Stephanie Shaw is the founder of Stephanie Lynn Shaw and host of Hello, Hot Flash podcast. Stephanie took the strategies she implemented to recover from a two-year illness and turned them into a nutrition coaching and online education business where she teaches mid-life women how to manage their hormones, lose weight, have more energy, and slow the aging process.

In this episode we cover:

• The importance of having a voice when speaking with a medical professional?

• How to gain control of your midlife transition with natural solutions, lifestyle advice, and a mindset shift

• Understanding and managing the change, so you can feel confident and take charge of your health

Summary:

When Stephanie Shaw was struck with a serious illness, it not only changed her life but also opened her eyes to the struggles that women face with healthcare providers. After spending $20,000 out of pocket to see 18 different doctors and two world renowned medical facilities, Stephanie was able to recover from her illness by changing her diet, implementing mindset work, reducing stress, and moving her body more. She believes that doctors are not adequately trained in nutrition, which is often the root cause of many health issues.

Stephanie shared her story and discussed the importance of advocating for yourself when visiting the doctor. She recommends that people come prepared, ask questions, and request that the doctor write down any refusals to help. Stephanie also advocates for women to go into their doctor's appointments with a mindset shift, feeling like they are the customer and the smartest person in the room.

Stephanie is the founder and host of the Hello Hot Flash podcast, which helps midlife women control the change they are going through. Through her podcast, Stephanie focuses on lifestyle changes and all natural solutions to help midlife women through their transition. The key takeaway from the conversation is to go into doctor's appointments feeling confident, prepared, and with a plan.

Stephanie Shaw is an inspiring example of how to take control of your health and speak up for yourself, and her podcast—Hello Hot Flash—is an excellent resource for women going through their midlife transition. Stephanie's story and advice serves as a reminder for women to be their own advocate and remember that they know their bodies best.

Mentioned In This Episode

• Where you can find Stephanie: Website

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Transcript:

[0:00:02] Dr. Destini Copp: And my special guest today is Stephanie Shaw. Stephanie is the founder and host of the Hello Hot Flash podcast. Stephanie took the strategy she implemented to recover from a two year illness and turn them into a nutrition coaching and online education business, where she teaches midlife women how to manage the hormones, lose weight, have more energy, and slow the aging process. And today we're going to be talking about how nutrition impacts your mind and body. And Stephanie, I am so excited to chat with you and all the things that you help people with manage their hormones, lose weight, have more energy, and slow the aging process. I certainly want that, and I'm sure a lot of people who are listening to this episode want that. But before we get into all the questions that I have for you, can you tell the good audience a little bit more about you and how you help people? Sure.

[0:01:03] Stephanie Shaw: Stephanie, first of all, thank you so much for having me as a guest on the podcast today. I'm super excited to be here. As you said, my name is Stephanie Shaw, host of Hello Hot Flash, and I support women by providing free education to them. So, personally, I was sick for two years. 18 different doctors, two world renowned medical facilities, $20,000 out of pocket. So I have this deep passion for educating people around what helped me. I was able to go to a naturopathic doctor and was able to bypass all of the medications and so forth. So that's my passion, to teach women how they can do the same thing and live a healthy, whole life. And not only with the podcast. I help buy a course that I've created called Mastering Menopause. So those are my two areas where I tried to help us ladies out as we start to age and mature.

[0:02:00] Dr. Destini Copp: So you said you were sick for two years. It sounded like you went and saw a bunch of doctors to 20 grand out of your own pocket.

[0:02:09] Stephanie Shaw: Yes, it was a lot Destini. So I did not know what was going on. Rapid heartbeat after I ate, twitching in my eyes, cold hand and feet, numbness, tingling, my hair falling out. There were so many symptoms. And part of the problem, I think, well, I never wanted to be diagnosed, to be honest with you, because that attaches you to something, but yet I wanted to know what was going on. And I think part of the problem was it was changing every day. So some days I was having a problem with the twitching and the eyes. Some days I was not here. I did all types of different blood work, different types of tests and so forth. And at that particular time, because I was going to so many doctors, insurance does not pay for everything. So, yes, I spent over $20,000 out of pocket, but toward the end, I found someone or a good friend of mine referred me to a naturopathic doctor, and he did one non invasive test and said, hey, eat this, don't eat that. And he gave me two pages, a list of things that were not working properly in my body. I changed, and there were good things. So, like, I can't eat pineapples, I can't eat cabbage, and there are certain types of apples I can't eat. So it's things that I wouldn't have ever thought about or imagined, but I was able to change the way that I ate, implemented some mindset, work, and then also got rid of the stress, started to move my body more.

[0:03:39] Stephanie Shaw: And it took a while. It was 50 plus years of it all adding up. But in a six, nine month time frame, I really started to see a difference. And I have been living free of pain and all that jazz for close to three years now.

[0:03:56] Dr. Destini Copp: Wow. So it's definitely working. Whatever you're doing is definitely working. You've had the change and the transformation there. Tell us a little bit about your experience of going to see doctor after doctor after doctor. Did you feel like they just weren't listening to you or why? Were they having trouble trying to basically figuring out what was going on?

[0:04:24] Stephanie Shaw: Yeah, a lot of the doctors that I went to were actually friends and people that we knew. So I believe that their heart was into what was going on. They wanted to try to figure out what was going on with me. Some did. Some were dismissive. Some just assumed that I was living in an abusive relationship. I've been married for 32 years, living in this crazy abusive relationship, and it was just all stress related, and some could have cared less. I was just like a number. So I got all different perspectives from the physicians. But what I found was when I started asking the real questions, coming to the appointments ready. Like, I had notes. If I left your office, I wanted to see exactly what you wrote down. I needed a copy of it. And a lot of times they would put I was taking a lot of supplements. They wouldn't add a supplement, or they would leave something off or it would be the wrong information.

[0:05:20] Stephanie Shaw: When I started calling their attention to all of those things, they started listening to me and taking me more seriously as a patient. And that's how I think, well, of course, the naturopath is the person that help. But even through the course of the different doctors, I think I started getting closer, perhaps to an answer, because I was taking care and starting to advocate for myself. But I will tell you what I have found. I've heard over and over. I've started to study and I've read books on is. Bottom line, physicians are trained to do what they're trained to do. So OBGYN cannot help you with your heart. A heart doctor cannot help you with your bone health. And none of them have extensive nutrition training, which is often the root cause inflammation in the body, those are often the root cause of what's going on in our body. So they have approximately 20 hours worth of training the entire time they're in medical school. And I've read that there are also lobbyists who make sure that they keep that amount of time at a minimum. Why? I don't know, but I think that really became the key, or is often the key when people are going through these different things. Start having those conversations with your doctor, like is it something that I'm eating?

[0:06:45] Stephanie Shaw: And if they're telling you no or they don't know, then look for a naturopath or look for someone else who can help you with that part. So that was a super long story, but my journey was super long and at the end of it, I would say that again, it's super important to advocate for yourself, find someone who is listening and make sure that your nutrition is in line.

[0:07:07] Dr. Destini Copp: And that's one of the things I was going to ask you because I actually wrote it down while you were talking. You talk about advocating for yourself, but can you go into a little bit more detail about what exactly that means? Let's just say I have a doctor's appointment scheduled and I'm having issues. How should I plan for that doctor's appointment? How should I act when I'm in the room with the nurse or the doctor? What are your recommendations there?

[0:07:36] Stephanie Shaw: So think about you going out to dinner. So if you go out to eat and the waiter comes to your table and spends like 2 seconds and goes, hey, what do you want? You're like, wait. And then they come back and they kind of just throw your food on the table or they're not responsive, they never fill your water, they don't give you a menu, they don't talk you through the menu. You would be upset, right? You would leave the room because you're a customer. Go into your doctor's appointment, just like being a customer, and you need to understand that you are there and that they should be giving you a very high level of customer service. So that's putting it back on the doctor, but putting some of that intention back on yourself as well. When you walk into that doctor's office, be prepared. So if you're just going for annual blood work, understand you don't need a medical degree. And I'm not recommending you go to WebMD for everything, but understand a little bit about what they're testing. So go in prepared. Write a note down. I've been feeling this way maybe the week or two before. I'm feeling this way, that way, that way.

[0:08:48] Stephanie Shaw: I want to ask my doctor about that. And I've interviewed quite a few doctors on the podcast and they've all told me that when you come in and you say, hey, can I ask you another question? It kind of takes that wall down, and it allows them to open up and know that you're there and that you want the information as well. So come, prepare, ask the questions. Make sure that you also have your physician look at your last year's results or hopefully the last three years results and compare them to now. So, for example, I have a white blood count issue. So when I go in, if they're telling me I don't take the response of everything is okay, no, show me that it's okay. So when I started to see that my white blood cell count was getting less and less, I'm like, all right, so every year it's only dropping a tiny bit, but it's dropping a tiny bit every year. What do we need to do now? So being your own investigator and so forth when you're there and the last thing I would say is my mom. I'm advocating for my mom right now. And I asked the doctor specifically with what you've just diagnosed her with, I know that nutrition can help. What do you need to do? The doctor told me, I don't recommend nutrition. I said, well, fine.

[0:10:10] Stephanie Shaw: Can you write that down? As soon as I said, can you write that in your chart that you're refusing to help her find a natural way of doing it, he responded with, but, hey, maybe we can do this and this, and maybe your primary care physician can do this and this. So I learned that also from interviewing someone. When you have someone who does not want to support you, a doctor that doesn't want to support you either find a new one and or start asking them to write that down so that you have a record showing that they're refusing to help you in another way. Again, being prepared, I think, is one of the most important ways of making sure that you're advocating for yourself and or for a loved one.

[0:10:56] Dr. Destini Copp: And I love that. And as you were going through that, when you were talking about advocating for yourself, going into the appointment, feeling or understanding that you are the customer, that's somewhat of a mindset shift, right? Because a lot of us, when we go into a doctor's appointment, we might feel rushed. We might feel scared to ask questions. We might say or if we've asked questions, I know this has happened to me in the past. I've asked a question, and it was dismissed. And then you're like, oh, I feel stupid. I shouldn't have even asked that. So I love what you said there. That is so powerful.

[0:11:36] Stephanie Shaw: Destini, quick story. So the same thing happened again, same doctor with my mom, every time he asked her a question, he would, like, talk over her. And so my energy may not have been polite, but my tone was polite. And I said, hey, you're asking her questions in order for you to serve her better, you probably need to listen for her response. Do you think that would be helpful? Again, it completely changed the tone. But I had to like you said, it's a mindset shift. I had to step into my power and know that more education than me, he knows all the jargon and so forth. But only my mom knows what's going on her body. So at that point, she is the smartest person in the room. So going in with that mindset that you are the smartest person in that room and all of your questions are super valid.

[0:12:32] Dr. Destini Copp: And no matter what, we understand our bodies and what's going on more so than anybody else. So making sure that we are communicating and feel confident and comfortable enough, communicating with our doctor, I think is important. Stephanie, can you tell the audience a little bit about your podcast and how it helps midwife women control the change and also where we can find you if somebody wants to work with you?

[0:13:04] Stephanie Shaw: Oh, sure. Well, thank you for that question. So again, the podcast is called Hello Hot Flash because I say welcome midlife because this is the best time of life and post can find me@hellohotflash.com. You can go there and listen to episodes and so forth. I totally forgot what your question was, I'll be honest.

[0:13:28] Dr. Destini Copp: No, you answered it. So where can people find you and tell us a little bit more about your podcast? The other thing I just want to mention is we're going to make sure that those links are in the show notes so people can go right there and click on them and subscribe to your podcast so they can I love the name of that podcast. It is so much fun.

[0:13:48] Stephanie Shaw: It is so much fun. I love being able to educate midlife women. Part of what we do is we bring people who have science based so. We bring OBGYNs and functional medicine, doctors and psychiatrists and psychologists, but with a twist. So instead of saying you need to take a medicine, we start to talk about what are the lifestyle changes and the all natural things that you can do to help change help this middleize crisis that we're going through. Is it a crisis? I don't know what it is.

[0:14:17] Dr. Destini Copp: Well, I can certainly relate to it. So, Stephanie, thank you so much for joining me today and educating us about the key takeaway I had is what we need to do to go into our next doctor's appointment, to be confident, to be prepared and to plan for it. So thank you so much for that.

[0:14:41] Stephanie Shaw: Thank you.