Tapp Francke Ingolia: Embracing Her Second Spring 

00:00:06:03 – 00:00:37:08
Claudia
Voila! Here we are in season two of my podcast Shift Happens. Welcome back. I missed you and I am so thrilled to share what I find are truly necessary conversations with women on important turning points in their lives. Now we can feel heard again and listen to women’s stories. My first guest this season is the Certified Nutrition Specialist and Integrative Health Practitioner.

00:00:37:11 – 00:01:09:15
Claudia
Tapp Francke Ingolia. Tapp actually joins me from Long Island, where her practice is located in watermill. Tapp and I first met a few years ago when I didn’t know what was going on with my body, and she supported my traditional doctor and doing some important detective work to discover that I was suffering from AlphaGo, an allergy against mammalian meat, meat from animals with four legs transmitted by the lone star tick.

00:01:09:17 – 00:01:39:08
Claudia
Tapp’s pivotal moment has nothing to do with ticks, but with another upheaval of well-being and a major shift in a woman’s life. We can all relate to it. Menopause. I am really excited to be in conversation with her about this huge transitional phase in her and many of our lives. Listening. Feel heard and welcome back again. Shift happens.

00:01:39:10 – 00:01:51:13
Claudia
Season two kicks off.

00:01:51:15 – 00:02:05:09
Claudia
With Welcome to Tapp Francke Ingolia from Stan Wellness in Watermill. I’m really happy that you are here at Shift to Happiness. Took a while for us to get together, but.

00:02:05:13 – 00:02:09:07
Tapp Francke
It took a little while for us to get organized. But we did it. We did it, we did it!

00:02:09:07 – 00:02:24:16
Claudia
Yay! I’m so glad you’re here. So what I would like to do to start off our conversation is a few warm up questions. Okay. What is your idea of perfect happiness?

00:02:24:18 – 00:02:51:04
Tapp Francke
That’s a warm up question, Sure. honestly, that’s a very simple answer for me. Is peace, right? Perfect happiness is when everything is in homeostasis, when everything is in balance, and there is an overall feeling of sort of peace and warmth. So that that’s an ideal I. I’m yet to achieve it. Yeah, I’m working on it.

00:02:51:05 – 00:02:55:05
Claudia
What do you most value in your friends?

00:02:55:07 – 00:03:28:03
Tapp Francke
honestly, they’re they’re insights. and, you know, this is something interesting because part of what you know, we’re going to be talking about today is this transition in life. And one of the things that I’ve really found myself is that the the strengthening and the deepening of my female relationships, during this period, which is, is something really beautiful, because when you’re in the childbearing phase and the young kid phase, you don’t tend to have those same really strong female bonds because you’re so focused in on your family.

00:03:28:05 – 00:03:52:04
Tapp Francke
And I do feel like this phase has allowed for these really deep, really beautiful female relationships. so it’s about understanding and it’s about camaraderie and it’s about, you know, people seeing you and being seen in a way that they really understand. It’s empathy. you know, it’s it’s a really beautiful thing, and I’m very grateful for it.

00:03:52:04 – 00:03:58:00
Claudia
Yeah. True. Well said. what is your most treasured possession?

00:03:58:02 – 00:04:00:05
Tapp Francke
My most treasured possession.

00:04:00:05 – 00:04:03:10
Claudia
I was thinking, you know, infrared sauna.

00:04:03:12 – 00:04:04:12
Claudia

00:04:04:14 – 00:04:25:20
Tapp Francke
Well, I mean, I love all of my health tools, all of my health tools. I, you know, I have every single day of my life. I have my infrared sauna, and I have my PMF, and I have my cold pot, and I have my, you know, foods and everything. But I would say that my most treasured possession probably aren’t any of those, at least just kidding.

00:04:26:01 – 00:04:33:15
Tapp Francke
It’s probably my kids, and they’re not my possession. But the thing that means the most to me would be my kids.

00:04:33:18 – 00:04:34:07
Claudia

00:04:34:09 – 00:04:51:10
Tapp Francke
I’m also in this phase where, like, trying not to hang on to things so much. You know, like those possessions, those things that we sort of carry around through life. So I don’t think that there’s the thing that I attached to. The things that are useful during the day.

00:04:51:15 – 00:04:56:08
Claudia
Yeah. What is your greatest fear.

00:04:56:10 – 00:05:28:04
Tapp Francke
honestly deep water. Oh really really deep water. I know that sounds it actually makes a lot of sense because it’s something very uncontrolled. Right. So really at the core of it it’s about lack of control or lack of ability to be able to fix it or do anything about it. But somehow the idea of being over really sort of deep dark water with this unknown underneath it, strikes a huge fear in me that and spiders.

00:05:28:06 – 00:05:39:19
Tapp Francke
Yeah. But yeah, that it does really have a lot to do with not being on steady ground, not being grounded. That feeling of being out of balance.

00:05:39:21 – 00:05:42:06
Claudia
What would you come back as.

00:05:42:08 – 00:05:45:04
Tapp Francke
One of my dogs.

00:05:45:06 – 00:05:45:11
Claudia
I mean.

00:05:45:15 – 00:06:10:09
Tapp Francke
They’re so spoiled. I know all they do. And they’re living the like food that I cook for them and lie in the sunshine and get belly rubs and, and honestly I would love to feel the level of excitement that they express over like a greeny over. Where you coming home or dinner? Every day.

00:06:10:11 – 00:06:11:10
Claudia
They’re an animal.

00:06:11:12 – 00:06:19:03
Tapp Francke
Of happiness and enthusiasm is just beyond. I would like to experience that every single day for sure.

00:06:19:05 – 00:06:25:21
Claudia
And would be the.

00:06:25:23 – 00:06:51:00
Claudia
So, I’ve been having a number of conversations for my podcast. Right. And it’s about shifts in life, about pivotal moments, turning points. And it’s so interesting because you’re the first that is addressing the major topic that we’re all in. Like many of the women that I’ve spoken to and many of my listeners, and it’s menopause.

00:06:51:02 – 00:06:51:09
Tapp Francke
Yeah.

00:06:51:10 – 00:07:20:20
Claudia
So I’m actually really thankful that you chose that as your pivotal moment to focus on. And of course, I would like to understand from you what for you in particular, as someone you know, who knows the body so well, who knows nutrition so well, who knows the hacks so well and are trained in all of this, that it was such an I mean, I don’t know if tsunami is a two strong word, but you know that it’s moved you in the way that you’ve described.

00:07:20:22 – 00:07:22:14
Claudia
before we spoke.

00:07:22:16 – 00:07:50:10
Tapp Francke
Yeah, it was a real shock to me, I think, because I, I tend towards being obviously very healthy and health conscious, that this perimenopausal shift hit me like a freight train and that was startling number one. But I think the thing that really made the change for me, the thing that made it such a pivotal moment, was the lack of health.

00:07:50:11 – 00:08:14:16
Tapp Francke
So even as you know, I’m a trained clinical nutritionist, I have a degree in integrative health. Even in that training it’s not covered that much. Like you would think that there would have been a lot more coverage. So there I was at age, you know, 45 suddenly being hit with all of these symptoms and, you know, went off to my gynecologist, who is my age, right.

00:08:14:16 – 00:08:38:07
Tapp Francke
She’s of a very similar age, maybe a couple of years above me, and was literally provided nothing. Right. Yeah. I thought wait, wait, this was a while ago right. I’m 53 now. So this was, you know, closing in on eight years ago. So there wasn’t as much information out as there is now. I’m very grateful that there’s been a celebrity cause that’s happened.

00:08:38:07 – 00:09:18:09
Tapp Francke
That’s really gotten a lot more attention on this subject. But it was really startling. So I started actually writing about perimenopause because I just dove deep into the subject and was like, well, what is it that we can do in our lives to support this transition? And what I really found was that there are so many tools that we can use in our diet, in our day to day, you know, exercise in our ways of, regulating our nervous systems and our self-care, our that can really support this transition.

00:09:18:11 – 00:09:34:14
Tapp Francke
But what I was finding seven years ago when I started writing about it is that my spellcheck didn’t even recognize it. Right. I would be writing perimenopause and there would be a little red line underneath it. I’m like, you don’t even know what it is. That’s right.

00:09:34:19 – 00:09:36:10
Claudia
And that is so tragic.

00:09:36:11 – 00:09:38:12
Tapp Francke
It’s tragic. Yes.

00:09:38:12 – 00:09:40:23
Claudia
Unbelievable. Really unpleasant.

00:09:41:03 – 00:10:04:11
Tapp Francke
There was nothing. It was like it just got swept under the rug, like, oh, it’ll just happen. You’ll just deal with it. So when I went up to my gynecologist and had all these symptoms, which I now know to be very perimenopause related, I was offered birth control pill and an antidepressant and I thought, this is I didn’t take them, but I thought, this is wrong.

00:10:04:15 – 00:10:33:13
Tapp Francke
Like, this is there’s a better answer. So the reason why it was so pivotal for me, because my response to all of the all things in life is research. Let me research it. Let me figure this out. And so it really drove me to dive very deep into this topic to figure out what the things actually are that need to be done, in order to help us through this time.

00:10:33:13 – 00:10:45:20
Tapp Francke
And it certainly isn’t birth control pills and anti-depressants. So I was just very disappointed by what I was finding and what I was being offered.

00:10:45:21 – 00:10:51:10
Claudia
So, question were you able to discuss it with your girlfriends at the time?

00:10:51:12 – 00:11:19:00
Tapp Francke
So absolutely, I started the conversation with them at the time and so many of them. And this is what is also so fascinating because we have menopause is like, a transition in life that the Japanese call this second spring. Right? It’s an opportunity. It’s another chapter. It’s another era sort of beyond our reproductive era. But somehow it’s been demonized.

00:11:19:02 – 00:11:39:10
Tapp Francke
Right. This idea of menopause and you bring it up to your friends or like I’m not in menopause. Oh I’m not anywhere close to that. Like somehow that what that means is that you’re old and wrinkly and like, you have nothing to offer. Like no no no no no no no no, not at all. Right. This is a really rich time.

00:11:39:12 – 00:12:07:02
Tapp Francke
But this is also a period and a transition that we should be talking about. Right. If you are feeling these symptoms and for me I am such a non anxious person. I had anxiety I couldn’t sleep, I gained like 20 pounds overnight. I hadn’t changed anything. I thought this is, this is something real. Like something is really going on here and there really isn’t any support in how to handle it.

00:12:07:02 – 00:12:18:12
Tapp Francke
And even in those conversations with my friends, which I continue to have to this day, and now they’re like, oh, I get it. It’s very menopause. At that time, it was almost like an offensive thing to say.

00:12:18:17 – 00:12:25:06
Claudia
Oh, I remember right. I mean, I’m 5056. no. And,

00:12:25:08 – 00:12:25:22
Tapp Francke
How am I?

00:12:26:02 – 00:12:28:15
Claudia
Yeah, really, I mean, sometimes, like what?

00:12:28:17 – 00:12:32:05
Tapp Francke
I know, I know. And then you look in the room and don’t remember why you’re there.

00:12:32:05 – 00:12:56:04
Claudia
I know it’s in the 50s, but, And I also started to have symptoms, I think, like, also around, like, 46, 47. And then it was like, it might be menopause, you know, it was like whispering it almost. Yeah. And then I also remember I went to my gynecologist that was here in New York, a woman. She’s retired now, a great doctor.

00:12:56:04 – 00:13:23:03
Claudia
But I said, well, I have the feeling I don’t really know enough about menopause and no one’s really talking about it. And she said, well, we are talking about it here all the time. And and then I was like, oh, okay. And I really thought, it’s me. You know, like I’m uninformed. I just need to understand better. I would get, you know, completely confused with the names of all the hormones and which hormone is responsible for what function and all of that.

00:13:23:03 – 00:13:42:20
Claudia
And then I thought, oh, whatever. You know, it’s probably just going to go by. Yeah, but it actually also really haunted me. Until you really before Covid here and there, you could see that, you know, sites were coming up and women took initiative like you to focus on this. Yeah. And share their knowledge.

00:13:42:22 – 00:14:07:06
Tapp Francke
Yeah. Well thank goodness, because it’s something that, is absolutely a medical biological change in our body that really requires support and everybody needs something a little bit different. But the general structure is the same. So in order to, to deal with it, I think the first thing that we need to do is to talk about it.

00:14:07:08 – 00:14:34:03
Tapp Francke
Right. To make it actually known and make it public and not have it just be something that women deal with behind closed doors. So I’m actually quite grateful for this sort of celebrity rush that’s happened. because it really has brought all these conversations much more to the forefront, than they’ve ever been. The reality is that menopause can start as early as 35, right?

00:14:34:03 – 00:14:57:23
Tapp Francke
The actual hormonal changes begin around 35. I was having my first baby at 35. Right. I wasn’t thinking about that now. so, you know, so, you know, just to understand that, that when you hit your 40s and you’re in sort of this transitional time and these symptoms come up that there’s a reason. You’re not crazy.

00:14:57:23 – 00:15:04:16
Tapp Francke
You’re not losing your mind. You’re not, you know, all of these things that were being labeled as before. Yes.

00:15:04:16 – 00:15:29:06
Claudia
And if anxiety comes up or brain fog comes up, you know that. What does not need to be ashamed of it. Yeah. It’s there. It can be addressed. And, you know, just invite it in and not block it off. Yeah. And, hopefully, you know, we can now slowly have the tools and prepare the way for the following generations that for them, it’s much more natural to be also prepared.

00:15:29:11 – 00:15:50:14
Tapp Francke
Yeah. I’m very I’m very grateful for that next generation of women that come up that will come up informed, that won’t walk into their doctor’s office at age 45 and get nothing. Right. They’ll be able to they’ll be books available. They’ll be websites about it. There’ll be courses you can take, you know, and there are supplements out there that are supportive.

00:15:50:15 – 00:15:56:02
Tapp Francke
Yeah. You know there are so many tools that are readily available.

00:15:56:03 – 00:16:23:13
Claudia
So what would you say was your most interesting finding or how did you feel then that you all kind of embracing the shift into menopause in a way that you, you know, looked better with it? I mean, you’re specialized in nutrition and, you know, all these choices that we can make in eating better food. But what would you say was really where you felt, you know, this is almost like a relief.

00:16:23:13 – 00:16:27:07
Claudia
This is taking the fog cloud away.

00:16:27:09 – 00:16:32:22
Tapp Francke
honestly, you know, I as a clinical nutritionist, my answer should be food.

00:16:33:00 – 00:16:33:21
Claudia

00:16:33:22 – 00:17:05:01
Tapp Francke
But it’s not. It was stress, right? Stress is the biggest impactor of how women experience perimenopause and menopause. And their clear biological reasons for that. So, I was extremely stressed. I had kids at home. I had a full time business. So as always, seeing all my clients, I am taking care of my aging parents. You know, where there’s a lot, right?

00:17:05:01 – 00:17:50:09
Tapp Francke
There’s a lot going on in the world. And so I was carrying it, all right. Because as women, that’s what we do, right? Yeah. I have, a husband who is wildly involved at home, and I’m terrifically grateful for that. But even then, it’s still too much. Right. So very, very stressed. And as a result, I think that was really what sent me into that very turbulent time is that my hormones were changing at the same time that I was experiencing probably the most acute level of, stress, you know, in my life, just based on all of these circumstances, the kids, the parents, the business, the everything going at once, you’re juggling.

00:17:50:09 – 00:18:23:14
Tapp Francke
You’re just trying to keep everything in the air, and you just can’t. It’s right. It’s too much. And so I sort of broke at that point. so my main my huge moment was understanding two major things. One is that estrogen, which is the hormone, as the estrogen hormone that is made by your adrenal glands to post menopause and to regulate estrogen during perimenopause, which comes from your ovaries.

00:18:23:14 – 00:18:50:02
Tapp Francke
Right. the estradiol comes from the ovaries. Estrogen comes from your adrenal glands. If you are, say, taking this job, creating estrogen from your ovaries, right. You’re saying, okay, we’re done, we quit. We’re retiring now. See you later. And they’re bringing this big job over to the adrenal glands. And the adrenal glands are already overtaxed. They can’t do the job right.

00:18:50:04 – 00:18:50:20
Claudia
Makes sense.

00:18:50:20 – 00:19:17:02
Tapp Francke
So it’s very it’s very simple. Like that’s one piece of it. And that is really your estrogen production then, which is really meant to transition you through into menopause and beyond. It’s just not there because your adrenal glands are so overtaxed by the stressors. Right. The other piece of that is that cortisol, which is your primary stress hormone.

00:19:17:04 – 00:19:41:11
Tapp Francke
Also a good guy right. It also keeps you get you awake in the morning. And I mean cortisol isn’t the enemy here. But cortisol when it runs too high too long becomes an acute stressor right in and of itself. And what happens is, is the body is always trying to keep you alive. Right. 100% of the time your body’s trying to keep you alive in the moment.

00:19:41:13 – 00:20:01:20
Tapp Francke
So when you have high cortisol your body’s like oh my God we have to run away from a lion on the great African plain. So what is it going to do. It’s going to make sure that your cortisol stays high. There is concurrently a release of blood sugar, which is starts a whole other cascade of inflammation, weight gain, blood sugar dysregulation.

00:20:01:22 – 00:20:28:16
Tapp Francke
But when you have this high cortisol your body has to keep it high. So what happens is that you get cannibal ized. Your other hormones get cannibalized particularly progesterone. Right. So progesterone which is made from the hormone pregnant alone starts along the happy path to become progesterone, which is kind of like your Zen hormone. Your, not anxious, I can sleep hormone and cortisol comes and grabs it.

00:20:28:18 – 00:21:05:08
Tapp Francke
It’s called the cortisol steal. So cortisol steals it because the body is saying what we need is more cortisol because we need to stay alive in this moment. So those stressors, that presence of stress in the body actually makes the entire process of perimenopause into menopause significantly worse. So my clinical experience is that those women who have better stress management tools or who have sort of fewer stressors in their lives, tend to transition, maybe unnoticeable.

00:21:05:10 – 00:21:32:12
Tapp Francke
Sometimes they’re like, oh, yeah, I just stopped getting my period and then everything was fine, right? It’s those women, really, who I think more, more often than not, just have better stress management. So really understanding that was the the key moment for me, which is, yes, it’s about diet 100%. We need to understand and be protein forward and have the proper amounts of fats.

00:21:32:12 – 00:22:00:04
Tapp Francke
And we need to eat on a balanced schedule, and we need to make sure we eat breakfast and yes, all of those things, but it’s the it’s the stress management. That was really the the critical point. And there’s actually a nutrition point in there too, which is so many people especially in this food culture that we’re in think that intermittent fasting, especially in the morning is really good in perimenopause.

00:22:00:04 – 00:22:21:16
Tapp Francke
But I would say that’s the worst time for it really. So your cortisol, which is what wakes you up in the morning, is highest in the early part of the day. So the cortisol is going to spike up in the morning in order to get you awake. Now if you then drink coffee, what that does is it increases the cortisol.

00:22:21:16 – 00:22:45:02
Tapp Francke
So all you’ve done is create a steeper incline of that cortisol, which is part of what’s creating some of the problems, the adrenal stress and the sort of stealing of your other hormones. So the better choice for most perimenopausal women, and honestly, everybody is a unique individual. And it all depends on your, you know, of course, your specific biology.

00:22:45:04 – 00:23:06:19
Tapp Francke
But I’d say for most people eating a protein rich breakfast and having their coffee, say 90 minutes after they wake is the most profound nutritional change that they can make. And that was a huge change that I made because I was an intermittent fast, or before that I didn’t eat anything before noon. But I did drink my black coffee and I was just crushed.

00:23:06:19 – 00:23:07:19
Claudia
Fascinating.

00:23:07:19 – 00:23:32:11
Tapp Francke
So making that shift, along with really managing my stressors and understanding that regulating my nervous system and reducing that cortisol response was really what brought about all of the big changes for me. You know, I lost 20 pounds. I have no anxiety. I sleep through the night like all of those things came back. And because of the actions that I took.

00:23:32:13 – 00:23:50:20
Claudia
All right. Okay. Well, I saw a follow you. So you have your practice stand wellness. And how are you incorporating this personal experience and this personal pivot, and how are you bringing it into your professional life?

00:23:50:22 – 00:24:23:03
Tapp Francke
So, number one is I understand much more thoroughly. I mean, this is going back years, but, how to deal with that perimenopausal woman sort of what tools to put into place in order to support them through this time. The other thing is that I wanted this information to be accessible. I wanted this information to be out there for anybody to have that didn’t need to come in and have an appointment with me.

00:24:23:05 – 00:24:47:23
Tapp Francke
So I actually made a course. the course is Mastering menopause. and that course just goes through all of these tools. It goes through all of the stress management tools, all the dietary tools. There’s a, a very clinical specific perimenopause diet in there, specific to supporting the body hormonally. and so I, I put it all together.

00:24:47:23 – 00:25:14:12
Tapp Francke
So all of that knowledge that I acquired through my own experience, I packed into this course so that, so that the generations behind me, the people that came in and came into my perimenopause behind me, would know what to do. I mean, the statistics are unbelievable, right? 47 million women enter menopause each year. Wow. Right. So that’s 47 million women enter.

00:25:14:14 – 00:25:47:20
Tapp Francke
So that’s just the phase of being 12 months without a cycle. There are solid ten years. perimenopause, right? That’s almost a half a billion people. Going through all of these symptoms. So I wanted to just have a resource. Right. Have something out there to support women in this time. Give them tools. And these are the tools that I used and the tools that genuinely turned me completely around.

00:25:47:20 – 00:25:57:11
Tapp Francke
And now as I look out onto the menopause landscape like I feel great. And I’m so grateful. Like I’m so grateful.

00:25:57:13 – 00:26:04:15
Claudia
So you shared with us that intermittent fasting is not really, the smartest idea in regards to, well it’s.

00:26:04:15 – 00:26:08:00
Tapp Francke
Not ideal for somebody in perimenopause. Yeah.

00:26:08:02 – 00:26:10:08
Claudia
Let’s be correct about this.

00:26:10:10 – 00:26:13:16
Tapp Francke
Right. There are great situations for it. Yeah.

00:26:13:18 – 00:26:22:01
Claudia
And would you share and reveal one other life hack? Perimenopause. Menopausal life hack.

00:26:22:03 – 00:26:49:17
Tapp Francke
Prioritizing sleep. That was another, really major pivot for me. obviously being very busy having, you know, a very big life, I just ended up working into the night. I ended up working on my computer later at night. I ended up skimping on those sleep hours. because there just was enough time during the day for me to get all those things done.

00:26:49:19 – 00:27:15:03
Tapp Francke
And the pivot for me was, no, like, your sleep is actually more important than finishing that work right now. So getting a solid eight hours of sleep also is a significant change hormonally for you. It’s, for your brain to make the necessary repairs that it needs to make during the night. for your body to be able to be even ready for the next day.

00:27:15:03 – 00:27:39:08
Tapp Francke
If you’re skimping on sleep, then really, what? You’re doing is you’re just kicking the can down the road, and it’s going to come back and it’s going to kick you. Right. So really prioritizing those sleep hours my bedroom I keep at a very cool temperature. I even got one of those cool pads for my bed. So it keeps my bed really cool because your body, in order to get into a really deep sleep, needs to drop two degrees.

00:27:39:10 – 00:27:59:14
Tapp Francke
So I sort of had to really think about how to idealize my bedroom setting. There is no computer in there, there’s no phone in there. There is no television in there. There’s no distraction. It’s just it’s cool, it’s comfortable. And I go to bed and I make the choice to just go to bed.

00:27:59:16 – 00:28:04:14
Claudia
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I’m working on it. I find it’s really work to do that.

00:28:04:19 – 00:28:05:11
Tapp Francke
It’s hard.

00:28:05:13 – 00:28:25:12
Claudia
Yeah. I mean, it’s hard. One should be like, you know, I’m going to bed. It’s all going to be so snuggly and nice and warm and cold and, you know, everything, but it’s really work. Yeah. To really turn it off. And also suddenly my iPhone, for example, is in the bedroom. And for years I never did that.

00:28:25:12 – 00:28:32:23
Claudia
And I’m still trying to think back when it happened that suddenly my iPhone found its way next to my bedside table. Yeah.

00:28:33:02 – 00:28:33:19
Tapp Francke
Yeah.

00:28:33:21 – 00:28:40:01
Claudia
Yeah. But no, it’s a good reminder. It’s such a precious gift to cultivate sleep. Yeah.

00:28:40:03 – 00:29:01:17
Tapp Francke
Yeah. And I think that in our information age, right where we think that we need to be on 24 seven because we have this electronic next to us that tells us everything that’s happening 24 hours a day. I mean, we didn’t grow up that way. No, like we weren’t available. Our parents certainly weren’t available at this time and middle of the night.

00:29:01:17 – 00:29:29:22
Tapp Francke
And, you know, it just didn’t happen. So why is it that we think that our nervous systems are able to take on 24 seven on switch, right, that we’re on, that we’re able to answer the phone, that we’re on deck, that we’re we’re not on. And we shouldn’t be. So it’s something that we really need to go against our own new habitual culture in order to get to.

00:29:30:00 – 00:29:50:10
Tapp Francke
And it’s a, it’s a real challenge. I have to say I am still. I’m still working on getting the phone out of the bedroom because I do use it as an alarm. But I put it like on my dresser and I put it like out of arm’s reach. I put it on, airplane mode. Right. Sort of like turn off all of the features.

00:29:50:11 – 00:30:12:14
Tapp Francke
and then I put it as far away from me as I can, but I think that even I’m going to move to, like, an alarm clock. Yeah. So that the phone isn’t, isn’t there at all. And it, it shouldn’t be, it shouldn’t be next to your head for the radiation purposes. Yeah. For and just for communication purposes like you shouldn’t be available all the time.

00:30:12:17 – 00:30:15:04
Tapp Francke
Your nervous system is too much.

00:30:15:06 – 00:30:35:16
Claudia
So I usually ask the question what energizes you and how do you kind of calm down. So you said that a life hack is prioritizing sleep, but is there another way that you calm yourself down or what works for you? Or and then also what you know gives you like energy in general?

00:30:35:18 – 00:31:03:14
Tapp Francke
so honestly, what gives me energy more than anything is education. I love research, I love working with people. I am so energized by my client conversations, by my work. And then doing that research further into whatever the situation might be. I find that incredibly exciting and invigorating. And I get really thrilled and inspired by that.

00:31:03:16 – 00:31:26:01
Tapp Francke
and I wind down really tends to be like your deep breathing, your grounding. I’ve just started recently doing the sound baths. that I find incredibly grounding. More so than almost anything. I also started doing these cold plunges which I know people think is crazy. But it’s amazing what it does for you.

00:31:26:02 – 00:31:26:16
Claudia
Yeah.

00:31:26:18 – 00:31:44:21
Tapp Francke
It’s profound. So I am intrigued by the body always amazed by the body and also looking for ways to. Yeah. Always looking for ways to make it work better for you. Right. There are just so many interesting things that that we can do.

00:31:44:22 – 00:32:08:23
Claudia
Well I thank you so much for this insight and really also for sharing this pivotal moment of waking up and being confronted or swallowed up by perimenopause and how you handled it and what you did with it. I’m sure that many feel heard with this topic. So I thank you so much for your time and our conversation.

00:32:09:01 – 00:32:21:05
Tapp Francke
And I thank you so much for creating this platform to have this conversation and right, and to have all of the various conversations on these sort of shifting, pivotal moments. I think it’s beautiful.

00:32:21:05 – 00:32:22:17
Claudia
So thank you so much.

00:32:22:17 – 00:32:23:09
Tapp Francke
So thank you.

00:32:23:13 – 00:32:25:03
Claudia
All right. Bye bye.

00:32:25:04 – 00:32:39:17
Tapp Francke
I’ll talk to you soon. Okay.

00:32:39:19 – 00:33:16:08
Claudia
Who knew that? Stress management, high cortisol levels, and sleep even come before nutrition? When it comes to suffering from and dealing with menopause, menopausal weight gain, hormonal imbalances, etc.. For me, I can only say no wonder this was a truly important conversation with a highly educated and knowledgeable expert, and it’s extra admirable of Tapp to share how even she, as someone who knows the body so well, was so hit by and uninformed about this major transition in life.

00:33:16:10 – 00:33:46:08
Claudia
And another takeaway for me is actually what she said about friendships in midlife and how they gained a totally different quality and depth. Now that we slowly regain our freedom and rediscover, even reinvent ourselves. A second spring indeed. If you want to learn more about Tapp’s work, please visit w w w Dot Stand wellness.com.

00:33:46:10 – 00:34:11:02
Claudia
Shift happens has been created and is hosted by me, Claudia Mahler, editing Andy Boroson social media Magda Reckendrees. I hope you felt connected and heard by listening to Shift Happens and please leave a review and a rating wherever you listen to podcasts.