I'm, I'm writing this chapter on my, uh, my dissertation at the moment. But yes, you can, but not always. And so there are what's called menstrual suppression drugs, or, I mean, it used to be that women would just skip the, the kind of the placebo pack in their period, and now there are [00:07:00] pills that don't have a bleed.

[00:07:01] Now that bleed is not an auditory cycle though. So the whole purpose of a contraceptive agent is to stop an individual from oscillating. Avi is how women make most of their progesterone. So it serves a very important,

[00:07:14] Carl Lanore: [00:07:14] it is, it isn't in fact, those hormonal based pills, they are, they are quite often synthetic progestins.

[00:07:20] Right?

[00:07:21] Victoria Felkar: [00:07:21] Correct. So then they're the kind of the bastardize form of progesterone. They are either derived from progesterone or I mean, have you,

[00:07:29] Carl Lanore: [00:07:29] have you seen this studies? I actually had the author on this show probably seven, eight years ago. There's a good study out there. I want to say it comes from one of the, uh.

[00:07:38] A state, university of New York, uh, uh, participants who that showed that even that there's a dose dependent, not dose. There's a length of therapeutic application dependent propensity to develop dementia in women who [00:08:00] have used progestin. Based a birth control pills, the longer you're on them, the higher the probability that you'll develop.

[00:08:09] Have you seen that study?

[00:08:10] Victoria Felkar: [00:08:10] I have. And that's a, that's one of many. Uh, and that, I guess that kind of is full circle. So as I was going through my own health issues and that I had my two different axes sit down and chat down simultaneously when I then got healthy, my body didn't know how to handle these hormones.

[00:08:24] And so the first time my body tried to ovulate on its own. All hell broke loose and I, my adrenal androgens went really, really high to the point that they thought I had a tumor. And so I was diagnosed with Cushing's disease and then within three months they dropped down to nothing. So then I was diagnosed with Addison's disease and I was passed around the medical system, seeing internal medicine doctors seeing endocronologist fertility and metabolic specialists.

[00:08:48] And nobody knew what to do with me because I was a young and active female. That had just, I mean, weight gain that went come up. I had secondary hair growth. I had, my voice had dropped [00:09:00] here from all these. Exactly. I had all these, these hallmark signs of hyper androgens

[00:09:06] Carl Lanore: [00:09:06] and, and there's a lot of women hopefully listening to the show going, wow, I have this too.

[00:09:12] But on top of that. You've been told that you have ovarian cysts because PCLs causes a lot of these same conditions.

[00:09:20] Victoria Felkar: [00:09:20] Yeah. And so, and again, I can touch on that if you want. PCLs is a cluster of symptoms. It's not actually a diagnosis. I don't use that term myself in my research because it is actually an accurate, right.

[00:09:30] Um, you can have cysts on your ovaries without having TCOs, but unfortunately, that's not the way the medical system's labeled it these days. Um, PCLs really is an anomaly. Tori cycle, which means you don't ovulate. I Androgen excess in conjunction with insulin resistance. So that's like the three defining characteristics, but women get diagnosed with it.

[00:09:49] Um, with, like I said, if they had cysts on their ovaries, if they have irregular periods, um, there's also what they call drug induced PCLs, or whether this is post birth control, which, going back to my [00:10:00] story, that was a bit of my, my aspect. I also had some genetic issues going on. Um, and so there was, for me personally, there was this cluster of things happening.

[00:10:08] Um, and it was frustrating because it made me realize the lack of knowledge about women's health. Women's reproduction and the fact that oral contraceptives, as much as they are a steroid with incredibly damning side effects, they're not regarded as that. And for women, they are given out like candy.

[00:10:24] And I was like, okay. This doesn't make sense to me cause I kept getting suggested to go back on the pill and I was like, but we're trying to fix my hormones. We're not trying to cover them up. Um, and at that point in my journey is actually when I started seeing dr Eric Sorento down in Ohio and as a Canadian, that was my, that was like my spring break was going down to see Eric, um, and really kind of pushing myself and I

[00:10:47] Carl Lanore: [00:10:47] not gotten this, I don't want this.

[00:10:50] Yeah. Could, they have not gotten this level of care in Canada with the Canadian medical system?

[00:10:56] Victoria Felkar: [00:10:56] Well, I kept getting passed around. So. Okay. It's

[00:11:00] [00:10:59] Carl Lanore: [00:10:59] very I just want them to kind of, I just wanted to kind of wedge that in there. Yeah, no,

[00:11:05] Victoria Felkar: [00:11:05] it's, it's, it's more of a specialized thing. I was a female athlete and that I was somebody who also had these really complex endocrine issues and that nobody was looking at me from an integrated perspective.

[00:11:16] It was all very localized. Like, let's look at The cysts on the ovaries. Let's look at the hair growth. It was not, nobody was looking at the full picture. And so Eric is, I mean, he's brilliant at that. And so he also, I was initially going to want to go into sport med and he was like, no, you're, you're not going to be able to do what you want to do if you go into med, you need to become a researcher.

[00:11:36] And I actually listened to him and I, that's how I got into the work that I do. So it's a bit of my personal story, but then also once I saw the state of the literature, I couldn't unsee it. I couldn't ignore it. And then as I got more and more into professional consulting, so I did like my exercise physiology certificates, and I did all that stuff.

[00:11:56] And, and I was working with women a lot in the, in more of the gym setting. And [00:12:00] so once I transitioned into consulting, I just couldn't believe the amount of women that either were having You know, preexisting reproductive disorders that were then put on the pill. Women that had started to play around with androgen use and had no idea what to do.

[00:12:13] And often they didn't even explain it to their doctor because of the stigma around it that they were taking these drugs. So they had no actual kind of course of action to help them navigate the, the after effects. So the longer the short, like that's how I got into this work. It's, it is a world I loved to study.

[00:12:31] But it's a world that also terrifies them because there is so much lack of study there.

[00:12:36] Carl Lanore: [00:12:36] Let, let me, let me add something to your to do list.

[00:12:42] Victoria Felkar: [00:12:42] Yeah.

[00:12:43] Carl Lanore: [00:12:43] Okay. So I've been doing that. I, I've been actually doing quite a few deep dives and one of them that the audience knows about that actually started in 2010 is the role of iron.

[00:13:00] [00:13:00] On senescent cells. and really, I could sum it up by saying that all of the phenotypical changes that we attribute to aging, slowing down of the motor gate, you know, slowing the myelination, uh, wear and tear on meniscus and, and convenience chondrocyte can all be traced back to iron overload.

[00:13:26] And women who, uh, are not on birth control, who, who have regular menstrual cycles, they, they manage your iron because every month they bleed a little bit. And as a result of that, when you look at women who are post-menopausal and you see that once they stop menstruating, their iron loads go up very quickly.

[00:13:46] They actually start to catch up to men at that age. And so one would say, well, if that's true. Then women who are on birth control that reduces the amount [00:14:00] of blood they lose, but not completely ameliorates the period. They should fall someplace in the middle, and guess what they do. Yeah. When you look at that, when you look, when you look at, what's that?

[00:14:16] Victoria Felkar: [00:14:16] I said it's a little more complex.

[00:14:17] Carl Lanore: [00:14:17] No, no, no, no. Wait a minute. I'm just talking about Frank. Uh, if you just look at, if you just look at, uh, uh, TIBC direct blood iron levels, you see that they fall somewhere in the middle of normally menstruating women and, and women who have no longer. A period they fall right in the middle of their ion load, and this makes perfect sense because they're bleeding a little bit.

[00:14:47] They're bleeding more than this person up here, but they're bleeding less than that person down there. And absolutely, when you look at their ferritin levels and you look at TIBC and you look at some of the other markers of iron, they [00:15:00] fall right in the middle. All right.

[00:15:02] Victoria Felkar: [00:15:02] See, I would also, I'd add to that though, a couple of things.

[00:15:04] One being that some oral contraceptives actually come with iron, so their, their iron is

[00:15:10] Carl Lanore: [00:15:10] okay, but the I, I will, I will challenge you respectfully, respectfully challenge you that that has no bearing because the only iron we readily absorb. is, is that which is bound to blood or ready. Okay. And, and all plant based and, and, and, and, and a, an isolated iron, unless it's taken with real vitamin, a retina, retina, retina, retina, OIC, acid or whatever you want to call and vitamin C, you absorb none of it.

[00:15:42] You poop it right out. Yeah. And we've learned this from the children in third world countries that they send iron supplements over to them, and they also send real vitamin a and they in vitamin C that they have to take simultaneously with the iron in order to absorb any of it. So I, I don't know that that iron [00:16:00] in there unless, unless.

[00:16:03] You know, we know hormones have an ability to effect iron uptakes, or maybe maybe that progestin does increase its iron uptake too.

[00:16:11] Victoria Felkar: [00:16:11] And you can't forget vitamin B12 and folic acid deficiencies, which when you're on an oral contraceptive, you're leaching those at astronomically high rates, which further complicates this.

[00:16:23] And that's actually one of the directions. My work in like more of the consulting work has gone in is, is talking about the nutrient deficiencies that are induced through the use of oral contraceptives and other oral

[00:16:33] Carl Lanore: [00:16:33] steroids. My opinion is really, really a worrisome thing. Cause w because look at all this stuff that's coming out on proton pump inhibitors right now.

[00:16:40] All of those bad things, heart problems, dementia, it's not direct. It's not intrinsic of that pill. It's the extrinsic effect it has on malabsorption.

[00:16:51] Victoria Felkar: [00:16:51] Absolutely. Absolutely. And when you look at the. Their relationship between something like iron deficiency, B12, folic acid, they're all [00:17:00] interrelated to inflammation.

[00:17:02] And so we know that there's this really, really complex relationship within the body. And then if we look at inflammation, and then you can kind of draw into that even more and look at all the things that are related to inflammation and all of these things are clustered. One of my favorite new worlds of medicine right now is, um, systems pharmacology.

[00:17:19] I absolutely fell in love with it because that's the way that my brain works. And so what this kind of dynamic is, is that it's looking at not only how. Drugs interact within the body on multiple different systems, but also how those systems interact with the drug because it's a two way relationship.

[00:17:36] Um, even though often a pharmacology used to just be regarded as a one way, it really is the two way relationship. And because of the use of, um. I mean large, like large, big, it's called big data, but data visualization, right? They've actually been able to map and you can see these crazy mind maps of all these different integrated connections that then you can start to peel back the layers and apply them to [00:18:00] individual cases, which is what, in my case, that's what saved me and got me better or in a manageable state.

[00:18:08] Right? Um, but that's what a lot of people are missing when it comes to this stuff.

[00:18:14] Carl Lanore: [00:18:14] So let, let, let, let's talk about purposeful use of drugs, uh, to recreate the physical form and, or impart strength and athleticism. Uh, and, and a lot of these drugs are androgen based. So is the problem. The androgen is city of some of these drugs.

[00:18:36] Cause, cause I know that like movie stars in Hollywood will use vol, which has a very high anabolic but very low androgen. Oh, yeah. Is that the magic for women?

[00:18:46] Victoria Felkar: [00:18:46] No. Um, it's a lot more complicated than that. And I think before we can get into that stuff, I need to speak to a little bit of a juxtaposition of sorts that exist right now.

[00:18:56] And so there is, and I [00:19:00] say this, that there's a very critical, limited amount of information on female athletes and steroids. Like full stop, not, not just anabolic androgenic steroids. But also oral contraceptives and the hormonal contraceptive family. So that's kind of the first thing. But with that being said, there is a body of literature that exists on the use of testosterone and other forms of synthetic androgens as it applies to clinical populations and their use in like HRT.

[00:19:31] So there is literature that does exist. So I guess for me, that's been in my soapbox is that people go, Oh, there's no research on women in anabolics. It's like, well, actually there is, it's just not where you think

[00:19:41] Carl Lanore: [00:19:41] it's going to be here and cancer. It's a

[00:19:44] Victoria Felkar: [00:19:44] cancer research.

[00:19:46] Carl Lanore: [00:19:46] SEO research.

[00:19:47] Victoria Felkar: [00:19:47] Yeah.

[00:19:48] Sexual desire. That's one of the biggest fields

[00:19:51] Carl Lanore: [00:19:51] Masteron created for women who had breast cancer.

[00:19:55] Victoria Felkar: [00:19:55] Yeah. And that's one of many. And and so women, so

[00:19:58] Carl Lanore: [00:19:58] foremost, where hormones

[00:19:59] Victoria Felkar: [00:19:59] and [00:20:00] I don't

[00:20:01] Carl Lanore: [00:20:01] have breast cancer and want to be working.

[00:20:05] Victoria Felkar: [00:20:05] So hormones that were created in a no testosterone specifically synthesize in 1935 1936 the first study used both male and female.

[00:20:13] Um, populations. So women have been using androgens synthetically as long as men have been. Right. So that's, I guess that's the first thing to remember. But with that being said. There are a ton of exaggerated kind of myths around the use of androgens in women, even within the medical literature that calls them even inappropriate names, like saying that testosterone is still the male sex hormone, which we know that it's not.

[00:20:39] These really aren't even sex hormones. I have been very careful about my language because in my research, I don't call them sex hormones. I didn't even call them reproductive hormones because that's not what they do. That's one of many things in the body. But when I'm speaking more in kind of settings like this, I do drop a little bit of like the, the street lingo.

[00:20:56] Um, so. They're all, these are these myths. [00:21:00] And that historically, one of the reasons why in particular female athletes, um, either stayed away from these drugs or cautiously kind of approach them was because of these myths, is that these myths really coated that the use abuse, whatever you want to call it, of synthetic androgens by the female population.

[00:21:20] So let's fast forward though to today. That's not the case anymore. There is almost this weird ambivalence or IG ignorance maybe towards a lot of the effects that these drugs can potentially cause and females, um, or they get passed off as like, you know, that's just the way it is. If you want to have this, you're going to have this and that is just host a whole bunch of different issues, um, that.

[00:21:47] I can tangent about for a really long time, but I'll say the audience on that. Um, but that just kind of what I wanted to illustrate is that it is really complicated that there is this really, really complicated dynamic. And that at the end of [00:22:00] the date, the use of these drugs will be different in individuals.

[00:22:07] And so when we look at, say something like, I'm having an effect of, um, facial hair growth. Well, that is incredibly individual because one individual might not have high levels of androgens to begin with, whereas another individual might have really high levels of androgens, so they go in with and already has issues managing facial hair growth.

[00:22:30] One individual could be using an like a UGL, like an underground lab, and who knows what this individual is taking at the end of the day. Somebody else might be using it very low dosing and microdosing, uh, for short durations and still run into these issues. So there really isn't this one size fits all when it comes to these drugs.

[00:22:50] There are some general, I guess, statements we can make about them by looking at what they're doing at the physiological level. But in large, [00:23:00] there. That is like the biggest, I think, takeaway when we think about females, anabolic use is that it is really complex. There's a whole bunch of different factors involved.

[00:23:09] And one of the biggest things in that, in the kind of the fitness industry performance world that I see is this disregard for somebodies, uh, baseline reproductive function, which is going to. Help to potentially mitigate some of the more negative effects associated with these drugs

[00:23:27] Carl Lanore: [00:23:27] because what are the and light like?

[00:23:29] I have for years and I have fought because of literature. I've read that, um, the use of what is considered super physiological levels of androgens in women.

[00:23:43] Victoria Felkar: [00:23:43] Why

[00:23:44] Carl Lanore: [00:23:44] caused heart problems at some point in time in the future,

[00:23:48] Victoria Felkar: [00:23:48] but that's not talked about, is it? No.

[00:23:51] Carl Lanore: [00:23:51] No,

[00:23:52] Victoria Felkar: [00:23:52] that's one of my, the, I talked about that actually last week on a show that I did with, uh, with Scott on, um, advices radio.

[00:23:58] I think big media, and [00:24:00] that is that we have such, this overwhelming, uh, conversation in the fitness industry about male bodybuilders and heart attacks, male bodybuilders and heart issues, male bodybuilders even needing to do blood dumps. Where is that for women?

[00:24:16] Carl Lanore: [00:24:16] Well, in fact, I, I, I stand to be corrected.

[00:24:19] But I think that the effects of super physiological testosterone, for instance, on a woman's heart is worse than that of a man's heart. And that's because a women's heart isn't as a rule. Oh, did I just get dropped? Hold on a second.

[00:24:39] I don't know what happened. My camera just dropped out. Does it ghost in the system? I can. Can you hear me okay now?

[00:24:46] Victoria Felkar: [00:24:46] Yeah, I can. Yeah.

[00:24:48] Carl Lanore: [00:24:48] Um, it isn't, it I've, I've been under the assumption that it's worse. Like testosterone, high levels of testosterone is worse for a woman than a man because her heart, from an [00:25:00] evolutionary standpoint was not designed to be exposed to that.

[00:25:04] Level of androgens the same way men who have estrogen dominance, they end up with heart problems too because we weren't designed to have our heart bade and that much estrogen.

[00:25:19] Victoria Felkar: [00:25:19] It's a more complicated because we've got to look at estrogen, progesterone, and androgens because they all have a massive impact on the cardiovascular system and cardiovascular health and that the ratios is what.

[00:25:32] is really important with this. Yeah. It's the ratios and also what an individual, I mean, if an individual already has say, um, called arteries or has some type of preexisting issue, and then they're compounding this and compounding this in combating this, of course they're going to have be more exposed to it.

[00:25:50] But based off of the, like the, the literature overall, if we look at kind of the curated, so the, the what the literature, what research has said about. [00:26:00] Androgens, progesterones and estrogens is the number one effect is actually on the cardiovascular system. That has been shown time and time again.

[00:26:08] Another investigation has looked at estrogen, progesterone as it relates. Well, progesterone war as it relates to cancer, a estrogen as it relates to kind of nervous system.

[00:26:17] Carl Lanore: [00:26:17] Know what I was shocked to find out. And uh, it's progesterone. That causes fibroids and fibroids, a uterine fibroid growth.

[00:26:29] It's progesterone. I had dr uh, Bruce Lee, how on, I forget his name on this show, who is the inventor of this, a zapping device where women don't have to give up their uteruses anymore to get rid of fibroids. And he said, uh, what we see is women with very high progesterone. That's the ones that are growing and everybody thinks it's estrogen.

[00:26:50] Victoria Felkar: [00:26:50] yeah. Yeah. And that, I mean, even with some of the, I mean endometriosis that can end a museum walls cause like that is that they also are starting to look at the, [00:27:00] the, um, autoimmune link to it as well. Um, and that it is or can be a sign of a really stressed out body over an extended period of time that starts to create these kind of misalignments of sort.

[00:27:13] Um, so we were talking about, I think the effects of androgens. So I. Call them effects, not side effects. Um, and I would stay true to this because they

[00:27:23] Carl Lanore: [00:27:23] are desired and there are undesired.

[00:27:27] Victoria Felkar: [00:27:27] Zachary, there was a brilliant quote in I, I drug textbook on anabolic steroids from 1976, which was kind of in this explosion of research on anabolic androgenic.

[00:27:38] Um, and the, the researcher said like, no, like hair growth in women isn't a side effect. It's an effect. If an individual has high levels and super physiologically high levels of androgens, this is what's going to happen. So

[00:27:51] Carl Lanore: [00:27:51] why would I bet at that? But to partake, to take a page out of your book of individuality, only if they're only, if they're high five [00:28:00] alpha reducers or they're using a testosterone, I mean a DHT based drug,

[00:28:05] Victoria Felkar: [00:28:05] or they're not metabolizing things properly.

[00:28:08] And If they've got high levels of inflammation, if they've got a degree of insulin resistance, we now know that things like say cystic acne and high like inflamed hair, hair follicles all relate together and are really like, I mean, something like berberine or Metformin has been looked at in clinical studies with a polycystic ovarian syndrome as greatly reducing.

[00:28:30] The affinity, poor hair growth, that doesn't mean it all goes away, but that it does have the potential to reduce it. So there are lots of different mechanisms that here, but some of the, I guess the classical side effects that have been associated with androgen use, um, are what you, what has been traditionally called like secondary sex characteristics.

[00:28:49] I freaking hate that name though. But that's things like dropping like deep boys, facial hair growth or secondary hair growth. So not just facial hair growth, but. Um,

[00:28:59] Carl Lanore: [00:28:59] changing the [00:29:00] jaw

[00:29:00] Victoria Felkar: [00:29:00] line, John,

[00:29:01] Carl Lanore: [00:29:01] right. We just quoted visualization or masculinization back in the day.

[00:29:05] Victoria Felkar: [00:29:05] Yeah. Yeah. Secondary hair loss.

[00:29:08] So people think hair loss in women as being like patchy, but it's actually your hairline starts to recede, right? Um, there is also a, I mean, enlarged cliteracy, uh, different types of thickened or abnormal reproductive tissues. So in terms of the uterus and, um, the more of like reproductive axes, um, there is also discussions around the impact on.

[00:29:33] The blood and just basic how we, how our ratios and what our levels are. But those are traditionally what has been regarded. Um, and so I like to add onto that though, cause there's a heck of a lot more. Um, and what I do recommend people to take a look at is look at in women that have indogenous high levels of androgens.

[00:29:56] Cause there has been a ton of research on this. And one of the, one of the things [00:30:00] I have done in This is a non published study, but it is getting to the point of publishing. I probably shouldn't talk about, but I'm going to do it anyways. And that's the fact that if you cross reference the, the, um, I kind of elucidated effects of androgen use in women with hyperandrogenism States of endogenous forms and you cross reference them, we have almost absolute match up right.

[00:30:24] Um, obviously there's a lot more to that, but if we're just looking at the basics, things like lipid issues, mood changes, and mood alterations, a lot of the things that we associate with male androgen, yes. We also have in women. Um, and that, yeah. Muscularity is one piece of that. But leanness, I always question because there is a slippery slope when it comes to insulin resistance in women when weight on androgens, because we like, I mean, peripheral tissue in women is one of our main sources of androgen production, right?

[00:30:58] And by that I mean fat [00:31:00] cells. Fat cells aren't incredibly

[00:31:01] Carl Lanore: [00:31:01] important. It's why, and this is why women get fat when they go through menopause. Everybody thinks. They get fat because their body wants more estrogen, and it knows how to make more estrogen. Absolutely. More fat cells.

[00:31:13] Victoria Felkar: [00:31:13] Yeah. And it's, the body's incredibly smart.

[00:31:15] And so both the skin and the adipose are important to endocrine organs. Um, and they get fed by both the adrenal Anderson, Diane, as well as ovarian Anderson, Diane, which then aromatize into estrogen in Estradal, the skin and the fat help to do that. So visceral fat. Adipose side, circulating lipids, fatty liver.

[00:31:36] Those are all things that we associate with high levels of androgens. And so the idea that these things are going to like Andrew, Denise is going to make women lean. I'm like, okay. Eh, not quite. There's a lot more to that. I mean, you gotta look at like the ratios between astrogen. You also have to look at progesterone.

[00:31:55] I always feel bad for progesterone because it's like this forgotten hormone and it does have thermogenic.

[00:32:00] [00:31:59] Carl Lanore: [00:31:59] I used it last night to get the first good night's sleep, but I feel hung over this morning. I use too much.

[00:32:06] Victoria Felkar: [00:32:06] Yeah. Progesterone will do that though. Yeah, it definitely has it. There's a.

[00:32:11] There's a point there of no return as I wanted. I used to have to do PR progesterone. I remember that all too well. Um, some of the other things are like high levels of blood glucose. Um, and that's really important. Again, if somebody is thinking about like their physique, that there is this point of no return, that when androgens get high, whether this is through, you know, feeding indogenous forms, whether this is that individual has issues metabolizing them, whether this is that they have also other forms of androgen production, which is always what I, I tend to.

[00:32:40] Try to get across is that if you have a female who's really stressed out, her androgen or adrenal production is going to be high. Now, she's got exogenous in there too, and we know that even if somebody isn't having a menstrual cycle or an oddly period, [00:33:00] they're still making and creating at the, at the ovarian level.

[00:33:05] So we now are creating this shitstorm. For exoticness androgens in the body that it might be okay for a little bit, but then all hell breaks loose.

[00:33:18] Carl Lanore: [00:33:18] I want, I want to, I want to take a break. I want to take a break and here's what I want to do when we come back, I want to focus on, okay, so let's say I am a woman and I, and for whatever reason I am going to be using.

[00:33:32] These performance and appearance enhancing drugs. What steps can I take to safeguard my health as much as possible and try to, uh, figure out how I can go down this road without doing a lot of damage to my body? How about that? I'm on it.

[00:33:52] Victoria Felkar: [00:33:52] I got your answers.

[00:33:54] Carl Lanore: [00:33:54] Okay. And so if you want to learn more about Victoria, you could either go to her website, [00:34:00] which is Victoria dot com or you can follow her on Instagram, add Victoria fell car a.

[00:34:07] And she has a lot of people who follow her there. And as you can tell, she's very brilliant and in a unique area that we need more research. You know? Um, I remember, uh. Scientists once referring to female rodents as pesky when it comes to doing research. Because they, they, that pesky hormone estrogen.

[00:34:28] It's like, Oh, why don't you put that in the mix? And we can, you know, we can't figure anything out anymore. And the reality is that women are more complex than men because guess what? Women can actually make human beings think about that. Think about that from the, the factor. Like you can manufacture a human being inside your body.

[00:34:46] So there's a lot more going on in a woman's body than there is in a man's body. Uh, but. Uh, understanding those things, uh, is the key. You have to learn more. So we're going to take that when we come back. Stay tuned. [00:35:00] Hey, welcome back. Couple things I want to mention. First of all, uh, those of you who love dr seeds, BPC and chill pill, it's now available on Amazon.

[00:35:11] It qualifies for free two day shipping. If you're an Amazon prime. A member, uh, but also there's deals on Amazon that you won't find at the website, dr seeds.com. Uh, there's lots of, uh, lightning deals that you can grab product that super cheap prices. So if you're a big fan of the chill pill and the oral BPC product, uh, get over to amazon.com and search for them there.

[00:35:35] You'll find some exciting stuff. Also. If you are an avid fan of hunting and guns, like I am a Tyler. Henry changed the face of. Firearms back in 1886 with the first repeating rifle lever, action rifle. And right now, if you go to super human radio.net you'll see a banner ad where you can get this beautiful [00:36:00] catalog worthy of leaving out on your, your coffee table.

[00:36:03] Of all of the amazing rifles that Henry rifle makes, uh, and has been making since the 1886 they shaped the wild West. Uh, so check that out. My guest today is Victoria Felker and we've been talking about women and androgens and all that good stuff. So what can women do about, so let's say there's women out there listening to the show right now.

[00:36:24] Maybe they're figure competitor. Well, maybe they're just an average girl who wants to look like a figure competitor and they're about to start using stuff. And who knows what that stuff is. Maybe it's a little or some orals, maybe it's some injectables. Is there anything women can do, uh, or does it come down to just working with a professional who understands what they're going to do?

[00:36:45] Victoria Felkar: [00:36:45] Um, yes and no. I think eliciting the help of professional is always the best kind of course of action. But unfortunately the information on this stuff is. Not the greatest. Um, and that there are intelligent individuals that are still using really [00:37:00] archaic ideas around female, anabolic, androgenic steroid use, um, and also ancillaries.

[00:37:05] So yes, there is, and stay with me because it might go on a tangent, but I promise you the academic in me always ends up where we want to be. So the first thing though, I always recommend for male women, doesn't matter. There are two main variables we're looking at here. One. The individual. So knowing the unique variables to that person, to the drug in question.

[00:37:30] So those are two different avenues that have to be looked at and reflected on. So with regards to a female, thinking about utilizing, um, utilizing as steroids, I mean, even if this is maybe going on an oral contraceptive or, or something like that, is that. Knowing your own kind of health makeup is really important to this.

[00:37:54] And so what I recommend people do is, I mean, quite simply [00:38:00] understand that there are. Inter individual variability when it comes to hormones, meaning that my hormones are going to be different than another woman. So you can't base things off of what somebody else is doing. It's not, even if it's a female who's very evenly matched and there's a lot of intra individual variability in an individual's hormone levels, meaning that my hormones are going to change.

[00:38:21] Day to day based off of numerous different factors. So if we think about research, um, in the broad sense of like scientific method, one of the big pieces of, of conducting a research study is to try to control variables. So there are certain things that you can do to help create at least more of a foundational base.

[00:38:41] That is going to be a little bit more stable than having, you know, sporadic highs and lows. Because let's just say you have really poor coping techniques. You have a temper that then you allow yourself to get triggered constantly. Your stress hormones are going to be highs and lows all the time as you continue to get triggered.

[00:38:59] It sounds so [00:39:00] simple, but it does make a big impact. Same thing with sleep. We know sleep has an astronomically. Huge importance with our hormones, and yet something like that does not get regarded as something that's critical to help manage the use of certain drugs. Um, also, as I mentioned previously, understanding an individual's of a female's reproductive cycle, because we know the reproductive cycle is so important to our hormone production.

[00:39:25] I mean, it is absolutely critical. And so even if you are peri-menopausal. And so going through that kind of, that tumultuous time that people associate with menopause, but that's perimenopausal or postmenopausal or you're in kind of your reproductive, um, I mean, the best years are your reproductive cycle.

[00:39:45] Yeah. You've got to understand that there are some really important hormones here on, and so

[00:39:49] Carl Lanore: [00:39:49] show you, are you suggesting that women modulate their androgen use based on their cycle?

[00:39:57] Victoria Felkar: [00:39:57] I am suggesting no such things are old. [00:40:00] Cause I don't recommend women take androgens periods. So, um, I'm

[00:40:04] Carl Lanore: [00:40:04] not a

[00:40:06] Victoria Felkar: [00:40:06] doctor.

[00:40:06] I'm a researcher. Right. Um, but what I do suggest is that. I mean sensitivity of how a drug is going to be utilized in a body depends on the, the environmental, um, state of an individual. If we're thinking about how much of our hormones are produced by the or the reproductive cycle, and if that individual does not have a regular reproductive cycle, it's going to be really hard to have, again, that stable base.

[00:40:31] It's also going to be really hard to manage and monitor for side effects. So, and I think this goes to say for, I mean, women in general, to be able to understand your reproductive cycle and to know whether or not you're even just making progesterone. We know that, let's say osteoporosis. I mean, progesterone's effects on bones is astronomically important.

[00:40:53] When you don't ovulate, you're not giving your body what it needs to preserve bone. It might not [00:41:00] affect you today, but we don't know what the effects of that are longterm. Um. So individual factors really, really important here. Um, and that also is, I mean, if somebody has been on, let's say, an oral contraceptive pill for numerous years, they come off, they don't have a cycle.

[00:41:19] They don't have an arbitrary cycle. They haven't

[00:41:21] Carl Lanore: [00:41:21] gotten those post cycle therapy for women.

[00:41:25] Victoria Felkar: [00:41:25] And, um, I think I can talk about that too. But, um, then they all of a sudden decide to jump on an androgen. I can hypothesize what that might look like. And it's not pretty no at all. So that is a big piece to make sure that there is, and I mean crap, this is the same as if I wanted to go and learn how to say Olympic lift.

[00:41:50] I would probably need to have the basics down first. I would need to know how to use my core. I would need to know how to squat with proper form and proper shoulder mobility. [00:42:00] If not, I'm going to damage myself that that same principle doesn't apply when it comes to anabolic androgenic use because these, this is not used for clinical purposes.

[00:42:10] This is used for optimizing or enhancing purposes. That is a different. That is a different Avenue when you all together, because often there is going to be some type of baseline production of that hormone already happening. And if it's not, especially in women, we've gotta figure out why. Why are you heading?

[00:42:26] Why are you in a low androgen state? Or why are you in a high androgen state? Because if you're already in a high androgen state, if your SHBG is already really low, if your DHAs already cranked up, your Anderson diamond is cranked up, your testosterone is cranked up. What do you think is going to happen when you then go on and exotic androgen?

[00:42:47] Carl Lanore: [00:42:47] Yeah, so I have to ask, I have to ask this question. So women who have endogenously higher androgen levels. [00:43:00] then maybe even what the assays say is high, cause there's a lot of women out there who

[00:43:04] Victoria Felkar: [00:43:04] are shit.

[00:43:05] Carl Lanore: [00:43:05] Yeah, right. Because they're looking at a sick population. Remember that? So you're already looking at their, there are women out there who probably operate in the three to 400 nanogram, a deck liter range, which is probably a 200 a hundred to 200 deck lead to higher than what they think the high end for women.

[00:43:21] So if you take that woman. Probably naturally athletic builds and retains muscle better, stays leaner. Uh, and is she more okay? Maybe it doesn't stay leader. Is she more likely to fare better if she started using some exogenous testosterone, for instance, because her body is kind of like, yeah, this is, this isn't all wheelhouse.

[00:43:47] This is okay. no. think about

[00:43:51] Victoria Felkar: [00:43:51] it. When you're in a female has a high androgenic state and there's going to be elevated LH or luteinizing hormone, lower normal [00:44:00] FSH. So right from the get go of your feedback loops, you're already not not making hormones in what would be considered the normal kind of flora phone away of your body.

[00:44:11] So when we have elevated LSH, if we have low FSH, then now we're having excess production of androgens by the ovaries. We're having infrequent oscillation, which means we're not producing most of our progesterone. Now we're having elevated serum androgen levels. We're having low or normal estrogen levels and we're having low.

[00:44:29] So,

[00:44:29] Carl Lanore: [00:44:29] but you're talking about somebody that you've, okay, so let, let me, let me rephrase my question. So you're talking about somebody who is pathologically develop this, but there are women out there who don't, who, who physiologically have higher androgen levels to begin with. And there, and they're having regular periods at that and they're thriving and they're doing well, and then maybe they're more athletic than the average girl.

[00:44:54] What about her?

[00:44:55] Victoria Felkar: [00:44:55] That's a small percentage of the population. Now we know that [00:45:00] high, high estrogen levels, you're going to be more likely to have an arbitrary cycles or luteal phase dysfunction, which then lines yourself up for other things, right? We know that your affinity for potentially, let's say, um, heading a, an elevated androgen index would then push you over.

[00:45:16] I have adrenal androgen, I should say index.

[00:45:18] Carl Lanore: [00:45:18] So I see what you're saying. What you're saying is like, look, if you're already up to the line, well now you're going to use more. You're in trouble. Like you're, you're, you're opening the line fast. But if you're somebody who's got low androgens and you use something, you may actually be at a good place

[00:45:31] Victoria Felkar: [00:45:31] potentially.

[00:45:32] There's, again, this is hypothetical because there's just an observation.

[00:45:35] Carl Lanore: [00:45:35] It has to be OBS observation.

[00:45:37] Victoria Felkar: [00:45:37] Think about somebody who has an, uh, a female that say, has actually low. A serum testosterone, but she has a high level of adipose tissue,

[00:45:47] Carl Lanore: [00:45:47] so she's probably gonna have a lot of estrogen too.

[00:45:51] Victoria Felkar: [00:45:51] And then we go into hyperinsulinemia. We know that hyperinsulinemia works with our estrogens. We know it works with our androgens. [00:46:00] And so you

[00:46:01] Carl Lanore: [00:46:01] guess what else causes hyperinsulinemia

[00:46:05] Victoria Felkar: [00:46:05] iron and iron yet? Yeah, they're all

[00:46:08] Carl Lanore: [00:46:08] interrelated. It's rust inside your cells. You have Russ. Yeah.

[00:46:12] Victoria Felkar: [00:46:12] Um, and sodas.

[00:46:13] I mean, so does though. Uh, I mean, shitty methylation, having B12 deficiencies, um, having Uh, I mean chronic, uh, autoimmune or allergic kind of reactions happening in your body when the body is stressed, it's going to go into that hyperlink insulin state. When you don't sleep, it's going to go into that hyper incidence

[00:46:33] Carl Lanore: [00:46:33] state.

[00:46:34] 24 hours. Just one night of bad sleep.

[00:46:36] Victoria Felkar: [00:46:36] Exactly. And that's why I say that when it comes to managing certain things, get your basis covered. Because if you know you're already gonna induce a state of hyperinsulinemia, why don't we control for other variables that we can, they're going to cause hyperinsulinemia.

[00:46:50] It's kinda like, you know, we pick and choose our battles. We know that there's some variables we don't want to touch. Why would we do reduce, for example, an androgen level and an individual that's intentionally taking [00:47:00] an androgen? Right? That doesn't make sense. But what we can do is look at the other axes.

[00:47:04] I also don't think that fighting, you know, fire with fire is smart. And so all of a sudden than throwing in all these, like as in ciliary, is to, to completely obliviated estrogen levels. Or utilizing certain compounds that make cause a higher per gesture Renick load in the body. We have to be so careful with that because let's just say progesterone we know communicates with cortisol.

[00:47:25] We know that. Then cortisol also communicates with androgens, and so there's these just so many complicated feedback loops. So for me with, I mean, I've been doing this for a while now. I know I'm the young, but this has been my life. For 10 years now is there are four main things that from both the literature and from practice that I see that women who either have been on an oral contraceptive or hormonal contraceptive or another type of steroids, like an androgen, typically, I mean typically are faced with, and that's high levels of inflammation.

[00:47:54] So use, if you know you're going to be on these drugs or you're on these drugs, you should be [00:48:00] managing your inflammation like a boss. Like you need to be on that insulin resistance. Even if you don't show signs of insulin resistance, you need to be on that. Yeah. Nutrient deficiencies and got dysbiosis.

[00:48:18] Carl Lanore: [00:48:18] Big issue right there.

[00:48:20] Victoria Felkar: [00:48:20] And got with gut dysbiosis. I mean, liver health fits into that because got liver, we can, we can throw in together, but, and also nutrients and Libre, but those four things. So, and I'm not saying that this is like you're golden, take it out of hyper androgenic, you know, affects.

[00:48:35] But what I'm saying is that if we think about managing the things that we can, it's going to have a lot more. Potential for an easier ride. With that being said, if somebody already has say acne and then, and it's say, hormonal or cystic acne, and then they go on a androgenic drug, [00:49:00] why would you think that that would go away or say the same?

[00:49:04] Yeah, it's going to get worse. I mean, that whole thing of, you know, that is now acting on steroids right? It. And this is, again, this is not to say this could happen, everybody, but what I mean, what I typically suggest people think about and to consider is that think about like, um, the, the metaphor of a, of an iceberg.

[00:49:25] Um, I mean, they have these stupid success posters all the time of like,

[00:49:28] Carl Lanore: [00:49:28] this is what success, right? All you see is the tip, right?

[00:49:30] Victoria Felkar: [00:49:30] Yeah. So let's like peel back some of those layers and let's look at, let's say a high energetic state and a female. Let's look at what's underneath that. So there can be numerous causes.

[00:49:41] I mean, we've talked about a couple of them just today, but, uh, I mean, even things like drug nutrient interactions, things like eating disorders, States can cause the nutrient deficiencies can cause them, um, hereditary or genetic. Any type of ovarian dis, um, ovarian kind of, [00:50:00] uh, dysfunction or dyslipidemia, metabolic syndrome, having high LH levels.

[00:50:03] There can also be a dermatological basis. There could be high prolactin levels, there could be some type of rare pituitary issue or are adrenal issue. There are so many different things. So happy to consider that because. If you don't know where your hormones are before you start something that's really scary to me

[00:50:21] Carl Lanore: [00:50:21] and nobody, nobody gives us.

[00:50:23] The truth is that nobody cares when they decide to use something like this. It's a very, it's a, it's, I mean, I'm speaking from experience. If you have a very reckless attitude, you're like, Oh, come on, I'm just gonna do this. You know?

[00:50:34] Victoria Felkar: [00:50:34] Absolutely.

[00:50:35] Carl Lanore: [00:50:35] But with women, it's even worse, right? So guys can struggle with getting their testosterone levels back up again.

[00:50:42] But there are some women that, uh, like I know girls who competed and they used some androgens and they use, uh, you know, some, uh, uh, T3 let's say, for instance, thyroid hormones. Maybe they even, [00:51:00] uh, maybe they even used some, some questionable stems, some beta edge and urges, and then they stop competing.

[00:51:10] And their body morphs into like the Pillsbury dough boy and it never, and they never get their bodies back to normal because they cause such a, and again, it comes back to that women are so much more complex. It's like, it causes disruption in so many different areas that you can't even get straightened back out again.

[00:51:29] And so you really need to think about that before you take this plunge. Yet everybody's telling you, Oh, you know, you'll, you'll be ripped and muscular and no time at all. Just add a little of this to the game. When you're a woman, I, you know, he is one of those areas where guys do better. I mean, we do have our problems when we use drugs button.

[00:51:47] It's not like women use. I want to take our last commercial break and when we come back, I want you to give your message. So what do you, what do you telling women? Are you telling women don't don't use drugs? Yeah, I remember South park don't use drugs. [00:52:00] Uh, are you telling women don't even endeavor it or are you saying if you're going to endeavor it, this is the way you got to do it or, or what?

[00:52:06] Let's get to that when we come back. How does that sound?

[00:52:08] Victoria Felkar: [00:52:08] Sounds good.

[00:52:09] Carl Lanore: [00:52:09] Okay. Sit tight. We'll be right back. Welcome back. We're talking with Victoria Felker. Her website is Victoria fell car, F. E. L. K. R. don't misspell it like me and put an E in there where it doesn't belong. Uh, dot com and of course you can follow her on Instagram as well.

[00:52:27] Uh, so what's the, what's the summary message? What, what, what do women really, there's a lot of women out there that are already using, uh, we, we do, we want to freak them out a little bit. And then also what's the underlying message in, in total. Oh, I'm sorry, Victoria, please repeat. I'm sure I had your microphone close.

[00:52:47] Victoria Felkar: [00:52:47] So I think for, at least for my takeaway for, I guess listeners to understand is I'm not pro, and I'm not con. I am education. Education is [00:53:00] so important when it comes to risk management, and that really is also my second takeaway is that risks are everywhere. I could walk outside and I could get hit by a car today that does that mean I'm never gonna walk outside again?

[00:53:14] No. But I take certain steps to reduce the likelihood or the chance that that is going to happen. And I think that when we think about female drug use, when you think about female Sarah Jews, we have to recognize that there are certain factors just that, that are intrinsic to drug use in general.

[00:53:32] And one of those factors is being a woman because. Not only do we have hormonal fluctuations, but there is also just incomplete dearth of study on women and pharmaceutical use. I mean, all altogether. I mean, look at depressants and women's use is very understudied, but there are certain risk factors.

[00:53:53] Um. Beyond even just being a woman that are going to line you up for potentially more issues such as, I mean poly-pharmacy [00:54:00] or, um, if you've got some type of, uh, let's say reduced metabolic capacity or already have some chronic illnesses, these might potentially line you up for more issues. But if risk is everywhere, the ways we can reduce risk is to consider things like.

[00:54:18] Okay. Our source, if we are actually looking at the variables that we need to, to ensure that we are as healthy or optimal as we can before use and during use and after use. And to be honest, because I can't tell you how many times that, uh, I've consulted with individuals that aren't even honest with themselves about the effects of these drugs.

[00:54:42] And we also have to consider things that drugs have to be tailored to an individual's own unique state. We also have to consider that when something happens, like let's say secondary, her growth, why this has happened, we can't just kind of go, Oh no, that's, that's just androgens. When I go off, it's gonna.

[00:54:58] It's gonna go away. [00:55:00] Because guess what? That's not always the case because the, the hair growth as a result of androgens is just the end point. There was a lot of shit that happened in your body to get to that point. I, I caution people that maybe aren't on them or considering to go on them too, to really assess their current state life, state health, state, everything.

[00:55:23] Take an inventory. Put in to work the factors that will have a impact, even if it's not what people consider to be a huge impact. Guess what it is? Like sleeping schedules, like stress reduction, like, you know, working towards, um, repairing certain nutrient deficiencies, improving your gut function.

[00:55:39] You've got to poop every day. Like. My gosh, the amount of women that I know that are on steroids that don't have proper digestive function, and that does actually impact how you're clearing estrogen,

[00:55:51] Carl Lanore: [00:55:51] but it impacts a lot of things. I mean,

[00:55:53] Victoria Felkar: [00:55:53] absolutely.

[00:55:55] Carl Lanore: [00:55:55] One of the earliest signs of Parkinson's disease is constipation.

[00:55:58] Victoria Felkar: [00:55:58] Yeah. Absolutely. [00:56:00] But if we're talking about like hormonal management, we know that estrogen has to get out of the body or else it will re circulate and that includes kind of jumping ship from your shit. Right? Um, so even if we, if we say, Hey, observation might not happen when you're on them, so we can't really control for that.

[00:56:17] It's kind of, we've got. Yeah. Think about what these drugs are doing in the operatory cycles might not, or most likely won't happen. However, let's look at all these other variables and let's manage those. And this doesn't matter if you're on them currently thinking about going on them, come off them.

[00:56:31] This is where in for, for me personally, people need to start male, female alike though. Um, also to recognize that right. Getting your labs done is not going to be some type of magical fix for things. There is a huge misunderstanding when it comes to getting serum lab work done, especially as it relates to hormones and that for women to be able to get an accurate marker of their hormones, they have to consider where they are in their cycle.

[00:56:58] Now, if they don't have a menstrual [00:57:00] cycle, then there are other kind of variables that they can look at to still try to gauge. When they should get their lab work done, to actually be able to do it in a way that they're going to have some type of reading that, that really can be interpreted and put to work and put to use.

[00:57:15] Um, so that is, I mean, that's another kind of aspect that I just, I caution women about the go like, well, you know what? I'm a healthy user cause I get my lab work done. And I'm like, yeah, that's, that's one small piece of a very, very, very big puzzle. Um, and I mean, again, I'm not sure.

[00:57:33] Auntie, I'm not pro, I'm, I'm in the middle. I'm on that education. But when there is, um, a lot of uncertainty with the human body, men and women alike, and we're entering a really complex state and body's already complex. It is, but it's gonna get even more complex. When we're adding in another variable, our risk goes up.

[00:57:55] And so the more. Educated you can be about your current [00:58:00] state. The more that you can actually, I call it like dating or drug, get to know what you're actually taking. There's no reason for an individual to be like, Hey, there's no information I'm going to start with today. Look up the drug. Don't go to industry platforms.

[00:58:13] Go to certain types of, I mean, drug bank. Dot. CA is an amazing source and they break it down to a very basic level. To help people understand what these drugs are actually doing in the body. Um, so these are things that we can do to help us reduce ignorance because ignorance isn't bliss.

[00:58:30] Ignorance is risk. And the more ignorant that we're about, not only our own bodies, but what we're putting into them, we're aligning ourselves up for risk. And I don't want. To see anybody go through that. it's not, if you work, you

[00:58:44] Carl Lanore: [00:58:44] work with people. If someone's listening to this show right now and they think, you know what, I'm a body, a female body builder, and I just like to know, is there anything I could do to, to put myself in a better position?

[00:58:54] Will you work with them?

[00:58:56] Victoria Felkar: [00:58:56] So I. Currently have a waiting list, but I do assess case by [00:59:00] case. Um, and I work with both, I mean, individuals with athletes, but also I work with professionals as well. I work with a lot of individuals over the years, whether they're in the medical field or in more of the fitness industry, consulting world coach world.

[00:59:13] Um, so that's also my way that I can actually help get more people, uh, give people the tools. But, um, yes, I do. And, and I would say that most of my cases that I see in a year are either related to post anabolic use and somebody kind of looking and trying to clean up the pieces and not knowing where to start.

[00:59:32] Um, or post oral contraceptive use and same thing or, or, um, I mean hormonal IUD or implant and going like, Oh my God, I don't know whose body this is anymore. Right. This isn't mine.

[00:59:44] Carl Lanore: [00:59:44] You know what's really interesting that, that. I had intended to talk about performance and appearance enhancing drugs, but I neglected to think about, uh, and more used [01:00:00] form at, which is birth control.

[01:00:02] And it's really interesting because there are a lot of women out there right now who will look down on. Girls who are using drugs in sports who are using birth control pills.

[01:00:15] Victoria Felkar: [01:00:15] Absolutely.

[01:00:16] Carl Lanore: [01:00:16] Yeah. Where do you stand on HRT for postmenopausal women?

[01:00:22] Victoria Felkar: [01:00:22] Um. It's another complicated question. It depends on how much you fucked with your hormones in the earlier phases of your, Oh, no, no.

[01:00:30] I'm

[01:00:30] Carl Lanore: [01:00:30] talking about average women who didn't say they didn't have, you know, the average woman, she, she hasn't been on birth control since she was in her twenties she says she's going into our sixties now. She's starting to have hot flashes. You notices, amen. A Maria creeping up on her and she's like, Oh, I think I'll try.

[01:00:46] BHRT.

[01:00:46] Victoria Felkar: [01:00:46] Yeah, yeah. So a lot of the perimenopausal. Symptoms, though, are associated to reproductive dysfunction earlier on in life, that that is, there is a relationship there. So if somebody is managing certain factors, like, I mean, [01:01:00] even inflammation, they're kind of Menopausal side effects are not going to be the same.

[01:01:05] So I caution people. I don't, I'm not against it, but I caution people because the human body has a, I mean, we have a reproductive clock in us. We have this metronome of sorts that's taking away and that for women, we're born with a certain amount of eggs, and that that's taking away throughout our life course until we start to enter perimenopause, is we're reducing our egg load, menopause.

[01:01:27] Then we don't have any left. Okay. So. For individuals that are trying to create a super physiological levels of say what a 70 year old female body doesn't necessarily have the capacity to handle anymore. That to me is problematic. We have to think about hormone use in conjunction to the other systems that are also going to have to manage this, this load, because it's not just our reproductive symptom system that also has this metronome.

[01:01:55] I mean, it's virtually every system in our body. And so if all of a sudden. We're jacking up [01:02:00] levels of our endocrine hormones, yet our, our thyroid is low, or our digestive capacity is slowing down, or our fatty acid balances off or whatever. These kind of other things that we associate with aging.

[01:02:13] That could lead to potentially some very big issues. Um, that's one of the things I see actually in the literature around HRT that they're not talking about, is they, they kind of, I mean, there's a group of research kind of cohort, that shit on HRT going like, Oh, you're aging. Just, you know.

[01:02:29] Suck it up. And

[01:02:30] Carl Lanore: [01:02:30] yeah, the Andrew Weil says I learned to age gracefully.

[01:02:34] Victoria Felkar: [01:02:34] Exactly.

[01:02:35] Carl Lanore: [01:02:35] No, I don't want to age gracefully. I'm not into it.

[01:02:37] Victoria Felkar: [01:02:37] And then,

[01:02:38] Carl Lanore: [01:02:38] but I get what you're saying. Cause, cause I have a cousin who went on HRT

[01:02:44] Victoria Felkar: [01:02:44] and

[01:02:46] Carl Lanore: [01:02:46] this was, this was about 10 years ago and she is very fat. I mean she, she's like, she looks like when she puts a dress on, she looks like it's sausage casing.

[01:02:57] And. She, she [01:03:00] self medicates. She loves Hawaiian. You know, a lot of women when they get to that age, they don't feel good. They start self-medicating couple glasses of wine every single night. They don't realize how badly they're screwing up their sleep, which is then impairing their blood sugar management.

[01:03:13] And it's this vicious cycle. And so she got on HRT, she was on it for about two years and she got. Breast cancer, and it was so interesting to me that she blamed it on the HRT, but not the fact that she's got like 80% body fat. She drinks wine every single night. She doesn't sleep good. It just, it just, and so to your point, you know, a lot of people think HRT.

[01:03:41] Is going to protect them. I look at HRT as a responsibility, like if you're going to get on HRT, that means you can't F around. You got to sleep good. You got to eat right. You got to exercise. You got to live a clean life. It doesn't, it. It doesn't [01:04:00] mitigate. A, a crappy life. In fact, it'll make you sick faster.

[01:04:06] Victoria Felkar: [01:04:06] Absolutely. And I think though, that's the responsibility to that. Like I jokingly say it, that as human beings, we have certain responsibilities to be able to ensure that we're functioning. Um, I mean from. Sleeping to social relationships, positive social relationships, to coping mechanisms, to knowing about what we're eating and, and, you know, being active.

[01:04:25] And so I think that when it comes to HRT, especially OHT for women, so that's ovarian hormone therapies. There are certain, um, especially certain cases that it would be incredibly beneficial, but that's not to be looked at isolated. It has to be looked at. As a whole. Um, and that say for the provincial prevention of osteoporosis, they have to be using the right drugs using a progesterone for HRT.

[01:04:49] It makes me want to pull my hair out because that's not right. I mean progesterone, even in, in a birth control agent. It's not the actual hormone that our body has. It's this really crazy molecule [01:05:00] that's neither a progesterone or an androgen. And so having the right form is also really

[01:05:05] Carl Lanore: [01:05:05] important.

[01:05:05] How about that? How about, let's look at another one. How about one from a horse.

[01:05:11] Victoria Felkar: [01:05:11] looking at Premarin, Premarin, and Prempro.

[01:05:13] Carl Lanore: [01:05:13] I mean, these and people take this stuff. Doctors prescribe it. To me. This is like meet evil alchemy. It's like, we're going to give you, uh, estrogen that we isolated from horse piss.

[01:05:26] Yeah. Like who, who in their right mind goes?

[01:05:30] Victoria Felkar: [01:05:30] Yeah, absolutely. I mean, and there's a lot of really interesting work that's been done and people are interested in some of, more of like that historical attitudes towards HRT and women. And in particular, because that's where my, my work is actually males too.

[01:05:44] There are some great resources. Um, John Hoberman wrote a book called testosterone dreams. It's kind of got the history of androgens as synthetic androgens and testosterone. Excellent book. Um, Jerilyn, Pryor, uh, and her coauthor, which I can't remember right now, but they wrote one called estrogen storm [01:06:00] on, um, women's, uh, ovarian hormone replacement therapies.

[01:06:03] Excellent. And it actually tells you like, Hey, we're still prescribing these, but we really shouldn't be because this is why. This is what we're seeing. Um, and so I think that there is a lot still to be learned when it comes to let,

[01:06:16] Carl Lanore: [01:06:16] let's talk about something cause you keep talking about methylation.

[01:06:18] Methylation is a very, very important function of the liver. And so doctors prescribe methylated hormones to their patients because, yeah. If you take a base of you take pure estrogen powder, only 2.5% of it actually gets into your bloodstream. Your liver is very effective at getting the rest of it.

[01:06:39] Victoria Felkar: [01:06:39] Absolutely.

[01:06:41] Carl Lanore: [01:06:41] So by methylating it, they give the liver a hard time, the liver chomps on it and chomps on it, but you can't break it down so they can give you less. So in the interest of profits, they methalate these hormones to give to women. Uh, and, and lo and behold, the [01:07:00] problem isn't from the hormone, but it's from the hepatic stress that increases things like throat, uh, thrombin, thrombin, which is a, uh, thrombolytic hormone that thickens the blood, causes clotting.

[01:07:14] So whenever you hear about women having problems with. With birth control pills, it's always a clot. Oh, I had a clot in my lung, a clot in my leg, and they don't get it. That has nothing to do with the hormone. That's just because of the delivery system that the pharmaceutical industry decided is okay for you.

[01:07:31] Victoria Felkar: [01:07:31] Yeah. Oh, absolutely. I mean, that's why when I talk about drugs and reducing risk, I, I introduce people to things like, um, white being they actually, how that drug is working in the body. How is it. So it's called the ADME. So how are we administrating it? So how is its route of entry? How is it getting distributed in the body?

[01:07:48] How are we metabolizing it and how are you disagreeing it? Because each drug is a different property and when and when it comes to, I mean, HRT, you get people that are put on. Orals. You get people that are put on patches. You get people that are put [01:08:00] on creams. You're getting people that are put on creams but administered at different places in the body.

[01:08:03] You're going to get pilots. Exactly. You're getting pellets, you're getting suppositories. You're are good. There's a whole host of administration, which also changes then how we're distributing it, how we're metabolizing it and how we're excluding it. And so with HRT, I mean, if you're giving somebody very localized, let's say a vaginal suppository of a variant.

[01:08:21] Hormones. That's to have a very different potential response in the body. Then if somebody is taking an oral form,

[01:08:28] Carl Lanore: [01:08:28] and in the past, the liver has actually exactly. We now know that. Uh, so what is unclear at this point in time is the chicken and egg relationship between hormones and. Uh, and, and gut flora.

[01:08:44] But we do know there is a connection. We know that when oxytocin is higher in the body, a, uh, a microbe known as El roo, Terri is higher in the gut. We also know that [01:09:00] when estrogen is high, I can't think of the name of it, but there is a microbe that proliferates. When asked you to design and keep this in mind and women, this is happening all month long.

[01:09:10] It's changing. So you want to know why your stomach is bothering you that one day, you know, and you're, you're getting your period. All my, my period must be coming cause my stomach. I'm not digesting something. This is why. But the bottom line is we don't know whether the hormone causes an increase in the microbe or the microbe causes an increase in the hormone.

[01:09:33] But what we do know now. Is that absolutely, uh, these hormones affect the flora in our stomachs. And now that we're starting to get into the whole microbiome thing, which the, to me, it's another one of those, we really don't know what we're talking about yet. Everybody's pounding down probiotics and we don't even know yet whether that's a good thing, a bad thing for some people, good for some people bad, but I mean, they look at the effects of these hormones on the gut.

[01:10:00] [01:09:59] Victoria Felkar: [01:09:59] Oh yeah. I mean that and the microbiome is only one of many biomes that we have in our gut. We have the virome ion, we have fun. We have fungal bio.

[01:10:08] Carl Lanore: [01:10:08] You don't, we don't tip. Think about fungus. So fungus have a nucleus.

[01:10:12] Victoria Felkar: [01:10:12] I see. All

[01:10:13] Carl Lanore: [01:10:13] right. What, what, what is the, what is the term of, of something that has the nucleus as some that something that doesn't, it sounds like you carry recite.

[01:10:19] Is that what it is that you care? Site has a nucleus at a pro. A pro. Cara site has a nucleus that you care side doesn't.

[01:10:26] Victoria Felkar: [01:10:26] You're making me go back to biochem and that one. So

[01:10:28] Carl Lanore: [01:10:28] it's one of the, it's one of those two. It's right. Right. So here's an interesting thing. So fun guy is smarter than microbes.

[01:10:35] So what fun guy do is they, they, they like, like shepherds, they gather microbes and surround themselves with microbes that produced that poop. Things that they like to eat. So they're almost like doing what we did with animal husbandry, with the microbes in your stomach. And they take them with them, they create this biofilm around them, and they go, Hey, you're, you're like, like, instead of you're my dog, yo, my cat, your mind, you're my [01:11:00] cow.

[01:11:00] They're like, you're, you're this microbiota. And they take them. That's how smart fungus's are.

[01:11:05] Victoria Felkar: [01:11:05] Yeah. Yeah. And, and here's something like that doesn't get talked about a lot that I'm fascinated with, is that we know that hormonal changes in women will. Potentially cause some type of yeast infection, especially in the vaginal biome.

[01:11:21] We also know that the urinary tract is absolutely, I mean the role of hormones in it is critical. So, so critical. We know that even in bladder integrity, androgens play an incredibly, incredibly important role. And so there is this kind of mixture of things that can happen in particular in say, women that have some type of a hormone deficiency and that their bladder becomes a weekend cause they don't have the

[01:11:49] Carl Lanore: [01:11:49] answers for this.

[01:11:50] It's a hormonal, it's a result of hormones

[01:11:53] Victoria Felkar: [01:11:53] at the same time. They have a yeast infection. That's just, it's, um, it's kind of like a dormant thing that [01:12:00] comes and goes depending on where their hormones are fluctuating. And you put these two things together and the results are devastating for individuals, yet.

[01:12:09] If you look in that, I mean the UTI kind of literature, there's, there is some conversation about hormones, but they still directly talk about treatment with antibiotics, not with something like hormone replacement, which that's the case there. That there is potentially a really important need, especially for women that are premenopausal.

[01:12:28] Carl Lanore: [01:12:28] You know what's even worse than that? The drugs that they use to treat and continents in both men and women.

[01:12:34] Victoria Felkar: [01:12:34] Yeah.

[01:12:35] Carl Lanore: [01:12:35] Cause the, the. Kidneys to create a blockade. So the way they fix your tinkle problem is to keep the kidneys from sending anything to your bladder. Now think about this. The kidneys job is to maintain electrolyte ratios, is to get rid of things that shouldn't be in the blood any [01:13:00] longer.

[01:13:00] In fact, I did a show probably 12 years ago. With a guy who came on and said, any athlete who wants to pass a drug test, just take one of those anti incontinence drugs for two days before you pay, because it will blockade every metabolite from every drug you've taken and won't let it out in your urine.

[01:13:18] But think about that from the other standpoint. You're a woman, you have a little bladder incontinence, and instead of them treating the problem, which is hormonal, they give you something that jacks up your kidneys instead. Like, you know, when I look at women today, I, you know, the one area that women haven't progressed in my humble opinion is the way is the way the medical orthodoxy treats them.

[01:13:46] You know, they, they vote, they do this, they, they, they have women's right, them earning money. But the one thing they don't get is that doctors feel it's okay to give you stuff that's really harmful for you. It's just to get rid of [01:14:00] your ability so you go out and have casual sex, number one.

[01:14:03] That's a big one. And the other one, and I'm not saying look, guys play a role in that too. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that, but I'm saying doctors like won't give a guy an oral androgen to, to, to, to, to reverse his muscle wasting. But they'll give a woman an oral progestin. Dan has all the same risks of heart disease and liver failure and from and thrombosis that they won't give a guy.

[01:14:28] Victoria Felkar: [01:14:28] Yup. You're pretty, this is what my dissertation is on and I'm looking at that specifically in the context of sports. So it's even more tumultuous, but, um, I mean, there's something called syndrome, which is essentially, it's a medical, kind of a folklore of sorts where women are just, they're misdiagnosed, left, right, and center for the fact, none other than they're a woman.

[01:14:48] Ah, that they have to be able to plead with doctors to be able to get the proper treatment. And I mean, this, the goal was as long as there's been that there's been modern medicine, this is the Neff phenomenon that we're still seeing. Um, there's some called bikini medicine, which is the, I mean, [01:15:00] the overall lack of attention to women and especially women's health issues.

[01:15:03] In contemporary medicine, things are getting better, but there is such a long way to go when it comes to that, um, that it's just astronomical and that we can look at specific case studies like the underdiagnosing of heart disease in women. People think that breast cancer is the number one killer that is so inaccurate.

[01:15:22] So inaccurate heart disease is a killer plaguing women, but nobody pays attention to that. Things like, I mean, even just proper diagnosis of a UTI, so automatically associated to like, um, an hygienic sex practices or, uh, STDs when there is so many different things that can cause UTIs in women that are so under diagnosed.

[01:15:47] And because they're underdiagnosed, it means that they're being missed, managed. It means that they're either being mismanaged by certain drugs. They're not actually being managed at all because the testing hasn't caught up to that. Um, and so like [01:16:00] for me, I guess this almost goes full circle when it comes to women's anabolic androgenic.

[01:16:05] Sarah, do you set as such a micro example of how much more we need to learn about women. And drug use overall, but women's health in general. Um, and that is why I'm, that's why I do what I do. I was passed around to doctors, seven different specialists when I was 19 years old and nobody had an answer for me.

[01:16:24] And that for me, that is really, really scary. And that I want to know that there is people that have some type of information that. Could help me. And that's just not the case for women. I mean, the often the answer when it comes to somebody who has, let's say amen or IA, is to go on birth control.

[01:16:42] And that is such a counterproductive. By that I

[01:16:45] Carl Lanore: [01:16:45] know, I know a woman who just had a hysterectomy because she had, she had a very heavy periods. So, okay, so like it's an inconvenience, right? In the convenience, right? Yeah. So let me just take it. So let me just take these organs [01:17:00] out. Surely that there's no consequence for removing

[01:17:03] Victoria Felkar: [01:17:03] crane.

[01:17:03] Oregon's. Not just the Oregon's endocrine organ.

[01:17:06] Carl Lanore: [01:17:06] So this is a funny story. So when I was married, we were in Chicago, uh, and we just checked into the hotel. We had two young children and a traveling crib. And my ex wife, I hear this shriek and, uh, she's laying on the floor in the bathroom. And so we call the ambulance.

[01:17:24] The ambulance takes her to Northwestern Memorial hospital. Really good hospital in Chicago. And so I go down there, I get somebody to come and watch the kids cause we were visiting people. And I go down there and they say, well, you know, she has, uh, a appendix that has actually been leaking and you know, she's runs the risk of getting blood poisoning and we need to get in there and get that, that appendix out.

[01:17:45] Let's do it. So I go to sleep in the solarium on this little love seat. I'm like, crunched up. And all of a sudden his surgeon wakes me up and she says, look, we're in there. Uh. And while we're in that we think we should probably go ahead and give her a hysterectomy. [01:18:00] And I was, I said, why? Well look, she's not going to have children anymore.

[01:18:05] How old is she? She looked, and she was like, at that time she was in her, um, she was in her early forties, like 40 or 41. She goes, she's not going to have children anymore, and we're in there and she's going to have to have a hysterectomy someday anyway, so we can save you a lot of money by doing it now.

[01:18:19] And I looked at and I said, absolutely not. And she bristled at me. She was like, she was pissed off. And I said, look, if I went to sleep with my balls and I woke up without them, I'd want to know who sanctioned that and I'd be really pissed off at them. I said, you wake her up and you ask her if she wants a hysterectomy.

[01:18:36] You know, two years later she got pregnant. Hmm. So when it comes to women and their, their reproductive organs, for some reason medicine just kind of went, Oh, you

[01:18:50] Victoria Felkar: [01:18:50] know, research is showing that like. I mean, this is one study, but like a over 18% of women did not actually have a pathology [01:19:00] requiring a hysterectomy, but still had a hysterectomy, and this was done on the population of the

[01:19:04] Carl Lanore: [01:19:04] U S Let's just take those

[01:19:06] Victoria Felkar: [01:19:06] out yet.

[01:19:07] Why do you think people suppress their menstrual cycle with not birth control? Because they're not using it for reproductive control purposes. They're utilizing it for convenience sake. It's what birth control is now called A lifestyle drug because it's used for convenience,

[01:19:22] Carl Lanore: [01:19:22] like I don't want to get her period.

[01:19:23] It's such a nuisance.

[01:19:25] Victoria Felkar: [01:19:25] The scary thing is, is that's a social concept that is a socially embedded concept in women's periods should not be a nuisance, and it is a hallmark sign. Like it's something, it's a report card that we have for our health. So if you have. An irregular period. If you have a heavy period that is a sign that something else is going on.

[01:19:40] There's a really interesting relationship that exists between inflammation and heavy periods and in particular how we are. There is a, there is a cross talk that happens from high levels of inflammation. Prostoglandins and estrogen and a continuum. We'll get started. And here's a fun trick [01:20:00] for people to try.

[01:20:00] And now I'm not a huge, huge proponent of kind of like just taking ibuprofen or Advil for the shit of it. But if you have, and you're not managing inflammation properly in your body, and you get nasty cramps at the onset of them, try taking like 400 milligrams of ibuprofen. I bet you. That your menstrual cycle be a lot less heavy.

[01:20:23] They've seen a reduction of 70%

[01:20:25] Carl Lanore: [01:20:25] basically, if that happens, that inflammation is the reason you're having such bad

[01:20:29] Victoria Felkar: [01:20:29] Zackly, which then triggers a cascade of estrogen and now the estrogens gets jacked up. And the acronym that, I mean, it's a funny long story, but I came up with it in a hotel room and 2:00 AM in the morning in Ireland before I gave a talk, but it's help high estrogen, low progesterone, and the root of that is.

[01:20:48] Inflammation, and that is behind most reproductive dysfunction in women. It's high estrogen,

[01:20:54] Carl Lanore: [01:20:54] low trajectory at the root of hot flashes because hot flashes are actually more blood sugar.

[01:21:00] [01:20:59] Victoria Felkar: [01:20:59] Absolutely. And it is though for irregular menstrual cycles. It is for H, it stems into the cascade to have potentially high levels of androgens.

[01:21:09] It stems into insulin resistance. It sends it to all these different things. But if we're just talking about the context of cramp. If you can reduce the inflammation in your body, and if you need an acute way to do it, and you take an ibuprofen at the onset, like as soon as you feel your ovary twinge, you can reduce your flow up to 70% that is incredible.

[01:21:29] Think about the women that have had a hysterectomy that didn't know that.

[01:21:32] Carl Lanore: [01:21:32] Yeah. I mean, even

[01:21:35] Victoria Felkar: [01:21:35] even looking at the research, I mean, I'm GLA through at barrage oil has a massive impact. They've looked at that in relation to heavy bleeding. So the, the thing for me that's scary is that the doctors still believe that like, Oh, I mean hysterectomy is, or ovarian Blasians or even IUD don't have an impact on your hormones.

[01:21:57] Are you? Are you kidding me? You're taking out [01:22:00] you're taking, and you know

[01:22:01] Carl Lanore: [01:22:01] who dr Uzi Reese is. Have you ever heard that name

[01:22:05] Victoria Felkar: [01:22:05] before? name is familiar. Yes.

[01:22:07] Carl Lanore: [01:22:07] So he's like a world famous gynecologist.

[01:22:10] Victoria Felkar: [01:22:10] Yes.

[01:22:11] Carl Lanore: [01:22:11] Uh, he's actually, he, he's a Hollywood gynecologist. He has actually seen all the famous Poon Ani in Hawaii.

[01:22:18] He's like Oprah's gynecologist

[01:22:19] Victoria Felkar: [01:22:19] actually. Why? I know who he is. Okay.

[01:22:21] Carl Lanore: [01:22:21] So I got, I hung out with him in Florida not too long ago at the international peptide society. We went out to dinner. And so, you know, I'm always interviewing people. It's just what I do.

[01:22:31] Victoria Felkar: [01:22:31] I, I, I

[01:22:33] Carl Lanore: [01:22:33] do, I do this because this is what I would do without a microphone in front of me.

[01:22:36] Right? So, so I started asking him like, you know, how did you get started? And, you know, the guy is like, he's a multimillionaire, very famous, goes all over the world and speaks, and he's also very involved in the anti-aging community as well. Um, so he told me the story. He said, uh, I don't know, back in the 70s.

[01:22:55] And he goes, there was a study published that showed. That applying progesterone, you [01:23:00] know, base progesterone in a cream at the onset of PMs. makes the PMs go away. And so he said, uh, so I thought, let's see if it works. So he tried it in his, his practice, and sure enough, like every woman that had severe premenstrual syndrome, like I'm talking about, derailed, like I can't work.

[01:23:19] I gotta lay in bed all day long for three days. Like they got their lives back. So he opened up a clinic in Hollywood. and all they did was pre prescribed progesterone cream to women who had PMs. And he was, at one point in time, he was actually prescribing like 50% of all the progesterone in the country.

[01:23:45] it became, it became very, very,

[01:23:47] Victoria Felkar: [01:23:47] very well, but that, that goes back to that like the high estrogen, low progesterone. Yeah. That is, I mean, it's such an important root cause of really heavy. Heavy periods, PMs, [01:24:00] uh, sleep dysfunction as a result of your cycle. I mean, there's a lot of it. There's also post like there's pre-menstrual dysfunction, but then there's also postmenstrual dysfunction.

[01:24:09] Um, because that is now you've got this crazy loop in hormones, but that there are many different signs of having a, our mini depression say instances of having irregular cycles, um, luteal phase defects and all the way Tory cycles and long ones. Um. Yeah, a regular ones, no period whatsoever. But a lot of these can go back to that high estrogen and that low progesterone.

[01:24:32] And if it doesn't get addressed, you're going to keep just making these ratios go like that until is now, I mean, you're making most of it from your reproductive axes, and so your estrogen's gonna keep climbing and eventually that has its own repercussions. Um, and so like, oddly Tory cycles, going back to that for even women that are utilizing or thinking about utilizing Anabolic androgenic steroids.

[01:24:55] That is such an important, important thing to have.

[01:24:58] Carl Lanore: [01:24:58] Well, in, in a, an HRT, [01:25:00] I have a pet peeve with doctors who prescribe HRT with women. And the reason is this. So they'll put a girl on multi hormone, right? They'll, they'll give them progesterone, uh, by us and they'll give them testosterone and maybe they'll grow into You had the stack.

[01:25:14] Maybe they'll throw in some the, because they want to back load some of these pathways and that's cool. But when they get their blood work back. Yeah. You know, their testosterone is where it would be for the luteal phase. Yeah. The estrogen is where it would be for the follicular phase, and it's like, don't these doctors get it?

[01:25:36] Like. All the hormones, like the stars have to be lined up in the same phase in order for HRT to not just be effective but not cause problems. If you can't have these three hormones, like one in this phase, one in that phase and one in that phase, the body goes. What the fuck are we doing? Are we, are we having a period or are we, are we coming out of a period or, and [01:26:00] doctors never talk about this.

[01:26:01] They're just happy to see the testosterone, the estrogen, you know, the, the Astra dial and, and the progesterone are higher than they were when she walked in. They don't synchronize them to fit into the appropriate phases.

[01:26:15] Victoria Felkar: [01:26:15] And that's one of the issues with, with that, say for example, an oral contraceptive is that it's often feeding.

[01:26:21] Drugs at this constant level. Um, and that progesterone is a cyclical hormone. Therefore, progesterone synthetically has to be applied, or not even synthetically, it'd be a bio derivative, but it has to be applied in the same matter. When we think about even trying to use, um, natural things to say, influence your, your cycle, whether that's like black holis or, uh, VI text, these things we have, uh, we have a cycle and we have to be able to, to utilize.

[01:26:50] Drugs in, in this form or road screw to screw ourselves up. Um, I mean, that's one Avenue of, of female androgen use that gets ignored, right? [01:27:00] Um, I can't speak a lot to that because there's not the literature on it, but it gets ignored. And so like I get, I mean, going back to what people can do, I mean, Carl, it's really simple.

[01:27:10] Learn how hormones are made in the body. Learn steroidogenesis. If you don't know steroidogenesis and you're manipulating people's hormones. That's wrong. That is so unethical. I mean, it's enough that you don't have a background and say medicine or bio camp. Learn Sarah Genesis. Learn what, for example, the female reproductive cycle that the normal like ebb and flow and then look at what happens when you're on certain compounds.

[01:27:35] There's literature that's looked at like, I mean, what the an oral contraceptive does. To your endogenous levels and how it's feeding exogenous hormones throughout the cycle. And they parallel and they look at these, look at the implications of drugs or even where they're absorbed. Look at where they're excrete at, learn this stuff.

[01:27:53] That's what I meant. When you look at the individual and also look at the literature that does exist because we can't [01:28:00] always depend on the really crappy HRT literature or that you know, the, the stuff on female athletes. That's complete. Awfulness. Like it's just, it's, it's awful. I, I did a massive systematic review that I'll be publishing this next year on it.

[01:28:12] I learn the foundations and apply the foundations

[01:28:16] Carl Lanore: [01:28:16] led Moskovitz makes an amazing point here. Okay. He says the majority of gynecologists today are women, and that trend is increasing. When people say doctors, I think the bias is to still think men. The doctors that aren't helping these females enough are women.

[01:28:34] And this is true because when Elisa got on HRT years ago, one of the doctors she went to said, Oh, you don't want testosterone. You'll be humping the door knobs in the house. I mean, this is how did these, and I know a lot of gynecologists that will not even consider HRT for their patients, just won't, they just won't.

[01:28:56] It's like, not even for debate, but if you want that, I don't do that.

[01:28:59] Victoria Felkar: [01:28:59] But that [01:29:00] speaks to medical knowledge, like let's not, okay. I absolutely, there are growing number of female gynecologists. There's also growing number of women as physicians and Profession, not being a doctor, just like there's a growing number of men in the profession of being a nurse.

[01:29:12] But let's look at the foundation of knowledge that's sound.

[01:29:16] Carl Lanore: [01:29:16] These women are learning the same thing. The guys are

[01:29:18] Victoria Felkar: [01:29:18] exactly. The foundation of knowledge when it comes to hormones is incredibly skewed. The fact that in 2019 there still isn't the medical literature and prescribing guidelines they use of things like estrogen is the female hormone and testosterone is the male.

[01:29:35] Carl Lanore: [01:29:35] So stupid.

[01:29:36] Victoria Felkar: [01:29:36] Correct. Testosterone, even that name signals testes meaning,

[01:29:42] Carl Lanore: [01:29:42] but meanwhile, but yeah, it's real. It was named wrong. It's so, so, so look, PSA, prostate specific antigen was discovered in breast cancer tissue in 2008. They will. They will perplex what are we going to call [01:30:00] it? We got to stick with it.

[01:30:01] It's prostate specific antigen, but it's in breast tissue. Too bad. It's good. So they down they have, they have literature out there talking about prostate specific antigen in breast tissue. It doesn't fit because they, they, they pigeonholed it by colon and prostate specific.

[01:30:18] Victoria Felkar: [01:30:18] That's what they did to PC, polycystic ovarian syndrome.

[01:30:20] But that's what they did to estrogen, progesterone and androgens. And the funny thing is when you look at the history of hormones. They knew they made a mistake almost immediately after they named them. But it was too late. The drugs had already gone to market and the pharmaceutical companies were like, Whoa, we're not, we're not changing this.

[01:30:41] Right? So you add it as divide in the literature in the mid 1930s so these hormones are, I know the history of all this stuff cause my research, but there was this big conference, they named these hormones estrogen. And progesterone, God name and Addison's got a name. Then about six months later, they're like, Holy shit.

[01:30:56] We just found these and we found androgens [01:31:00] in women and we also found estrogens in men. These names don't belong anymore,

[01:31:04] Carl Lanore: [01:31:04] right?

[01:31:05] Victoria Felkar: [01:31:05] But it was too late. So think about the foundation of knowledge and then how that gets passed on and gets passed on. And now we get drugs that use in sport gets coated into it.

[01:31:17] So a lot of ideas around androgens get coded in perceptions of drug use in sports, which actually goes back to morality. And cheating and Fairplay.

[01:31:25] Carl Lanore: [01:31:25] Yeah. There's social constructs. Absolutely. Or our, they use a social contract. There is no such thing as morality.

[01:31:31] Victoria Felkar: [01:31:31] Yeah. And so it's crazy to think that we still, the stuff is still in, in medicine.

[01:31:36] It's still in science. I mean, science itself is a, it is not, people perceive it to be this very unbiased, but people are still making the studies. They're still coming with how they're doing them. They're so utilizing social constructs so that the foundations of medicine, when it comes to the hormones, at the end of the day.

[01:31:52] There's a long, tumultuous history. How we understand the female and the male endocrine systems was heavily influenced by the pharmaceutical companies [01:32:00] that were looking for, and not only optimization, but honestly how to control women's fertility, uh, and their menstrual cycles. And today we see the remnants of that.

[01:32:09] Those ideas are still lingering. Um, and that the thing that I find fascinating and what I said at the beginning is the fact that women's use of androgens used to be so heavily influenced by a lot of these ideas. But in the last couple of years, we're seeing a push for women utilizing androgens that don't have that same consciousness.

[01:32:27] The people even 10 years ago had about female androgen use, and it is an incredibly interesting time. It's a scary time. It's terrifying. But from, if I was going to take a step back and just look at it from like a sociologist or a medical anthropologists, it's an incredibly interesting time that we've seen this shift rapidly occurring.

[01:32:45] Carl Lanore: [01:32:45] Alright, one of the thing that Len points out, and then we'll go to that an hour, an hour and 40 minutes went very fast. He said it's perplexing that these women, gynecologists aren't well motivated to help their own bodies. Let alone their patients and seek [01:33:00] this information. It really speaks to the domain, the dogmatic nature of medicine, that it even overwhelmed the pursuit of knowledge.

[01:33:09] That's true. Very, very true.

[01:33:11] Victoria Felkar: [01:33:11] Researcher and didn't go into medicine. That is, I mean, that's exactly the reason for it. Okay.

[01:33:16] Carl Lanore: [01:33:16] So people can find This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or they can go to your Instagram and follow you on Instagram. Uh, and you are a regular guest on some of Scott McNally's podcasts, right?

[01:33:32] Victoria Felkar: [01:33:32] Yeah. I'm sorry. I've kind of

[01:33:34] Carl Lanore: [01:33:34] advice it's that, that's advices. A radio, what's the name? But he's got quite a few podcasts. He told me to release it six shows this week.

[01:33:41] Victoria Felkar: [01:33:41] Yeah. So it's advices radio network, which is where you can listen to them, but if you want to view them that you can find them on advices radio either on Um, Facebook or it's think they bodybuilding media on YouTube and that's where kind of the, all of the shows,

[01:33:56] Carl Lanore: [01:33:56] everything goes there.

[01:33:57] That's the place to go cause you to, come on. Listen, I [01:34:00] wanna thank you so much for making time and cause I know you're anxious to get out and shovel snow. Oh,

[01:34:05] Victoria Felkar: [01:34:05] I

[01:34:07] Carl Lanore: [01:34:07] thanks for making time and not shoveling snow for the show tonight. Victoria is note in where she's at. So anyway, this is fun. It went very fast.

[01:34:16] Thank you so much for coming on the show.

[01:34:18] Victoria Felkar: [01:34:18] Thank you for having me.

[01:34:19] Carl Lanore: [01:34:19] Okay. We'll talk again soon. Okay. Take care. And then, uh, so here's the dealio. I am leaving to go hunting, uh, Wednesday. There will be no show tomorrow because I have to get all my stuff together and I will be gone till the 22nd.

[01:34:33] I hope to come back with both a, a deer and a black bear. The bat, the bear is more important to me because I want a bear skin rug for the house, but I will be rerunning old shows. From 10, 11, 12, 13 years ago, a shows that many of you who just found superhuman radio in the past four or five years have probably never had a chance to hear.

[01:34:56] And so, uh, please tune into those. And of course, always [01:35:00] patronize our sponsors because without them, there is no show and you don't get to hear wonderful guests like Victoria Felker. So that's it. I will see everybody when I come home and hopefully I will be dressed like a mountain man. Take

[01:35:34] Victoria Felkar: [01:35:34] care [01:36:00]