Women’s Fitness Expert: What You NEED To Know About Dieting & Exercise | Dr. Stephanie Estima

**Steven Bartlett** (0:00)
For the last couple of years, I've been working on something that I realized every podcaster listening to this, but actually probably every creator listening to this might just need. Podcasting is difficult for many reasons. And one of them is that these hosting platforms don't give you much information. And also, because they're so fragmented, you kind of have to go through every single platform, uploading it to YouTube, and then taking the same big old video file and uploading it to Spotify's platform. It takes huge amounts of time, and that friction means most of us don't do it. That is the problem we set out to solve. And so we built something called Flightcast, which you can find at flightcast.com. And today Flightcast is also one of our show sponsors, and some of the world's biggest podcasters are now using our platform to run their shows because it gives you an edge, it saves you time, it gives you analytics most people won't typically get, it allows you to use AI to be more informed on your show, and it has growth tools that other hosting platforms don't have. So podcasters that are using Flightcast have this unfair advantage. So go to flightcast.com/doac now.

**Dr. Stephanie Estima** (0:58)
I want women to stop being losers. And so I'm on a mission to really undo the genuinely terrible advice that most women have been given as it concerns their health and their fitness. So we're going to talk through some actionable strategies on how to build a body that has curves, more of an hourglass figure. But Steven, if I can be very honest with you, I am pissed off because we've been sold a lie that our worth is the number on the scale. And I've seen tens of thousands of patients over my 20-year tenure. And right now, a lot of online dialogue is, I want to be toned. I want to have the Pilates body, be as small as possible. So this is where I get a little fired up because I also have personal experience. Struggling with my own weight and my own worth, I was trying to become what I thought was the right thing. And I had massive problems afterwards. So I am going to be very transparent and honest with you. The pursuit of skinny is a bad thing. You end up with devastating consequences. Like you are going to end up with bone disease like osteoporosis.

**Steven Bartlett** (1:57)
So there are lots of things on the desk here in front of us that I would love to go through. We have got these five fitness myths.

**Dr. Stephanie Estima** (2:03)
Yes, so one of them, for example, is a lot of women are scared to consume more carbohydrates because they think it is going to make them fat. But we need carbohydrates for our mood, our sleep, even performance at the gym. And then there is also women are scared that if they are lifting heavy weights that they are going to start looking like a body builder. But that's almost impossible. 97 to 98% of women don't have the hormonal environment to bulk.

**Steven Bartlett** (2:28)
And then we've also got these archetypes here.

**Dr. Stephanie Estima** (2:30)
So there's four archetypes that women identify themselves in their fitness journey. And the most common woman that I see, skinny, fat Sophie. And we will talk about what this means.

**Steven Bartlett** (2:39)
So let's talk about what the women listening should understand about hormones. How do you think about fasting in your menstrual cycle? What are the specific issues that mothers face as it relates to fitness? I mean, there's lots of things that I'd love to talk about.

**Dr. Stephanie Estima** (2:49)
100%. That makes me so excited.

**Steven Bartlett** (2:54)
Guys, I've got a favour to ask before this episode begins. The algorithm, if you follow a show, will deliver you the best episodes from that show very prominently in your feed. So when we have our best episodes on this show, the most shared episodes, the most rated episodes, I would love you to know. And the simple way for you to know that is to hit that follow button. But also, it's the simple, easy, free thing that you can do to help us make the show better. I would be hugely grateful if you could take a minute on the app you're listening to this on right now and hit that follow button. Thank you so, so, so much.
Dr Stephanie Estima, why is it you do what you do? Like ultimately, what is it you're trying to change in the world? Or what impact are you trying to have? And who are you trying to have it for?