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You can feel exhausted, anxious, and inflamed and still be told your labs are normal.

In this episode, I’m kicking off a mineral series that pairs with the daily posts I’m sharing in December so I can give you the depth and context that I just can’t squeeze into a single post. You will learn about the five macro minerals as the big players that run your electrical system, stress response, thyroid, blood sugar, and detox pathways, and why I always start with a straightforward hair test before worrying about smaller numbers.

What is really happening when these core minerals drift out of balance and you feel fatigued, anxious, constipated, bloated, unable to sleep well, or emotionally numb while your blood work keeps looking normal? Chronic stress, mold, gut and absorption issues, restrictive eating, big hormonal transitions, and even over filtered water can quietly drain these minerals long before anything shows up clearly on your standard labs. Your body has been compensating for years using every mineral trick it has to keep your blood looking stable, and the question is whether you’ll help it move from survival back into actually feeling good.

You’ll Learn:

[00:00] Introduction
[02:49] What a cellular-level mineral test reveals long before blood work changes
[04:57] How calcium can steady your system or silently block hormonal signals
[05:51] The surprising ways low magnesium derails energy, mood, and digestion
[06:52] What sodium levels expose about your stress load and resilience
[18:52] How mold strips key minerals and creates the “four lows” pattern
[20:26] Why arsenic and other heavy metals rise when minerals crash
[32:40] What it really takes to move from mineral survival mode back to stability

Resources Mentioned:

Master Your Minerals Course | WebsiteOther Hormone Healing episodes to listen to:

Zinc deep dive | Episode
Copper deep dive | Episode
Iron deep dive Part 1 | Episode
Iron deep dive Part 2 | Episode
All about the Copper IUD | Episode
Selenium deep dive | Episode
Nothing boring about Boron | Episode

Master your minerals. Harmonize your hormones. Start your mineral journey here.

Learn about helpful nutrition habits, the different phases of your cycle, how to track, signs of good metabolic health, and so much more in my Free Healthy Period Starter Guide.

Find more from Amanda:

Hormone Healing RD | Instagram
Hormone Healing RD | Website
Hormone Healing RD | Facebook
Hormone Healing RD | YouTube
Hormone Healing RD | TikTok

Transcript:

[00:00:00] Why are these five minerals so important? They truly influence every other mineral and nutrient in the body. They’re really the architects of your electrical system, stress response, thyroid, blood sugar, and detox pathways just like an architect, designs and oversees the construction of a building, calcium, magnesium.

[00:00:17] Sodium, potassium and phosphorus really design and oversee the entire structure and function of the body. Our bodies are incredibly intelligent. They have all these cool compensations that they do when you have low mineral levels, very high load on the liver, the kidneys, your detox organs, then. You start to retain more heavy metals and you have a hard time getting rid of them.

[00:00:36] I’ve helped a lot of women through perimenopause and that transition, the amount of progress I’ve seen just with supporting minerals, not even getting into the conversation of HRT or anything, they completely get rid of their symptoms. The good news is that we can restore mineral imb. And a lot of times it’s not that difficult.

[00:00:54] You can’t work on your gut health without minerals, but you can work on your minerals without [00:01:00] doing a stool test and a whole gut protocol.

[00:01:08] Welcome to the Hormone Healing RD podcast. We’ll get clear, practical guidance for your healing journey. I’m a Amanda Montalvo women’s health dietician and mineral expert after helping thousands of women in navigating my own healing. I know. How overwhelming the wellness world can be. And this show cuts through the noise with simple research and clinical backed insights on hormones, minerals, and what your body truly needs to heal.

[00:01:31] So we’re starting a new series. I’m very excited for it. It’s really partnering with my, I am doing 25 days of minerals on Instagram for December, and of course there’s only so much I can fit in. Instagram post. So to get into more detail and to just to provide like more context, I am gonna do a little mineral series to help you connect the dots when it comes to mineral imbalances.

[00:01:55] So this is part one, and we’re starting with digging into the macro [00:02:00] minerals, that’s calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, and phosphorus. And so I’m gonna get into what these minerals do in the body, how they work together, and then what happens when they get out of balance. Like what? Common symptoms might show up for someone and what causes these imbalances in the first place.

[00:02:18] And I’m gonna talk a little bit about hair tissue mineral analysis toward the end. But just so that you guys do know, I’m gonna link to a podcast episode I’ve already done on HT MA testing. I covered in detail more like. Why I use it, things like that. I really do. I, I use it primarily because it, it’s showing me what these minerals are doing like in real time.

[00:02:40] ’cause it’s giving me more of a cellular window into what your body’s doing, not just what’s floating around in your blood at the moment since. Our blood is very tightly regulated, so we get to see stored patterns, earn rates, imbalances, weeks, even months before they’re gonna show up on a blood test. So that’s why I use HTMA and that’s what [00:03:00] I’m referring to when I’m going through these macro minerals.

[00:03:04] Obviously you can definitely do blood tests as well, but again, like it just. Imbalances often don’t always show up, and you’re not always gonna see the same types of patterns. So why are these five minerals so important? They are really the big players in the mineral world. They don’t just work alone.

[00:03:21] They, they truly influence every other mineral and nutrient in the body. And that’s why when you get a hair test, it can be overwhelming. When you first get your hair test back, you’re kinda like, there’s a lot. On here. There’s a lot of charts on here, and I’m always like, the first thing you need to look at are those five minerals, because they’re really like the architects of your electrical system.

[00:03:43] Stress response, thyroid, blood sugar, and detox pathways. Uh, just like an architect, designs and oversees the construction of a building, calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, and phosphorus really, and the entire tructure and function of the body. You know, [00:04:00] they don’t just work on their own. They’re not individual materials.

[00:04:03] They’re really the ones that are like mapping the blueprint, structuring the foundation, coordinating all the systems, and making sure everything works together. And that’s why even though it can be tempting to like look at some other mineral, maybe you have, you know, a very low level of something like copper or zinc, which we’re gonna get into in the next episode.

[00:04:23] But. Maybe it’s like a certain mineral. You’re like, oh, that’s really deficient. I, I think I’m gonna try to address that first. You don’t wanna do that until you’ve already addressed these five minerals because of how they affect our other mineral levels. Even just focusing on these five, you can see an improvement in other mineral levels.

[00:04:42] Just by doing that. So let’s go through them in a little bit more detail. And I had way too much fun making these like characters. I’m gonna do this on Instagram too. So calcium is like the structural engineer, right? It’s like the concrete and steel of your body. It helps build [00:05:00] strong bones and teeth. But it’s also really stabilizing for your nervous system and regulating cellular gates.

[00:05:07] So like what gets into and out of the cell. If we have too much, then the system can get very rigid and that communication shuts down. It can get hard, be hard to get things in and outta the cell. If we don’t have enough, then that structure weakens and then signals don’t transmit well. So it’s, it’s a very important mineral for many different reasons.

[00:05:26] I feel like you mostly think of it for, you know, bones and teeth, but it is important for other parts of the body as well. It also buffers stress, um, but if it’s chronically elevated, it can actually block hormone and thyroid signaling like a concrete wall inside your cells. So calcium’s an important one.

[00:05:45] We just wanna keep it in balance. Magnesium is like the project manager, so it keeps the timeline running smoothly. It oversees hundreds if not thousands of enzyme enzymatic reactions. Keeps your nervous system calm, keeps your [00:06:00] muscles relaxed, helps make. A TP or the, the energy source in the body. It also is important for balancing blood sugar, uh, detoxification.

[00:06:09] I mean, so literally thousands of reactions in the body. When our magnesium is low, then things can start falling behind schedule. So like sleep can get off track, digestion can slow down, emotions can get tense. Like maybe you’re not handling stress the same way that you used to, and usually energy production takes a hit, so you’re, you can feel a lot more fatigue.

[00:06:30] Then sodium is like the electrician, so it really wires your body for energy. It regulates voltage across your cell membranes. It fires neurons, and it plays a huge role in adrenal health, which I feel like most people. Know about if you’re interested in minerals and how they affect your health. It’s very important for how our body is able to respond to stress when we have low sodium levels.

[00:06:55] It’s like a city with a brownout. Everything feels dim, slow, and [00:07:00] disconnected. If our levels are high on a hair test, and that’s like a surge of acute stress, it means your body is using it. Potassium is the hydraulics expert. Potassium is, it’s really like the fluid engineer, so it balances water inside the cells.

[00:07:16] It supports thyroid hormone. Getting inside our cells, helps regulate blood sugar, and it’s really important for muscle tone. It’s important for digestion too. Low potassium is like low water pressure, so like nothing flows. You can get constipated, low energy, poor detox, emotional flatness, and just. Usually your blood sugar is not as stable.

[00:07:35] And so I see lots of like energy and mood shifts as well. I also see lots of acne, low potassium, so potassium is a huge one and it works very closely with sodium. They both really contribute to how our body can handle stress. Phosphorus is like the power plant. It’s really hugely behind making a TP, the body’s energy molecule.

[00:07:58] So you’re, it’s really like your [00:08:00] body’s battery pack. Like if you were gonna. Call yourself and charge yourself like a phone. That’s what a TP really does, and it’s required for every cell to make and use energy. When our phosphorus levels are low, our energy tanks and protein digestion usually suffers.

[00:08:15] You can eat well and still feel very drained and foggy or weak. That’s very common when I see low phosphorus on a hair test, so that’s a really big one as well. And when we. When we focus on these five minerals, then we are able, usually you, you know, you work on them together. That’s when I see clients are very much able to see quick improvements in their health and get a lot of those quick wins.

[00:08:39] So some of the symptoms, if these five minerals are out of balance, like overall the, the biggest symptoms I see are gonna be fatigue and energy crashes, usually from the low phosphorus, low magnesium, low potassium, low sodium, or high calcium levels. Muscle cramps, spasms are twitching. That can be from low magnesium or potassium.[00:09:00] 

[00:09:00] That can also be from like excess calcium as well. Anxiety, restlessness, panic, low magnesium, low potassium, high sodium, or low calcium. Those are common patterns you’re gonna see with those symptoms. Thyroid symptoms. So maybe you have a sluggish metabolism, cold hands, maybe you, you get your blood work done and you have low T three, T four levels.

[00:09:22] This is often linked to having. A high calcium, potassium, or thyroid ratio, which we’re gonna cover. We’re gonna do a whole episode on the significant ratios, um, or low potassium potassium’s. Very important for utilizing thyroid hormone constipation’s. Another one. This is a classic sign of low potassium or magnesium or high calcium.

[00:09:42] Second, slow down that gut motility, and then poor sleep or trouble staying asleep. I often see this. With low magnesium, low sodium, low low calcium especially, um, calcium. We need magnesium and calcium to make neurotransmitters that help us sleep. So [00:10:00] that’s, I feel like very obvious. But I also see this a lot with just low minerals across the board, especially if those five macro minerals are all low.

[00:10:09] ’cause it, it actually takes energy for us to sleep. So if you are, have lower minerals, I see this a lot in children too, where they don’t sleep well. ’cause all their minerals are low. They’re just not able to produce the same energy. Then brain fog or emotional numbness. I often see this with high calcium, especially calcium shells, low phosphorus, low potassium, and then bloating and poor digestion.

[00:10:32] I often see with low sodium, low potassium, and low phosphorus. So when we don’t have these five. Macro minerals doing their job, nothing else can be built correctly. So trace other trace minerals that we’re gonna get into certain vitamins, hormones, they’re like furniture and decorations, but without the right blueprint and structure, the whole house is gonna fall apart.

[00:10:55] It’s not gonna function properly. So those are the macro minerals. Those are some of the [00:11:00] common patterns that I see. And I wanna go, I wanna get into a little bit about. Why I use HTMA versus blood work, like why the view is so different. How do we get all this information? Because usually the question that I’ll get is, well, I check these levels in my blood work and they look normal.

[00:11:18] Or, um, maybe they like, calcium is low, but it’s like high in my hair. And. Blood and tissue, they just tell two different stories and, and I think they’re both very valuable. I use both of my clients and I go through both inside my Master Minerals course, so I, but I often find, I mean, HTMA, it’s, it’s a hair sample you can do at home.

[00:11:39] It’s often less expensive than blood testing. It’s just like a lower barrier to entry typically. Uh, and it gives you a ton of information versus the amount of blood work that you would have to do to get the same amount of information. It would be a lot, and it would probably be hundreds and hundreds of dollars.

[00:11:54] So I think the practicality piece is important too. So when it comes to blood work, it [00:12:00] is short term. It’s tightly regulated, which is not a bad thing, right? Our bodies work very hard to keep blood mineral levels stable at all times, even if it’s pulling minerals out of the bones, tissues, or organs To do that.

[00:12:13] So that means you can feel exhausted, anxious, inflamed, and your blood looks normal. Alright. I mean, how, how many times have women gone to the doctor and they’re like, I have all these symptoms. I feel like something is off. My gut is telling me that something is off. And then they’re like, yep, your blood work’s all normal and it’s not.

[00:12:31] It’s not that you can’t get any information from it, it’s just like, okay, so you don’t have anything. ’cause if I were looking at a client like that, I would think, alright, so there is nothing deeply outta balance in blood yet. Good to know. Hasn’t gone that far, but you can walk it back further and do a hair test.

[00:12:48] And that shows what’s happening at the cellular level where minerals are actually being used or stored over time and it’s reflecting months, you know, the last three to four months. Not [00:13:00] just one snapshot in the moment. So blood, it’s like checking your bank account. It shows what’s available right now. HT MA is like looking at a, spending, like a detailed spending report.

[00:13:09] So it’s gonna show where resources have built, been going, what’s been overdrawn, what’s been stockpiled, that sort of thing. And this is one where, you know, sometimes we have like a few labs that range at blood work. There’s not necessarily gonna be a big intervention if you’re seeing a conventional doctor.

[00:13:27] And that can feel discouraging too. ’cause I, I do, a lot of people are like, yeah, this was like a little outta range, but they’re so that like it’s normal and you know, I can just take the supplement or medication, I’ll be fine. Whereas it’s like, all right, if we look at your hair test, we’ll get to see what’s been going on the last few months that is not showing up in your blood work that matches up to your symptoms completely.

[00:13:47] ’cause I think that’s the coolest part is that. Everything on the hair. ’cause you get to look at all the systems in the body. You really get to match up all your symptoms and get how you’re feeling on paper, which can be [00:14:00] very validating and nice. A couple examples of blood versus hair, just so you guys can really grasp, but especially if you’ve never seen a hair test or maybe you’re not as familiar with a hair test.

[00:14:11] Blood calcium could look totally fine, but you could have your hair test showing you a very, very, very high calcium. This could mean that it’s stuck in the soft tissues. It’s not usable. Um, that’s a very common one. It could also mean that you’re using way too much of it and you’re pulling it out of the tissue to compensate for that blood level.

[00:14:32] The way that you figure out which one you are is typically, like I have a roadmap inside my course and I go, I have people go through like, do you line up with the deficiency symptoms of calcium or do you line up more with the excess symptoms of calcium? And that’s a really good way to figure out which, and even just thinking about your health history and stuff too, like I’ve had a lot of clients that have, they don’t do dairy, um, they haven’t eaten dairy in a very long time.

[00:14:57] They don’t get a lot of calcium rich foods in their diet. [00:15:00] And so. They’re really high levels. It’s not that it’s like stockpiling, it’s more that that’s being taken out of the cell. Um, so it’s important to distinguish those. But that’s one example. Blood sodium is another common one. That’s too, it’s typically normal.

[00:15:15] Same with potassium, but the hair test will often show it’s chronically low, and especially if someone’s like. They’re fatigued a lot. They, they experience dizziness. Maybe they stand up too quickly and they get dizzy. They don’t feel like they’re handling stress well. They’re exhausted. They don’t wanna get outta bed in the morning.

[00:15:30] That is like it. It’s again, it, that sodium level in the tissue was taken and utilized. Keep the blood levels normal, which is not a waste either. It’s an important thing. It’s important function, right? Our bodies are incredibly intelligent, um, and they have all these cool compensations that they do. The hair test just lets us see what compensation is happening and how can we support it.

[00:15:51] Our monthly cycle is like a report card. Understanding how to track your cycle and know what is and is not normal as far as your symptoms can go, can help [00:16:00] you identify possible hormone imbalances and whether or not maybe you’re making nutrition, lifestyle, or supplement changes. It’ll just give you an idea if those are working for you or not.

[00:16:09] And this is why I created my free healthy period starter guide. It walks you through all the different phases of your cycle, how to track, teaches you what’s at the root of different hormone imbalances, and even has a section for nutrition tips for healthy hormones. I think every woman should have this knowledge easily accessible to them, which is why I made it.

[00:16:26] You can grab the guide via the link in the show notes, or you can go to my website. Hormone healing rd.com and you can find it under the guides and support section. Blood magnesium is another one. Oh my gosh. Serum magnesium tells you nothing ’cause most magnesium is inside the cell. It’s like 99 or 98, 90 9% is inside the cell.

[00:16:43] Same with potassium. So I, I cannot tell you how many normal serum magnesium levels I’ve seen. And then you look at their HTMA and it’s very low, or it’s really high, showing that their body is using it up very quickly. Uh, so. That is [00:17:00] one where it’s very much not accurate. If, if you wanted an accurate blood level for magnesium, could be uh, magnesium, RBC, that’d be a great measurement to get done.

[00:17:09] And I’ll often compare that, especially if we’re looking at someone’s iron status and we’re trying to understand their iron recycling system. We’ll pull that marker and then compare that to their hair test. But this is why I always start with HT MA for like energy hormones, mood, digestion, metabolism, thyroid, whatever, someone it tells you like your whole story of how your body’s functioning.

[00:17:30] It. It’s not just like this quick Snapchat. And again, I do use blood work as well. I think it can be very helpful. Um, I go through iron, iron panels in my course. I also go through looking at copper status and then thyroid levels. ’cause I think those are important to understand. It’s not that it’s useless, it’s just that.

[00:17:49] It’s not gonna give us as much detail or the patterns as you would see in an HTMA. So what leads to macro mineral imbalances in the first [00:18:00] place? And this could really go for all minerals. But since we’re focusing on the macro ones first, ’cause that’s what you would really be digging into on your hair test when you first get it.

[00:18:09] Chronic stress is a huge one, and that’s E every form of stress, emotional, mental, physical, hidden infection that really burns through sodium, magnesium, and potassium. And when the body’s in that constant fight or flight, it’s gonna use up those minerals just to stay upright. Cortisol raises sodium and it lowers potassium, and then adrenaline spikes magnesium loss.

[00:18:31] So over time, this leaves the body in a very low reserve state where it can’t buffer stress anymore, and that this is like the classic setup for just having adrenal burnout, feeling like you do not handle stress well, low energy, all those things. Low resiliency or a calcium shell pattern, which is when calcium is very, very high on an H, tm a.

[00:18:55] And then mold is another big one. I see all the time and we’ve got [00:19:00] those mold episodes that we did with my dietician, Gracie, if you have any mold concerns, definitely listen to those, but I, I see a lot of hair tests of women and families in general that have been living in mold and it’s. A huge, huge cause of mineral loss on HT MA.

[00:19:18] It drives chronic stress on the liver. Adrenal’s an immune system. This is gonna pull sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, pulls ’em all down together into a pattern that we call the four lows patterns. That’s when those first four minerals on your hair test are all low. And mold is gonna act like a biological chelator, so it’s gonna bind minerals and tissues, it’s gonna block absorption, and magnesium and manganese are typically very low.

[00:19:43] Sodium potassium levels crash and calcium can spike if the body’s trying to like buffer an acidic load of toxins. But I often see it very low. And typically those clients are gonna have fatigue, dizziness, irritability. They don’t sleep well. They [00:20:00] feel like they can’t turn off their nervous system of a hard time relaxing.

[00:20:04] And until you support those minerals, they can’t detox mold effectively either. It’s like trying to like rebuild a house while the wiring is completely fried. It just. You need the energy from the minerals. There’s also like a very interesting connection with mold and heavy metals. I see very, very, very high levels of heavy metals on hair tests of clients with mold, especially arsenic and mercury and uranium.

[00:20:28] Those are like the three biggest trends I’ve seen. Arsenic is number one, which is always interesting ’cause that one, it’s supposed to be antifungal. That’s why they use it on pressure treated wood, I believe. Pretty positive. It’s my hu my husband’s into woodworking and he’s like, yeah, they’re gonna replace it with copper.

[00:20:43] And I was like, I don’t know if that’s good. We all don’t need more copper, but probably better than arsenic. Right. Um, so, but it’s interesting ’cause I see very high levels of arsenic in children and adults that have mold exposure, history and the heavy metals. The reason they accumulate is [00:21:00] because they, the kidneys are affected by the mold.

[00:21:04] The mycotoxin, they, it builds up. And so, and it uses up a lot of your minerals. And so minerals are, they prevent heavy metals from accumulating in the body in the first place. ’cause they kick them outta their place. But if you, when you have low mineral levels, very high load on the liver, the kidneys, your detox organs, then you start to retain more heavy metals.

[00:21:27] And you have a hard time getting rid of them. So minerals are key. They’re so important for mold detox. They’re not the first stop. You gotta get the body stable first, but they’re the second and they make a huge difference. So, but I, I really do think that mold is a huge reason now, um, if I, if I, there’s ever a client that we can’t get them out of the four lows, we usually will.

[00:21:47] Dig into mold and then poor diet, restrictive eating. So if we, if we don’t have enough protein, mineral rich foods, enough salt, or if we’re like overly focused on too many like raw veggies that are hard to like [00:22:00] absorb nutrients from too much caffeine, filtered water, even like, we want some, some water filters, they can strip minerals instead of replenishing them.

[00:22:09] So just. Really for nutrition? I think it’s extremes, to be totally honest. I think people just go to eating extremes and then that creates more imbalances in especially our macro minerals. Um, but calcium, magnesium, potassium, and then sugar, alcohol, processed foods, those are gonna burn through B vitamins and magnesium quicker, and that’s gonna further drain that energy.

[00:22:30] And just that, that metabolic capacity that we have. And then gut and absorption issues. You can’t use what you don’t absorb. So if we have low stomach acid enzyme insufficiency, like we’re not making up digestive juices, or maybe we have a lot of gut infections that can impair mineral uptake. Um, a a lot of people get gut issues with mold too.

[00:22:50] Um, and just heavy metals. Because that they will impact the bacteria that can grow in your gut microbiome. So we’ll see a lot of issues with calcium, [00:23:00] especially like there’s a lot of inflammation. Then typically vitamin D is lower, so you have less calcium absorption. Magnesium and phosphorus levels tend to be lower and.

[00:23:09] If you’re looking at a hair test, like if phosphorus is below 11, then this is like a huge deficiency pattern, even if the person eats well, and that’s when we know, okay, there’s probably some absorption issues. And I often get the question, and I know I talked about this with my episode with Nina, do you work on your gut first or your minerals?

[00:23:24] And her answer was, you can’t work on your gut health without minerals, but you can work on your minerals without doing like a stool test and a whole gut protocol. I think minerals come first. Does that mean that we can’t use tools like. Digestive bitters or digestive enzymes or apple cider vinegar before we eat.

[00:23:45] I have a lot of those recommendations that I give people if they have the low phosphorus or maybe they have very high or low cobalt, which can be a sign of stomach acid issues or even just like how their symptoms are. But I do think it’s helpful to support [00:24:00] digestion. ’cause that’s gonna be, you know, a huge piece of the puzzle.

[00:24:03] But. Minerals are important for making stomach acid, digestive enzymes in bile as well. So getting all those juices flowing. So it works both ways, but the one thing that they both benefit from is supporting your stress response and working on stress management and learning how to get into the relaxed state.

[00:24:20] Not constantly going, going, going, rushing around. You know, like a chicken with your head cut off. That’s like. That that’s gonna affect your minerals and your gut health. But if you can work on that, and that’s usually where I have someone start. If we, they have severe gut issues and they’re like, I feel like I’m not digesting, absorbing, that is like the first thing I think of is their stress response and like their body cannot get into that rest and digest state.

[00:24:42] So working on that, replenishing those macro minerals can work wonders for digestion and gut health. And then if we have hidden copper toxicity or heavy metals, you know, copper, mercury, aluminum lead, they displace certain minerals and alter that enzyme function. So. [00:25:00] Certain heavy metals can mimic minerals, like they can like bind onto an enzyme and take their place.

[00:25:05] They don’t work the same so that that function, that process is now dysfunctional and that’s typically when people get symptomatic. But really it, it can mimic adrenal or thyroid imbalance, but it’s actually a mineral transport issue. Excess copper alone that can lead to very high calcium. It’s a very common reason for having a calcium shell, which is when you’re at calciums, like off the charts on a hair test.

[00:25:27] It can raise sodium at first, but then it burns those out and typically that person will then eventually become a for lows pattern with all their minerals, low medications, and birth control. This is another one obviously like diuretics, antacids, PPIs, antibiotics, hormonal birth control is a big one. All of them.

[00:25:46] They can deplete sodium, potassium, magnesium, zinc, or they just interfere with their absorption. But synthetic estrogen from birth control or even just like. Xeno estrogens in our environment, they can increase copper [00:26:00] retention and that increases calcium buildup while draining our magnesium sources. So I, and I’ve seen this, I mean, my hair test, I was on birth control for hormonal birth control pill for a very long time, and my copper was like off the charts and it was higher then.

[00:26:16] Then one after I had a copper IUD. So it’s like, I think that hormonal birth control is a huge reason that a lot of women have high copper and then that makes them estrogen dominant and very symptomatic and it can lead to a lot of other issues like copper is very important. We need to obviously have done deep dives on copper and everything, but I think it can easily get outta balance in the world that we live in.

[00:26:37] So we gotta make it usable. Right. And we need all the co-factors. Hormonal shifts in life. Transitions. These are a big one that I feel like don’t get talked about a lot, but like puberty, postpartum, perimenopause, high stress seasons. These can all create huge shifts in adrenal activity and thyroid activity.

[00:26:56] And these will directly alter sodium, magnesium, and [00:27:00] potassium balance. So these transitions, they can often unmask hidden deficiencies that have been there for years. I’m still newer to doing the children’s, especially like, uh, the htma, but it’s interesting ’cause the, the ones that I tend to get now are.

[00:27:15] Young girls going through puberty early. That’s been like the biggest concern, along with like the very little itty-bitty toddlers with like eczema. Gut issues and sleep issues and things like that. I would say puberty is like the other really big one, especially in young girls and they have high copper, they all have very high copper, which, you know, you get that surgeon estrogen, which can raise your copper too.

[00:27:36] So I’m like, oh man. I, I’m sure that I was estrogen and copper excess for much of my life and it wasn’t until like I was able to get it in check and actually use that copper that I felt better, but. I, I think that’s like, I’ve seen that shift postpartum can be similar. ’cause in pregnancy your copper increases substantially.

[00:27:56] ’cause estrogen goes up. It can be normal. But if you already [00:28:00] have copper imbalances or certain nutrient deficiencies. Before pregnancy, then it can be more pronounced and it can contribute to things like postpartum depression. I think I did a whole co, I think I did a whole podcast episode on that a while ago.

[00:28:11] And then perimenopause, menopause, right? So these are, especially when we’re gonna see thyroid and adrenals take a hit, which is gonna alter sodium, magnesium, potassium. What do all these affect? And if you’ve been listening for a while, you’ll, you’ll probably be screaming blood sugar, right? Blood sugar digestion.

[00:28:30] How you handle stress, mood, all those things that are very, it’s a very symptomatic time for mo for many women. And so I, I think a lot of it has to do with, it’s not just the hormone shifts, it’s the systems that are shifting in the body and then how that’s affecting their mineral status. ’cause I’ve helped a lot of women through perimenopause and that transition and the amount of progress I’ve seen just with supporting minerals.

[00:28:54] Not even like getting into the conversation of HRT or anything. They completely get [00:29:00] rid of their symptoms for the most part. It depends on like how, how much health history and stuff you have. And then it’s just learning how do I continue to support my body? Because the other big mineral shit that’s gonna happen post menopause is you’re no longer bleeding.

[00:29:13] You’re no longer getting rid of iron. And so I always have clients keep a very close eye on their iron status. Check it, check your levels once to twice a year at least. See and get a, get a baseline for yourself. You know, stress can affect it. Other mineral imbalances, like if you have copper imbalances, if you don’t, if you’re, if you’re low copper or high copper, that can affect your iron levels.

[00:29:35] If you’re going through a, a super stressful season, that can affect it. And so these are just things, it’s good to understand, to be like, how can I avoid issues down the road? Because high iron is gonna contribute to insulin resistance, it’s gonna contribute to inflammation in the body. Things that we would really, really.

[00:29:51] Really like to avoid since it tends to already happen at an increasing rate as you go through peri and post menopause. So those are other mineral shifts that [00:30:00] can happen. And then over filtered or demineralized water, this is the other big one, reverse osmosis water and distilled water remove contaminants, but they also remove minerals.

[00:30:11] I would say like most reverse osmosis machines probably like filters. They add them back in now because I feel like we learned that. But when we drink that completely clean water without remineralizing it over time, it can dilute sodium, potassium, and magnesium. Especially if you’re an athlete, you’re sweating a lot.

[00:30:29] I always like to mention sweating a lot because I, I’ve, I lived in the south for, I don’t even know how many years now. And I’m like, man, I just sweat so much more down here. I’m from Connecticut. And so I’m like, even if you don’t think you’re an athlete, I’m like, I just feel like pe, like if you live in a warmer climate, you’re probably sweating a lot more if you’re breastfeeding, if you are pregnant, or if you are chronically stressed, like going through a very stressful season.

[00:30:53] Or I think of like a lot of our clients that are dealing with a lot of inflammation, like. Histamine issues, [00:31:00] MAS, that sort of thing. It is a stressful state. Pots, like your nervous system is disrupted, right? So the, like all those types of people, like if they are not remineralizing their water, they typically see the symptoms a lot sooner.

[00:31:13] So when we see these five macrominerals out of balance, it’s not random. It’s, it’s really the result that your body has been surviving. Like I said, our bodies are so smart. Right. They have all these ways that they can compensate to keep us alive. ’cause ultimately that’s their goal. But. Ideally we can identify what they’re doing.

[00:31:34] Um, maybe, maybe we had a mold exposure or, I mean, everyone goes through stressful times and I’ve had clients that it’s like they’ve just had very stressful lives from, even from when they were very little, like lots of like trauma and stuff. And it’s like, that is stress that like your body has probably been in fight or flight for most of your life and it’s, it can be very hard to like step out of that.

[00:31:53] And even that takes energy, which they don’t have. ’cause usually their minerals are very low nutrition, you know. [00:32:00] Who hasn’t tried a trendy diet, you know, or restricted their food or gone through a season, maybe they’re not eating as well. Gut health shifts, I mean, I had like food poisoning and, or we have a lot of clients that have like traveled and then gotten sick while traveling.

[00:32:13] That’s gonna shift things. Um, being exposed to heavy metals, hormonal shifts in the body, and even water. All those things are gonna tell that story of how your body got this way on your hair test. But the good news is that we can restore mineral imbalances and a lot of times it’s not that difficult. It just.

[00:32:33] It’s like taking your body from the survival mode back into like, we’re gonna teach you how to calm down and thrive, make good energy, deal with stress, well digest your food, bounce your blood sugar, detox. Well, all the things. And it just takes, I just think it’s that awareness and that’s why I think that hair testing can be so, so valuable.

[00:32:52] So that is part one. Those are the macrominerals, calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, and phosphorus. [00:33:00] They affect all of our other mineral levels. So we wanna work on those first and see how that goes. See how the other minerals shift on a retest. And if you’re someone that is wanting to learn more about each single mineral, you could definitely, I have deep dives I’ve done on each of these that I will link.

[00:33:18] I don’t think I’ve done one on phosphorus, but I’m gonna put. Deep dive episodes ’cause those were very fun to make. I’ll link the HCMA one if you guys wanna dig into that more and look at the research on the validity of the test. And then next time I’m gonna get into, it’s gonna be a fun one, the metabolism and hormone helping minerals.

[00:33:36] So we’ll talk about. Copper, zinc, iron, manganese, chromium, selenium, and boron. So we’ll get into those next time. If you wanna follow along daily on Instagram, you can follow me at Hormone Healing RD to look at the little mineral of the day for the 25 days of minerals. And then if you are not getting my weekly newsletter, that’s where I post announcements, updates, and then I do a fun little [00:34:00] nerding out session on the podcast episode that’s coming up.

[00:34:02] If I’m not in podcast season at the time, then I just nerd out on some other topic. But they’re fun. It’s a great way to keep in contact and just knowing everything that I’m up to, what free trainings are coming up and all that sort of thing. So you can get the link in the show notes and join My Feminine Periodical goes out every Sunday at 6:00 PM and I think that’s it.[00:34:22] Thank you for being here, and I’ll see you in the next episode.