The Creatine & Strength Mashup Every Woman Needs

Summary

Pursuit of Wellness

Episode: The Creatine & Strength Mashup Every Woman Needs

Host: Mari Llewellyn
Guests: Dr. Gabrielle Lyon, Dr. Andy Galpin, JJ Virgin
Date: August 18, 2025

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Episode Overview

This episode tackles two pillars of women’s health and longevity: strength training and creatine supplementation. Host Mari Llewellyn brings in leading experts to bust myths, share personal stories, and lay out the science guiding women to take muscle health seriously—from their 20s onward. The conversation is radically honest, practical, and deeply encouraging, with clear takeaways for women at any fitness stage.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Breaking Down Myths: Creatine for Women

• Creatine is not just for “bros” or bodybuilders.
  • JJ Virgin (01:02): “I wish I’d started this much sooner…when I was training people at Gold’s in Venice, it was such a bro dude thing. I was like, none of that, you know? And I just never looked at it.”
• Women often have less tissue stores of creatine, especially plant-based women, making supplementation more relevant.
  • JJ Virgin (01:40): “If you’re a plant-based woman and you’re not getting enough, you’re not going to get it from your diet. You’re only going to make about a gram.”
• Creatine supports more than muscle: mood, cognition, bone health, and skin.
  • JJ Virgin (01:50): “Great study in menopausal women, helping with depression. We know it helps with cognition, bones, skin, helps you work out harder…”

Myth: Creatine Causes Water Retention and Bloating

• JJ Virgin (02:17): “I have gotten more feedback on this supplement than anything else ever.”
• Reality: Fluid retention with creatine is intracellular (in the muscle), which is a good thing.
  • JJ Virgin (03:23): “I have more water in my muscles. This is what I want, right? This is the best thing ever. I did not take creatine and put on body fat.”
• Dr. Andy Galpin (34:56): “Is it possible that some women might feel like watery or bloated from creatine? Yeah, but... on aggregate, is it a moderate risk? No. Do you see that reported a lot in literature? No.”

Dosing: Start Low, Increase Gradually

• JJ Virgin (04:59): “Now what I would do with someone is I would start them with a gram, then take them to two, then to three, depending on their size…somewhere between three to five grams and then you just always stay there.”

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2. Strength Training: An Investment for Life

Why Start Early?

• JJ Virgin (07:03): “If you had it to do over again, you would start investing [in muscle] from the time you were born… the earlier you start, the better.”
• “It’s never too late.” Starting in your 20s or 60s, you always add dividends by building muscle now.
• JJ Virgin (08:27): “You would never tell a 60 year old, well, you didn’t start investing… I’d say here, start now.”

Encouraging the Older Generation

• Leverage what your parents already know: calisthenics, resistance (body weight), and the “Jack Lalanne” era.
• Progression is key: Even morbidly obese clients or those in pain can start with assisted squats and chair stands.
  • JJ Virgin (16:00): “I’m doing this with someone right now who is morbidly obese...First thing was squats, but they weren’t even squats over a chair… just side of the chair.”

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3. “Muscle Mommy” Phenomenon & Social Change in Women’s Fitness

• The “Muscle Mommy” movement is a reflection of female strength being normalized and celebrated.
  • Dr. Andy Galpin (19:25): “You had a whole generation of females from that 1990s who were like, wow, I’m kind of getting to strength training. I’m kind of getting these things…Now these…turn into MDs and strength coaches and scientists, and now they’re… the Gabrielle Lyons. It’s now coming to the forefront.”
• Shift away from “bulky” fears—strength benefits are universal for women in performance and health.

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4. Why Muscle Matters for Lifelong Health

• Introduction of the concept of Strength Span—living as long as you’re strong.
  • Dr. Andy Galpin (26:23): “Your wellness span is going to be dictated in large part by your strength span because as soon as you start losing strength at age, then nothing else will function.”
• Physical strength enables independence, reduces sense of burden, and supports mental health.
• Dr. Andy Galpin (28:33): “When people feel like they're a burden, they don't want to do anything… Social isolation is a massive driver of long term joy, connection, purpose.”
• Strength training is causally linked to reduced risk of dementia and better cognition.
  • Dr. Andy Galpin (29:43): “Grip strength predicted 30% of dementia and Alzheimer’s.”

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5. Creatine as a “Life Supplement”—More Than Just a Performance Aid

• Creatine isn’t just for performance. Its benefits cover bone density, mood, brain health, mental health, and more.

  • Dr. Andy Galpin (30:25): “So the small issues you see with creatine…on aggregate it’s an incredibly safe supplement to take. Benefits are in muscle and performance…there’s a little bit of research...on bone mineral density, mood, brain health, cognitive function…So you have so many benefits…with a high safety profile.”

• Safety and dosing:

  • Dr. Andy Galpin (32:58): “Postmenopausal women took 4x the normal dosages for 2 years and had no issues.”

• Dr. Gabrielle Lyon (38:45): “Creatine is one of the safest supplements…but not only that for women, there might be additional benefits for women. Women have what seems to be lower creatine stores…”

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6. Creatine: Evidence-Based Recommendations

• Best dose: 3–5g per day; higher doses may benefit brain and mood.
  • Dr. Gabrielle Lyon (40:31): “One pound of red meat might have half a gram of creatine…if you need a minimum of 3 grams, 3 to 5 grams for muscle, 10 for brain health.”
• Particularly helpful for:
  • Those with low dietary intake (vegetarian/vegan)
  • Women in phases of menstruation, pregnancy, menopause, or aiming for fertility support (discuss with your doctor)
• Dr. Gabrielle Lyon (41:20): “If we know that women seem to have lower levels of creatine in the brain and that they are very responsive to creatine and it improves mood and memory, that’s extraordinary.”

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7. Muscle: The Ultimate Organ for Longevity

• “The more healthy muscle mass you have, the greater your survivability against nearly anything that’s going to kill you.”
  • Dr. Gabrielle Lyon (45:29): “The most important organ from my perspective when it comes to longevity is muscle.”
• “The more healthy muscle mass you have, the stronger you are, the greater your survivability…There’s nothing more important. And it’s the only thing that we can control.”
• Women should resistance train 2–3 times per week, aim for higher protein intake, and prioritize functional movement.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• JJ Virgin [02:17]: “You might as well just say, take this and you’re gonna blow up... I have gotten more feedback on this supplement than anything else ever.”
• Dr. Andy Galpin [26:23]: “Your legs and your hands are the things that make you move throughout the world… they are your interface with the world.”
• Dr. Gabrielle Lyon [41:20]: “If we know that women seem to have lower levels of creatine in the brain and that they are very responsive to creatine and it improves mood and memory, that’s extraordinary.”
• Dr. Andy Galpin [29:43]: “One paper found...low grip strength predicted 30% of dementia and Alzheimer’s.”
• Dr. Gabrielle Lyon [45:29]: “The more healthy muscle mass you have, the greater your survivability against nearly anything that's going to kill you… It’s the only thing we can control.”

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:00–04:30: Why Creatine is for Women, Not Just Men (JJ Virgin busts myths)
• 07:03–09:30: The “Investment” of Muscle—Start Early, Reap Benefits for a Lifetime
• 13:44–17:00: Beginner Progressions for Resistance Training and Functional Movements
• 19:13–22:37: The Rise of “Muscle Mommies” and Normalization of Strong Women (Dr. Andy Galpin)
• 26:23–29:50: Strength Span, Social Isolation, and Cognitive Health
• 30:25–34:52: Creatine as a “Life Supplement” and its High Safety Profile
• 38:34–43:41: Dr. Gabrielle Lyon’s Essential Supplements for Women and Nuances of Creatine Dosing
• 45:29–46:20: Muscle as the Cornerstone of Longevity—Training, Diet, and Metabolic Health

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Takeaways

• Creatine is a powerful, safe, and underutilized supplement for women—benefiting not just muscle, but also mood, cognition, bone, and metabolic health, especially in periods of life with increased need.
• Strength training is foundational for functional independence, injury prevention, quality of life, and longevity. It’s truly never too late—or too early—to start.
• Empowering message: Women can define for themselves what “fit” or “strong” should look like—strength and health are for everyone, not just a certain image or gender.

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For more expert interviews and practical tips on women’s health, subscribe to Pursuit of Wellness.

Transcript

[A]

This is the Pursuit of Wellness podcast and I'm your host, Mari Llewellyn. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the podcast. Today's episode is a powerhouse mashup all about two major players in the world of fitness and wellness, strength training and creatine. Whether you're just getting started or you've been lifting for years, we're diving into how these two go hand in hand and why they matter at every stage of life. We've got some expert voices joining us, including Dr. Gabrielle Lyon, Dr. Andy Galpin, and JJ Virgin with a real world look on how strength routines and creatine use evolve over time, from building lean muscle and boosting energy to supporting mood, mobility, and overall resilience. We'll explore why strength training is one of the most effective tools for lifelong health. And if you've ever wondered what creatine actually does, or if it's just really for bodybuilders, we're here to break down the science, bust the myths, and show you how it can support you in more than just your gym goals. Can you give us the tea on creatine for women? Okay. You love creatine.

[B]

I love creatine. I would definitely. I wish I'd started this much sooner. I can't believe I didn't. I think it's because when I was training people at Gold in Venice, it was such a bro dude thing. I was like, none of that, you know, And I just never looked at it. And then as I started to really look at sarcopenia, there were a couple things that became very clear. Number one, like, why are we not all taking creatine, especially women who have less tissue sores, as we know. And, you know, especially if you're a plant based woman and you're not getting enough, you're not going to get it from your diet. You're only going to make about a gram. But you look at what it does. Great study in menopausal women, helping with depression. So we know it helps with cognition, it helps with bones, it helps with skin, it helps you work out harder. And I have been amazed because as I've been talking about creatine, I have gotten so much resistance that I'm blown away. Like, you might as well just say, take this and you're gonna blow up. They're like, but what about my hair, my kidneys? And I'm gonna retain water and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, oh, my gosh. Like this one. I have gotten more feedback on this supplement than anything else ever.

[A]

I think It's. Is it the water retention? Weight gain concern is the big one for women?

[B]

It is. And I am really. So I'm digging into creatine right now, big time. I have been using creatine monohydrate because that was, you know, the oldest, most researched one. I met the guy who has creatine HCl, who created it. He found me because I was speaking at a medical conference, and he tracked me down on LinkedIn and gave me the whole spiel and creatine HCL. And I'm like, okay, well, but you created a creatine HCL. So he goes, this is like the iPhone 15, and that over there is rotary phone. So I'm really looking right now to see what makes the most sense, which type of creatine, whether it's the most pure form that's 99.9% pure, or the regular form that's 99% pure. Like, how much does this matter? Or is it the HCL that turns out you can use a lot less of and may not cause some of that fluid retention? So what is the fluid retention? And I'll tell you what I've done to work through this and help people. Some of that fluid retention is amazing.

[A]

It's in the muscle, right?

[B]

Which goes back to. You got to use a biompedance scale, because then you'll go, oh, this is awesome. I have more water in my muscles. This is what I want, right? This is the best thing ever. I did not take creatine and put on body fat. And I don't know about you, but when I started taking creatine, like, where has this been all my life? I can now work out harder. It's fantastic.

[A]

And you didn't see bloating when you first started taking?

[B]

No. And I even did loading. Like, oh, I did loading. I did five grams four times a day. Because what you have to do is get your creatine stores up, okay? And. But I have now a different way. I would teach people to do it based on all the feedback I'm getting from people. I just went. And it's like, fine, I'll do five days and load it a little. A little tummy thing. One day I was like, nothing, really. And I've been taking 5 grams at least a day ever since. But now I'm kind of playing around with the hcl. Now what I would do with someone is I would start them with a gram, okay. And then I would take them to two, then to three, depending on their size. I'd put them and their diet. If you've got someone who's totally plant based, let's go to five, but depending on your size, somewhere between three to five grams and then you just always stay there. Now there might be an advantage to doing that before you go to the gym. Seems like it. At first I was like, it doesn't matter because it's tissue stores, but it seems like it could, could be helpful. Now is figure I'm going to get every advantage I can. Why not? Why wouldn't I? So that's how I do it, is I take it in the morning, do.

[A]

My electrolytes, mix it all in like a habit style. Yeah, I'm just starting to use creatine again. I used it so I was keto for a while.

[B]

Oh, you were. How did you like that?

[A]

So I think it's a great tool, right?

[B]

Science your tools.

[A]

Yeah, I think it's a great tool. I did it probably for a little bit too long.

[B]

Long. Did you do it like on and.

[A]

Off for three years. To be honest, it wasn't just for weight loss. I also did it for my skin and I felt like it was incredibly beneficial for my skin. But I also found when I did stool tests that I was missing some crucial bacteria. So now I'm eating sweet potato again. I don't respond very well to carbs. I don't feel amazing afterwards. Like potatoes are kind of like my sweet spot.

[B]

Got.

[A]

I don't feel great with rice. Like I've had to kind of experiment and figure out the best thing for me. But I liked it and I used creatine during that time to kind of like help with the muscle. You know, I felt like I wasn't getting that pump at the gym. And I remember Greg recommending creatine and now I'm starting to use it again after having so many people on the show tell me how amazing it is.

[B]

Especially aren't you trying to get pregnant?

[A]

Yes, ma', am, yes. Yes, it helps with that.

[B]

It's not helping with that. But. But you. When I look at pregnancy, I look at a couple different phases. There's before you even think about getting pregnant where you're doing all of the detoxification and upgrade to make sure that your body's super healthy and you've, you know, saunas, all that. Then everything that you want to really maintain is great nutrients during pregnancy. You start before you get pregnant, then you keep that through, then post with the, the nursing and the recovery. Right.

[A]

So creatine is a helpful supplement.

[B]

Creatine is A helpful incarnate team.

[A]

I know you have a focus on aging optimally and focusing on muscle as we age. A majority of my listeners are probably 25 to 30. Kind of my age range. Why is it important that we start thinking about that now at this age?

[B]

Let's reframe it to aging powerfully.

[A]

Aging powerfully, powerfully.

[B]

And this is the right age to start. You know, I feel very fortunate. I was lifting weights at 16 with the high school football team with the Bros. And I grew up, I mean, I went to Richmond, California. I went to a very like, rough neighborhood high school and lifted weights with football team. If in the perfect world, we would be doing DEXA scans on girls in their teens and really seeing where they were in terms of bone density and muscle and we would start just like in the perfect world, if you had it to do over again, you would start like investing from the time you were born. Your parents would teach how to do it and you would just invest all the way along. And you have this, you'd be a gazillionaire. It's the same with muscle. The earlier you start, the better. But the cool thing is you would never tell a 60 year old, well, you didn't start investing. You know, guess you're screwed for retirement. You would say, start now. And that's what I'd say here, start now. But gosh. And at this time period, I can't think of a better time to really get this dialed in and started than right now because the dip dividends you're going to get later on in life are crazy amazing. Like there's all these horrible stats about aging and I can tell you they don't need to be at all if you've got a solid foundation and you just don't stop.

[A]

And so it's never too late to start weightlifting, in your opinion?

[B]

No. If you're 26, you're fine.

[A]

Like, I would love if my parents were to weightlift, but I don't even know where to begin convincing them because they just didn't grow up in that culture. Do you have any tips on like, how we can encourage our parents to weightlift?

[B]

Yes, they did grow up in the time of calisthenics and Jack Lalanne. And in the reality, when you look at what a lot of what he was doing, it was body weight, calisthenics, it still was resistance training with some power training. Right. Jumping jacks and things like that. So they grew up with that. Where I like to, to do this, I have a very specific Progression. Because my favorite audience is the audience that's new to resistance training. Like, I love that audience. Like, it's easy to indoctrinate the indoctrinated, but someone who's never done it, first of all, the results they're going to get are so much more. You take someone who's always resistance trained, you know, it's like cleaning a clean window. Like, oh, I got rid of the spec. You take someone who has never resistance trained, it's like you've got a dirty window and all of a sudden you can see the light. It's crazy what they feel.

[A]

Newbie gains.

[B]

Yes. So newbie gains the. But, but the cool thing is, and I always like to say, you don't train to get better at training. You train to get better at life. The great thing is, is you'll see it in every aspect of your life. Yeah, like everything.

[A]

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[B]

Yeah, I'm excited to talk to you about that because I think the important thing there is you're not focusing on losing weight. You're focusing on getting strong, getting healthy, and falling in love with those activities. And if you live like a healthy, lean person, guess what will happen. And then you stay there, which is the hardest part of all. I first track activity and then I get them up to 8 to 12,000 steps a day. That's kind of the sweet spot. More is better, but, you know, that's the. You got to hit that. Then I add some intensity a couple days a week into that. So maybe put a rucking vest on. I think that my husband loves those. They're so great.

[A]

Do you do it? You ruck?

[B]

I do.

[A]

Uphill?

[B]

No.

[A]

No.

[B]

Well, I live in Florida. It's a little flat. Unless I can find a bridge, I'm out of luck. The way I see a rucking vest, it's a great way to add intensity. It's a great way to put, you know, to strengthen your bones. And if someone's losing weight and they're concerned about a little metabolic downshift, which some of that we can offset with resistance training and adding more muscle. But the other way we could is like wear your wrecking vest around. Wear my working best around and I'll do some treadmill walking with my wrecking vest. That's how I use it. It's just more of my sustained activity. Although sometimes at night we'll go out and crank it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

With the wrecking vest. So that's the next step. Then I add in resistance training, but really focusing on compound moves that mimic what we want to be better at in life. Like if I had to pick one, it would obviously be a squat.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And you hear from people, they're like, oh, I can't do that because I have bad knees, bad back. It's. I often think the reason why you say you can't is the reason why you must. What types of exercises would this be? And again, when you're first getting someone moving, a lot of it is how the nerves you're training your nervous system. Like so often when you first start the first month, you're not going to see any real muscle hypertrophy because you're getting more of neurological learning.

[A]

So can you explain what that means? Hypertension.

[B]

So hypertrophy is your muscles getting bigger, which we know starting at around age 30, your muscle size starts to go down. It's anywhere from 3 to 8% a decade. Doesn't have to. The scary part actually isn't that the muscle size is going down. It's the muscle quality problem. A lot of it is our muscles getting infiltrated with fat. Think ribeye versus filet. Right. And we're losing strength. 2 to 4% of strength versus 1% muscle. But we're losing even more power. Strength is how much could you pick up one time. Power is how fast could you do it. And when you think about what translates to everyday life and why you see people breaking a hip and never recovering is they can't catch themselves, Right?

[A]

Yep.

[B]

They can't dart out of the way fast.

[A]

Isn't that one of the leading reasons that older people end up in the hospital and die young?

[B]

I don't know how many of them, how many people break a hip? I can't remember that stat. I do know this stat. If you do, if you are one of those people and right now, like sarcopenia, it's something like 4 to 11% of 50 to 60 year olds have low muscle relative to their weight. Sarcopenia. And then it of course just gets worse. But it doesn't have to. Again, doesn't. But if you are one of those people who breaks your hip at 65, it's, it's a third of those people die within a year. Like never get out of the hospital die within a year. And half of the people, they're. They're never where they were.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, they lose muscle, they can never get back. That's why it's so important not to get injured. As you age, you would start with things like doing an air squat. I mean, I literally, I'm doing this with someone right now who is morbidly obese. And we've gotten him to see back to the person he used to be, which was a, you know, professional tennis player. Right. And so the first thing that we did was squats, but they weren't even squats over a chair because he couldn't go down that far easily. Like, he has to pull himself out of chair. There was a square squat over just side of the chair. You know, an air squat. Next we'll go down to the chair. Right. And then we might add a little. A little handheld weight.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

But you just. The form is always the limiter. And then when you think about it, like, how many things in life involve you getting up off of something. A toilet, a chair, a car. So I would start with a squat with no body weight. Then you can add a little dumbbell that you hold. Then you can also, once you get that foundation, you can do a squat with a jump to add some power in.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

One of the ways we can test a vertical jump is just take a pen, a pencil with in and mark it, and then jump as high as you can and mark it again. And you can get the norms for that. So that would be one. One's obviously a deadlift. And the caveat is, I hear from people, well, I can't do these things because. And again, if you have bad knees, when I blew my knee out at 17 and then did the dumb thing again, they're like, you need a knee replacement. I go, all right, I'll come back. And I came back 30 years later, and literally they were like, we don't know how you're walking. You are bone on bone. Like, how are you doing this? But I'd strengthened everything else so much that I was able to do it. And then I trained for the knee surgery. So literally, I never used a walker. I never used anything. Three weeks later, I was on stage. So, you know, it's like you have to think of these things differently. Right. So if they started with a squat, they started with the deadlift. What's the deadlift? It might be just them doing the movement, and then maybe they're picking up water bottles. Yeah, right. Them doing push ups. Like, in the perfect world, you would go in for a physical. You would get a dexa with a VO2 max. You'd have to do push ups and you would have to do, like, a jump test. Could be amazing. And then you'd have to do a balance test.

[A]

So are you generally recommending people strength train?

[C]

Of course.

[A]

Have you heard of muscle mommies?

[C]

Oh, my gosh, I have.

[A]

This is like a. This is something I love doing. When men come on the show, I have to bring up all the phrases.

[C]

I'm loving. I'm. I'm learning so much from you.

[A]

Yeah. You could, like, name programs. Like the Muscle Mommy program. Like, Dr. Gabrielle Lyon is a muscle mommy. You know, that's a perfect example.

[C]

Okay. She used definitely both of those things.

[A]

Yep, yep.

[C]

Very much a mommy and very much a muscle.

[A]

But it could also apply to someone who doesn't have kids. They're just like, super muscular. I think the confusion for a lot of girls is the amount of weight that's needed because I think with Pilates, they feel this. I don't know if you've ever done it, but you feel this, like, crazy isolated pain in one area. So they're like, oh, it's. This is growing my muscle.

[C]

In the early 90s, mid-90s, all the way up through like the early 2000s, we still very much dealt with strength training. These anaerobic things were a male, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

No matter how much we fought that battle, there was a couple of problems there. Number one, there was not a lot. Female sports were still not accessible media wise. Right. It wasn't actually until recently where female sports had really any TV time coverage, stuff like that. But even if you go back to history, women didn't even start running the marathon, start doing other activities like this until decades after men did. Right. And then the participation numbers were tiny. This was growing scientifically. But you had a whole generation of females from that 1990s who were like, wow, I'm kind of getting to strength training. I'm kind of getting these things. I'm getting into sports. But there wasn't social media. There wasn't media out there. Well, these people turn into MDs and strength coaches and scientists, and now they're 30 and 35 and 40 and 45, and they're the Gabrielle Lyons. Right. And now these. Because. But these are girls that got inspired in the 80s and 90s to do these things. It's now coming to the forefront, which is great because we've been arguing this. And when you asked that question earlier about Toning, I'm like, oh my God. Like for 25 years we've been fighting.

[A]

Fighting the toning war.

[C]

Sure. And it never worked because it was dudes like me telling girls like you that, don't worry, you're not going to get bulky.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Which is not effective at all. We needed in like, honestly, those female scientists and stuff to start coming forward and being the face of those movements. That's largely happened. And so the muscle mommies is probably a reflection of the last five to seven years of folks like that and Abby, Smith, Ryan and all these other folks coming from these different communities and saying, I've been lifting my whole life, look at me.

[A]

And you're like, oh, shit, yeah.

[C]

Huh. You don't look like what I thought I was going to look like. If you do want to look big and jacked and bulk, I don't care. As a female, like, again, you define what is good or bad. Like, I don't care at all. And I don't think Gabrielle would care at all what people say. Right. So you tell me what you do and I want to look like. We can program to that. It just had. It took a while for us to come from the female voice you throw on top of that such mounting, colossal amounts of peer reviewed, high quality scientific evidence for things that touch female pain points. And then you started getting belief and buy in. And so I think we're probably right at the beginning of that climb because, yeah, you will definitely see more there. And men have been saying this for a very long time, but some men don't like muscular women. A lot of men do. So you. I think this is certainly how I'll raise my daughter and how my wife is and how she'll raise her is like, you look however the fuck you want. There will be some man who cares about you if you care about that. But you don't have to worry about playing sports because you're too worried that, like, boys won't like you. Yeah, that will happen, of course. But I mean, you sure hope like every amount of education we can instill in them, it's like that should never be a reality that you have to deal with. If you want to be strong and get all the health benefits of that, we can do that in a way that doesn't make you look how you don't want, if you care, or even better yet, hopefully you don't even care. Hopefully you just look how you ever want to look. That makes you happy and healthy and, and we can hopefully by the time my daughter is at that age that these things don't matter as much.

[A]

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[C]

Women going at the longest end of the spectrum? Everyone wants to live a long, healthy life. Of course people are aware generally of lifespan and wellness span at this point. All right. But then there's a new a new awesome term that we call strength span. And so what this effectively says is your your wellness span is going to be dictated in large part by your strength span because as soon as you start losing strength at age, then nothing else will function. Really easy example here. Most people are familiar by now with the importance of things like VO2 max cardiovascular fitness as you age. This is the entire crux of the wellness span versus Lifespan argument. That said, if we were to go outside right now and walk from the bottom of the stairs all the way up here, right? And I gave and I cut your leg strength down by 80% you wouldn't make it up here. Your cardiovascular system would be going nuts. You would be a max heart rate and it would have nothing to do with your VO2 max. It's the fact that your legs are super weak. Your legs and your hands are the things that make you move throughout the world. And so that I call them, they are your interface with the world. So we know that if you have a strong interface, you're more likely to do any activity that you choose to see fit. More importantly, probably is you won't opt out of them. Easy examples like, oh, I'm not going to take that trip. I'm not going to go to the grandkids, I'm not going to do whatever else as I'm aging. Why? Because I know I have to carry my luggage throughout the airport. It's going to be a huge pain in the butt. I'm not strong enough to put it in the overhead bin, all the steps. Like, I don't want to do that activity. Why? There's research now that'll suggest one of the biggest driving factors of social withdrawal as you age is sense of burden. When people feel like they're a burden, they don't want to do anything. Because you've been this healthy, functioning, autonomous being for six decades, seven decades, eight decades, and now everyone is honking at you, you know, you're holding up the whole line, the entire thing's going to wait. And you feel really bad about that. And so you know you can't do anything about that. And so you're like, I'm just not going to take that trip. I'm not going to go to that outing or whatever that thing is that becomes a problem. It becomes a problem because it, as I mentioned, leads directly to social isolation.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Which is a massive driver of long term joy, connection, purpose. So all the physical attributes, sure, we can directly tie those to mortality. We can also draw out joy and sense of connection and purpose. When you lose a sense of purpose and in fact you have a sense of burden, mortality is right off the reservation. We've actually seen, we actually published a paper last year and we found that specifically leg strength predicted 5% of cognitive function through aging. And we have both correlation and causal data behind that. And so it's examples of movement, it's examples of physical activity. You're not strong, you're not going to be physically active. Sense of purpose isolate. So it ties into everything all the way up to directly brain functional purposes. There's excellent research on strength training and white matter atrophy in your brain. So your physical brain, not your mental health, your actual physical brain is going to stay around much longer when you strength train. And again, there are direct causal links. At this point we can make the same argument for grip strength. In fact, one paper found, I know that this is a very large study, they looked at grip strength and low grip strength predicted 30% of dementia and Alzheimer's.

[A]

Wow.

[C]

And so you pick the poison you want to go after. Brain health, mental health, physical. You're going to find just again, mountains of evidence to suggest strength training, the act of it itself, as well as just being strong is going to be holding toe to how long and how well you live. So you just can't make an argument that, that you can get away with being weak and living a long time.

[A]

How about supplementing for women who are weightlifting? Because I do think there's a lot of fear around, let's say creatine or some of the more performance supplements.

[C]

I think maybe the problem is differentiating these things, these items, these approaches as performance based. This is generally caused the issue when I used to do this a long time ago. But if I said things like strength and I said is that performance or is that health? Right. Ten years ago in my class everyone would have said, all right, that's strength is performance. Right. It's different now. Now when I throw that same slide up, the kids already know that's that's a bowl thing. Right. If I said anaerobic, same thing, right. Still to this day, if I said high intensity for years, that's always going to go in that same bucket. If you talk about exercise program, if you talk about supplementation, it's the same connotation, right. So if you say Creatine for years, 90 early 90s, mid-90s, late 90s, this was a performance based thing. But now you have so much evidence on the other side of the equation. Most up and coming students now are being like, oh, this is a health thing. Right. So you're talking about research on creatine specifically? Sure. Muscle growth, muscle strength. There's 30 years of research on that. That's very well established. It's been tested in every population you can imagine. Young, old, male, female, disease populations on disease, special populations, all kinds of things like that in different dosages. And you're seeing very high safety profiles and very high effectiveness. So the small issues you see with creatine, some people get kind of like nauseous or something like that from a little bit, but it's pretty uncommon. Then you have like Random anecdotal reports of weird things. But like that happens with physiology. But on aggregate it's an incredibly safe supplement to take. Benefits are in muscle and performance. Sure. There's a little bit of research actually. Darren Kandao did a two year study on postmenopausal women using this typical dosage for creatine that people say is like 5 grams per day. He did 20 grams per day. And postmenopausal women and they found some mild benefits in bone mineral density. So not all the areas that they scanned improved. Some of them did, I think like hips area ish did, but legs didn't or some variation. So some plausible benefit. It also highlights the fact Postmenopausal women took 4x the normal dosages for 2 years and had no issues. Right. No adverse events, basically no kidney problems, no issues. And so you're like, okay, maybe some mild benefits of bone mineral health, which is really hard to deal with, especially post menopause, a huge deal for women. We didn't even bring that up as a benefit of strength training. Right. And now you're either going to add some potential bone mineral density or you're going to maybe at least negate it from losing and from going away. And then there's research on things like mood, brain health, there's some research, recent stuff on cognitive function, on long term brain development, mental health. It's a little bit of anti. So you have so many benefits in so many areas with a high safety profile that's been tested in multiple populations and countless labs for decades that it starts to make a harder like become a really hard argument that that's a performance.

[A]

Mm. It's just a life supplement.

[C]

It's a really high and especially when you think about what it actually directly does.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Past that you can get into any supplement you want. And like on the surface you might have this mythology that it is a performance supplement, but in reality it is. The biggest bang for your bucks are going to be the things that remove the most amount of performance anchors. So what is needed specifically based on your physiology? What are the limitations in your diet? Okay, can we then solve maybe some holes there with supplementation? Getting any supplement from whole food first is always a landslide of a win. But if you have to use them, we'd recommend either sticking to the basics like that and I could certainly add more to that list or if you're going to add more, make sure that they are very specific to your physiology, very specific to your blood work, very specific to some limitation you're Having based on a choice you've made with your exercise or something else. Because outside of that, then you start, you can potentially run into issues. But, but the, the kind of high profile, high safety, high benefit ones are there. So performance versus health, like it's not really that different, to be honest.

[A]

I think women think creatine is going to bloat them.

[C]

It can a little bit. I'd say that temporarily give any person any supplement.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Some people will come back and say this hurt my stomach.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

I mean you could give them a placebo and some of that would happen. So is it possible that some women might feel like watery or bloated from creatine? Yeah, but also like again, we could give you any food and that could happen. So if you're saying like on aggregate, is it a moderate risk? No. No. And do you see that reported a lot in literature? No. Have I given like hundreds of cre, hundreds of women, creatine? Yeah. Have we had a huge problem with it? Not at all.

[A]

Okay.

[C]

Have we ever had some women come back? Sure. We've had some men come back and say that too. We've given people chicken and they've come back and said I made like. So it, it's not any different than like almost any other substance. So I'm saying that because I'm very sensitive. When somebody comes to me and says I started doing A, B and C and then this happened, my general default is I believe them. I'm not like, oh yeah, whatever. Just I keep taking it and it's like, oh, my stomach is cramping. Like, nah, like weird stuff happens.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

It's pretty rare for us to hear that.

[A]

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[D]

I'm so glad you came out with a crein. Do you know the data is unbelievable. Yeah, creatine is one of the safest supplements.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

But not only that for women, there might be additional benefits for women. Women have what seems to be lower creatine stores and not just based on.

[A]

Size, which is crazy because I think the way people think about creatine is that it's for men.

[D]

Totally.

[A]

So why is it so beneficial for women?

[D]

I think. Well, first of all, let me give you my top supplements that I would say, okay, this is what I think would be valuable for anybody. For women, a protein powder. I am obviously partial to whey protein, a omega 3 fatty acid, some kind of polyphenol that you know, for example a red, green, purple or something like urolithin A, which is a prebiotic creatine at a higher dose than you would think creatine at a dose between three and five is what people think of for women, but creatine, what we are starting to see what some of the research is coming out and also Dr. Abby Ryan Smith, that women, depending on their phase of their menstrual cycle, seem to have greater benefit from creatine than other times, which, again, I think that you should take creatine every day. I. I think that it's very unrealistic to dose creatine based on your cycle, whether you're in the luteal phase or even in pregnancy.

[A]

So it's safe during pregnancy.

[D]

You did not hear that from me. Talk to your own doctor. But yes. And you have to understand, creatine is made in the body. We get it from sources like red meat, which we are never going to be able to consume enough that is going to be meaningful. For example, one pound of red meat might have half a gram of creatine.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

And if you need a minimum of 3 grams, 3 to 5 grams for muscle, 10 for brain health.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

One in eight women will struggle with some kind of mental health issue.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

Whether it's depression, anxiety.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

And part of the reason, at least I'm beginning to see evidence that part of the reason is this ability to generate energy in the brain. And these are very broad strokes. I realize that I'm not giving you the mechanism, so I do think that the brain is very complicated. But if we know that women seem to have lower levels of creatine in the brain and that they are very responsive to creatine and it improves mood and memory, that's extraordinary.

[A]

Yeah. That's amazing.

[D]

So also, if someone were to take it with, say, an SSRI or something that they are doing already for their mood and brain function might begin to see synergistic effects.

[A]

So it's helping muscle retention.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

Doesn't it hydrate muscles, too?

[D]

It helps with glycogen storage. If, say, an individual was struggling with performance, there seems to be some evidence that it actually helps with storing those carbohydrates in skeletal muscle. Amazing. It is not going to make you big and bulky.

[A]

Okay. That's the big thing is girls think it'll make them bloated. That's like the number one misconception I see. I actually have been taking creatine since the beginning of my fitness journey. And I remember being really nervous. I was like, oh, my God, I'm going to look bloated and watery, but it's the best thing ever.

[D]

And I think that we're going to start to see more women taking creatine.

[A]

Yeah, I hope so.

[D]

I believe that it is probably going to be proven to be one of the most useful supplements for midlife. And when I say midlife, I am talking about. So midlife I guess would be what 40 individuals should start before then.

[A]

So what should they start?

[D]

I mean from a health muscle span perspective, I would say as early as they're willing to. Yeah, I mean when I was 18, I was taking supplements. I don't know if you were pretty. I wasn't. I wish I was.

[A]

I wasn't into fitness when I was 18. It took me until I was 23, 24 to have a mental breakdown and get into fitness.

[D]

But think if you adjust into creatine, kidding aside, I. I definitely believe women of childbearing age in their reproductive prime would benefit greatly from creatine. Creatine is considered, it's something called a carne nutrient where it is really found in animal products, mainly red meat, which is. That's where the name carney nutrient came from.

[A]

So it occurs naturally in foods. Foods, yes. Which is the recipe for a great supplement.

[D]

Yes.

[A]

Okay.

[D]

And when you think about it, let's talk about who responds most to creatine. Number one, individuals that are eating likely a low creatine diet. So vegan vegetarians can really benefit from creatine.

[A]

Okay.

[D]

Individuals that are tired, there may be evidence to support it. Seems to give people more energy in training, decreasing fatigue, brain function could improve mood and improve just overall thought process. That's amazing.

[A]

Yeah, that's pretty extraordinary.

[B]

It is.

[D]

And the safety profile, we know that there is a high safety profile.

[A]

It's the most studied supplement in the.

[D]

Supplement industry for 60 some years. You know, we talk a lot, like our last podcast, we talked a lot about muscle and protein. And that is a huge layer. Right. You have to get that right. I Recommend Close to 1 gram per pound, ideal body weight. If you want to be plant based, fine. If you don't want to be plant based, fine. But really higher protein is better. You think about training, right. What are the training things that we have to do to optimize muscle? You have to lift, you have to do that two to three times a week. It's non negotiable. You cannot replace it with walking. Yoga is great, but you really should be doing some kind of resistance training, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

So this is the foundation. And then I think the next level is we start to think about our environment, our interaction with the outside world, our relationship with light our relationship with feeding, timing, these kind of things that as we think about the greater complexities of a woman, fertility, these things I think that we layer in appropriate and meaningful habits, like the time of day that you eat. I think that we can really begin to optimize our health. The most important organ from my perspective when it comes to longevity is. Is muscle.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

The more healthy muscle mass you have, the greater your survivability against nearly anything that's going to kill you. The more healthy muscle mass you have, the stronger, let's say the stronger you are, the greater your survivability.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

There's nothing more important. And it's the only thing that we can control.

[A]

Isn't it also great for like, menopause and pcos?

[D]

Yes.

[A]

Yeah. So many things.

[D]

It is the metabolic sync. When we have chronic disease, we have to think, okay, well, where does that start? The majority of chronic diseases are metabolic in nature.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

Where do we push the envelope for metabolism muscle.

[A]

Thank you for joining us on the Pursuit of Wellness Podcast to support this show. Please rate and review and share with your loved ones. If you want to be reminded of new episodes, click the subscribe button on your preferred podcast or video player. You can sign up for my newsletter to receive my [e-mail] it will be linked in the show Notes this podcast is a Pursuit Network production brought to you by Mikayla Phillips Jones, Joel Contartese, Daviel Waldner and Mackenzie Meisel. You can also watch the full video of each episode on our YouTube channel at Pursuit of Wellness podcast. Love you POW girls and POW boys. I will see you next time. The content of this show is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not a substitute for individual medical and mental health advice and does not constitute a provider patient relationship. As always, talk to your doctor or health team.