Episode 65
Lisa Grant:Hashimoto's and Fertility: The ONE Thing you MUST Do to Improve Your Fertility
Lisa Grant:
Hashimoto's and Fertility: The ONE Thing you MUST Do to Improve Your Fertility
This week we are talking about Autoimmune Thyroid Disease and it's connection to fertility. Dr. Lisa Grant joins us to walk us through the foundational health building to improve fertility and what you need to know if you are trying to conceive.
First Aired on: Dec 12, 2022
Episode 65
Lisa Grant:Hashimoto's and Fertility: The ONE Thing you MUST Do to Improve Your Fertility
Lisa Grant:
Hashimoto's and Fertility: The ONE Thing you MUST Do to Improve Your Fertility
This week we are talking about Autoimmune Thyroid Disease and it's connection to fertility. Dr. Lisa Grant joins us to walk us through the foundational health building to improve fertility and what you need to know if you are trying to conceive.
First Aired on: Dec 12, 2022
Table of Contents:
Table of Contents:
In this episode:
In this episode:
Today we are joined by Dr. Lisa Grant, OMD and we are talking about Autoimmune Thyroid DIsease and Fertility. Dr. Lisa is a double board-certified Oriental Medicine Doctor specializing in fertility, and the owner of Fertility Reset Online, where she supports couples in building the families they dream of.
Lisa started her journey as a patient. She struggled with digestive distress that got worse as time went on. Western Medicine doctors couldn't find the problem. When it was so bad that Lisa could barely eat without extreme pain, she found an article that pointed her toward acupuncture.
Sure enough, acupuncture helped ease her symptoms, and continued to improve her health. As she was looking for a career change, Lisa decided to go to school and practice the medicine that had so significantly impacted her health.
Lisa wasn't focused on fertility at first. Having had five pregnancies and three miscarriages, she wasn't sure she was ready to support others in that way.
Until a friend turned to her for support in conceiving. The rest is history!
Lisa helps fill in the gaps in the fertility experience. Often her patients have fertility specialists and Lisa's work complements the treatment path.
The importance of a FULL thyroid panel:
Most Western Physicians are only testing TSH and T4 levels.
They are missing key pieces of information regarding thyroid health.
If fertility issues are present, it is essential to check thyroid anitbodies, along with free T3 and rT3 as well.
So many of Lisa's patients have undiagnosed Hashimoto's
The symptoms are chameleon-like!
Chinese Medicine Approach
Thyroid is on the spleen and kidney meridians.
Kidney rations energy
Spleen - nurturing and nourishment
The thyroid is the energetic thermostat
Carrying a baby is like being an olympic athlete!
If our body doesn't have enough resources for full health, it won't allow or maintain the pregnancy.
Must build foundations of wellness first!
Where to start?
GO COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY GLUTEN FREE!
No cheating!
75% of time Lisa sees thyroid antibodies correct with this perhaps difficult, but SIMPLE step!
Lisa's gift for you:
go to Fertilityresetonline.com. and use code Inspirednow20 for 20% off!
Why aren't doctors catching this?
If only testing TSH, they are missing what's going on until the thyroid has sustained significant damage. They are missing subclinical thyroid issues that when treated, could prevent the damage.
Get a full panel!!!
Lisa's One Step...
If you have to ask...the answer is NO! No Gluten! No Wiggle Room!
Lisa started her journey as a patient. She struggled with digestive distress that got worse as time went on. Western Medicine doctors couldn't find the problem. When it was so bad that Lisa could barely eat without extreme pain, she found an article that pointed her toward acupuncture.
Sure enough, acupuncture helped ease her symptoms, and continued to improve her health. As she was looking for a career change, Lisa decided to go to school and practice the medicine that had so significantly impacted her health.
Lisa wasn't focused on fertility at first. Having had five pregnancies and three miscarriages, she wasn't sure she was ready to support others in that way.
Until a friend turned to her for support in conceiving. The rest is history!
Lisa helps fill in the gaps in the fertility experience. Often her patients have fertility specialists and Lisa's work complements the treatment path.
The importance of a FULL thyroid panel:
Most Western Physicians are only testing TSH and T4 levels.
They are missing key pieces of information regarding thyroid health.
If fertility issues are present, it is essential to check thyroid anitbodies, along with free T3 and rT3 as well.
So many of Lisa's patients have undiagnosed Hashimoto's
The symptoms are chameleon-like!
Chinese Medicine Approach
Thyroid is on the spleen and kidney meridians.
Kidney rations energy
Spleen - nurturing and nourishment
The thyroid is the energetic thermostat
Carrying a baby is like being an olympic athlete!
If our body doesn't have enough resources for full health, it won't allow or maintain the pregnancy.
Must build foundations of wellness first!
Where to start?
GO COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY GLUTEN FREE!
No cheating!
75% of time Lisa sees thyroid antibodies correct with this perhaps difficult, but SIMPLE step!
Lisa's gift for you:
go to Fertilityresetonline.com. and use code Inspirednow20 for 20% off!
Why aren't doctors catching this?
If only testing TSH, they are missing what's going on until the thyroid has sustained significant damage. They are missing subclinical thyroid issues that when treated, could prevent the damage.
Get a full panel!!!
Lisa's One Step...
If you have to ask...the answer is NO! No Gluten! No Wiggle Room!
Other Resources:
Other Resources:
Connect with Lisa Grant
Connect with Lisa Grant
Lisa Grant has a gift for you!
Lisa Grant has a gift for you!
20% Off Dr Lisa's 90 Day Fertility Reset
Use promo code INSPIRENOW20 for 20% off at checkout when enrolling in Dr Lisa's 90 Day Fertility Reset course
Episode Transcript
Julie Michelson: [00:00:00] Welcome back to the Inspired Living with Autoimmunity podcast. I'm your host, Julie Michelson, and today we're joined by Dr. Lisa Grant and we're talking about autoimmune thyroid disease and fertility. Dr. Lisa is a double board certified oriental medicine doctor specializing in fertility, and she's the owner of the Fertility Reset Online supports couples in building the families they desire.
In today's conversation, we're [00:01:00] diving deep into the autoimmune thyroid fertility connection, and Lisa shares her approach and wisdom with us, including that one thing that everyone with Hashimotos must do.
Dr. Lisa, welcome to the podcast.
Lisa Grant: Hi. It's great to be here.
Julie Michelson: I am so excited for our conversation today and to dig deep with listeners, but I always love to start cuz at a, cuz I'm curious and B, because I know somebody's gonna lean in a little closer, you know? How did you get. To be doing this. What? What is your, whether it's your personal journey or your story that kind of brought you to this world?
Lisa Grant: So I was actually a patient. I'm a Chinese medicine doctor. I was a patient before I was, you know, before I went to school, I had horrific digestive issues to the point where my stomach would hurt so bad, I thought I was gonna pass out. It just, it hurt and the [00:02:00] doctors scoped me and they were like, We don't know what it is.
And they were like, And I was like, Everything hurts. And they're like, Well, if it hurts, you don't eat it. And I'm like, No, everything hurts. I can't eat anything. So I happened to read an article in the paper that said that Chinese medicine, acupuncture could help patients who had chemo induced nausea.
And I'm like, Well, nausea is definitely something that I'm dealing with, so let me go talk to an oriental medicine doctor and see if they can help me out. And I went to, Local acupuncturist and things were so bad that in the, originally I was going like three days a week, which is, which is a lot. But after a few weeks, all of a sudden, like I could start eating things again.
And it got to the point where like every few days I would call up my dad and I would be like, Dad, guess what? I was able to eat today and not wanna pass out. So, and at the same time I was looking for a career change. And I was looking at law school versus. Something else, you know? And I went into my [00:03:00] acupuncturist one day and I was like, you know, I'm pretty sure I'd be a good lawyer, but I don't think I wanna be a lawyer because it's going to like, it's gonna be really hard to raise my kids and do that at the same time, just because of the nature of, you know, my husband's job.
And he was like, Okay. And I was like, So what should I do? And he's like, Are you asking me? And I'm like, Sure. I'm taking suggestions. And he looked at me and he is like, You should do this. I. Why, Why do you think I'd be good at this? And he's like, You stop complete strangers on the street if they're limping and hand them my card and tell them they really need to try acupuncture.
He's like, You're clearly passionate about it. He's like, You know, it works. And honestly, if, if you're concerned about balancing work and life is an issue, he's like, Because you own your own practice. You can set your own hours and you can do the things that you wanna do. And I went home and I thought about that and I went and looked at the website and looked at the prereqs and I'm like, I can do that.
So I enrolled and like [00:04:00] 14 years later, here I am.
Julie Michelson: So amazing. The universe is so kind and I love, you know, it's, we need to look up sometimes, right? We're always, it's that next step is there even if we have no idea what it is.
Lisa Grant: Right, Right.
Julie Michelson: nothing better than somebody with their own journey that becomes passionate. Of course, you know, I'm a little biased but. I believe this is how we are changing medicine and, and changing wellness, really, not just medicine.
So
Lisa Grant: Yeah, it's one conversation, one patient at a time, but it builds and it's important. So, and, and how I got into fertility was I had actually had my own fertility journey. I had had, you know, during the course of trying to get pregnant, I had five pregnancies, three miscarriages. It was really rough.
Nobody had any great answers. Had my, you know, second kid, I'm like, I'm done, I'm good. And when I got into acupuncture, I was, Deliberately avoided fertility because [00:05:00] it was still too raw for me. It hurt too much. And then a really, really close friend came to me and she's like, I really wanna get pregnant.
And I've been trying and I can't. And I was like, I need to think about this. I know, and I'm like, Oh man, if that isn't a call, I don't know what it's , but I was like, Can I handle this? You know, because there's often a lot of disappointment and false starts and just, you know, it, it, and, and there's not always a happy ending.
So it, but it was, it was good that it was her because, you know, I tried some things. We did some things, and I was really honest. I was like, Okay, so I'm doing what? It's hot. I don't know if it's gonna work. And you know, she was there. She was like, Look, I know you will do the best you can. That's all I'm asking.
And you know, fortunately it worked out. She got her kid, it was great. And then the phone started ringing off the hook
Julie Michelson: Ha,
Lisa Grant: It is again. So, you know, it's, it's, I'm not always sure, Right. I'm not always sure that I accept that whole idea that the [00:06:00] universe is always gonna bang on your door when you need it or you know, but it's like, But definitely in these two places or cases, I was like, yeah, okay.
This is clearly something and there's such a need for. For any practitioners who are, you know, complimentary, specializing in fertility because while Western Medicine doctors, I mean, it's a technological wonder what we can do with Western medicine to help women and you know, couples start their families, but there's still a huge number of missing pieces.
And that's where what I do comes in because putting these pieces together, Filling in the gaps for the places where Western Medicine doesn't know what to do with it, or doesn't even, it doesn't even show up on the radar. So I will often find that, you know, it's like there's some patients where I'm like, Look, from the get go, I'm like, we're gonna have to do some sort of assisted reproductive fertility, but what I wanna do is improve your fertility so much that whatever it is that we're gonna wind up doing is gonna work better, faster, and hopefully save you some money.
[00:07:00] Because IVF is so expensive, right? If we
Julie Michelson: well, and heartache and yeah, all of it.
Lisa Grant: hard in all of it. So yeah, so that was, that was the other piece of the story was it wasn't just me as a patient, it was me as not having a patient, not having the resources. I got lucky, I got my kiddos, but then it was like, okay, what can I do to help other women on this pathway?
Because it's a really tough place to be.
Julie Michelson: I love that. And for those of you that are watching the video, I have something in my eye. . I'm not, I'm not crying, although I could be because this, it is, it's such a, a common journey. I actually remember the first time I'd ever, this is. Way it was before I even had symptoms of autoimmunity. And remember the first time I heard the term Hashimotos thyroiditis?
And, and it was because I had a family member who was diagnosed. Post miscarriage. And it was like, dots connected cuz she's like, Oh, my mom had that, my mom had three miscarriages and, and, and so Yep. It's so, so, so [00:08:00] common. And so I wanna talk about those missing pieces and, and we were chatting before I hit record.
Listeners know because it comes up all the time, right? That. I am absolutely not anti-Western medicine nor you where, so I just wanna highlight, we're not bashing that. It, it's I always say there's a time and a place, and if I have an emergency and I need acute care, that's where I'm going. I'm not going to an acupuncturist when I need surgery.
Lisa Grant: No, absolutely. And I tell my patients that all the time. I'm like, there are times when it's like, Do not call me, call your
Julie Michelson: Yeah, what are you doing? Yeah,
Lisa Grant: because it's, Yeah. The, the cons, the issue or the, the place where I think a lot of people have misconceptions is that what Western medicine does is it has its own sort of like wheelhouse and quite frankly, so do I, and you know, and it's like there are places where I can improve things.
There are places where western medicine can improve things.
Julie Michelson: And when [00:09:00] you're working together, it could be magic
Lisa Grant: And I, and I am actually, I'm actually like personal friends with several reproductive endocrinologists in Las Vegas, which is where I practice. And you know, we basically have each other on speed dial because I'll have a patient who comes in and I'm looking at stuff and you know, and it's like, I will ask my friends like, Hey, so this is what I'm seeing.
Can you like, You need some mind share. They will text me and go, Hey, we're sending somebody to you because they've got this, this, and this, and we know we, you need to take care of them before we can get, do what we need to do. So it's a really lovely like partnership because they understand that with the way that Western medicine is structured, there are certain things they don't know what to do with, For example, like Hashimotos.
Thyroiditis, and I'm really excited to talk about this because this is one of those sort of unexplored, unacknowledged and, and yet very, very, very critical pieces in dealing with fertility issues because I have patients who come in with like this crazy range of [00:10:00] like fertility issues. And at this point, what I now do is I always do that full panel.
I don't just look at tsh, right? Because a lot of doctors will, It's like as the regular panel, they will look at TSH and they will look at free t4. And if the TSH is fine and the free T4 is fine, they will say no thyroid issues. Well, as you know, Probably most of your listeners, there are three tests missing in there and the big one is, is TPO and the T G A B.
And if you are missing the diagnosis of the Hashimotos, Often what happens is, is that, you know, patients will come in and they will have either repeat miscarriages or just generic, I can't get pregnant, or they'll ovulate late, or they'll ovulate early, or they're always cold or they're always hot. I mean, it's like this is the entire gamut of Chinese medicine symptoms, right?
It's like it could, I, I got 15 diagnosis just looking at those, but. Looking at those tests, the free t3, the tsa, or excuse me, the tpo, the T G A [00:11:00] B let's me do is diagnose, okay. Autoimmune thyroid disease. Now that's a Western medicine diagnosis. Okay. But. And how I deal with that in Chinese medicine comes after I kind of take a functional medicine approach to it.
And I look at that and I'm like, Okay, you have antithyroid antibodies. Has anybody ever told you you have Hashimotos? And half the time the answer is no. And then or more. And so the answer, then we go through a like one main huge lifestyle change that they have to. And you cannot screw with this lifestyle change.
I'm like, You cannot compromise. You cannot cheat. I was like, I'm willing to compromise with a lot of things. I am not willing to compromise on this one lifestyle change that you must do. And I was like, And 75% of the time we can fix the hush motos and it will stop it cold. And everybody's like, at that point is like, I will do anything.
Because when women come to me because they're having fertility issues, they're either at the [00:12:00] place where they're like, I don't wanna do. IVF or whatever, or if I have to, I wanted to have, you know, get, put my best foot forward or they've done it, it didn't work. And generally my patients will do anything that I ask them to.
Because I make an effort to like connect and have rapport with them, but also let them know, Look, I will tell you these things and if I don't know what the answer is, I will tell you. But I'm also working with like 10, a decade more of doing this and I want you, you know, you just have to trust that I know what it is that I'm doing.
And you know, some patients will joke is like, Do you want me to stand on my head? I'm like, Not today, . I mays
Julie Michelson: maybe
Lisa Grant: maybe. But, and, and that one change, like I said, 75% of the time we fix it. And then on top of that, we put all of my fertility recommendations and my Chinese medicine diagnosis and all that because what I found is my Chinese medicine alone [00:13:00] doesn't deal directly with the Antithyroid antibody because of what we do in the United States.
And so I'm, it's like, so, so drum roll. Do we
Julie Michelson: I know. I'm like, Ooh, she should
Lisa Grant: So here's, here's the thing. What I tell my patients is it's very hard to do, but it is a very simple change. And that is I need them to go 100% strict. Like, you have celiac disease, like your life depends on it, gluten-free,
Julie Michelson: I was so ho. I'm like, if she says something different, I'll be so surprised.
Lisa Grant: no, and that's, and that's, but that, that is it.
And, and,
Julie Michelson: And I love, I love two things that you said. One is that it's hard to knowledge, It's, it can be hard to do, but it is simple, right? It's simple. And two is, I already forgot what you . Wow, that's great. And no, I did not have gluten today. Wow. Oh, the all in the, [00:14:00] All in the, Oh my gosh. If I hear one more time, you know I'm gluten free.
You are. Well, mostly then you're not
Lisa Grant: Nope. And, and, and the way I explain it, the way I explain it is, is basically look okay, Every time you eat gluten, your body, your immune system is getting confused. And because the protein on the outside of the gluten looks so similar to the, the protein molecules on the outside of your thyroid, your body is attacking your thyroid.
And then I play dirty and I'm like, How bad do you want this baby? I, I'm, I'm perfectly happy to play dirty like that because it's
Julie Michelson: Well, and, and
Lisa Grant: and it's not really playing dirty. It's like take going to the heart of what they want. And it's like, Look, if you want this baby, because it has not happened, you have tried for however long you've been trying for, whether it's, you know, six months or I had one, I had one woman come in.
So it was really interesting. About a year and a half ago, I had four women come in within a. Three of the four of them had undiagnosed Hashimotos. Three of like, say one [00:15:00] of them had had like four repeat miscarriages and nobody could figure out why. One of them was just like she had been trying, couldn't get pregnant.
One of them knew that she had Hashimotos, but didn't know what to do about it. And one of them was just, I mean, actually two of them were just kind of like, we don't know what's going on. Of the ones that weren't diagnosed ran my panel. I'm like, Hashimotos. I'm like, This is what you need to do. And they went all in.
Right. And it's, it's, I actually send all of my Hashimotos patients to celiac.com. I'm like, they did all the work, right? I'm like, they did all the work. It hides
Julie Michelson: not Rockets on
Lisa Grant: Oh no, it's not. Except you have to hear, Excuse me. You have to know that, like, it hides, it doesn't say wheat. It doesn't say gluten. It says modified food starch.
I'm like, if you don't know what it is, assume it's gluten. Right? If, if, if, and if it doesn't have the little label that says gluten free, it's gluten. Unless you know you're talking about.
Julie Michelson: Unless it's lettuce or
Lisa Grant: Like lettuce or meat or is like, And [00:16:00] rice. Rice is naturally gluten free, right? I'm like, You're okay with rice? But I was like, But the problem is, is that anything is processed.
It could have been cross-contaminated. And we are talking about, it's not like you picked up a piece of bread and ate it. We're talking on the microscopic level. Anything that triggers your immune system is going to kill your thyroid, and that makes it impossible for your body to do what it wants to. Now do women who have Hashimotos thyroid thyroiditis get pregnant naturally?
Absolutely. Do they do it without my help? Absolutely. Do they do it eating gluten? Absolutely. But if you're coming to me and you haven't, you're not. And that's why we need to be a lot more consistent and careful about it. And what's remarkable when I have my patients go gluten free is they'll come back like two weeks.
I'm like, Look, the first week you're gonna be like, what? You're gonna, maybe even 10 days, you're gonna be like, Ugh. I. Come back to me in two weeks, weeks, Mark my words, your brain fogs gonna go away. You're gonna have more energy. The bloating's gonna go down. If you have the puffiness that's gonna go back.
And they [00:17:00] come back and they're like, I have not felt this good in years. And I'm like, I know. And I know. So here's the thing, Julie, they always cheat. They always cheat because we're human beings and we always wanna
Julie Michelson: to, we have to test
Lisa Grant: And I know they're gonna cheat and I don't say anything cuz I know they're gonna cheat and they'll come back
Julie Michelson: And you know, they're gonna feel horrible. And it's like, Yes,
Lisa Grant: I don't have to say anything. They'll come back in and I'm like, How'd you do? And they'll be like, I had gluten this weekend. And I'm like, mm-hmm. , how'd that work out for you? ? And they're like, I felt horrible. You know? And they, and I was like, Yeah, that is your immune system going. Don't do that. And I never have to ask them about gluten again because they're believer, because their body has told them loud and clear.
That's not okay for me. And so here's, here's why. And this is why I'm so excited to have this conversation with you today because this is why this matters in Chinese medicine. So let's, let's come over a little bit into my world because Chinese medicine, [00:18:00] Doesn't explicitly recognize like autoimmune diseases.
Remember, this is a medicine that's been around for 3000 years. We look at everything from like outside signs and symptoms, so I've never found a way to see autoimmune thyroid disease in the pulses, which is one of our. Like, you know diagnostic techniques in the tongue. If you've ever been to an acupuncturist, they'll be like, Stick your tongue out.
We see things in the pulses in the tongue. We're looking at things on the body. But remember when I said I have women who come in with fertility issues and it, a lot of it comes down to Hashimotos thyroiditis, but it can look like anything. This chameleonlike aspect means it's very difficult for me to see it.
And I have other diagnostic tools that I use for fertility. And I just, I've never been able to see it, which is why I really love the blood work because that tells me it's black and white. It's right
Julie Michelson: a shortcut.
Lisa Grant: Oh, it's a shortcut. Saves lots of time and effort and, you know, heartache. So in Chinese medicine though, the way that we think about the [00:19:00] thyroid is there is not a separate thyroid, okay?
There's no. There's no separate sort of like energy line that says thyroid on it. We call it split between what we call the spleen meridian and the kidney meridian. We're not, we don't have time to go into the whole physiology thing about this, but basically there are 12 lines of energy that run through your body and each one is them, is associated with the organ that it runs through, so it, it governs the functions of that organ.
It governs the area of the body that it runs through. So like if I have somebody who has arm pain that's running, like along here, I'll be working on the large intestine meridian. Now I am aware that the large intestine isn't aware near there
Julie Michelson: Right
Lisa Grant: right? But the fact is, is that we know that points here will affect your large intestine, but sometimes if somebody's elbow hurts, just put a needle in there.
It's even, yes, it's a large intestine needle, but that's where it hurts. But it also covers like a [00:20:00] general function of the organ. So for example the large intestine is in charge of eliminating things that you are done with. And this happens on a physical level, it happens on an emotional level. So I have people who can't have trouble with grief and letting go.
I'll work on the large testimony cuz that clear. Okay. So just like that the spleen is split between the kidney meridian, which is basically the easiest way to think about it is sort of like the global sort of energy manager of the body. Okay. And it decides who gets what in terms of energy. So you can see how that might be a thyroid thing.
And the other half of it is the, the spleen meridian, because the spleen meridian in charge of nurturing and nourishment and what we call the transformation. Of basically food. Sure. You take, you eat the food, and there's this magical alchemical process where what you eat gets turned into, it gets broken apart and turned into all these molecules that we then absorb and turn into [00:21:00] tissue.
Okay. Whether it's thyroid or thyroid hormone or whatever it is. So you can see how you got the energy piece on the kidney, and then you've got the nutrition piece that also transforms into energy and you need both of them. And one of the things that I do for my Chinese medicine is figure out, okay, who's unhappy?
Because with thyroid I need to figure out is the kidney the most unhappy or is the spleen the most unhappy? And I have a ginormous. Shortcut if I have women going gluten free because I just fix the spleen. Meridian
Julie Michelson: right,
Lisa Grant: right? I'm like, it's way easier now. All sorts of things infertility having to do with the spleen meridian, because part of the transformation process has to do with like creating blood and creating, you know, the hormones and creating the follicles.
So it's not, it's not. You know, cure the Hashimotos or at least, you know, treat the Hashimotos and fix all the fertility issues. There's a lot more to it than that, but that's a such a gigantic piece of relieving the [00:22:00] pressure and the literal attack on the spleen meridian's function, that it makes it a whole lot easier to get everything else to go because your thyroid is your energetic ther.
In Western medicine, it decides how much energy does, how much energy do you have, and who's gonna get it right? And the who's gonna get it. Part is the kidney. And the kidney is always going to put your heart, your brain, your lungs, your nervous system. It's gonna put you before the fertility because fertility, eh, you can do that next month, another month after that, or maybe in a year.
But if you're dead, It's all good. You're done. Right? So the kidney is always having to discern who gets it, and the kidney will only feed fertility if it knows there's enough energy to go around.
Julie Michelson: you need the resources.
Lisa Grant: You need the resources, and if you've got the hush shemos thyroiditis, you don't have the resources because your body is barely keeping on top of what you need.
Brain fog, bloating, exhaustion. [00:23:00] So by fixing the huy Molis by going gluten free. We, we free up a huge amount of the energy and the resources that then with the fertility, with the fertility lifestyle changes that I have my patients do when they do my, my 90 day reset with, you know, the acupuncture. I can now tell tail the body.
Okay, so you now have enough energy. Let's do this next thing, which is near and dear to the heart of my patient and the near and dear to the heart, because of course, the. It's like heart wants a baby. I'm like, So now we can go to this next level where we're working on your fertility and we can, Your body, your body is convinced, your body knows there's enough energy to do all of it, live life and also have the resources to make a baby.
So that's why this is so important because if your, if your thyroid is messed up, you don't have enough energy to do the fertility thing, which is the top of the list of what my patients come to me for.
Julie Michelson: Which is so true and, and anybody who's really, whether they're [00:24:00] listening for fertility or listening cuz of hashi's, you know, which is so common,
Lisa Grant: Oh,
Julie Michelson: it, it's not difficult once you've experienced the fatigue that can go with it to imagine. Wow. Well, yeah, no wonder my body can't make a baby right now because I'm having trouble getting outta bed in the morning.
Lisa Grant: exactly.
Julie Michelson: Like if they connect
Lisa Grant: I heard something once recently or I, I heard something recently which I was like, Oh yeah. It's like you basically need to think of, of pregnancy, cuz remember that's the end goal of fertility. Pregnancy is like, Becoming an Olympic athlete for a woman, it's like the single most energy intensive thing that she's ever going to do other than just living the entirety of her life.
And if you don't have enough energy to live your life, how the heck are you gonna make it? Through the
Julie Michelson: I love that. It's so, so true. So true. I wanna touch on. [00:25:00] The, the question of, you know, what about the people listening that, you know, they have hashi's and maybe they've been struggling with fertility, or maybe they're getting ready to start a family, and even though they know they have Hashimotos, their ob gyn or their fertility specialist is saying, you know, Yeah, I know you have that, but it's fine.
It's, it has nothing to do with this. It's not affecting.
Lisa Grant: Right. Okay. So. Remember what we said earlier about, you know, the wheelhouse is, is the Western medicine does what? It's okay. So Western medicine doesn't have a way to treat. Hashimotos until it starts affecting tsh. By that point, the damage has already been done. So if your doc has run the tests and you know, if you have any kind of questions about fertility, I think every woman should get all five of those fertility or those, excuse me, those thyroid tests done.
And if you go to the doc and the doc is like, Well, it's not affecting your TSH yet, so we don't need to deal. The answer is, well, that's only because it's not showing up in TSH, and we never [00:26:00] want it to show up in tsh. We wanna stop
Julie Michelson: let's stop it before we get
Lisa Grant: in its tracks before we get there. Exactly.
Julie Michelson: I wanna back up to, to give listeners an understanding, you know, for us it's like, oh, TSH and three
Lisa Grant: Right. True.
Julie Michelson: and it's all, you know, so, So the marker that is most commonly tested, this tsh, thyroid stimulating hormone, you know, let's explain to listeners why.
Yes. When that's clearly out of whack. We already know you have a problem. Kind of explain what that is, and I think it becomes then really clear of like, Oh, well, why would I wait until that's a problem?
Lisa Grant: Okay, so TSH is the hormone that your brain, I believe it's the pituitary releases to tell your thyroid, Hey, we need some more energy. Okay, That's one measure. And tsh, you generally, at least for fertility, I like seeing it at around two. If TSH goes above four, Western medicine doctors will give [00:27:00] the patient Levo thyroid or Synthroid or some kind of synthetic hormone because they want, basically the brain is yelling at the thyroid, Wake up, do your job.
But the thyroid's having a really hard time responding if. And, and, and so what the, the medicine does is it basically is synthetic t4. So the brain tells the thyroid, Hey, wake up. We need some, some more energy. And in response to that, the thyroid makes t4, which is a, basically, it's a, it's a reserve hormone, but it basically says, Okay, here's, here's the bundle of energy waiting to go.
And, and that's what the medication. , but there are several other pieces in the, in sort of the, the communication pathway and the energy pathway. So T4 is an inert, inactive form. It converts to what's called t3, which is the active form of the thyroid hormone in the liver. And if you don't test that, the level of T3.[00:28:00]
You don't actually know if that piece is being done. And so you may be, you know, you can have t4, but a lot, some patients will get the t4, the the sy, and they'll be like, I'm still tired, and I test the t3. And that's because they're not converting it correctly. And that's usually a nutritional deficiency, usually.
Okay. So then that means we need to fix some of the nutritional stuff. T3, specifically free t3. That's the energy molecule. That's the one that, you know, starts opening it up and gives you all the energy. TPO and T G A. Are produced by your immune system and what they are is a marker that your body, your immune system, for whatever reason, has decided to attack your thyroid.
And like I said, my understanding is, is it's because the wires got crossed at some point and thyroid looks like gluten, which is why it fixes it in 75% of the cases. It doesn't always work. There is 25% where it's not that, but still. So if your body is attacking your TPO and or attacking your thyroid, [00:29:00] even if your tsh, which is the message from your brain to your thyroid that says, Hey, we need more energy is fine.
Your body can still be attacking your thyroid. And what's eventually going to happen, The conclusion of that story is, is that eventually the damage is gonna be so great, and most of the thyroid is gonna get killed off, that your TSH is gonna be through the roof because your brain is screaming at your thyroid and your thyroid literally cannot respond because it's dead.
And that's the part, it's like your body is killing your thyroid and it doesn't regrow. So the, So Western medicine has no way to stop that immune. Okay. And it's, and it's not just as simple as like taking an allergy pill. It's like I've never seen anything that says that that works. Okay. And that's why this gluten thing makes me so excited, cuz like I said, 75% of this time, it'll stop it cold.
Your body will stop attacking your thyroid.
Julie Michelson: And I would add even for the other 25%, it's a piece of it,
Lisa Grant: Oh, it's a [00:30:00] piece of
Julie Michelson: still absolutely. Never, ever,
Lisa Grant: Ever, ever have gluten, if you have antithyroid antibody, don't eat gluten. Period. Full stop. There are other pieces of that puzzle.
Julie Michelson: If you have any autoimmune diagnosis, donate gluten, period
Lisa Grant: We could spend an hour and a half talking about why gluten is a problem.
Julie Michelson: That's always my, my qualifier. Like, no, you know, there is no one diet for everybody except
Lisa Grant: Except getting off the gluten. So, so that's, so that's why,
Julie Michelson: catch, So thank you for going through all of
Lisa Grant: We wanna catch it
Julie Michelson: it before, which is,
Lisa Grant: has literally been killed to the point that your brain is screaming at it and it can't respond
Julie Michelson: Which is what they consider clinical thyroid disease. So we want, we wanna catch subclinical, we wanna get it
Lisa Grant: it gets
Julie Michelson: it's a problem. And it's a simple blood test and it's not expense there. This isn't, you know, I do some crazy testing cuz I love it.
Lisa Grant: It's like, it's like, Yeah, [00:31:00] no, I mean, when I order it for my patients, I think it's 15 bucks. So it's not an expensive test. It's a super, like I said, it's simple. It's not easy, but it's a simple change. And the reason that you wanna catch it before the TSH starts going up, which is where western medicine can come in, cuz they're like, Oh, well we now have, we have a treatment for that.
We just don't have a treatment for the other piece. That's why it's
Julie Michelson: a treatment for that symptom.
Lisa Grant: But we still haven't fixed the autoimmune
Julie Michelson: Right, right. Yeah. We can get your TSH to come back down if we give you some hormone,
Lisa Grant: And this is something that a lot of my patients, even if they're savvy, don't understand. Just because your TSH came down, if you have the Hashimotos, you know the tpo, T G A B, the Hashimotos thyroiditis, your body is still killing your thyroid.
All that's gonna happen is, is the amount of T, the t4, your medicine is gonna have to go up because your thyroid is less and less able to. Produce the hormone because it's still being killed off. That's why this is so beautiful is because you stop the gluten and like I said, in those 75% of the cases, and actually all the cases, [00:32:00] at least, you're dramatically reducing your body's attack on your thyroid.
So it has a chance to survive. So that's why it's really important to do the blood test. That's why it's important to do gluten free. And I cannot remember where we came to from that or where we, where we were on that.
Julie Michelson: We were talking about how, you know, even still today, Your fertility doc may say, Oh, you have Hashimotos, but it's not a problem.
Lisa Grant: But it's not a problem. So if, if the, if the TSH is high, right, And at that point I will say you, because I have occasionally patients come in, I don't wanna take that, but if the TSH is high, I'm like, You have to take it with, we can stop the damage on the thyroid, but. If your TSH is too high, it is a cause for miscarriage.
So we're gonna do all this work. And then if, because I've had it happen before, I had one patient who flat out refused to take the th the, the, the Synthroid, even though I was telling you, you gotta take this. And she miscarried. And it broke my heart because we could have [00:33:00] potentially prevented it. Because remember what I said about what the thyroid does.
It's, it's the energy generator. And if you don't have enough energy, your body will always choose. Over the baby because if it, there's not enough energy to go around, baby doesn't happen. Right? It's like it just, you can't sustain it. So yes, I would like my patients if they're like at, certainly if they're at four or above, they need to be on the Synthroid, but often as they're working with me, If we can get the Hashimoto thyroiditis under control, some, the TSH will often drop, and then we're good to go.
Now again, I have my whole diagnostic fertility thing to determine whether or not we need to add herbs into that, or whether I'm like, we still maybe wanna add synth right into this because, or whatever they, you know, the, the generic, because I'm seeing some things that I. I wanna make sure that once we get you pregnant, we keep you pregnant because, you know, miscarriage is the worst.
It's like, it's bad enough if you can't get pregnant, but when you get pregnant, you [00:34:00] lose it. It's horrible. So quick. So the, the story, those four, or was it five? The five that came in one. All of them went gluten free of the font. Four of them we got pregnant. They didn't miscarried and they kept. Okay.
One of them we did wind up having to go to, you know, can't remember if it was IUI or ivf, because even. Like the, the, you know, it was just, we never, for whatever reason, her hormones never got to where we wanted them to go. But the IVF story wound up being happy because she got her baby and she was thrilled.
Meanwhile, all five feel better, have better energy, you know, aren't bloated, don't have the brain fog, you know, I mean, do stupid stuff and sta yeah, you're gonna have the brain fog, but, but it's like, but they, their baseline energy level rose dramatically because their immune system was not constantly killing their thyroid.
So, It's for all those patients. It was a happy ending and it was a super happy ending for four of them because [00:35:00] Right, and because it was like we got them pregnant naturally, and they, they felt great during the pregnancy, you know, because we were able to deal with the Hashimotos thyroiditis. So it's,
Julie Michelson: baby at the end, even for number five, is a huge win.
Lisa Grant: correct.
And, and all of my patients, Appreciate the fact that they are, you know, one of what I wanna do is give them the tools that they need to be healthy and have a baby, because I see no point.
Julie Michelson: like they have
Lisa Grant: You're not done. I, what I tell my patients is, Hi, pregnancy is nine months, but you know what? Once you get pregnant and have that baby, you are on the hook for the next 18 years.
And actually, Well, yeah, that's when they're in your house. But you're actually, this is a lifetime gig, right? You are a mom until you die and you want to be around for as long as you wanna be around. You wanna have energy, you wanna have the ability to do the things that you wanna do. I was like, so my baseline [00:36:00] is actually not just fixing the fertility.
I tell my patients, I can't fix your fertility. I'm gonna say get you healthy. So part of what I work on in my 90 day reset is, 80% of that program is, is health. It's like, and it's, you're like, Well, I'm healthy. I have women, I healthy, I do this, I do that. I'm like, Hmm. We're talking about a healthy at a level where your body is absolutely going to believe and be convinced that you can make and carry a baby determined.
I'm like, And that is not the same thing. And what is healthy according to pop fads changes. So, And what is healthy eating or healthy exercise levels for this person is not the same thing as that person. So what it is, is like we're creating a foundation where these are the things that are pretty much baseline for everybody.
And then I go into, Okay, now for you because of this piece over here, we're gonna do that. But for you, because of this piece over here, we're gonna do this over here. [00:37:00] So it, it's a, it's a personalized program, but the foundation is very similar for most people because most of my patients are coming in, given where we are in the world and everything with the same sorts of baseline issues.
And we fix those and then it gets a whole lot easier to deal, to build the fertility.
Julie Michelson: And for those of you listening that don't have Hashimotos, the 90 day Fertility reset workshop is for everybody.
Lisa Grant: Oh yeah. It's for everybody trying to get.
Julie Michelson: just, Yeah,
Lisa Grant: Yeah, it's for everybody trying to get pregnant. Yeah, there is, there are pieces, like I have like several videos devoted to Hashimotos thyroiditis, and what I say is, look, if you've got, or if, if, if you have any kind of thyroid issue, go look at those videos, right?
And if you've got, for example, endometriosis. If you've got endometriosis, then you go look at those videos. But like I said, there's a base, they're base videos and then it breaks out according to what's going on. Interesting thing. Probably half of my women who come in with P C O S, which is polycystic ovarian syndrome, [00:38:00] have some kind of hypothyroidism.
And of those, probably half of them have Hashimoto thyroiditis. So, and, and you're dealing with, all of these things are in the body, Right? And we have to, we, we heal the body to deal with the underlying sort of issues that are creating the fertility problems.
Julie Michelson: I love that. Amazing, and I know you have an amazing gift, a gift for listeners for 20% off of this incredible online program. Go to fertility reset online.com. And it is inspired now 20 and you'll get 20% off. And again, this is for everybody. I, I would say honestly, I mean, because of what we were just talking about, anybody who wants to up level or health, it may feel a little weird to do a fertility workshop.
You know, if you don't have a uterus anymore, like me, but
Lisa Grant: You know,
Julie Michelson: But you'll still benefit from it, I swear.
Lisa Grant: It's true actually. [00:39:00] It's true. It's like I will have women, so, So putting aside women who don't have uterus, we'll talk about that. But it's like for women, for women who have like endometriosis or P C O S and they're not interested in getting pregnant, but they're like, What can I do to help myself feel better?
Yeah. Like I said, the foundation of the good health and dealing with the underlying issues is first, and then there are pieces of the workshop where I specifically go into like, This is what you do for fertility, and there's, there's one unit you don't do, you're gonna be like, Yeah, I don't need that.
Because I, I talk about how do you track and like monitor your fertility, but honestly 80% of it is about building health. And then the. 20% of it is specific issues and then actual fertility. And my patients will come into me and they'll be like, So this fertility piece was a really small part of it. And I'm like, Yeah.
And they were like, But I feel better. My cycles are better. I'm like, Everything's better. And I'm like, Yeah, that's cuz we fixed. The health foundation, so it's it, oh my gosh, it makes my job so much easier [00:40:00] if I don't have to deal with all that other stuff. I'm like,
Julie Michelson: Right now I could just
Lisa Grant: all I have to do is do fertility instead of like backfilling All of those health issues that everybody has for women who don't have a uterus, especially if you have P C O S, that's permanent.
Permanent. P C O S is an endocrine problem, not a reproductive. Okay. If you have Hashimotos thyroiditis or any Hashi, any sort of thyroid issue, that's an endocrine problem. It's not a fertility problem, so anything, you know, if you have
Julie Michelson: talking root cause like it's a Yeah. And the fertility problem is the symptom. It's not the problem. I mean, it feels like the problem when
Lisa Grant: It feels like the problem when you're trying to get pregnant, but the thing is, is that the underlying root cause is health issues and with,
Julie Michelson: And.
Lisa Grant: On women's health, which is a really neglected field. Right. It's like
Julie Michelson: you, you touched on it already, you know, we talked about that motivator of you can give up gluten, you know, do you want the baby, How much do you want the baby? [00:41:00] And then, like you said, now you have the baby, you wanna be here and feel well to raise the baby and the grandchildren and the whoever, you know.
So it, it's all so important.
Lisa Grant: Cause the thing to remember the way the one. When you talk to an ob gyn or reproductive endocrinologist, the only thing they're interested in is your uterus and your ovaries. They're a little bit interested in your brain, but mostly they focus on that little package. And last time I checked our uterus and ovaries aren't walking around by themselves out there, they live.
Right?
Julie Michelson: they're not moving anymore though.
Lisa Grant: That. But, But they started out in the whole package. So you deal with the whole package and then what you wind up with.
Julie Michelson: Shocker.
Lisa Grant: Exactly. And then this all gets better because again, the root cause has been addressed. So
Julie Michelson: I love it. Now, I know you already said it, but here's your opportunity if you wanna. add, or I always, [00:42:00] always ask guests to give listeners that one step that they can take to start to improve
Lisa Grant: It's, it's a
Julie Michelson: they fell asleep. I missed it. Let's sit it one more time.
Lisa Grant: So, so if you have to ask, But, but can I eat that?
Julie Michelson: Mm.
Lisa Grant: it's only a little bit of gluten answers? No. If you have to ask, can I? The answer is no, because, Because you already know what the answer is. You just want wiggle room.
Julie Michelson: Right?
Lisa Grant: And the answer is for Hashimoto thyroiditis, for any woman who has elevated TPO or T G A B, there is no wiggle room.
You have to go gluten free. Okay? Just be glad you're doing it now,
Julie Michelson: friend, . I'm gonna take all the sound bites.
Lisa Grant: Yeah, it's, it's, it's be glad that it's happening now and not like 10 years ago, I went gluten free about 10 years ago because [00:43:00] I actually got eczema, like crazy eczema. I also suspect, looking back, it probably had something to do with my miscarriages, but none of that stuff was tested when I was having my kids, but it's like, it's, and it's just not worth
Julie Michelson: Oh, it was so different back then. I,
Lisa Grant: like there's so much good gluten free, like.
Julie Michelson: 14 years ago and, yeah.
Lisa Grant: couldn't find it. Basically, you know, you had
Julie Michelson: Well, and I'm not as nice as you cuz I say then this is, we, this is a whole nother episode, but I'm like, take it further. Just go grain free and then you don't have to worry about it cuz then you're not getting all the junk.
But I know, I'm a,
Lisa Grant: so that there, there is a piece about that in my workshop and I didn't think we had enough time to
Julie Michelson: I know I wanna talk about dairy too. You're gonna have to come back. We have so much more
Lisa Grant: Oh yeah. Oh, I have all sorts of things. Actually, I only have one thing to say about D and we all know what that is.
Julie Michelson: Well, I think that may touch the other 25% of people, right? If you're, If you're gluten free, but you're still eating dairy,
Lisa Grant: And that's a problem too. Yeah, it's a problem. It's a [00:44:00] problem. You know, I, I, I do actually, I don't, I don't like 100% grain-free, except for in certain cases, but I also am ta. There's
Julie Michelson: Well, it depends.
Lisa Grant: Correct. And there's only certain grains that I'm, I will allow. So, but weed is not one of them. Gluten is not one of them.
You know, it's just that simple. It's like, it's just not, And you know, I know a lot of people go, Ugh, gluten free. Really? It's like, look, I, we have scientific evidence, especially in this particular case, that, that it's not just all of us, you know, complimentary alternative types. Saying this like with no back.
Julie Michelson: Right,
Lisa Grant: I have objective proof because I track tpo, T G A B. The only change that I had some of those women make was gluten-free. I was like, Don't change anything else. It dropped like a rock. They felt better and it's like, look, that's all the proof that they needed. So there it is.
Julie Michelson: you go. The proof is in the baby.
Lisa Grant: Great. That's exactly right, That's exactly right.
Julie Michelson: Before we wrap up, where's the best place for [00:45:00] listeners to find you? Those that listen on the go and don't check the show notes.
Lisa Grant: Okay, so if they go to fertilityresetonline.com, it's all spelled out. Okay? They can click on the link about buying my course if they want the discount and I have completely forgotten the code, they wanna put the discount code in at checkout, and that is
iNSPIRENOW20, you'll get 20% off.
It's completely automated. And it's. You know, it's, I make every one of my fertility patients take this, and every single one of them comes back and says, This has completely changed my life because I feel better.
And you know, it's just like any woman who is struggling with fertility, any woman who is struggling with any sort of like reproductive issues, even if you're not trying to get pregnant.
But if you have. Heavy periods or long periods or just yucky periods or like cramping or any of that stuff. It's like, it's it, I really designed it to help improve women's health [00:46:00] and Yeah, and that, and then there's
Julie Michelson: that the bonus is, Yeah,
Lisa Grant: bonuses is that we do the fertility too, but it's just, I think it's so important for women to be empowered to have the tools to feel better.
Honestly, it's like, and then at the end you decide what works for you and what doesn't, and you decide what it is that you're willing to incorporate and what you're not willing to incorporate. But if you have all of the tools in front of you, then it makes it so that you have the information, and information is power.
So,
Julie Michelson: it and I'm all about, we are both, all about taking your power
Lisa Grant: absolutely,
Julie Michelson: we do what we do. Lisa, thank you so much. You have shared amazing gold with us today.
Lisa Grant: Oh, well thank you so much for letting me like spread the word because it's, it's just really important to me that people feel better. Right? It's about wellness.
Julie Michelson: It is, It
Lisa Grant: It is. It is.
Julie Michelson: for everyone listening. Remember, you can get the show notes and transcripts by visiting inspired living.show. I hope you enjoyed this episode as much as [00:47:00] I did.
Lisa Grant: And me,
Julie Michelson: Yes, we will see you next week.
In today's conversation, we're [00:01:00] diving deep into the autoimmune thyroid fertility connection, and Lisa shares her approach and wisdom with us, including that one thing that everyone with Hashimotos must do.
Dr. Lisa, welcome to the podcast.
Lisa Grant: Hi. It's great to be here.
Julie Michelson: I am so excited for our conversation today and to dig deep with listeners, but I always love to start cuz at a, cuz I'm curious and B, because I know somebody's gonna lean in a little closer, you know? How did you get. To be doing this. What? What is your, whether it's your personal journey or your story that kind of brought you to this world?
Lisa Grant: So I was actually a patient. I'm a Chinese medicine doctor. I was a patient before I was, you know, before I went to school, I had horrific digestive issues to the point where my stomach would hurt so bad, I thought I was gonna pass out. It just, it hurt and the [00:02:00] doctors scoped me and they were like, We don't know what it is.
And they were like, And I was like, Everything hurts. And they're like, Well, if it hurts, you don't eat it. And I'm like, No, everything hurts. I can't eat anything. So I happened to read an article in the paper that said that Chinese medicine, acupuncture could help patients who had chemo induced nausea.
And I'm like, Well, nausea is definitely something that I'm dealing with, so let me go talk to an oriental medicine doctor and see if they can help me out. And I went to, Local acupuncturist and things were so bad that in the, originally I was going like three days a week, which is, which is a lot. But after a few weeks, all of a sudden, like I could start eating things again.
And it got to the point where like every few days I would call up my dad and I would be like, Dad, guess what? I was able to eat today and not wanna pass out. So, and at the same time I was looking for a career change. And I was looking at law school versus. Something else, you know? And I went into my [00:03:00] acupuncturist one day and I was like, you know, I'm pretty sure I'd be a good lawyer, but I don't think I wanna be a lawyer because it's going to like, it's gonna be really hard to raise my kids and do that at the same time, just because of the nature of, you know, my husband's job.
And he was like, Okay. And I was like, So what should I do? And he's like, Are you asking me? And I'm like, Sure. I'm taking suggestions. And he looked at me and he is like, You should do this. I. Why, Why do you think I'd be good at this? And he's like, You stop complete strangers on the street if they're limping and hand them my card and tell them they really need to try acupuncture.
He's like, You're clearly passionate about it. He's like, You know, it works. And honestly, if, if you're concerned about balancing work and life is an issue, he's like, Because you own your own practice. You can set your own hours and you can do the things that you wanna do. And I went home and I thought about that and I went and looked at the website and looked at the prereqs and I'm like, I can do that.
So I enrolled and like [00:04:00] 14 years later, here I am.
Julie Michelson: So amazing. The universe is so kind and I love, you know, it's, we need to look up sometimes, right? We're always, it's that next step is there even if we have no idea what it is.
Lisa Grant: Right, Right.
Julie Michelson: nothing better than somebody with their own journey that becomes passionate. Of course, you know, I'm a little biased but. I believe this is how we are changing medicine and, and changing wellness, really, not just medicine.
So
Lisa Grant: Yeah, it's one conversation, one patient at a time, but it builds and it's important. So, and, and how I got into fertility was I had actually had my own fertility journey. I had had, you know, during the course of trying to get pregnant, I had five pregnancies, three miscarriages. It was really rough.
Nobody had any great answers. Had my, you know, second kid, I'm like, I'm done, I'm good. And when I got into acupuncture, I was, Deliberately avoided fertility because [00:05:00] it was still too raw for me. It hurt too much. And then a really, really close friend came to me and she's like, I really wanna get pregnant.
And I've been trying and I can't. And I was like, I need to think about this. I know, and I'm like, Oh man, if that isn't a call, I don't know what it's , but I was like, Can I handle this? You know, because there's often a lot of disappointment and false starts and just, you know, it, it, and, and there's not always a happy ending.
So it, but it was, it was good that it was her because, you know, I tried some things. We did some things, and I was really honest. I was like, Okay, so I'm doing what? It's hot. I don't know if it's gonna work. And you know, she was there. She was like, Look, I know you will do the best you can. That's all I'm asking.
And you know, fortunately it worked out. She got her kid, it was great. And then the phone started ringing off the hook
Julie Michelson: Ha,
Lisa Grant: It is again. So, you know, it's, it's, I'm not always sure, Right. I'm not always sure that I accept that whole idea that the [00:06:00] universe is always gonna bang on your door when you need it or you know, but it's like, But definitely in these two places or cases, I was like, yeah, okay.
This is clearly something and there's such a need for. For any practitioners who are, you know, complimentary, specializing in fertility because while Western Medicine doctors, I mean, it's a technological wonder what we can do with Western medicine to help women and you know, couples start their families, but there's still a huge number of missing pieces.
And that's where what I do comes in because putting these pieces together, Filling in the gaps for the places where Western Medicine doesn't know what to do with it, or doesn't even, it doesn't even show up on the radar. So I will often find that, you know, it's like there's some patients where I'm like, Look, from the get go, I'm like, we're gonna have to do some sort of assisted reproductive fertility, but what I wanna do is improve your fertility so much that whatever it is that we're gonna wind up doing is gonna work better, faster, and hopefully save you some money.
[00:07:00] Because IVF is so expensive, right? If we
Julie Michelson: well, and heartache and yeah, all of it.
Lisa Grant: hard in all of it. So yeah, so that was, that was the other piece of the story was it wasn't just me as a patient, it was me as not having a patient, not having the resources. I got lucky, I got my kiddos, but then it was like, okay, what can I do to help other women on this pathway?
Because it's a really tough place to be.
Julie Michelson: I love that. And for those of you that are watching the video, I have something in my eye. . I'm not, I'm not crying, although I could be because this, it is, it's such a, a common journey. I actually remember the first time I'd ever, this is. Way it was before I even had symptoms of autoimmunity. And remember the first time I heard the term Hashimotos thyroiditis?
And, and it was because I had a family member who was diagnosed. Post miscarriage. And it was like, dots connected cuz she's like, Oh, my mom had that, my mom had three miscarriages and, and, and so Yep. It's so, so, so [00:08:00] common. And so I wanna talk about those missing pieces and, and we were chatting before I hit record.
Listeners know because it comes up all the time, right? That. I am absolutely not anti-Western medicine nor you where, so I just wanna highlight, we're not bashing that. It, it's I always say there's a time and a place, and if I have an emergency and I need acute care, that's where I'm going. I'm not going to an acupuncturist when I need surgery.
Lisa Grant: No, absolutely. And I tell my patients that all the time. I'm like, there are times when it's like, Do not call me, call your
Julie Michelson: Yeah, what are you doing? Yeah,
Lisa Grant: because it's, Yeah. The, the cons, the issue or the, the place where I think a lot of people have misconceptions is that what Western medicine does is it has its own sort of like wheelhouse and quite frankly, so do I, and you know, and it's like there are places where I can improve things.
There are places where western medicine can improve things.
Julie Michelson: And when [00:09:00] you're working together, it could be magic
Lisa Grant: And I, and I am actually, I'm actually like personal friends with several reproductive endocrinologists in Las Vegas, which is where I practice. And you know, we basically have each other on speed dial because I'll have a patient who comes in and I'm looking at stuff and you know, and it's like, I will ask my friends like, Hey, so this is what I'm seeing.
Can you like, You need some mind share. They will text me and go, Hey, we're sending somebody to you because they've got this, this, and this, and we know we, you need to take care of them before we can get, do what we need to do. So it's a really lovely like partnership because they understand that with the way that Western medicine is structured, there are certain things they don't know what to do with, For example, like Hashimotos.
Thyroiditis, and I'm really excited to talk about this because this is one of those sort of unexplored, unacknowledged and, and yet very, very, very critical pieces in dealing with fertility issues because I have patients who come in with like this crazy range of [00:10:00] like fertility issues. And at this point, what I now do is I always do that full panel.
I don't just look at tsh, right? Because a lot of doctors will, It's like as the regular panel, they will look at TSH and they will look at free t4. And if the TSH is fine and the free T4 is fine, they will say no thyroid issues. Well, as you know, Probably most of your listeners, there are three tests missing in there and the big one is, is TPO and the T G A B.
And if you are missing the diagnosis of the Hashimotos, Often what happens is, is that, you know, patients will come in and they will have either repeat miscarriages or just generic, I can't get pregnant, or they'll ovulate late, or they'll ovulate early, or they're always cold or they're always hot. I mean, it's like this is the entire gamut of Chinese medicine symptoms, right?
It's like it could, I, I got 15 diagnosis just looking at those, but. Looking at those tests, the free t3, the tsa, or excuse me, the tpo, the T G A [00:11:00] B let's me do is diagnose, okay. Autoimmune thyroid disease. Now that's a Western medicine diagnosis. Okay. But. And how I deal with that in Chinese medicine comes after I kind of take a functional medicine approach to it.
And I look at that and I'm like, Okay, you have antithyroid antibodies. Has anybody ever told you you have Hashimotos? And half the time the answer is no. And then or more. And so the answer, then we go through a like one main huge lifestyle change that they have to. And you cannot screw with this lifestyle change.
I'm like, You cannot compromise. You cannot cheat. I was like, I'm willing to compromise with a lot of things. I am not willing to compromise on this one lifestyle change that you must do. And I was like, And 75% of the time we can fix the hush motos and it will stop it cold. And everybody's like, at that point is like, I will do anything.
Because when women come to me because they're having fertility issues, they're either at the [00:12:00] place where they're like, I don't wanna do. IVF or whatever, or if I have to, I wanted to have, you know, get, put my best foot forward or they've done it, it didn't work. And generally my patients will do anything that I ask them to.
Because I make an effort to like connect and have rapport with them, but also let them know, Look, I will tell you these things and if I don't know what the answer is, I will tell you. But I'm also working with like 10, a decade more of doing this and I want you, you know, you just have to trust that I know what it is that I'm doing.
And you know, some patients will joke is like, Do you want me to stand on my head? I'm like, Not today, . I mays
Julie Michelson: maybe
Lisa Grant: maybe. But, and, and that one change, like I said, 75% of the time we fix it. And then on top of that, we put all of my fertility recommendations and my Chinese medicine diagnosis and all that because what I found is my Chinese medicine alone [00:13:00] doesn't deal directly with the Antithyroid antibody because of what we do in the United States.
And so I'm, it's like, so, so drum roll. Do we
Julie Michelson: I know. I'm like, Ooh, she should
Lisa Grant: So here's, here's the thing. What I tell my patients is it's very hard to do, but it is a very simple change. And that is I need them to go 100% strict. Like, you have celiac disease, like your life depends on it, gluten-free,
Julie Michelson: I was so ho. I'm like, if she says something different, I'll be so surprised.
Lisa Grant: no, and that's, and that's, but that, that is it.
And, and,
Julie Michelson: And I love, I love two things that you said. One is that it's hard to knowledge, It's, it can be hard to do, but it is simple, right? It's simple. And two is, I already forgot what you . Wow, that's great. And no, I did not have gluten today. Wow. Oh, the all in the, [00:14:00] All in the, Oh my gosh. If I hear one more time, you know I'm gluten free.
You are. Well, mostly then you're not
Lisa Grant: Nope. And, and, and the way I explain it, the way I explain it is, is basically look okay, Every time you eat gluten, your body, your immune system is getting confused. And because the protein on the outside of the gluten looks so similar to the, the protein molecules on the outside of your thyroid, your body is attacking your thyroid.
And then I play dirty and I'm like, How bad do you want this baby? I, I'm, I'm perfectly happy to play dirty like that because it's
Julie Michelson: Well, and, and
Lisa Grant: and it's not really playing dirty. It's like take going to the heart of what they want. And it's like, Look, if you want this baby, because it has not happened, you have tried for however long you've been trying for, whether it's, you know, six months or I had one, I had one woman come in.
So it was really interesting. About a year and a half ago, I had four women come in within a. Three of the four of them had undiagnosed Hashimotos. Three of like, say one [00:15:00] of them had had like four repeat miscarriages and nobody could figure out why. One of them was just like she had been trying, couldn't get pregnant.
One of them knew that she had Hashimotos, but didn't know what to do about it. And one of them was just, I mean, actually two of them were just kind of like, we don't know what's going on. Of the ones that weren't diagnosed ran my panel. I'm like, Hashimotos. I'm like, This is what you need to do. And they went all in.
Right. And it's, it's, I actually send all of my Hashimotos patients to celiac.com. I'm like, they did all the work, right? I'm like, they did all the work. It hides
Julie Michelson: not Rockets on
Lisa Grant: Oh no, it's not. Except you have to hear, Excuse me. You have to know that, like, it hides, it doesn't say wheat. It doesn't say gluten. It says modified food starch.
I'm like, if you don't know what it is, assume it's gluten. Right? If, if, if, and if it doesn't have the little label that says gluten free, it's gluten. Unless you know you're talking about.
Julie Michelson: Unless it's lettuce or
Lisa Grant: Like lettuce or meat or is like, And [00:16:00] rice. Rice is naturally gluten free, right? I'm like, You're okay with rice? But I was like, But the problem is, is that anything is processed.
It could have been cross-contaminated. And we are talking about, it's not like you picked up a piece of bread and ate it. We're talking on the microscopic level. Anything that triggers your immune system is going to kill your thyroid, and that makes it impossible for your body to do what it wants to. Now do women who have Hashimotos thyroid thyroiditis get pregnant naturally?
Absolutely. Do they do it without my help? Absolutely. Do they do it eating gluten? Absolutely. But if you're coming to me and you haven't, you're not. And that's why we need to be a lot more consistent and careful about it. And what's remarkable when I have my patients go gluten free is they'll come back like two weeks.
I'm like, Look, the first week you're gonna be like, what? You're gonna, maybe even 10 days, you're gonna be like, Ugh. I. Come back to me in two weeks, weeks, Mark my words, your brain fogs gonna go away. You're gonna have more energy. The bloating's gonna go down. If you have the puffiness that's gonna go back.
And they [00:17:00] come back and they're like, I have not felt this good in years. And I'm like, I know. And I know. So here's the thing, Julie, they always cheat. They always cheat because we're human beings and we always wanna
Julie Michelson: to, we have to test
Lisa Grant: And I know they're gonna cheat and I don't say anything cuz I know they're gonna cheat and they'll come back
Julie Michelson: And you know, they're gonna feel horrible. And it's like, Yes,
Lisa Grant: I don't have to say anything. They'll come back in and I'm like, How'd you do? And they'll be like, I had gluten this weekend. And I'm like, mm-hmm. , how'd that work out for you? ? And they're like, I felt horrible. You know? And they, and I was like, Yeah, that is your immune system going. Don't do that. And I never have to ask them about gluten again because they're believer, because their body has told them loud and clear.
That's not okay for me. And so here's, here's why. And this is why I'm so excited to have this conversation with you today because this is why this matters in Chinese medicine. So let's, let's come over a little bit into my world because Chinese medicine, [00:18:00] Doesn't explicitly recognize like autoimmune diseases.
Remember, this is a medicine that's been around for 3000 years. We look at everything from like outside signs and symptoms, so I've never found a way to see autoimmune thyroid disease in the pulses, which is one of our. Like, you know diagnostic techniques in the tongue. If you've ever been to an acupuncturist, they'll be like, Stick your tongue out.
We see things in the pulses in the tongue. We're looking at things on the body. But remember when I said I have women who come in with fertility issues and it, a lot of it comes down to Hashimotos thyroiditis, but it can look like anything. This chameleonlike aspect means it's very difficult for me to see it.
And I have other diagnostic tools that I use for fertility. And I just, I've never been able to see it, which is why I really love the blood work because that tells me it's black and white. It's right
Julie Michelson: a shortcut.
Lisa Grant: Oh, it's a shortcut. Saves lots of time and effort and, you know, heartache. So in Chinese medicine though, the way that we think about the [00:19:00] thyroid is there is not a separate thyroid, okay?
There's no. There's no separate sort of like energy line that says thyroid on it. We call it split between what we call the spleen meridian and the kidney meridian. We're not, we don't have time to go into the whole physiology thing about this, but basically there are 12 lines of energy that run through your body and each one is them, is associated with the organ that it runs through, so it, it governs the functions of that organ.
It governs the area of the body that it runs through. So like if I have somebody who has arm pain that's running, like along here, I'll be working on the large intestine meridian. Now I am aware that the large intestine isn't aware near there
Julie Michelson: Right
Lisa Grant: right? But the fact is, is that we know that points here will affect your large intestine, but sometimes if somebody's elbow hurts, just put a needle in there.
It's even, yes, it's a large intestine needle, but that's where it hurts. But it also covers like a [00:20:00] general function of the organ. So for example the large intestine is in charge of eliminating things that you are done with. And this happens on a physical level, it happens on an emotional level. So I have people who can't have trouble with grief and letting go.
I'll work on the large testimony cuz that clear. Okay. So just like that the spleen is split between the kidney meridian, which is basically the easiest way to think about it is sort of like the global sort of energy manager of the body. Okay. And it decides who gets what in terms of energy. So you can see how that might be a thyroid thing.
And the other half of it is the, the spleen meridian, because the spleen meridian in charge of nurturing and nourishment and what we call the transformation. Of basically food. Sure. You take, you eat the food, and there's this magical alchemical process where what you eat gets turned into, it gets broken apart and turned into all these molecules that we then absorb and turn into [00:21:00] tissue.
Okay. Whether it's thyroid or thyroid hormone or whatever it is. So you can see how you got the energy piece on the kidney, and then you've got the nutrition piece that also transforms into energy and you need both of them. And one of the things that I do for my Chinese medicine is figure out, okay, who's unhappy?
Because with thyroid I need to figure out is the kidney the most unhappy or is the spleen the most unhappy? And I have a ginormous. Shortcut if I have women going gluten free because I just fix the spleen. Meridian
Julie Michelson: right,
Lisa Grant: right? I'm like, it's way easier now. All sorts of things infertility having to do with the spleen meridian, because part of the transformation process has to do with like creating blood and creating, you know, the hormones and creating the follicles.
So it's not, it's not. You know, cure the Hashimotos or at least, you know, treat the Hashimotos and fix all the fertility issues. There's a lot more to it than that, but that's a such a gigantic piece of relieving the [00:22:00] pressure and the literal attack on the spleen meridian's function, that it makes it a whole lot easier to get everything else to go because your thyroid is your energetic ther.
In Western medicine, it decides how much energy does, how much energy do you have, and who's gonna get it right? And the who's gonna get it. Part is the kidney. And the kidney is always going to put your heart, your brain, your lungs, your nervous system. It's gonna put you before the fertility because fertility, eh, you can do that next month, another month after that, or maybe in a year.
But if you're dead, It's all good. You're done. Right? So the kidney is always having to discern who gets it, and the kidney will only feed fertility if it knows there's enough energy to go around.
Julie Michelson: you need the resources.
Lisa Grant: You need the resources, and if you've got the hush shemos thyroiditis, you don't have the resources because your body is barely keeping on top of what you need.
Brain fog, bloating, exhaustion. [00:23:00] So by fixing the huy Molis by going gluten free. We, we free up a huge amount of the energy and the resources that then with the fertility, with the fertility lifestyle changes that I have my patients do when they do my, my 90 day reset with, you know, the acupuncture. I can now tell tail the body.
Okay, so you now have enough energy. Let's do this next thing, which is near and dear to the heart of my patient and the near and dear to the heart, because of course, the. It's like heart wants a baby. I'm like, So now we can go to this next level where we're working on your fertility and we can, Your body, your body is convinced, your body knows there's enough energy to do all of it, live life and also have the resources to make a baby.
So that's why this is so important because if your, if your thyroid is messed up, you don't have enough energy to do the fertility thing, which is the top of the list of what my patients come to me for.
Julie Michelson: Which is so true and, and anybody who's really, whether they're [00:24:00] listening for fertility or listening cuz of hashi's, you know, which is so common,
Lisa Grant: Oh,
Julie Michelson: it, it's not difficult once you've experienced the fatigue that can go with it to imagine. Wow. Well, yeah, no wonder my body can't make a baby right now because I'm having trouble getting outta bed in the morning.
Lisa Grant: exactly.
Julie Michelson: Like if they connect
Lisa Grant: I heard something once recently or I, I heard something recently which I was like, Oh yeah. It's like you basically need to think of, of pregnancy, cuz remember that's the end goal of fertility. Pregnancy is like, Becoming an Olympic athlete for a woman, it's like the single most energy intensive thing that she's ever going to do other than just living the entirety of her life.
And if you don't have enough energy to live your life, how the heck are you gonna make it? Through the
Julie Michelson: I love that. It's so, so true. So true. I wanna touch on. [00:25:00] The, the question of, you know, what about the people listening that, you know, they have hashi's and maybe they've been struggling with fertility, or maybe they're getting ready to start a family, and even though they know they have Hashimotos, their ob gyn or their fertility specialist is saying, you know, Yeah, I know you have that, but it's fine.
It's, it has nothing to do with this. It's not affecting.
Lisa Grant: Right. Okay. So. Remember what we said earlier about, you know, the wheelhouse is, is the Western medicine does what? It's okay. So Western medicine doesn't have a way to treat. Hashimotos until it starts affecting tsh. By that point, the damage has already been done. So if your doc has run the tests and you know, if you have any kind of questions about fertility, I think every woman should get all five of those fertility or those, excuse me, those thyroid tests done.
And if you go to the doc and the doc is like, Well, it's not affecting your TSH yet, so we don't need to deal. The answer is, well, that's only because it's not showing up in TSH, and we never [00:26:00] want it to show up in tsh. We wanna stop
Julie Michelson: let's stop it before we get
Lisa Grant: in its tracks before we get there. Exactly.
Julie Michelson: I wanna back up to, to give listeners an understanding, you know, for us it's like, oh, TSH and three
Lisa Grant: Right. True.
Julie Michelson: and it's all, you know, so, So the marker that is most commonly tested, this tsh, thyroid stimulating hormone, you know, let's explain to listeners why.
Yes. When that's clearly out of whack. We already know you have a problem. Kind of explain what that is, and I think it becomes then really clear of like, Oh, well, why would I wait until that's a problem?
Lisa Grant: Okay, so TSH is the hormone that your brain, I believe it's the pituitary releases to tell your thyroid, Hey, we need some more energy. Okay, That's one measure. And tsh, you generally, at least for fertility, I like seeing it at around two. If TSH goes above four, Western medicine doctors will give [00:27:00] the patient Levo thyroid or Synthroid or some kind of synthetic hormone because they want, basically the brain is yelling at the thyroid, Wake up, do your job.
But the thyroid's having a really hard time responding if. And, and, and so what the, the medicine does is it basically is synthetic t4. So the brain tells the thyroid, Hey, wake up. We need some, some more energy. And in response to that, the thyroid makes t4, which is a, basically, it's a, it's a reserve hormone, but it basically says, Okay, here's, here's the bundle of energy waiting to go.
And, and that's what the medication. , but there are several other pieces in the, in sort of the, the communication pathway and the energy pathway. So T4 is an inert, inactive form. It converts to what's called t3, which is the active form of the thyroid hormone in the liver. And if you don't test that, the level of T3.[00:28:00]
You don't actually know if that piece is being done. And so you may be, you know, you can have t4, but a lot, some patients will get the t4, the the sy, and they'll be like, I'm still tired, and I test the t3. And that's because they're not converting it correctly. And that's usually a nutritional deficiency, usually.
Okay. So then that means we need to fix some of the nutritional stuff. T3, specifically free t3. That's the energy molecule. That's the one that, you know, starts opening it up and gives you all the energy. TPO and T G A. Are produced by your immune system and what they are is a marker that your body, your immune system, for whatever reason, has decided to attack your thyroid.
And like I said, my understanding is, is it's because the wires got crossed at some point and thyroid looks like gluten, which is why it fixes it in 75% of the cases. It doesn't always work. There is 25% where it's not that, but still. So if your body is attacking your TPO and or attacking your thyroid, [00:29:00] even if your tsh, which is the message from your brain to your thyroid that says, Hey, we need more energy is fine.
Your body can still be attacking your thyroid. And what's eventually going to happen, The conclusion of that story is, is that eventually the damage is gonna be so great, and most of the thyroid is gonna get killed off, that your TSH is gonna be through the roof because your brain is screaming at your thyroid and your thyroid literally cannot respond because it's dead.
And that's the part, it's like your body is killing your thyroid and it doesn't regrow. So the, So Western medicine has no way to stop that immune. Okay. And it's, and it's not just as simple as like taking an allergy pill. It's like I've never seen anything that says that that works. Okay. And that's why this gluten thing makes me so excited, cuz like I said, 75% of this time, it'll stop it cold.
Your body will stop attacking your thyroid.
Julie Michelson: And I would add even for the other 25%, it's a piece of it,
Lisa Grant: Oh, it's a [00:30:00] piece of
Julie Michelson: still absolutely. Never, ever,
Lisa Grant: Ever, ever have gluten, if you have antithyroid antibody, don't eat gluten. Period. Full stop. There are other pieces of that puzzle.
Julie Michelson: If you have any autoimmune diagnosis, donate gluten, period
Lisa Grant: We could spend an hour and a half talking about why gluten is a problem.
Julie Michelson: That's always my, my qualifier. Like, no, you know, there is no one diet for everybody except
Lisa Grant: Except getting off the gluten. So, so that's, so that's why,
Julie Michelson: catch, So thank you for going through all of
Lisa Grant: We wanna catch it
Julie Michelson: it before, which is,
Lisa Grant: has literally been killed to the point that your brain is screaming at it and it can't respond
Julie Michelson: Which is what they consider clinical thyroid disease. So we want, we wanna catch subclinical, we wanna get it
Lisa Grant: it gets
Julie Michelson: it's a problem. And it's a simple blood test and it's not expense there. This isn't, you know, I do some crazy testing cuz I love it.
Lisa Grant: It's like, it's like, Yeah, [00:31:00] no, I mean, when I order it for my patients, I think it's 15 bucks. So it's not an expensive test. It's a super, like I said, it's simple. It's not easy, but it's a simple change. And the reason that you wanna catch it before the TSH starts going up, which is where western medicine can come in, cuz they're like, Oh, well we now have, we have a treatment for that.
We just don't have a treatment for the other piece. That's why it's
Julie Michelson: a treatment for that symptom.
Lisa Grant: But we still haven't fixed the autoimmune
Julie Michelson: Right, right. Yeah. We can get your TSH to come back down if we give you some hormone,
Lisa Grant: And this is something that a lot of my patients, even if they're savvy, don't understand. Just because your TSH came down, if you have the Hashimotos, you know the tpo, T G A B, the Hashimotos thyroiditis, your body is still killing your thyroid.
All that's gonna happen is, is the amount of T, the t4, your medicine is gonna have to go up because your thyroid is less and less able to. Produce the hormone because it's still being killed off. That's why this is so beautiful is because you stop the gluten and like I said, in those 75% of the cases, and actually all the cases, [00:32:00] at least, you're dramatically reducing your body's attack on your thyroid.
So it has a chance to survive. So that's why it's really important to do the blood test. That's why it's important to do gluten free. And I cannot remember where we came to from that or where we, where we were on that.
Julie Michelson: We were talking about how, you know, even still today, Your fertility doc may say, Oh, you have Hashimotos, but it's not a problem.
Lisa Grant: But it's not a problem. So if, if the, if the TSH is high, right, And at that point I will say you, because I have occasionally patients come in, I don't wanna take that, but if the TSH is high, I'm like, You have to take it with, we can stop the damage on the thyroid, but. If your TSH is too high, it is a cause for miscarriage.
So we're gonna do all this work. And then if, because I've had it happen before, I had one patient who flat out refused to take the th the, the, the Synthroid, even though I was telling you, you gotta take this. And she miscarried. And it broke my heart because we could have [00:33:00] potentially prevented it. Because remember what I said about what the thyroid does.
It's, it's the energy generator. And if you don't have enough energy, your body will always choose. Over the baby because if it, there's not enough energy to go around, baby doesn't happen. Right? It's like it just, you can't sustain it. So yes, I would like my patients if they're like at, certainly if they're at four or above, they need to be on the Synthroid, but often as they're working with me, If we can get the Hashimoto thyroiditis under control, some, the TSH will often drop, and then we're good to go.
Now again, I have my whole diagnostic fertility thing to determine whether or not we need to add herbs into that, or whether I'm like, we still maybe wanna add synth right into this because, or whatever they, you know, the, the generic, because I'm seeing some things that I. I wanna make sure that once we get you pregnant, we keep you pregnant because, you know, miscarriage is the worst.
It's like, it's bad enough if you can't get pregnant, but when you get pregnant, you [00:34:00] lose it. It's horrible. So quick. So the, the story, those four, or was it five? The five that came in one. All of them went gluten free of the font. Four of them we got pregnant. They didn't miscarried and they kept. Okay.
One of them we did wind up having to go to, you know, can't remember if it was IUI or ivf, because even. Like the, the, you know, it was just, we never, for whatever reason, her hormones never got to where we wanted them to go. But the IVF story wound up being happy because she got her baby and she was thrilled.
Meanwhile, all five feel better, have better energy, you know, aren't bloated, don't have the brain fog, you know, I mean, do stupid stuff and sta yeah, you're gonna have the brain fog, but, but it's like, but they, their baseline energy level rose dramatically because their immune system was not constantly killing their thyroid.
So, It's for all those patients. It was a happy ending and it was a super happy ending for four of them because [00:35:00] Right, and because it was like we got them pregnant naturally, and they, they felt great during the pregnancy, you know, because we were able to deal with the Hashimotos thyroiditis. So it's,
Julie Michelson: baby at the end, even for number five, is a huge win.
Lisa Grant: correct.
And, and all of my patients, Appreciate the fact that they are, you know, one of what I wanna do is give them the tools that they need to be healthy and have a baby, because I see no point.
Julie Michelson: like they have
Lisa Grant: You're not done. I, what I tell my patients is, Hi, pregnancy is nine months, but you know what? Once you get pregnant and have that baby, you are on the hook for the next 18 years.
And actually, Well, yeah, that's when they're in your house. But you're actually, this is a lifetime gig, right? You are a mom until you die and you want to be around for as long as you wanna be around. You wanna have energy, you wanna have the ability to do the things that you wanna do. I was like, so my baseline [00:36:00] is actually not just fixing the fertility.
I tell my patients, I can't fix your fertility. I'm gonna say get you healthy. So part of what I work on in my 90 day reset is, 80% of that program is, is health. It's like, and it's, you're like, Well, I'm healthy. I have women, I healthy, I do this, I do that. I'm like, Hmm. We're talking about a healthy at a level where your body is absolutely going to believe and be convinced that you can make and carry a baby determined.
I'm like, And that is not the same thing. And what is healthy according to pop fads changes. So, And what is healthy eating or healthy exercise levels for this person is not the same thing as that person. So what it is, is like we're creating a foundation where these are the things that are pretty much baseline for everybody.
And then I go into, Okay, now for you because of this piece over here, we're gonna do that. But for you, because of this piece over here, we're gonna do this over here. [00:37:00] So it, it's a, it's a personalized program, but the foundation is very similar for most people because most of my patients are coming in, given where we are in the world and everything with the same sorts of baseline issues.
And we fix those and then it gets a whole lot easier to deal, to build the fertility.
Julie Michelson: And for those of you listening that don't have Hashimotos, the 90 day Fertility reset workshop is for everybody.
Lisa Grant: Oh yeah. It's for everybody trying to get.
Julie Michelson: just, Yeah,
Lisa Grant: Yeah, it's for everybody trying to get pregnant. Yeah, there is, there are pieces, like I have like several videos devoted to Hashimotos thyroiditis, and what I say is, look, if you've got, or if, if, if you have any kind of thyroid issue, go look at those videos, right?
And if you've got, for example, endometriosis. If you've got endometriosis, then you go look at those videos. But like I said, there's a base, they're base videos and then it breaks out according to what's going on. Interesting thing. Probably half of my women who come in with P C O S, which is polycystic ovarian syndrome, [00:38:00] have some kind of hypothyroidism.
And of those, probably half of them have Hashimoto thyroiditis. So, and, and you're dealing with, all of these things are in the body, Right? And we have to, we, we heal the body to deal with the underlying sort of issues that are creating the fertility problems.
Julie Michelson: I love that. Amazing, and I know you have an amazing gift, a gift for listeners for 20% off of this incredible online program. Go to fertility reset online.com. And it is inspired now 20 and you'll get 20% off. And again, this is for everybody. I, I would say honestly, I mean, because of what we were just talking about, anybody who wants to up level or health, it may feel a little weird to do a fertility workshop.
You know, if you don't have a uterus anymore, like me, but
Lisa Grant: You know,
Julie Michelson: But you'll still benefit from it, I swear.
Lisa Grant: It's true actually. [00:39:00] It's true. It's like I will have women, so, So putting aside women who don't have uterus, we'll talk about that. But it's like for women, for women who have like endometriosis or P C O S and they're not interested in getting pregnant, but they're like, What can I do to help myself feel better?
Yeah. Like I said, the foundation of the good health and dealing with the underlying issues is first, and then there are pieces of the workshop where I specifically go into like, This is what you do for fertility, and there's, there's one unit you don't do, you're gonna be like, Yeah, I don't need that.
Because I, I talk about how do you track and like monitor your fertility, but honestly 80% of it is about building health. And then the. 20% of it is specific issues and then actual fertility. And my patients will come into me and they'll be like, So this fertility piece was a really small part of it. And I'm like, Yeah.
And they were like, But I feel better. My cycles are better. I'm like, Everything's better. And I'm like, Yeah, that's cuz we fixed. The health foundation, so it's it, oh my gosh, it makes my job so much easier [00:40:00] if I don't have to deal with all that other stuff. I'm like,
Julie Michelson: Right now I could just
Lisa Grant: all I have to do is do fertility instead of like backfilling All of those health issues that everybody has for women who don't have a uterus, especially if you have P C O S, that's permanent.
Permanent. P C O S is an endocrine problem, not a reproductive. Okay. If you have Hashimotos thyroiditis or any Hashi, any sort of thyroid issue, that's an endocrine problem. It's not a fertility problem, so anything, you know, if you have
Julie Michelson: talking root cause like it's a Yeah. And the fertility problem is the symptom. It's not the problem. I mean, it feels like the problem when
Lisa Grant: It feels like the problem when you're trying to get pregnant, but the thing is, is that the underlying root cause is health issues and with,
Julie Michelson: And.
Lisa Grant: On women's health, which is a really neglected field. Right. It's like
Julie Michelson: you, you touched on it already, you know, we talked about that motivator of you can give up gluten, you know, do you want the baby, How much do you want the baby? [00:41:00] And then, like you said, now you have the baby, you wanna be here and feel well to raise the baby and the grandchildren and the whoever, you know.
So it, it's all so important.
Lisa Grant: Cause the thing to remember the way the one. When you talk to an ob gyn or reproductive endocrinologist, the only thing they're interested in is your uterus and your ovaries. They're a little bit interested in your brain, but mostly they focus on that little package. And last time I checked our uterus and ovaries aren't walking around by themselves out there, they live.
Right?
Julie Michelson: they're not moving anymore though.
Lisa Grant: That. But, But they started out in the whole package. So you deal with the whole package and then what you wind up with.
Julie Michelson: Shocker.
Lisa Grant: Exactly. And then this all gets better because again, the root cause has been addressed. So
Julie Michelson: I love it. Now, I know you already said it, but here's your opportunity if you wanna. add, or I always, [00:42:00] always ask guests to give listeners that one step that they can take to start to improve
Lisa Grant: It's, it's a
Julie Michelson: they fell asleep. I missed it. Let's sit it one more time.
Lisa Grant: So, so if you have to ask, But, but can I eat that?
Julie Michelson: Mm.
Lisa Grant: it's only a little bit of gluten answers? No. If you have to ask, can I? The answer is no, because, Because you already know what the answer is. You just want wiggle room.
Julie Michelson: Right?
Lisa Grant: And the answer is for Hashimoto thyroiditis, for any woman who has elevated TPO or T G A B, there is no wiggle room.
You have to go gluten free. Okay? Just be glad you're doing it now,
Julie Michelson: friend, . I'm gonna take all the sound bites.
Lisa Grant: Yeah, it's, it's, it's be glad that it's happening now and not like 10 years ago, I went gluten free about 10 years ago because [00:43:00] I actually got eczema, like crazy eczema. I also suspect, looking back, it probably had something to do with my miscarriages, but none of that stuff was tested when I was having my kids, but it's like, it's, and it's just not worth
Julie Michelson: Oh, it was so different back then. I,
Lisa Grant: like there's so much good gluten free, like.
Julie Michelson: 14 years ago and, yeah.
Lisa Grant: couldn't find it. Basically, you know, you had
Julie Michelson: Well, and I'm not as nice as you cuz I say then this is, we, this is a whole nother episode, but I'm like, take it further. Just go grain free and then you don't have to worry about it cuz then you're not getting all the junk.
But I know, I'm a,
Lisa Grant: so that there, there is a piece about that in my workshop and I didn't think we had enough time to
Julie Michelson: I know I wanna talk about dairy too. You're gonna have to come back. We have so much more
Lisa Grant: Oh yeah. Oh, I have all sorts of things. Actually, I only have one thing to say about D and we all know what that is.
Julie Michelson: Well, I think that may touch the other 25% of people, right? If you're, If you're gluten free, but you're still eating dairy,
Lisa Grant: And that's a problem too. Yeah, it's a problem. It's a [00:44:00] problem. You know, I, I, I do actually, I don't, I don't like 100% grain-free, except for in certain cases, but I also am ta. There's
Julie Michelson: Well, it depends.
Lisa Grant: Correct. And there's only certain grains that I'm, I will allow. So, but weed is not one of them. Gluten is not one of them.
You know, it's just that simple. It's like, it's just not, And you know, I know a lot of people go, Ugh, gluten free. Really? It's like, look, I, we have scientific evidence, especially in this particular case, that, that it's not just all of us, you know, complimentary alternative types. Saying this like with no back.
Julie Michelson: Right,
Lisa Grant: I have objective proof because I track tpo, T G A B. The only change that I had some of those women make was gluten-free. I was like, Don't change anything else. It dropped like a rock. They felt better and it's like, look, that's all the proof that they needed. So there it is.
Julie Michelson: you go. The proof is in the baby.
Lisa Grant: Great. That's exactly right, That's exactly right.
Julie Michelson: Before we wrap up, where's the best place for [00:45:00] listeners to find you? Those that listen on the go and don't check the show notes.
Lisa Grant: Okay, so if they go to fertilityresetonline.com, it's all spelled out. Okay? They can click on the link about buying my course if they want the discount and I have completely forgotten the code, they wanna put the discount code in at checkout, and that is
iNSPIRENOW20, you'll get 20% off.
It's completely automated. And it's. You know, it's, I make every one of my fertility patients take this, and every single one of them comes back and says, This has completely changed my life because I feel better.
And you know, it's just like any woman who is struggling with fertility, any woman who is struggling with any sort of like reproductive issues, even if you're not trying to get pregnant.
But if you have. Heavy periods or long periods or just yucky periods or like cramping or any of that stuff. It's like, it's it, I really designed it to help improve women's health [00:46:00] and Yeah, and that, and then there's
Julie Michelson: that the bonus is, Yeah,
Lisa Grant: bonuses is that we do the fertility too, but it's just, I think it's so important for women to be empowered to have the tools to feel better.
Honestly, it's like, and then at the end you decide what works for you and what doesn't, and you decide what it is that you're willing to incorporate and what you're not willing to incorporate. But if you have all of the tools in front of you, then it makes it so that you have the information, and information is power.
So,
Julie Michelson: it and I'm all about, we are both, all about taking your power
Lisa Grant: absolutely,
Julie Michelson: we do what we do. Lisa, thank you so much. You have shared amazing gold with us today.
Lisa Grant: Oh, well thank you so much for letting me like spread the word because it's, it's just really important to me that people feel better. Right? It's about wellness.
Julie Michelson: It is, It
Lisa Grant: It is. It is.
Julie Michelson: for everyone listening. Remember, you can get the show notes and transcripts by visiting inspired living.show. I hope you enjoyed this episode as much as [00:47:00] I did.
Lisa Grant: And me,
Julie Michelson: Yes, we will see you next week.
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My Guest For This Episode
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Connect with Lisa Grant
Lisa Grant
Traditional Chinese Medicine
Dr. Lisa Grant OMD is a double board certified Oriental Medicine Doctor specializing in fertility. Undiagnosed and diagnosed autoimmune issues profoundly impact fertility, and Dr. Lisa works with patients to decrease the impact and help couples to build the family they want. She is the owner of Fertility Reset Onine, a virtual on demand program to rebuild fertility.
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