← The Dylan Gemelli Podcast
The Dylan Gemelli Podcast
Episode #90 Featuring Dr. Ann Shippy! The ULTIMATE Guide to Fertility! Why are fertility rates declining?? How much do environmental toxins effect fertility? The impact of stress and more!
01:06:56
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- [00:18]
A
With over 20 years in the supplement industry, I have seen and heard it all. Empty promises, tricky marketing, wasted money, leaving so much left to be desired and creating feelings of resentment. Thankfully, I'm positive by nature and stay on the lookout for the next breakthrough product. And then I found Tone, a science driven wellness company built on over a decade of research into natural solutions for metabolic and brain health. Tonem understands that it takes a mind and body connection to obtain full health alignment. With their featured products, Modus and Neuro, they address both aspects of this connection. First, Modus, an all natural supplement designed to support fat loss, metabolic function and energy. Then Neuro, a cognitive performance supplement supplement designed to support focus, memory and long term brilliance. Tonem has brought back my trust in the supplement industry with natural evidence based ingredients that support long term outcomes. So because of this I want to share them with the world. Use my code Dylan for an extra 10% off and start to treat your mind and body today with Tonem. All right everybody, welcome back to the Dylan Gemelli podcast. So I'm on my Austin trip so I get to go to all of these cool new studios and my guest set this up for us today. It's very sweet and and I love doing this and traveling and getting the opportunity to interview so many amazing people. And my guest today is a different topic which I'm so excited to talk about because I know how passionate she is. She's got a new book coming out but I'm also pretty passionate about this topic which I haven't talked about a lot. So I'm looking forward to it just real quickly before we get going because I want to get all the information out of her that I can today. So she's a board certified internal medicine physician and she's a pioneer in functional and environmental medicine and she focuses on the 3 to 36 month preconception window which is the most powerful determinant of a child's lifelong health. She's got this new book coming out, it's called the Preconception Revolution and I am excited as can be to get into all of these things. I like polarizing stuff, I like stuff to push the needle, I like to stir some feathers and I like to get underneath the true realities of everything. I try to always stay as level headed and that's why people like me and follow me. So I like to bring people on that bring facts, not emotional criterias that they go on straight facts and that's why we're here today. So my friends, Dr. Ann Shippy, thanks.
- [02:58]
B
So much for having me. Have some fun.
- [03:00]
A
We are going to have some fun. I got to speak with you a few days ago. Of course, I was hectic. I have read some of your things. I had been introduced to you but hadn't spoken to you. And after speaking to you, I became a lot more excited. I get thoroughly excited with all of my guests, or I wouldn't do this, wouldn't make sense. But the passion that you had, and I could tell how much it affects you. And it's not that you're just doing this as a career, it's something personal to you, too. So I want to talk a little bit about your main focus here, what you do and why are you so passionate about this particular topic?
- [03:41]
B
When I look at the future for our children, it's pretty concerning. The 1 in 31 children being diagnosed with autism. And those statistics are lagging. The increased autoimmunity, obesity, cancer, diabetes. Like, our children are so ill. So for the people that are thinking about starting or growing their families, it's. It's a roll of the dice on. On whether they're going to get a healthy child or not. And it's getting harder and harder. So I started seeing what's possible with my patients. My patients started teaching me even about this window. Almost 20 years ago. I had a patient come in. She's 42, and she finally got married and wanted to start her family a little later. And she's like, I have a feeling there's some things going on with my body that won't be good for the baby. And I want you to figure out what they are.
- [04:37]
A
This.
- [04:37]
B
This. I was just starting functional medicine at the time. She was great. Like we found her microbiome was a mess, her toxin levels. She had really high heavy metals and a lot of inflammation in her body, some autoimmunity. And so we, instead of being like, rush, rush, rush, let's go. We're out of time. We worked process and we got our toxins down, we got the inflammation going away, the microbiome rebuilt, and she got pregnant super easy and had a healthy baby. I was like, yes. And then a year or two later, I had a patient come who was in her mid-30s. She tried multiple rounds of IVF, had gone coast to coast to look with IVF docs. They gave up on her. They're like, it's not going to work. Just stop now. So again, we just started looking at what was going on in her body, and we found a couple of autoimmune things going on and more on the microbiome, several things for about six months. She got pregnant right away, and then she thought she was still going to have a little bit of issues with infertility. And less than a year later, still nursing, got pregnant with twins.
- [05:47]
A
Whoa.
- [05:49]
B
And then we quit. Hadn't finished our, Our, our lesson. She's almost 40 at this point, got pregnant third time with fourth baby. She ended up with four. Being told no babies to four and four. I, you know, I started paying attention to what are the things that affect fertility, what are the things that help people have healthy babies? And just got so passionate about it because it's. It's just one of the most fun things that I get to do.
- [06:19]
A
Okay, well, we're going to. I've got a ton of different directions I want to go with you on this. Now, you were talking about functional medicine. You're talking about heavy metal testing, autoimmune. All of these things that we know are of the utmost importance that have been overlooked for, I don't know how long. I don't have a direct number, but I know for a very, very, very long time. And I also know that there are way more prevalent problem now than they have ever been, and it's only progressively getting worse from things they put in our foods, high stress levels, et cetera. So let me ask you this. Let's say somebody has a pregnancy and they're full of toxicity, whether it's aluminum or mercury or the mold, the big culprits, what kind of effect is that going to have on the baby? And what kind of effect is that going to have on even allowing for a pregnancy in the first place?
- [07:20]
B
Right. I do think that these heavy metals and other environmental toxins are decreasing fertility, because I see with both men and women that when we test their levels to get them down, they get more fertile. But the really alarming thing is when people do get pregnant and those epigenetic messages from the toxins in the sperm and the egg and then also basically bathing the baby and the toxins during the fetal period increase the risk of all the things that we don't want. The autoimmunity, the autism, the other neurodevelopmental issues, the cancers to diabetes. Like, the. What I did with this book is I put, like, I put a lot of these links together that people aren't making on what these factors are, how we can test them and what we can do about it so that we can increase fertility and have healthier babies.
- [08:20]
A
So a lot of these fertility clinics that you can. That People do go to, do they take this approach, do they look for this type of thing? Or are they only looking for like prior drug use, alcohol use, things of that nature?
- [08:30]
B
They don't do any of that.
- [08:32]
A
Nothing.
- [08:32]
B
There's none of that. Not even looking for some of the things like the signs of the autoimmunity. Usually, like, that's so far down the line. But I really like for people to be doing this proactively. Look, do you have an autoimmune process that's brewing in your body so that we can reverse it? But unfortunately, most doctors don't even know that we can reverse autoimmune disorders by taking look at these factors like toxin levels, microbiome, mitochondrial function. I know a lot of these terms your audience is already familiar with goes.
- [09:06]
A
Into everything that we do. And so we need to keep stressing it over and over because the more we repeat it, the more people understand the importance and the level of importance.
- [09:16]
B
It's so critical in this preconception period because the sperm and the egg are like time capsules for the baby. So it's, it really is this place so that we can pass on the best information on the operating instructions through the genetics that they get.
- [09:34]
A
So just because you're not using drugs, you're not using alcohol, and you're doing all of these things, you could potentially be carrying so many toxins and still not even quite know that. And you could be feeding yourself certain types of foods and things consistently while you're pregnant too, and not know it exactly. And, and putting yourself into that. Yeah.
- [09:53]
B
So I text test for toxin levels on almost all my patients. And even people that think they're doing everything right, there's, there's always hidden things, including myself. Like, I think I'm doing everything right, but I'm like, I, I know that you mentioned that you don't eat out. I think that's actually probably really wise because so much of what I'm seeing currently are from the takeout containers or probably the packaged foods that people are eating. And one of the exciting things for men that are willing to cook or, you know, make sure that they're having fresh foods is they can make a dramatic change in the quality of their sperm in just a few weeks.
- [10:35]
A
Really.
- [10:35]
B
Like, I prefer that people go 3, 6, 12 months where they're really optimizing things. There's a study that just came out a couple months ago where they took men and for three weeks they fed them highly processed foods and then they did a little washout period. And Then they fed them, you know, fresh, healthy foods and they dramatically improved their sperm count in just a few weeks, which is supposed to be like 74 days to get the full process of the storm. So the fact that they could do it in three weeks, it could make such a difference in three weeks hit and it was so statistically significant is so inspiring. Right, because just get started, start making the changes, take the time to cook and feed yourself the healthy, fresh foods. And I think we, we could even start thinking about sperm as being an independent longevity marker. So there's a new sperm test by a company called Sperm qt where they can look at the epigenetics of the sperm. Not just the count and concentration and seed and all those things, but look at some of the epigenetic markers. And it's so fun to see those markers improve by putting a little effort in. Right?
- [11:49]
A
Yeah. See, that's the struggle I have. There's multiple reasons I don't eat out. One is because I, when I was modeling, I worked in many restaurants at bars and I saw what was going on back there. But two, the understanding about the processed foods and how they cook and what they use. And now there's probably 5% that go seed oil free or they care, but generally speaking, it's not affordable and they just don't do that a lot of these places. I don't think that there's enough people that have a rational understanding of just how bad these things are. And many people are going, that's nonsense. Oh, you know, and then the people that are producing them and making the money put out their trolls or fake studies or whatever you want to do to manipulate and trick everybody. I try to be the most rational guy around. And given my background, my past, most people trust me.
- [12:43]
B
Yeah.
- [12:44]
A
Going through what I've gone through. But I want to, you know, it's always good to hear from professionals because there are doctors that are just trained a certain way and I don't even blame them. But then there's ones like you, more functional, more open minded, more understanding. How big of a problem do you think the food is that we eat in comparison to just literally anything else in terms of our health?
- [13:09]
B
It's so important, especially even seeing this, like the study that I just described, like, you can dramatically change what's happening from a reproductive process in three weeks. And then so the way that I think about food is that it's foundational like all these other things in the biohacking. If you wanna do peptides, you wanna do hyperbaric you wanna do the sauna, those are great. But if you're, if you're trying to build them on a foundation that isn't solid, it's not gonna do much. Right. It's like building it on quicksand. So you gotta. I ask all my patients to really focus in on their diet and we do additional testing to know what it is that they need to eat to get the best results and to have the low inflammation in their bodies. But I don't have a single patient that I don't work them on optimizing their diet because I don't get as good a results with them if they're not willing to, to eat clean and really prioritize that. I feel like it's not gonna, they're not gonna get the results that they want if they don't do that.
- [14:20]
A
All of the stuff you mentioned are bonuses after you have a foundation and you're, you're optimized. And optimization isn't just the eating either. It's the hormones, it's the neuro sides, the mental side. I'm going to shift over there to you because I want to talk to you about the effect that stress, anxiety, lack of sleep. And I talk a lot about neuroscience now because I understand that being stuck in fight or flight mode is causing a lot of this. But do you find that now more than ever with all of the social media, the stresses, the things that get shoved down people's throats, that stress and anxiety and even hatred is causing us to be more unhealthy? And the biggest problem that you see out there for the mind, it's very.
- [15:07]
B
Clear from the research, and this is actually addressed in my book as well, that stress is such a driver for how fertile you are. But the epigenetic part of this is so important too for both men and women. So how are those genes gonna be dialed up, are down for the baby? It's so important to be mitigating your stress, managing the stress in relationships and work. So things like neurofeedback, meditation, the biggest nerve stimulator, really making sure you, you've gotten on the same page with your partner. I feel like it's super important for this topic, but every, every piece of help, it's gotta be a part of the conversation as well. And it's so fun to have the, the biohacking tools and to be able to, to delve into this. Even just five or ten minutes of meditation once or twice a day can dramatically change the, your hormone regulation. It can change your Microbiome, it can change your mitochondrial function and yeah, just on and on and on. The data behind this is incredible. And what I've also found super fascinating is the effects of drama, intergenerational effects there can be passed on. So you know, I think a lot of times we, we kind of put our own stress management in a back burner because we feel like, you know, we need to be prioritizing other people and not ourselves. Especially when we become parents, like okay, everybody else starts to. And yet it really is one of the most important things that we can do for ourselves to give ourselves the permission and the time to do the meditation, the neurofeedback to whatever modalities you feel called to do around trauma.
- [17:10]
A
So I'm 43 and it's taken me a little over 42 years to understand the control and the amount of impact that your nervous system and your, your neurological side has on every key aspect of everything that we do. And I'm one of those type ones that is like when I'm on, I am on fire. But I can go like this low from stress and anxiety too. And that's all like self done. And like you said about meditation and I do it as prayer and the more I do it and the more I can get there, like can shut off because I have this distraction thing where. Cause I know I have so much work to do when I can lock in and really lock in. I, I'm, I hate to say untouchable, but you know what I'm saying, I'm at my best.
- [17:58]
B
You get in a flow.
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A
Yes, because you're at peace. That's what I was just telling you about playing the video games last night. I was at. He said, I know that sounds childish and immature and stupid and I don't give a shit because it was fun and relaxing and it got me ready today. And I wonder when you have people come in that have problems, that are having issues and it's. You're seeing it on this side is do you see like continuously high levels of anxieties and stresses that aren't just related to the lack of ability to get pregnant, but other things.
- [18:33]
B
Like I just had a patient in this afternoon who is in his mid-50s. He's had normal cholesterol panels, extensive cholesterol panels, except for high lpa. He's been on statins, he's been on Repata, but I had had him get a, an advanced technology test called a clearly test that uses a CT angiogram, looks at soft medium and he has some pretty extensive. So he's sitting there thinking, oh my cholesterol's good. My other doctors have me on the cholesterol medicines. I'm golden. And then when we got this test sack and these medicines have not been protecting him like he thought that they were. He's got some pretty extensive blockages at a pretty young age. And so we just had the heart to heart this afternoon about what else he needs to do. He's got some gut inflammation and gluten issues and some heavy metals and some other environmental toxins that we found. So we're, you know, full court press because we've, we've got quite an issue here. But the most important conversation I think we had today was around stress. You know, been very successful and is semi retired at a young age as well. But he just stays in that high beta co co co co co even when he thinks he's, you know, just running kids around to their activities. And so we, we have to talk about what does it actually take to change state. Like we probably do need to do some neurofeedback. So he actually gets the opportunity to find out what it is like to not just be running in the high beta limbic survival state, but what is it like to run for his brain to run an alpha, maybe even theta brain state. So he was, he was open to it because he, you know, he could see what has been, what's working, what had worked for him to get him to where he is now, where he actually can light up on the gas a little bit and start to enjoy his life more. It he, he needs to look at that because the stressed collie is also somewhat of a dial, dialing up that inflammation.
- [21:02]
A
Does he have high inflammation?
- [21:04]
B
We had to really search for him. So I, something called a Cleveland Heart or Boston heart checks for LP, PLA2 and MPO high sensitivity CRP, which are traditionally the best markers for inflammation that correlate with advancing cardiac issues. His tour normal. So I had to do a smart vascular test, which we also got back today, predicted his a, his inflammatory age to be about 80 instead of 55. So we had to dig a little deeper than the traditional ways to find, you know, to actually find the risk factors that now we can do our mini experiments every six to eight weeks and try the diet, try the supplements, do the detox. We're also gonna do some IV phosphatidylcholine and NAD so that we can really get a get ahead of this because.
- [21:59]
A
It'S just, yeah, it's Strange to be on something like repatha and a statin. I mean, I am not a statin fan by any stretch of the imagination, but it should harden any soft plaque in the prepathus. See, the, the LP is the issue because, as you know, it's genetic. Not going to control it with diet.
- [22:22]
B
But I have so many patients with a high LP that have no, zero.
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A
It's weird because I see a lot of people that don't, but then there's always some. And I'm. And I speak because I know everything where you're going because I, I went to get a calcium score two and a half years ago and I thought, you know, the, the doctor I was working with said, I just have all my people that work with me go do it. He's like, I mean, look at you. You know, And I went in there and it was 120 and I thought I, I had a damn near meltdown. And then I dug and dug and I. My LP Lil A was 3:30. So progressively I've gotten it down into the 90s. I did a CT angio and it showed like a 35%, which thankfully, that's early enough of a catch. But I am on. I was on repath of vascepa and dropped the stat and didn't take it. And then I started to hack my way into other avenues that I know can reverse atherosclerosis. Because you can reverse it.
- [23:19]
B
You can reverse it, especially when you're willing to do the work.
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A
Yeah, that's it. Yeah, there's. There's plenty of things out there that can do it. And. Well, then I had some episodes and I was having strange heart palpitations went in and they did, you know, the catheter. And he looked at me and he says, there's no blockage here at all. And I thought, okay, well then what the hell's wrong with me? Ejection fractions. Now, look. So, yeah, 44. When I had that done in June, I got on jardiance and in three months I'm up to 50. I'm with D, ribose, ubiquitol and Jardians. But that's the problem is, is, you know, this.
- [24:02]
B
And that's the thing. I think sometimes when you lower the cholesterol, you actually make the cell membranes more fragile and you, you know, toxic load or get the stress or whatever, and then it makes the actual muscle more weak.
- [24:18]
A
And then. And I think. You tell me what you think. I think that a lot of this low fat diet that I did for so long. And that I see people do. Contributed to the heart problems, probably the plaque, and then probably the other way. You know what? And I've had an eating disorder most of my life, but when I switched and I doubled my calories and went from 20 grams of fat today to now 130, my HDL went up 40 points. Yeah. From the low 40s to 80.
- [24:47]
B
And so for people listening, that HDL going up is huge.
- [24:50]
A
Yeah.
- [24:51]
B
Because it's like having more garbage trucks to go gather up the oxidized ldl. That's huge.
- [24:59]
A
My LDL went up and APOB went up a little bit. But the other things and it's that.
- [25:04]
B
I mean, it's more challenging to try to get the HDL to go up than it is to get LDL to go down.
- [25:09]
A
Right.
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B
It's really good work.
- [25:10]
A
Yeah. Thank you. And now I don't like to over medicate. They gave. I have very low blood pressure as it is, and they put me on a trust bill with the Jardians, and I lasted a month or two and was right back in the hospital, you know, stop taking it. And the problem with Jardians is, is it sucks the electrolytes out of you. And so I keep getting low potassium. And you gotta. You gotta be careful there, too. You can't win.
- [25:37]
B
Be surprised if you could just get the heart muscle stronger and then be off that.
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A
Yeah. Well. And see, you have to look at all of these things. And that poses the question. With cholesterol testing, my biggest issue is they look at ldl, hdl, and triglycerides and don't look at what you're talking about. Particle sizes, apob, lp. Why. Why don't they look at these?
- [26:04]
B
They're just not trained on it. So I. I actually get kind of mad when people just order a regular cholesterol because it doesn't correlate with who actually gets heart disease very well at all. We really have to look at the article sizes, like the lpa, the LDL sizes and the HDL sizes, along with these detailed markers for inflammation, to know who's at risk. I think a lot of people are actually having a lot of harm done by lowering their cholesterol. When they don't have the cholesterol, then to make healthy brain and healthy heart and hormones.
- [26:43]
A
Yeah, yeah. You know, my cholesterol got down to 38. My LDL. 38. And I said, okay, I'm done. I am not doing this because I know better, you know, And I even went to the Mayo Clinic, and they told me to use Repatha would have been bad practice. I needed to stay on a statin. And I said, statins, increase your lp. And they got angry with me when I said that, and so did my mom and my wife until they, they came to and understood. But that's Mayo Clinic, so what does that tell you? I mean, that's why we need people like you more so than ever right now. My goal is to spotlight people like you, to get them functional, get functional medicine, to understand that we're missing. What do you think when you go. Because we know you get a CMP and a cbc. I mean, what percentage of a blood panel do you think we're missing? 70, 80% that we need. When you go to a regular doctor.
- [27:40]
B
Oh, you're missing most of what you need. Most of the traditional blood tests that are done through, like, LabCorp west are. You're only going to find things mostly when it's too late. So if we really want to know what is how the body's functioning, we need to do specialty tests through specialty labs. We need to look at toxin levels, we need to look at the microbiome, we need to look at how the mitochondria are functioning. More details for inflammation. I'd love to do genetic testing so we can delve into, like, where you might have some little pathway glitches or maybe you don't detoxify. Great. Maybe your immune system is upregulated. So when we know what some of those specific genes are, then we can optimize things by knowing how to have some workarounds. So, yes, I mean, I, I use traditional labs because sometimes we need to do that, but to really propel your health forward, you need so much more than that.
- [28:46]
A
Yeah, it, it's troublesome.
- [28:48]
B
It's so funny because for years I've thought about Medicare as being subpar to other insurances, but it turns out that Medicare actually covers some of these specialty tests that really. Yes, they will cover some of the microbiome tests, they will cover some of the deeper nutritional testing to look at amino acids, essential fatty acids, trace minerals, a little bit about how the mitochondria are working. Kevin covers it at least once a year. So I don't know if, if a traditional insurance will ever catch up with an effective. But, you know, it's expensive not to have this, wait until you've gotten sick.
- [29:32]
A
I agree that. But that therein lies the problem. It's more expensive to eat healthier, it's more expensive to get the testing you need. It's more expensive to go to the functional doctor than the regular doctor. It's more expensive to do everything that you need. It's almost. And call me crazy, but it's almost as if they don't. You're not wanted to get the things that you need. At least it would seem that way if it makes it harder for people. And, well, that's why when you write a book like this or you do what you're doing, it's more accessible, and people can then say, okay, this is what I'm missing. It needs to come from pros like you that are trustworthy, though. And that's another problem. And there's people that take advantage of people that put bad taste in people's mouth. And so I don't know what needs to be done, but I do know this. This message has to get out to more people. They need a better understanding and to understand that it's how necessary it is for you. Every single person that comes into you, do you put them through all of these tests? They have to do that to get optimized and to get ready or.
- [30:36]
B
Yeah, I really do. In my office, I can customize for each patient, depending on what their budget is and what's going on with them. You know, do they. They having early dementia? Are they having fertility issues? Are they just being proactive and wanting to have health and longevity, or they dealing with some autoimmune or.
- [30:57]
A
So you take all kinds of patients or just.
- [30:59]
B
Oh, yeah, yeah, no, that's. I. I got so fascinated about this preconception period just from my.
- [31:05]
A
From your work work.
- [31:06]
B
From the face of coming in. Like, you know, I sometimes still see kids. So, like a story that just popped in my head was mom and a dad who brought in their two young children. They had just gone through a big mold issue, and your little girl had autism, and the little boy was having a pandas where he was having a lot of tics and behavioral things. And so we, you know, we started working with the kid, got the autism turned around, got the pan pandas settled down, and then the parents started coming in to work on their health. And then suddenly they're pregnant with their third baby, not even planning because they had had to do infertility treatments for the first two. So.
- [31:49]
A
Wow.
- [31:51]
B
So it's been just the experience of taking care of my patients that I've. Wait, there's. There is a message that's missing. The. The narrative is that women are old, over 30, they need to save their eggs. Men don't know that their health really makes a difference for the health of the pregnancy and health of the baby. And. And so I just, I'm just trying to fill in the gap about what people need to know. And especially, you know, there's some books coming out this year that are. It's almost like they're just making IVF normalized.
- [32:28]
A
Yeah, we were talking about that. What, what is happening?
- [32:32]
B
Well, there really is a drop in fertility.
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A
Yeah.
- [32:35]
B
One in five or six couples can't get pregnant in a year, either with their first or future or, you know, additional kids. And there is, you know, a decline in sperm over 50% in the last 50 years, but it's accelerating. Instead of being at 1% a year, it's 2.6% a year drop in sperm count globally, and it just dropping the big drop in the number of children being born. So we have a real thing going on. But this whole idea that women's ovaries age to the extent that they're talking about, I don't think that that is true based on what I see. So we. There's a new study that just came out a few months ago that showed that the mitochondrial DNA of the eggs pretty well preserved. So I think the eggs are just picking up the environment the body is in. So the toxins, the microbiome, the hormone disruptions that we're seeing and that when we address those things, women can have help babies well into their 40s. My oldest patient is 47 right now, and she. She had a situation where she already had a couple kids. Something was, I met the love of her life and wanted. They wanted to have a job together. And she had heard about me. So she came in and we found some things that weren't optimal. So I'm like, wait, use condoms? And so she did. They did the work for about three months, and then one had one night where they didn't use the condom at 47 and got freaking one try.
- [34:16]
A
Wow.
- [34:17]
B
So it just shows me that the eggs are really, when they're in a really healthy environment, it doesn't matter how old the rest of the body is, that you. You can have a very fertile and have a healthy baby volunteer.
- [34:35]
A
Because, you know, it's always said that as the woman gets older, there's way more risk. Way more risk. How big of a risk is it as you get older in terms of the woman's health and then the health of the baby?
- [34:46]
B
Definite. We age, we have more chance to have damage to our DNA, but we can mitigate a lot of that for both men and women, we know that, you know, now there's the conversation about the male sperm increasing risk as well. As we age, I really see, especially during doing the sperm test, that we can mitigate a lot of that by supporting mitochondria, making sure we're putting the good nutrients in, by getting the toxins out and down. You can see things improve dramatically in very short periods of time.
- [35:20]
A
So one of the things that I always have trouble with that bothers me is this, like, gradual, and I guess I would even call it gradual, this consistent decline in average testosterone levels among men as time goes on. And. And then you see these, the Lab Corp and the Quest and everybody else that changes their range that's supposedly healthy. I talk about this a lot. I have more of a hormones background. But that obviously has to be a contributing factor too, to the fertility process. Right. I mean, lower, more stressed and strained testosterone levels certainly would be problematic.
- [35:59]
B
Absolutely. So then we work on the things that help the body to make more testosterone naturally. Lowering inflammation, eating the healthier food, like the study that I was mentioning on this firm.
- [36:12]
A
Yeah.
- [36:13]
B
Quality part of just cutting out the processed food. Testosterone went up crazy. It's so I think, you know, there's a lot of nutrients that are needed to make testosterone.
- [36:24]
A
Yeah.
- [36:25]
B
And so, yeah, let those in the body. Let's get inflammation down, let's get stress down. Eat the good fat so that you have a nice high cholesterol to start with. And a lot of times we can see testosterone come up natural.
- [36:37]
A
Yeah. Oh, it's totally doable. I've seen it year after year after year. And there's good herbs, there's good foods, rest, you know, less stress. All of these things, they all play a big role sometimes.
- [36:49]
B
Like, we really. We are kind of having an epidemic of young testosterone.
- [36:54]
A
Yeah.
- [36:55]
B
We have to look at that and look at what's causing it and help them. And I mean, it's just. It's a longevity issue, not just a fertility issue. Men don't feel like themselves. They don't feel good with low testosterone to just replace it doesn't make sense. Like, we have to get to the root of why the body isn't performing at the level that it should be.
- [37:18]
A
Yes. Because everybody, as soon as you say low testosterone, immediately wants trt. And I'm a proponent of it. When needed.
- [37:25]
B
Right.
- [37:26]
A
When needed.
- [37:27]
B
But I really recommend not doing testosterone until after you've had your family.
- [37:32]
A
Yeah. Oh, yeah, That's a big problem, bro.
- [37:36]
B
Things off.
- [37:37]
A
Oh, and this is. This was one of the million reasons why I had to get more out of that bodybuilding space and everything because of the arguments of, oh, we, it only takes one and da, da, da, da, da. The impairment that you can have on fertility by taking synthetic testosterone is astounding. And then, well, you can just take Clomid, you could just HHT's HCG. Bullshit. It's just not true.
- [38:02]
B
Um, I mean, I have had people that have been on testosterone and we've gotten them back.
- [38:07]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [38:09]
B
And you know, kind of look back at, well, did you really need that in the first place? Could we have done this before then? But so I don't want to leave people with no hope that you have testosterone and don't want to have child. But so much easier to say problem than to be like dysregulating the system. Because when you take testosterone, all the pathways that help to give you the signals to make testosterone get quieted.
- [38:35]
A
But see, that's the problem is a lot of guys, they see one side of it and, and they, they see a, a side that actually doesn't even exist because they think it does all of these things when in actuality it's just fixing what you're lacking. It's not turning you into what they think. But then they don't have any sort of concept or understanding of shutting down natural testosterone production and then what that does long term, because once you shut that down and you think it's just going to pop right back, because a lot of guys like to tell you that is not how it works. So when that happens and you stop your LH and your fsh from production, how do we fix that? Or, and how big of a problem is that in terms of fertility coming from a doctor? Please explain.
- [39:19]
B
Yeah, so just any, like, if you think about any system, a car is a good place to start. Right. Like if you just let a whole part of that car not maybe you don't use the air conditioning system.
- [39:33]
A
Yeah, right.
- [39:33]
B
For five years and then you all sudden start trying to use the air conditioning system quite the same.
- [39:40]
A
Right, right.
- [39:40]
B
You've been using it a little bit all the time, you know, every year. It can be very challenging to get at attunement because body's constantly adjusting with so many different mechanisms and even sensing is this a good time to create, create life. It's especially true for women. Like if you're over exercising, if you're extra stressed, if you're, if you're not eating enough food, if you're missing some vital nutrients, the body will often sense don't get pregnant. What I worry about is the people that their systems are actually strong enough that it overrides that sensing when it's not a good idea and still get pregnant and then have complications. So that's why it's so great to be able to do more of this advanced lab testing to really see where people are to, to really make sure that things are tuned up.
- [40:38]
A
I'm glad you brought that up. I didn't even think about the over training side of things and how big of a detriment that can be. I was the king of that for many years and I've seen so many people that do that without the understanding of what that actually does.
- [40:51]
B
It's easier to detect this in women because they often will stop having their periods or their periods will change.
- [40:59]
A
Right.
- [40:59]
B
It's harder to detect it in men, but I think it really holds true in men too. Yeah, there's something called the cortisol steel. So the body will kind of slurp up the estrogen, testosterone, estrogen, progesterone side of things and send it over into the cortisol pathway. But then again back to the epigenetics, the time capsule. I could sperm the, the way that the baby's genes will get expressed also flood that state. So it's really important men to be exercising, get good epigenetics for their babies. You know, good blood sugar regulation. I love for people to wear continuous glucose monitors and that they have a good state there because that gets passed on blood sugar dystregulated. Those epigenetic changes are going to be impacted by the baby. And there's so much data now around the things that increase the risk with baby being obese or baby having diabetes, including the environmental toxins and the, you know, in fast food. So getting the bad, fast getting the chemicals and can make such a big difference for their long term health and longevity and maybe even future generations. Sometimes these things get passed on for more than one generation. This is so important to take this time to really get your, your own body tuned up so that you can help your baby to data better longevity. Data, data, data, data, data.
- [42:34]
A
I am a big data guy and I'm glad you brought up the CGM because just because you tell me that you wear CGM and your blood sugar or your glucose doesn't spike when you, I don't know, have a bowl of oatmeal, doesn't mean it's not gonna spike for me. And also it'll give people an understanding of how their body reacts and responds to types of foods. And then you can play with that and say, okay, well when I eat this carb by itself, I'm having this problem. But maybe if I prioritize protein, fat and then this carbon, then check and see if that, that controls it like it should or not. And then you can go, well, if that's not controlling it, well, I just can't do it. Right. But you never know. You can't just guess.
- [43:15]
B
Just so individual. Yeah, it's, it's, it's actually kind of one of the fun things about the ecgm. I learn things all the time from, from my patients on what, what can work for different people. Like somebody would be like, oh my God, I could never eat rice. Like it just spikes even if I have plenty of protein or fat, or go for a walk afterwards. And then other people might be like, or potato or just no go. Yeah, it's so individual.
- [43:43]
A
You just brought up one of my favorite things too. So speak on that if you would please. But going for a walk after a meal, why that is so important, please explain.
- [43:52]
B
Was one of my biggest takeaways for me wearing the CGM is if I would just move my body for even 10 or 15 minutes after eating. My blood sugar was so soft almost regardless of what I ate.
- [44:09]
A
That's wild.
- [44:10]
B
A couple of crazy things that I like, I kind of pushed the envelope. One year I did it over Thanksgiving and I just wanted to see like if I had gluten free, dairy free pumpkin pie for breakfast.
- [44:22]
A
It's way we're just gathering data.
- [44:24]
B
I think it was a combination of probably the coconut milk and the fiber in it.
- [44:28]
A
Yeah, of course. But that's great to learn and see. You know what I bought me and my wife like bicycles. Bikes. Because I walk every day on this path. And I told her, I said, damn it, this looks so cool. Something for us to do. And so that's what I do after I eat now. So I, I do it at night after my biggest meal and I go like a 25 minute bike ride. And it's, it's so nice because sometimes when you walk or something after you have a heavier meal, it does kind of disrupt your stomach. But this, I'm moving and it doesn't do that. And so that's a nice way of moving to after. So I was, I offer that to people as something else to do.
- [45:05]
B
It's a great idea.
- [45:06]
A
Yeah, it works. It's nice.
- [45:08]
B
And the other thing I did was I had a chai latte almond milk, chai latte. It spiked my blood sugar so high. I haven't had one since. It's been a couple years since I did.
- [45:21]
A
Wow.
- [45:21]
B
I was like, this is not worth it. Why would I ever have this again?
- [45:25]
A
No, there's way better options.
- [45:27]
B
Love the CGMs.
- [45:28]
A
CGMs are great. What do you, which one do you use? I used the Stello, I think is the one that. Yeah, Stello is the one I used.
- [45:35]
B
The one that I usually use to my patients is the Freestyle Libre. But I think they're. They're all similar.
- [45:42]
A
Yeah, it is some of the most phenomenal data to collect of pinpoint accuracy.
- [45:49]
B
And it's such a important piece of all the risk factors. Right. So when we have better blood sugar control, we're less likely to have heart disease, we're less likely to have cancer. The autoimmunity, like just having a really stable blood sugar can be massive prevention. Even certain parts of dementia can be increased at risk when the increased blood sugar spike.
- [46:17]
A
So I'm, I'm curious on your end and I always ask this to everybody that I know that is a specialist or a pro that deals with anything nutrition. And this is more just for fun discussion on. On beliefs and belief systems. And I know and realized most people that I know when I'm talking to somebody extremely intelligent because they'll always answer, well, it's subjective to the person. And that's what I know. And I, this is a test. So I gave the answer away. But I am curious on your end because I get into these discussions and people get so angry if you're low carb or high carb or know what I mean? It's very polarizing. They get so, like, hurt. I'm like, are you married to the diet? Let's just talk facts here. How do you feel on. On micro or macronutrient balancing between carbs, fats and proteins? Are you like a even split?
- [47:08]
B
Do you.
- [47:08]
A
Are you more low carb or you think carbs are more important? Where do you fall?
- [47:13]
B
I do think it depends on the person and I think it depends and even on this situation, the particular, particular person has in their life. Like, I think there are times when doing a carnivore diet for a few weeks can be a really great microbiome reset I was looking for.
- [47:29]
A
It's a mix, right?
- [47:30]
B
Yeah. There's no doubt that phytonutrients are very preventive for very many things. Like just having green leafy things decreases your risk for dementia and cancer. And many Other things, the cruciferous vegetables for most people are you know, really enhanced detox and therefore do a whole bunch of good things. So you know, some of it does just boil down to preference too. We, we all have to feed ourselves and, and prepare food but I don't think you can go wrong with super high quality protein and the best plants that you can find wherever you live, organic, seasonal, raised really well so that you get those nutrients in that are going to really run your biochemistry physiology. And then I'm. It's very clear we've done America a disservice by doing low fat diet.
- [48:28]
A
Oh shit.
- [48:29]
B
You have to get good fat into your diet to have a healthy brain, to have a healthy, it's just a.
- [48:35]
A
Non negotiable of all the mistakes I've made which are mount of they're just mounds of mistakes that I made. I think that, that living on that low fat diet for so long is probably the biggest nutritional mistake I've ever made that I could ever make. Is just I, I, I would do this thing that I can't stand that other people do and I did it and I can't stand myself for doing it. I'm the exception. I can't eat that without even trying. Just convinced in my head that it was going to have a negative effect on me. And I, when I did that switch and I increased the fast to the level I have, my whole world opened up. I'm kind of of the mindset at this point because I, I did, I don't do low carb, especially with the training I do but I keep the carbs probably the lower end of my three and I've raised them now a little bit and I'm finding that I feel more stable. Electrolyte loss, you know and, and not getting enough of the carbs is detrimental if you train hard.
- [49:34]
B
I like to think about having a dual engine like kind of a hybrid model.
- [49:39]
A
Yeah.
- [49:41]
B
So good to be able to burn some carbs. Yeah. And it's good to yield, burn some fat.
- [49:46]
A
Metabolic flexibility.
- [49:48]
B
Yeah. So I think we have to mix.
- [49:50]
A
It up a little and I think like you said, there's a lot of determining factors. How, how often and how hard do you work out? What kind of conditions are you dealing with? How old are you? Because you know this, as we get older, some things don't agree with us as we age like they used to and combinations and correlations. What order do we eat in? What kind of things do we have on our plate? I don't think people understand how important it is to prioritize certain nutrients on your plate in order for like what the, the spikes and, and things like that too. And I like to have meals that are pretty consistent with all three involved if I can. Yes, you know.
- [50:29]
B
And do you start with protein?
- [50:30]
A
Always? Yeah, always. Unless it's a heavier fat and you know, but the proteins and the fats too. Right. So. Oh yeah, no, no, I, I always do. Unless I, I do mix vegetables in with, with meats a lot that I like to do. But yeah, a hundred percent.
- [50:48]
B
Yeah. And then I, so I, I've had a couple of run ins with my body too. Some healing journeys and there were times where doing a vegetarian macrobiotic gluten free diet actually was very healing for me. And then I love to go do Panchakarma, did the Indian Ayurvedic detox once a year. And so that's like nine to 12 days of doing a vegetarian diet. But I have to like kind of cheat and do extra protein. I stick it into the center cuz otherwise I just dropped too much weight.
- [51:24]
A
Yeah.
- [51:24]
B
Defeat the purpose of the whole thing. So it's kind of an interesting process to just play with it and see what feels good, what works. And just like you said, as for aging, things change. Like I found as I'm aging I need so much more protein than I ever did before. And I, I really think that this study that shows that you need to get 30, at least 30 grams of protein to stimulate muscle synthesis. I think there's something to that. 30 at least 30g grams of protein within an hour of getting up. And it's a game changer.
- [52:03]
A
Yeah, I'm, you know, like in the, in the bodybuilding area, they're always wanting super ridiculously high amounts that I don't find necessary. But I've always been a one to one ratio. One gram per pound of body weight I think is pretty damn solid. I mean you could go a little bit under that. But I, the importance of preventing sarcopenia as you age, which is a prevalent problem. And here let me ask you then as a functional doctor, because some people struggle with this. I don't think people realize how difficult it is to add one to two pounds of lean muscle a year. It is not easy.
- [52:42]
B
Well, so we go to the GLP1s please.
- [52:46]
A
We can do that for sure.
- [52:49]
B
So I'm, I, I think we got a whole new epidemic going on because people are not doing the GLP1s well and they're easily losing pounds and pounds of muscle. Not not realizing it. So to do the GLP1 safely, I really think that people need to start with the Texas scan, full body DEXA scan, know how much muscle they have and then follow it every three months. And then they have to be very proactive about getting at least a gram per pound body weight of protein every day. And then to take the supplements that really help with building muscles. So the carnitine, creatine, all other mitochondrial support. There's a peptide that I like by healthevity called Longevity and then another supplement called meios which has bordotropin in it. And. And then extra amino acids sometimes are required to keep the Dexa skin solid. If patients are not willing to do that work, I am not willing to prescribe the GLP ones for them because they're gonna be worse off metabolically than they were when they started. And they might be feel slimmer, but the sarcopenia, the muscle loss is going to leave them so, so set out for disaster in their lives.
- [54:08]
A
I think everybody over the age of 10 to 12 should be taking creatine. And I think anybody that's on GLP1 it should. You know when you get peptides and it comes with bacteriostatic water to reconstitute the peptide, I think it should just be a mandatory thing that goes along with your GLP1 is you, you, you take 5 grams of creatine a day. I think that that should be mandatory.
- [54:30]
B
And for some people need to do even more reconstruction. Oh yeah, yeah. Even more to. To boost the. Some of us long lean people that's kind of. It's been, it's not been easy for me to build muscle my whole life. What I've learned by helping patients to not lose the muscle has helped me to actually build more muscle than I've ever been able to build before. Because I'm like I'm not doing this if we're gonna actually make you worse in the long run. So I've been doing these things myself. Nice. The, the creatine and taking the, the longevity peptides and the bordotrope. Have you tried the trope?
- [55:10]
A
I haven't personally, but I am very, very aware of it.
- [55:13]
B
Those three things together have been a game changer really as far as how much I need to work out and still actually build muscle.
- [55:20]
A
Okay.
- [55:21]
B
So fun and, and that's not an easy thing.
- [55:25]
A
Over me and Sean. Well, today came we discussed the best protocol that was the safest for gaining size and strength natural supplement wise. So obviously creatine, betaine, hmb. These were three absolute essentials that we have to take. It were all safe and effective to use and those were like the top three that we came up with that were like a perfect stack, you know, natural stack. And, and dilucine was the big one.
- [55:57]
B
Oh, interesting.
- [55:59]
A
Dilucine was actually he, I mean he was talking about just creatine really for muscle building. Like the creatine I think is like I said, cuz I, I firmly believe like I have my 73 year old mom in there who was like scared of her shadow and she still takes it too. I, I think everybody should be taking it. I wish that it was more prevalently known what it did for so many years when it first came out because everybody thought it was just for strength and muscle and water retention. Yeah, all true in a sense, but nowhere near what we're seeing. Right. So I think, and you tell me, do you think part of the problem with the GLP1 S2 is a lack of, of education on the importance of the diet that needs to go along with.
- [56:46]
B
Yeah, it, it just needs to be part of the protocol.
- [56:49]
A
Yeah, right.
- [56:51]
B
I think it's gotten, it just has gotten off track, you know, starting out as a diabetes medicine and not really thinking through what the long term repercussions are with muscle loss.
- [57:06]
A
And that's just it. And that's what sucks about things is then somebody gets a hold of it, sees what it does, tells one person, tells another, and especially with something like weight loss, it explodes and people have a more is always better concept with everything. And I've found, and I'm curious on your opinion on this. The, the microdosing with the GLP one can have some good neurological benefits long term and would certainly have a less likelihood of stress on muscle loss. But people want to go for the gold and they want to dose way too much. What do you feel about the microdosing side? Are you more comfortable with that?
- [57:44]
B
Yes, for sure. So it's really interesting because what I'm actually really known for is my taking care of patients who've been exposed to toxic mold and a lot of environmental medicine. So with, with toxicity and with toxic mold, a lot of people get something called mast cell activation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, so what's really been Fascinating with the GLP1s, especially tirzepotide, is that microducing tirzepatide helps to stabilize mast cells.
- [58:16]
A
Really?
- [58:16]
B
Yes. So it's been a very interesting process to use it in like quarter doses. Quarter doses as part of the mast cell protocol. Again, you know, mold toxicity, cell activation are very complex illnesses. It's very challenging just to say, okay, here's the protocol and. And go figure it out. A lot of times it does take a lot of fine tuning and iterating.
- [58:48]
A
Yeah.
- [58:49]
B
If for people that can tolerate the GLP1 with the mast cell, it can really speed up the trajectory of their healing.
- [58:59]
A
Wow. That's. I see. This is why I love this. Cuz I always learn new shit and I love it. Let's touch on your book because I. I don't know where the time went, but I, I didn't. We see we went a lot of places you didn't expect, but I'm. But I am spotlighting everything that you do. Not just one thing. I know that you wrote the book. I know that we're talking about that. But see, this is great because you touched on so many things. We get to show the multifaceted knowledge base that you have. And that's why I love doing this. And I don't do scripts because we would have never done this had I ever gone off any strip. That's why I don't use scripts.
- [59:36]
B
That's great because you're just so curious and interested and I am. So many different areas that you've. You've explored. So it's fun to chat with you.
- [59:47]
A
It's fun to bring out so many different avenues of a person that you maybe don't ever get to talk about or you're not known for or that only people behind closed doors sees that are your patients. You know what I mean? Somebody's known as a specialist in this or that. And then you never get to see or learn what all they do. You know what I mean? And so that's. That's awesome. Let's talk about your book that's coming out here.
- [60:13]
B
Yep. Preconception.
- [60:14]
A
Yeah. When is it coming out?
- [60:16]
B
Well, it's out.
- [60:17]
A
It's out now.
- [60:18]
B
Out.
- [60:19]
A
So people can buy it. Right.
- [60:20]
B
Right now. Easiest to buy on Amazon than any place that books are sold. And it's really like, it's. It ended up being kind of a thick book because I really wanted to address a lot of these things. I wanted people to understand the impacts of toxins and blood sugar and mold and all these things that I've learned over the last 20 years. Helping my patients so that they can really be prepared to have healthy baby and not have to go down these infertility paths and, and take our healthy families without all fear.
- [60:59]
A
When I talk to you, what hit me probably one of the hardest things was your concern about the lack of preparation and understanding for, for people that were becoming new parents. I have a. I have the biggest soft spot in the world for kids. I, I don't necessarily have my own, but I have step kids, I have grandkids, and I have always been the guy that comes in and plays with the kids and is, is the one that they go to and they flock to and, and I have this utter care where so many things affect me. Like, I recently did an interview with Aaron Seri, who did the vaccine book. And you know, I was, I was like, man, I don't know if I should do this. I want to, but I, it's pushing it. And I was on the airplane and I was reading it because he sent it to me because he wanted to do the interview. And as soon as I got to the thing about the kids, I set the book down. As soon as I got off the plane, I called my wife and I said, I don't give a shit. I am doing this because it was relation to the kids. And that's what drew me to you the most on our conversation was your care for the way that parents were going to bring them into the world. And I feel like that's a lot of the reason why you wrote the book.
- [62:07]
B
Really hard to see. You know, it's hard to see people going through infertility, but it's harder to see people that have.
- [62:19]
A
Yeah, it's worse.
- [62:20]
B
It's devastating when parents bring in their child with autism or autoimmune issues, mental health, all the things that we're seeing and me knowing that it might have been preventable.
- [62:32]
A
Well, I think that what you're doing is amazing because that's your goal and that's what you're trying to do. So we got to make sure people read this book, take everything that you're saying for what it is and how valuable and important it is. These things that we talk about, we're not just saying them because we're fear mongering or because we're, we're crazy. It's because it's a damn fact.
- [62:54]
B
You know, I've been practicing functional medicine for 20 years and our, we really do have a children's health epidemic. Like, it's, it's very daunting what's happening with our kids. And I feel so lucky that the, the research to back up what I believe is, it's, it's here, it's in the book. We can make such a huge difference to the health, work, child by really focusing that free 612 months on for both partners. It's just one of the exquisite things about humanology. Like it could really make huge changes really fast.
- [63:35]
A
We gotta try because it's affecting our kids, their kids, their kids as kids. And it's gonna keep going down the line. And this, this is an epidemic along with several other things as you know. And it's all kind of correlating and into where it's coming from and why. So it, it needs to have a continuously growing group to address this and talk about it and do something about it. And the only thing that can we can do is be a voice. And we need more and more and more. And that's the goal.
- [64:04]
B
Thank you for caring so much. Like I think that's really what is going to move the needle is to people that really do care. We care about each other, we care about the kids, we care about the communities and future generation having good life.
- [64:21]
A
That's it. Selflessness is undefeated because you, you're always helping. You know what I mean? And when you, when you do that, I am only an expert by the people I hang out with like you, that I talk to, that I learn from. I'm good at letting everybody see you and bringing out the best in you, I hope in terms of what you do. So that is always my goal. And, and I love talking with people like you and showcasing probably what you don't get to showcase, which is I think we did today.
- [64:51]
B
Thank you so much. I hope this really inspires anybody that is starting or growing their family to press the pause button and relearn what it is that they can be doing to help their babies be healthier.
- [65:05]
A
So where can people come follow you or even sign up with you, get with you? Like do you take impatience and then where do they buy the book from?
- [65:13]
B
Yeah, uh, so my website's annshipbmd.com or on Instagram. Lots of good information there. And then we have a new site that we've just developed for this particular topic called every baby. Well that's the goal is that every baby gets a better start by their parents. I love for it ahead of time. So and then the book is on Amazon and every place that exers all preconception revolution because really is time to help people to tap into this period that really will give them the best shot at being fertile and tapping.
- [65:49]
A
Amazing. I will link everything in the description so everybody listening, no excuse, click on the links they put in there. But thank you for having me here. Thank you for getting this all set up for us and for everything that you do, I immediately knew by talking to you and in a million times more. Now I'm pretty good with the judgment after all these years on people, and I feel like I hit a home run with you. And I really appreciate the time and all of your efforts, and it will not go undone, I assure you.
- [66:21]
B
Thank you so much.
- [66:23]
A
You're very welcome. All right, everybody, that wraps up another one. I know I always say, I hope you get a lot from this. I know you're going to get a lot from this. So stay tuned for plenty more to come. Dylan Gelli and Dr. Ann Shippy signing off.
- [66:36]
B
That was.
- [66:44]
A
Sa.