Women's Fertility & Lifestyle Debate: Dangers Of Not Having A Period! Fasting Can Backfire For Women

**Steven Bartlett** (0:00)
If someone's menstrual cycle is irregular, should they be concerned?

**Dr Stacy Sims** (0:02)
Yes.

**Dr Natalie Crawford** (0:04)
Your body is meant to work like clockwork.

**Dr Vonda Wright** (0:06)
And our monthly cycle is so much more than getting ready to have a baby.

**Dr Stacy Sims** (0:11)
Especially when we're looking at exercise.

**Dr Natalie Crawford** (0:13)
And it's important to say, if you don't have a period, it's very harmful to long-term health.

**Dr Mary Claire Haver** (0:18)
Brain health, mental health, low energy, mood, libido.

**Dr Stacy Sims** (0:21)
And I don't want the younger generations to have to go through the stuff that we've gone through.

**Dr Natalie Crawford** (0:25)
So it's an important discussion that we need to have.

**Dr Mary Claire Haver** (0:28)
We are joined by four leading female health experts from very different fields.

**Dr Vonda Wright** (0:32)
To have a crucial conversation about women's health. With over 80 years combined experience, they're sharing the truth about what every woman and every man needs to hear.

**Steven Bartlett** (0:40)
We asked a thousand women to submit their questions ahead of this conversation. And I got so many questions around fertility, understanding hormones, PCOS, birth control pill, miscarriage.

**Dr Natalie Crawford** (0:48)
And I'll say this, Steven, it's because we haven't had these discussions publicly.

**Dr Mary Claire Haver** (0:52)
When we look at funding in women's health, it's horrible.

**Dr Vonda Wright** (0:54)
Like, less than 1% is spent on women over 40

**Dr Mary Claire Haver** (0:57)
Women are living 20% more of our lives with chronic disease or mental health disorders.

**Dr Natalie Crawford** (1:02)
I mean, 50% of patients with unexplained infertility have endometriosis. But yet, it takes women 7 to 10 years to get a diagnosis after symptoms start. But also, there are things that we do that will inherently harm our fertility because we're not taught this. And it predisposes you to many medical problems later in life.

**Dr Vonda Wright** (1:18)
And patients will say, like, I have a really high pain tolerance.

**Dr Natalie Crawford** (1:21)
Yes.

**Dr Vonda Wright** (1:22)
Like it's a badge.

**Dr Natalie Crawford** (1:23)
So they gaslight themselves.

**Dr Mary Claire Haver** (1:25)
And that's what we're all trying to fight here. But there are a lot of things we can do to deal with this.

**Steven Bartlett** (1:29)
And then I want to talk about menopause.

**Dr Mary Claire Haver** (1:31)
So in medical school, menopause just gets shoved into a tiny box.

**Dr Natalie Crawford** (1:35)
This is a scary statistic. So...

**Dr Mary Claire Haver** (1:37)
Oh my God.

**Steven Bartlett** (1:38)
It's crazy.

**Dr Mary Claire Haver** (1:38)
I just think it's insane.

**Dr Stacy Sims** (1:39)
This is why we need to create change.

**Steven Bartlett** (1:44)
This might be one of the most important conversations we ever have on The Diary Of A CEO because women's health has long been a total mystery to so many people. And so many people are struggling with all of the issues that we're going to talk about today with their menstrual cycles, PCOS, endometriosis, with diet, with understanding how to exercise as a woman. It's probably never going to be the case again that these four individuals that are at the very top of women's health in their fields will be in the same place at the same time having this conversation. We structured this conversation into two parts. They cover completely different subjects, but they're fundamentally interlinked. For me, the understanding that I got from this conversation at this table with these four women has fundamentally changed my life. It's going to change how I deal with my romantic partner, my sister, my team members that I work with every single day. And funnily enough, because it's a conversation I wouldn't have clicked as a man, it turned out to be the conversation that I needed the most. And I don't think I've ever said this before, but if there was ever an episode to share with a loved one, then this is that episode. Please share this episode with as many women as you can, but also with as many men as you can. Ladies, we should start with some introductions. Could you give me a brief introduction, Stacy, as it relates to your perspective and your experience and what your sort of bias is as it comes to this debate? When I say bias, I mean your experience and your research that you're lending to this conversation today.

**Dr Stacy Sims** (3:14)
I come from the exercise, phys and sports med background.
So, I'm always looking through the lens of activity and nutrition and how that has an impact on our stress and our stress outcomes and how we can adapt to specific applied stressors, especially when we're looking at improving health span, improving mood, improving body composition, all of those things. I've worked with and still work with the subset of active women. I come from an endurance and a high-profile, high-performance sport background. So, that's where I've gotten my chops and then brought it over into the general recreational female athlete kind of perspective.