Welcome to Your Upgraded Summer!
This new series revisits the Top 10 Bulletproof Radio episodes of all time. The topics cover essentials like nutrition, energy, hormones, sleep and autophagy, as well as gut, brain, autoimmune and women’s health.
You’ll get the main points in a shortened version so you can get the good stuff and get on with your summer plans. And if you want to listen to more, tune in to the original episode.
Dr. Jolene Brighten takes the No. 9 spot with: On Women’s Health, Post-Birth Control Syndrome, and Brain Injuries – Dr. Jolene Brighten – #415
In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, Dr. Jolene Brighten, a functional medicine naturopathic doctor, talks about the birth control pill, states of giving birth and recovery, and even traumatic brain injuries.
Specializing in women’s health, Dr. Brighten focuses on how gender bias in medicine often undermines women’s ability to work through health difficulties. The conversation covers the experiences women often have after giving birth, such as hypothyroidism, brain fog, and larger mental health issues due to major hormonal changes.
She takes a strong stance on the birth control pill. She shares the ways it causes leaky gut, disrupts thyroid hormones, increases risk of depression, and more. By being off the pill, she says, you can be more aligned with your body. She advocates for fertility awareness, a process in which (with the help of technology) you can track your cycle and the way your hormones manifest themselves in your life, month-to-month.
Dr. Brighten first works on healing the body, then the mind, and then on a bigger level, like healing family lineage.
In an interesting aside, we also veer in discussion about traumatic brain injuries (we’ve both had one!) and our immediate and long-term approaches for healing.
Our discussion is highly informed and even more encouraging. I think you’ll find it really helpful! Here’s what Dr. Brighten has to say:
- On The Pill: “Unfortunately, what we’re seeing of the 100 million women worldwide, who have taken the pill, about 60 percent of them are only taking it for symptoms, which is a huge red flag to me. If only 40 percent are taking the pill to prevent pregnancy, then what’s up with this other 60 percent? And why are we not practicing root-cause resolution, which we could absolutely do, and just giving women a pill?”
- On Birth: “For some reason, somewhere along the line, we got it in our head that women should be able to pop out a baby and then just go along their merry way. And at six weeks, everything’s recovered and fine. Reality is, is it takes a whole year to really rebuild the nutrients and recover your body.”
- On Orgasm: “It’s a big thing that gets dismissed in women’s medicine. Having an orgasm is this mythical unicorn and women aren’t that interested in sex. But when you look at the research, there are so many benefits.”
Enjoy! And get more resources at Dave.Asprey/podcasts.
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Follow Along with the Transcript
WOMEN’S HEALTH- How to Get the Right Care – A Top 10 Episode with Dr. Jolene Brighten
Links/Resources
- Website: drbrighten.com
- Facebook: facebook.com/drbrighten
- Twitter: twitter.com/drbrighten
- Instagram: instagram.com/drjolenebrighten/
- YouTube: youtube.com/channel/UCZ4TEofVU5qOudhDW8QUfcQ/featured
- Pinterest: pinterest.com/drbrighten/
Dave Asprey Blog:
- Hormones Flex Their Superpowers – Dr. Jolene Brighten – #670
- Conquer Your Cycle at Every Age – Stephanie Estima, D.C., with Dave Asprey – #810
- The Birth Control Episode: The Pill Isn’t Bulletproof – Sarah Hill, Ph.D. – #665
- Way Better Sex Without the Pill – Dr. Jolene Brighten #617
Bulletproof Radio:
- What is Birth Control Syndrome and Do You Have It?
- Cycle Syncing: How to Hack Your Menstrual Cycle to Do Everything Better
- Ditching Hormonal Contraceptives? 11 Non-Hormonal Birth Control Options
Key Notes
- Dr. Jolene is trained in naturopathic medicine, but also in biochemistry. She wrote a book called Healing Your Body Naturally After Childbirth: The New Mom’s Guide to Navigating the Fourth Trimester. – 0:42
- Everyone’s focus is on baby. So, once baby is delivered, mom gets the six week checkup. “Hey, your vagina’s looking okay, no signs of infection. Fantastic. Go upon your way.” – 2:18
- When you deliver your baby, what follows is a placenta. And when you deliver the placenta, your hormones instantly drop to the level of like a post-menopausal woman. – 4:04
- I want to shift gears a bit from the pregnancy side of things to talk about what happens before pregnancy. Let’s talk birth control. – 5:31
- So, what happens when a woman goes off of the birth control pill? What should she expect? – 7:07
- The fertility awareness method is pretty profound, because in addition to, if you’re a woman, you start tracking this, you realize that there are times of the month, not when you’re necessarily ovulating. – 9:59
- Chaste tree berry, it’s something that’s used… It stimulates the LH production in the brain to help stimulate the ovaries to make progesterone. – 11:38
- “I took the million dollar equipment we use for measuring our WiFi things. And I turned it around and I aimed it at myself and oh my God, there’s all this data coming off the body.” – 12:03
- I came from a nutrition background and we were like, “Never, never have coffee on an empty stomach and keto is bad.” I laugh about what I was taught 20 years ago. – 14:46
- I took a titanium knee to the head flying through the air. – 15:58
- Something you brought up, so in the first 24 hours, inflammation goes up in the brain, we also develop leaky gut. – 21:44
- There’s a lot of things to heal the brain that you have to do those if you’re going to heal your gut. It’s not going to be just L-glutamine and doing autoimmune paleo diet or something like that. No, there’s neurological component to all of this. – 23:56
- Dave Asprey:
Someone came and said, “Look, I want to perform better at everything I do, better at being a human being. What are the three most important pieces of advice you have for me? – 26:01
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