Health, Fitness & Personal Growth Tips for Women in Midlife: Asking for a Friend

Ep.181 The Blood Tests Every Midlife Woman Needs: Gut Health, Metabolism & Longevity with Christa Tyler

• Michele Henning Folan • Episode 181

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In this episode of Asking for a Friend, we’re getting real about what’s happening inside your body in midlife—far beyond diet culture, quick fixes, or another “Motivation Monday.”

I’m joined by Christa Tyler, functional nutritionist, founder of Your Gut Goddess, and breast cancer survivor whose near-fatal sepsis and reconstructive surgery complications sent her on a mission to rebuild health from the inside out. From a hospital bed to a thriving practice, Christa’s story is a powerful example of why midlife women can’t afford to ignore their gut, hormones, and metabolism any longer.

We dig into:

  • The blood tests every woman should be asking for in midlife: fasting insulin, A1C, vitamin D, hs-CRP, homocysteine, lipids, B12, and more
  • Why “normal range” on labs isn’t always optimal—and how to track trends over time
  • The difference between a short-term diet and a sustainable wellness lifestyle (and why 95% of diets fail)
  • How gut health, fiber, and the microbiome influence cravings, weight regulation, mood, and long-term disease risk
  • The real impact of alcohol on gut health and hormones
  • How to help your 20- and 30-something kids build a foundation for longevity now
  • Movement, steps, and simple daily habits to nursing-home-proof your future

If you’re a midlife woman navigating perimenopause or menopause, confused about your labs, or wondering where to start with gut health, this conversation will give you the questions, tools, and mindset to become your own best health advocate.

You can find Christa Tyler at https://www.instagram.com/yourgutgoddess/

To get a FREE Food, Mood, Poop Journal, go to https://christa-tyler.com/

_________________________________________
1:1 health and nutrition coaching or Faster Way - Reach me anytime at mailto:mfolanfasterway@gmail.com

If you’re doing “all the right things” and still feel stuck, it may be time to look deeper. I’ve partnered with EllieMD, a trusted telehealth platform offering modern solutions for women in midlife—including micro-dosed GLP-1 peptide therapy—to support metabolic health and longevity.

https://elliemd.com/michelefolan - Create a free account to view all products.

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🎤 In addition to coaching, I speak to women’s groups, moderate health panel discussions, and bring experts together for real, evidence-based conversations about midlife health.

Transcripts are created with AI and may not be perfectly accurate.

Disclaimer: This podcast is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute the practice of medicine, nursing, or other professional healthcare services. It is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your qualified healthcare provider with any questions regarding a medical condition.

Michele Folan:

I'm really curious, how many recipes have you saved over the last month? How many random workouts are sitting in your camera roll? And how many times have you said I'll start Monday or maybe in the new year? Here's the truth: you don't need more Pinterest boards or another motivation Monday. You need a plan that actually ties it all together: nutrition, movement, mindset, and in a way that's doable and sustainable. That's exactly what I do in my metabolism reset with Faster Way. I'll teach you how to eat, train, and recover like a woman who's done making excuses and ready to feel strong, confident, and in control again. Check the show notes to join us because this time I've got you. Health, wellness, fitness, and everything in between. We're removing the taboo from what really matters in midlife. I'm your host, Michele Folan, and this is Asking for a Friend. The truth? You can't supplement, sweat, or spin your way out of what's happening inside your body. This week I'm joined by Christa Tyler, functional nutritionist, founder of Your Gut Goddess, and a woman whose own health crisis turned into her life's calling. From a hospital bed in the middle of the night to helping hundreds of women rebuild their health from the inside out, Christa's story is a powerful reminder that real healing starts long before the lab results come back. We're diving into the blood tests every woman should be asking her provider for, the difference between diet and lifestyle when it comes to midlife health, and how to help your young adult kids build a foundation for longevity now before symptoms ever start. Because at every age, your gut, hormones, and metabolism are in constant conversation. And it's time we all start listening. Christa Tyler, welcome to Asking for a Friend. So great to be here. Thanks, Michele. Well, I have been dying to have this conversation with you. And I told you when I was prepping for this, I was getting even more excited because I realized that a lot of these topics aren't things that we've talked about on the podcast before. So we're going to dive in. But I want to really talk about you. And you have a story. You talk about in the wee hours of the morning from your hospital bed. You were at one of your lowest points. And I'd love for you to share that story with our audience just to get started. Absolutely.

Christa Tyler:

So when I was 28, I was diagnosed with breast cancer, super out of left field, no real family history to speak of. And I opted to have a bilateral mastectomy with a direct implant reconstruction. Easy peasy as far as the whole process goes, or so I thought. And I had multiple surgeries to correct it. And ultimately, that did not solve anything. And I ended up septic one evening. I everyone else was in the house. I said, It's really chilly in here. Can we turn the heat on? And my husband's like, Well, it's June and it's like 75 degrees out. So what's actually happening? And I went upstairs to my bedroom and I took my shirt off and I was fire engine red from my clavicle to my ribs on one side.

Michele Folan:

Oh God.

Christa Tyler:

So that was the beginning of the demise and what turned out to be sepsis from that dying breast tissue. So of course I went to the hospital naively thinking that, hey, they're gonna save this implanted, you know, reconstructed breast mound. And I remember vividly one of the nurses in the emergency department stating, We're not trying to save your breast implant, sweetie. We're trying to save you. And that really was the first time I was like, oh, this is a really big problem. I was the model of health. I exercised, I ate really well, I was young, I was a non-smoker, I barely drank. I was the person who sailed through the surgery. But yet here we were. So of course I was admitted to the hospital for massive doses of IV therapy. And it was one evening where I felt absolutely horrific. I tried to sleep. I was up all night, and I was just laying there. And I said, if I can somehow come through the other side of this, there has got to be a better way. There's a better way for education of what actually happens in these surgeries and what, you know, just how do I help other women through this? And that was sort of the first light that went off in my brain of wanting to make sure no other woman went through the same thing as I. And of course, I can't prevent that on a global scale. But the education that I was lacking, I naively just went into the surgery thinking, oh, it's like 1% of people that this happens to. It's really not 1% of people, it's much higher than that. And that was where my mission kind of started. Through recovering from that horrific ordeal, I tapped into a lifelong love of food, super healthy eating, really changing my gut health. I went back to school. I studied nutrition. And it was all really at that point to figure out how to help myself and make sure my kids never went through this. And when I came out on the other side, I was armed with all of this knowledge. And I said, I have to somehow, at some point in my world, share my knowledge with other women. And slowly it transformed into where I am today.

Michele Folan:

So you had a decade, I think, of managing a home health care practice. Yeah. Was this before or after you had this horrific ordeal? During. It was all during.

Christa Tyler:

Yeah.

Michele Folan:

Oh my gosh. Okay. And then what was the final step to becoming a functional nutritionist? So tell me a little bit about that journey.

Christa Tyler:

So I was in healthcare management. I sat on the other side. I managed schedules. I managed providers. I did billing. I did all of the management of things. And after my ordeal, my whole health journey, I started listening when I spoke to patients. And I listened to in a different light, not like, oh yeah, I can't make that appointment. Can you do this? But like, what were your struggles? I'm so sorry that that happened to you. And I would start to ask these high mileage questions. And people are like, is this like a counseling appointment or what is this? I'm just trying to schedule an appointment. I'm like, I am so sorry. I will get you scheduled. And I slowly started to realize that it wasn't isolated to me with my journey. It was so incredibly widespread of a low health IQ, not understanding their diagnosis or not managing it properly. And slowly, every day, I was like, this is my calling. This is where I'm supposed to be. I'm not supposed to be over here scheduling and managing and coordinating provider care. And it was my husband and myself, our home health care company, and I sat him down one evening and I said, I don't think this is for me anymore. And he's like, Yeah, I don't think so either. I hear you on the phone, and you need to figure out what that journey looks like to you. And I took sort of the educational leap and I felt that functional nutrition for me was the path that he was the most impactful for me. So I went back to school, got a direct certification in that, and slowly started not marketing myself, but talking with friends. And I'm like, oh yeah, I hear that there's something more there, and working with someone here and working with someone there. And my husband finally said, like, you need to either come back full-time to this or you need to just dive headfirst into what you love, into your passion and what you really light up for. So with his shove, it really helped thrust me into this world.

Michele Folan:

And you call yourself the gut goddess, which I love. And you know, it's funny when you sit and you chat with friends or whatever, you realize that women in midlife, we got a lot of gut issues that I think we just tolerate. Is that what you see in your experience?

Christa Tyler:

Yeah. So we all have gut problems, but nobody wants to talk about it, right? No one wants to talk about that. I went to an ice cream stand with my kids and I ended up with explosive diarrhea 25 minutes later. No one wants to discuss this stuff. So we we just quietly suffer with it. We don't talk about the constipation that went on for eight days that landed us into the emergency department. Nobody wants to talk about that. And through my journey, I recognized that when my nutrition was dialed in, I was the best version of myself. I had normal bowel movements. My skin literally glowed. It was the I had no headaches. My psoriasis cleared up and magically went away. And it was, I felt like a goddess when my nutrition was really dialed in and exercise and doing all of the different, you know, pillars of health that I practice, that's when I felt like a goddess. And it all originates from your gut. So it became your gut goddess.

Michele Folan:

You know, and we do talk about that every once in a while on the podcast about the gut brain connection and how much happier we feel when our guts are happy. And, you know, I know it sounds like woo-woo, but it is not woo-woo.

Christa Tyler:

Many people, they're like, oh, really? There's a gut brain connection. I was like, have you ever heard the term where your gut is your second brain? Or when you get this feeling and you just in the pit of your stomach and something makes you really nervous or uneasy, and you say, Oh my goodness, I should probably shouldn't do that. That's that gut brain access. That is your gut, you know, pulling it and connecting it. So that is exactly what happens. And there's a huge connection, diet and mood, right? So you look, if you Google like uh nutrition for depression, it is not necessarily a pharmacological intervention as your first line of defense. The first line of defense is actually nutrition for many people. And we feel literally you can improve your mood through what you put into your mouth and improving that gut health.

Michele Folan:

Yeah. And to your point, Christa, that's why it like when I work with clients, the first thing I do is I try to dial in on their nutrition because I feel like we can't really make any headway with the fitness piece if we're not feeling good and have good energy and we're got sugar cravings all over the place. So anyway, I appreciate that and I love your story. And it's so often on the podcast, you know, we we go through these life moments that really propel us into doing something that really becomes our life passion. So I love that. Thank you for that. So Christa very kindly did a, I would say, a training session for my VIP clients a while back. And one of the things that she discussed with with our group was the blood tests that we should be requesting from our healthcare providers. And I've never seen so much interest in any topic that we've covered. And I thought this would be a great place for Krista and I to start. Could you, first of all, walk us through what blood tests you would recommend that my midlife audience what they should be asking for and why? Absolutely.

Christa Tyler:

So I do see clusters of people coming from functional medicine practices, and all of a sudden they have these beautiful labs and we're able to see trends, right? This is not a once-and-done kind of blood test. These are tests that we need to do routinely and regularly to start seeing trends. The first one in sort of a midlife that we really should be looking at is insulin levels. This is going to be the first barometer that things are starting to quietly shift and creep up, which can often lead to insulin resistance, which can lead to type 2 diabetes. And many times you'll see a slight little increase, nothing that anyone's really thinking about, until all of a sudden we see three or four of these tests and their increase from what your baseline was five years ago. In midlife, you change nothing. And all of a sudden your entire world changes. You come back with high cholesterol. You're, you know, told that you have, you know, pre-diabetes or type 2 diabetes, and you're said, but I've done nothing differently. I'm eating the same foods, I'm exercising. It comes back to that hormonal shift as you go through menopause and as you get older. So the insulin levels is going to be your first little detective that you can start looking at. So I recommend that early and often. And even for children, your adult children, late 20s, early 30s, start looking at it. Understand what that baseline is. So when something does shift, you can be your own best advocate and say, hey, four years ago it was five, and now I'm at 16. What does that mean? Yeah. And any physician is going to look at that and say, oh wow, that's a big problem. That's a shift. Yeah.

Michele Folan:

And you're talking a fasting insulin. Yes. A fasting insulin level. Okay. All right.

Christa Tyler:

So that's definitively one that I want to see. Obviously, the A1C is going to really go hand in hand with that. That's nothing special. It's not unique. Most physicians are, you know, including that in routine screening annually. If for some reason you've never had one drawn, simply ask. Most doctors are really excited to take a proactive step. Vitamin D is another one that we really want to see. Most women are deficient in it. And when we're deficient in it, we are not absorbing calcium the way that we should be. So we need those two things to go hand in hand synergistically, which is also going to affect your bone density down the road. So you want to really make sure that you were, if you're deficient, that you are supplementing, speak with your doctor of how that works. But that is a really great one to keep an eye on as well. Another marker that I like to see is high sensitivity C reactive protein. You may see it as HSCRP, and this is a barometer of inflammation within your body. So again, it could be very subtle and slowly shifting, but that's something that we really want to keep our eyes on as well. Homocysteine is another one that's not pulled as frequently, but it is another barometer. It can, you know, show early inflammatory markers that can lead to heart disease as well as certain cancers. It can also be indicative that maybe you're not processing vitamin B12 as effectively as you could be. So these are all really important to look at and have them pulled. So your next time at your checkup, you're with your primary, start the conversation early and often. And even if you're going in for your annual with your with your gynecologist, ask them as well. A lot of women are using gynecologists as sort of that primary role these days because we're so freaking busy. And when do we have time to get to get another doctor?

Michele Folan:

Right. And those are those are all great. I want to backtrack on a couple things. So I was with friends last week and this came up. And I said, Have you all been to the doctor lately? Have you gotten a vitamin D level? Because we were talking about supplementing. And of course, that's what we talk about when we're in our 60s that we're together with friends. And I was really surprised how many hadn't had a vitamin D level. And I want to explain what a what an A1C is. So an HBA1C or an A1C is your average blood sugar over a two to three month period. So they kind of get an average. So it just in case anybody wasn't certain what that was, I thought I'd I'd throw that out there. The inflammatory markers, Krista. What else do we glean from those? Could those be precursors to anything else? A lot of times, yes.

Christa Tyler:

Heart diseases being a big one, that high sensitivity C-reactive protein. So we really want to keep an eye on that. And there's also fields of study that are showing that it's sort of like the earliest sign of a cancer starting. There's small bodies of research. Some people debunk this, that's theirs. But I, in my idea, the more information we have, the better. And if there's any studies that are consistently showing that it could be something of that nature, I want to know about it. Okay. So those are the two bigs from the inflammatory markers. Obviously, infection could be another one that's, you know, brewing. But again, none of these should not react off of one, right? These are all trends. This is what should be looked at over a period of time.

Michele Folan:

All right. I do want to talk a little bit about our lipids because that we all know, like along with our fasting insulin levels, lipids tend to go a little rogue after when during menopause. And I know everybody focuses on LDL, but shed a little light on this because I know I talk about this with my clients, but can you shed a little light on HDL and your triglyceride HDL ratio and how that plays a role here too? Yeah.

Christa Tyler:

So everyone's concerned about slowly the LDL, right? Because it's the bad, it's the bad one. But no one wants to see the modifiable factors of like HDL, right? So we know that there's things that we can do to help increase HDL levels, which also comes back to gut health and nutrition, and to manage the triglycerides. So, and there's other, you know, the LPA also is another protein that we are now seeing. You probably, if you've had blood work done in the last few years, you probably see this new addition. Um this is more of a genetic factor for heart disease as well, that we're looking, we're starting to identify as a factor. So it is not just that bad number. We really need to see, you know, if you have some people still will have an elevated LDL, but a really high HDL, and physicians are now not as concerned with the total number. So you have to start early and often. You have to know what you can do to modify your risk and know that there are those three different factors that we really need to be to be looking at. Yeah. Um, and when you are lowering one, your your triglycerides are typically going to fall a lot of times as we see that age the good HDL rise as well. Right.

Michele Folan:

And I'm a classic example of this where my LDL has never ever in my whole entire life been under 100. And we won't get into this because I have a philosophical issue sometimes with the statins and doctors prescribing statins when we don't always need them. But my HDL is is always super high and my triglycerides are always very low. I've never even been approached about being on a statin, even though my LDL sometimes is hovering around 160. So I just want people when you are getting these numbers, do your research. Make sure that you're not just looking at the levels on the test, do some research. Be armed when you're having these conversations with your doctors. So you agree?

Christa Tyler:

Yeah. 100,000 percent. Okay. Not to jump down the rabbit hole of statins, but very quickly. Also understand that your doctor is most likely going to be less nutrition-oriented and more pharma heavy. So if you are consistently having high levels of LDL, ask your doctor, hey, what can I do nutritionally? Will you give me a period of time to really work on my gut health and my diet? And I do believe that a statin has to go hand in hand with a healthy diet. What does that truly mean? We can dive into those macros. But really, when you make your plate, 50% of that plate should be vegetables. And if you do end up on a statin, because they deem that to be the best for you, really get serious with your diet. It's not necessarily forever, but you have to go and you have to ask the questions. And you also have to ask if you can start as like a low dose versus just jumping head first.

Michele Folan:

So yeah, yeah. I agree. I agree. Okay. The other thing that I want to talk about with these blood tests is they'll often say a normal range, but is that necessarily optimal? Not necessarily. So let's look at B12, right?

Christa Tyler:

So you could be you have a B12 level pulled. Some place levels will vary from institution to institution. I had mine pulled locally at my local health mart, and it was, let's say it was like 210, and they said, You're perfect. And then I went to a much larger teaching hospital two weeks later, and they looked at them. They're like, dear God, that's deficient. So we really, so B12 is like the perfect one, right? So it typically ranges from 250 up to about 1200, and that's a gigantic range, right? You can see the numbers. Where does that mean? So that for B12 is somewhere like middle of the road. And a lot of women start to notice where they feel the their best, have the most energy. And when you're doing lab work, you can start to dial in and say, hey, this is where I feel the best. Vitamin D is also a really big one where there's a really large range, depending on how old you are. But for sort of middle of the life, it's gonna be 40 to 80 of what you're sort of shooting for. So if you're walking in at 38, you're considered deficient. Some places are not deficient unless you're under 30. Um, but that optimal range is really gonna be somewhere probably 45 to 70. Um, so there's a whole lot of variables. There's with the um like the A1C, that's you know, there's that's not a debatable. That is like it is cut and dry. But yeah, you have to start looking at trends and you have to start seeing if your body is constantly sending these little signals out to you of where you're feeling the best. Um, and a lot of those other nutrients, you will start to see what your happy level is. And if you're consistently towing the line of quote, normal and you have no energy and you feel terrible, that's not your normal. And that's where you know functional medicine providers are amazing to help with that.

Michele Folan:

Okay. The other labs, and and I didn't tell you we were gonna talk about this, but I I do want to discuss this really quickly is the estrogen testosterone levels, because estrogen's a little harder to nail down because it fluctuates so much during the day, the week, the month. And um, so that's a little tougher. So do you find that it's just better to use symptoms as a as an indicator of where someone is on their estrogen? I do.

Christa Tyler:

Okay. I absolutely do. Because again, it fluctuates so greatly, and so many women are on some sort of a birth control or HRT. So if you're on absolutely nothing, you have to see how you feel. You're going to feel at different times at different parts of the month if you're still menstruating. And that is going to be a personal symptom sort of journey. The biggest thing that you can do for yourself before appointments is really take a full month and notate how you feel at different parts of your cycle if you're still getting one. And notate anything that you're feeling that's coming up, because those can be really great indicators into levels. Um, again, I believe that because estrogen can fluctuate so greatly and it's so unique to everybody, that has to be a symptom-driven conversation.

Michele Folan:

And then I believe testosterone, you can take have a better assessment from doing blood tests on a better assessment.

Christa Tyler:

Okay.

Michele Folan:

Okay. Yeah. And they do test mine regularly because I am on testosterone. So we're going to take a real quick break, Christa. And when we come back, I want to talk about the difference between diet and lifestyle. Let's talk peptides. These little chains of amino acids are having a moment. And for good reason. Yes, they can support fat loss and metabolism, but that's just the beginning. Think glowing skin, thicker hair, deeper sleep, sharper focus, stronger muscles, and even better libido. Basically, all the things that start to shift in midlife, peptides help your body work like it used to. I've seen the difference myself and only recommend what I trust. If you've been curious about peptide therapy and want to learn more, check out the show notes for my preferred telehealth partner. Because midlife isn't the time to slow down, it's the time to optimize. Okay, we're back. You talk a lot about there's a big difference between your diet and lifestyle because people are all diet-focused, right? We all think about, you know, diet and we come from diet culture, particularly women in my age demographic, because we've lived through the step aerobics, you know, eat less, move more, you know, era, right? Can you define Forrest Krista kind of where you are in this with diet and lifestyle? And what's the best move to make right now? Yeah.

Christa Tyler:

So I don't believe in diets. 95% of diets don't work, or they work for a period of time. A diet is has a clear beginning, middle, and end. And that diet is not going to set you up for a wellness lifestyle. When you can land on a pattern of eating that feels sustainable, it's nourishing your body, your brain, that becomes your wellness lifestyle. That becomes the baseline for everything that you do. Diets are from a place of deprivation. They will never work. You many women are like, well, I can't go to dinner because I can't eat out at that restaurant. That should never be the case. Um, one of the things that I do with private clients is I we we navigate restaurants. I have a few that don't cook and we have navigated restaurants so well that they eat out breakfast, lunch, and dinner and they have lost weight and they feel good. And it's a matter of creating a reproducible, sustainable pattern of eating and pattern of living for the long term that really supports your overall longevity, not trying to lose a few pounds here in, you know, right before the holidays so you can fit into your holiday dresses. And then by February, we're right back to the yo-yo effect. So I don't believe in diets, simply put.

Michele Folan:

And I I will say this in support of what you're saying. I have had countless clients who have done keto and they have lost the weight, and then they're backseeing me saying I game all my weight back. And I said, So that's why keto doesn't work long term, because it's not sustainable. And yeah. So I think that message is starting to be heard, I believe. I don't think we're, at least in my circles, I don't hear as much about some of these extreme diets, but they're still kind of there. They're still out there.

Christa Tyler:

And if you take anything away from today, I just want you to know to eat more and move more. The average woman in this demographic that we're talking about, even when you're not in a place of restriction, you're still not eating enough. You're not eating enough nutrient-dense foods. So simply move your body more and truly put more food on your plate. 99% of the people that I have worked with have fallen into that bucket of not eating enough. And that was one of the biggest changes that we added nutrient-dense food dense foods, more on their plate. And all of a sudden, they're satisfied, they're sleeping better, they're losing weight, and they can get through their workouts consistently. Brain fog lift.

Michele Folan:

Oh, right. Exactly. And so then my other question is so a lot of us have children that are in their 20s and 30s right now. And they have probably a little, uh, they probably don't think that they need to worry about this as much. But what's one piece of advice that you'd give them so that they're set up for the next decades?

Christa Tyler:

You need to recognize that metabolic dysfunction doesn't start in your 30s and 40s. Metabolic dysfunction starts in your late teens. And for women, sometimes when we're talking about PCOS and other metabolic issues, it's starting as young as 13 years old. We're seeing, you know, changes, subtle changes that are happening that typically, if it follows without an intervention by the third decade of life in your 30s, you're already experiencing metabolic dysfunction. So it starts literally for those 20-year-olds out there, you know, children, it starts now. It is time to start looking at your diet and your lifestyle and making sure it aligns with where you want to be. If you want to be in a nursing home at 70, probably continue to do horrible eating, don't exercise, and you are guaranteed to be there probably by late 60s. If you want to have a vibrant lifestyle in which you can keep up with your children and your grandchildren and nursing home proof yourself, it starts now. Start with your diet and movement.

Michele Folan:

Well, we say this all the time, you know, you can't outrun a bad diet. And I think for these younger people in their 20s and 30s, and they're going out and they're drinking beer every night, and they're eating food late, bad food late, you know, their metabolisms are still kind of humming along there. But that that's not going to be the case forever. And then they wonder, oh God, like what happened?

Christa Tyler:

For those people who are eating all of the really low quality foods really late at night because you're like hungry and hung over, just because your metabolism can Can keep you in the clothing that you're wearing currently doesn't mean of you know that cardiovascularly is not taking a massive toll now.

Michele Folan:

Yeah, for sure. And then let's talk a little bit about the gut and the microbiome. What role do they play in weight regulation?

Christa Tyler:

So it plays such a massive role in weight regulation. A lot of weight regulation stems from inflammation. Inflammation fuels over 130 chronic conditions that we do not want. Cancer, arthritis, diabetes, the list goes on. Um, so the role that it plays is when we are have a really healthy gut microbiome, we have all of these healthy bugs that are producing all of these metabolites, short chain fatty acids, all of this goodness in our gut, it actually is pro-inflammable anti-inflammatory. And that will help with weight loss. When your body is optimized in a really great way, you're actually starting to produce your own naturally occurring GLP1s, which we all know can result in weight loss. It is of vital importance to optimize your gut. If you want to ward off those 130-ish conditions, it starts in your gut. If you want to lose weight, it truly begins in the gut. When you have a healthy gut microbiome, your cravings are going to slowly vanish. Your drive for sugar is going to slowly vanish. And that's your body actually changing and starting to have a healthier gut microbiome. And you will be shocked of what happens on the scale when this begins. All right. Two questions. Fiber. How much should we be getting? So I'm going to quote the standardized American diet, which is the sad diet. And it truly is an abysmal SAD diet. But even on the standardized American diet, it states that women should be getting about 30 grams of fiber. I will tell you, about 95% of Americans are fiber deficient and not even coming close to the, I call it the BFM, the bare freaking minimum. We're not coming that close. Okay. The average woman that I get to work with is coming somewhere between 9 to 14 grams of fiber a day. So if you can baseline get yourself to 30 slowly over time, if you go from nine to 30, you will be constipated and miserable and cursing the gut goddess that she knows nothing. So it's low and slow to slowly increase that. Once you get to 30, you hang out there. See how your bowels are. Do you have loose stools? Are you having several bowel movements a day? And then we can sort of gauge where you can go from there. Most women in middle life is somewhere about 34 to 36 grams of fiber as their comfort zone. Okay. And I'm talking about fiber in whole food form. I am not talking about taking a supplement to get you there. Yeah. A supplement is an addition to an otherwise healthy diet. So I have some clients that cannot get past like 28 grams, and we have done all of the things, and that's sort of their comfort zone. So at that point, once they've hung out there for several months and they can maintain that, then you can talk about adding a supplement to help with the fiber.

Michele Folan:

All right. And you're talking mostly fruits, vegetables, those types of whole foods.

Christa Tyler:

Whole foods, low glycemic index, fruits, and I like to say sort of transition over to those veggies because fruits are easy. We can all get more fruit in our diet than vegetables typically. So around 12 o'clock, midday, we start transitioning over to those veg. And it's not just about eating, you know, 20 servings of broccoli a week. It's about biodiversity. It's about making sure you're eating sort of the color of the rainbow with that fiber as well. So you want diversity in the veggies that you're choosing.

Michele Folan:

Now that's a really good point. Because I've put stuff out there about eating the rainbow, you know, getting more color in your diet. Make your plate look pretty, as you know, you want to have color on there. But I know based on people's habits and food aversions, that we tend to gravitate towards the same kind of foods and also ease. You know, it's like you can, you know, make a prep a bunch of veggies, like say sweet potatoes on Sunday and eat sweet potatoes the whole week. And I know yeah, right.

Christa Tyler:

But it's good to have some variety. Diversify a fun way to do it. Um, I think I stole this from Dr. Will Bolshewitz, um, who's amazing. But plant points. Try to shoot for like 30 plant points. Each veggie is a point, right? A different veggie is a point, and you want to have a diversity in that diet as well. Okay.

Michele Folan:

Yeah, I like that. All right. Then the other one I have to bring up, because this comes up with my clients, and this actually goes hand in hand with gut health. What is your feeling about alcohol and gut health? Alcohol and gut health don't go together, simply put.

Christa Tyler:

We know that moderation, we've been told, is really the best. You know, just have alcohol and moderation. Truly, when we get right down to breast text, it is no alcohol, is the best for your gut. Is that going to be realistic for everybody? No. Most of my clients, they will not fully give up alcohol, but they decrease it dramatically. And even, you know, having a glass of wine a week is sort of where people are starting to settle. Even that will be a massive increase. But, you know, alcohol is known to can lead to cancer diagnoses. It's inflammatory. So there's really, if we're talking about really truly dialing in your gut health, alcohol really doesn't have a place in that formula.

Michele Folan:

Yeah. It's not, I mean, and I'm I'm with you on that. If I if I can just get clients to just cut back and you know, not have that glass of wine every single night because then it becomes just a habit. It's it's not correct, it's not really helping, it's not helping our health journey. And so I appreciate you you chiming in there.

Christa Tyler:

And I get accused of talking about alcohol too much on my podcast, but I I it's it's a hot ticket item, and people need to know that just because you know, moderation is what we've been hearing for years and years, it's that's just not the reality of it. So cut back to the bare minimum, and even that will be a huge step in the right direction for you.

Michele Folan:

You know, I mentioned to you about uh Peter Attia. Um, he was on 60 Minutes recently, and he talked about, yeah, sure, we can keep people alive, but when we get into our 70s and 80s, they term those as those can be the marginal years. Those are the last 10, 12, maybe 15 years of someone's life. And you talk about are we are we just living or are we thriving? How can you best, I don't know, convince somebody that instead of being more reactive and to problems as they show up, to being more proactive, like setting up systems so problems don't show up.

Christa Tyler:

Simply to overcome this barrier, because I see this a lot, is I want you to conjure up a mental image of what you want your 70s and 80s to look like. Truly. Sit there, conjure that picture. If it is you spending time with your grandchildren on a vacation, then you need to take the steps now. That's gonna be diet, lifestyle modification, and movement. I cannot stress this enough. People that I have been working with that my husband sees in his private practice, if they're late 30s, cannot get themselves off the floor without their hands. If you can't do that now, how the heck are you gonna do that when you're 70 or 80? So the biggest thing is give yourself that goal of what you want it to look like and then reverse engineer into what do I have to do to get myself there? And that starts in those 20s, in those 30s. That is movement. It is, of course, diet, it is, of course, trying your very best to keep all of your blood work in a healthy range. But if you don't move it, you will lose it. It's simply put. Do not wait until you're 50 to say, hey, I really need to get back in shape. I really put on 30 pounds in the last, you know, X amount of years. It is from your late 20s, I would argue. You are fighting to keep yourself full of muscle, your bones strong to be able to set yourself up. The visualization exercise does seem to overcome a lot of roadblocks and then reverse engineer that plan. And just as a recommendation and a reminder, at a bare minimum, you should be getting 150 minutes of exercise a week, which sounds like a lot to some, but that is really what you should be striving for now. So you can maintain as you get older.

Michele Folan:

All right, let's do the math on that. That's 30 minutes five times a week.

Christa Tyler:

Yeah.

Michele Folan:

I'm gonna bet that people spend a whole lot more time on Instagram and Facebook. So when people say I don't have time, maybe we need to start quantifying where we're spending some of our other time.

Christa Tyler:

Yeah. It's when you start looking at your day, I call it perfect day scheduling. You go through and you set your non-negotiables. Exercise should be one of your non-negotiables, as well as other, you know, really important things. Scrolling on Instagram is not a non-negotiable. That is the first thing that goes out the window. All of these extras, you have to get really honest with yourself of where you, where your time sucks are, and what can you do to swap that out? And if you're just so addicted to Instagram, walk on your treadmill while you're scrolling on Instagram. Get on a stationary bike. Stationary is the optimal word there, so you don't end up in a tree or a ditch. But you need to start making it a priority, simply put. It's not, it sounds like a lot of time, it's not.

Michele Folan:

No, it's it's really not. And so on that note, walking on a treadmill, how many steps a day do you typically try to get?

Christa Tyler:

It's a good one. I am now trying to get about 12,000 steps a day. I sit at my desk and I talk to people remotely all day. So if you are on my schedule, there's a good shot you'll see me on a walking treadmill. 12,000 is for me my baseline. When I'm working with clients, if you're coming from completely sedentary, we just take small incremental micro goals to get you to an end goal of what would be appropriate. Most people, if you can shoot for 10 strive too and not overnight, but work your way up to 10,000 steps a day, you are making a huge step in the right direction. The average woman who works, it's really scary. They're getting about 3,000 steps a day. That's sedentary.

Michele Folan:

Correct. Anything under 4,000 steps per day is considered sedentary. That's frightening. Correct. And that is the vast majority of women who are working at an office job. Yeah. You know, we we talked about this. Um, I had Megan Dahlman. Do you know Megan? She's um, she's she's she's really good at getting people started on a exercise journey because, you know, we we've got to start with the right form and everything. But we were talking about exercise snacks and getting up and doing doing squats next to your desk, taking the stairs, walking around the parking lot outside, you know, particularly after you eat, if you can get out and get some movement in after you eat. That's that's always such a great, great thing to do. Any other tips?

Christa Tyler:

Park as far away from the grocery store as humanly possible. When you were going somewhere, push yourself out, make yourself uncomfortable, make yourself work for whatever it is that you're walking in to go do. After dinner, grab your kids, grab your husband, your partner, whomever. Go outside, get fresh air and move your body. There is everyone's gonna come up with a reason as to why it's not gonna work. I can't do that because of. I don't care if you do jumping jacks in your living room. I don't care if you do burpees or squats, move your body post-meals and make yourself a little uncomfortable outside of your comfort zone every single day with movement.

Michele Folan:

Yeah, I agree. So, what's one of your non-negotiables? Like when it comes to your own health, what is one thing that you do every day, regardless of anything? Working out. Okay.

Christa Tyler:

Working out. That is my I have finally, finally recently gotten myself up in the morning. Exercise for me, I I love it. I've always done it. It used to be midday, job change that doesn't work anymore. And I floundered. And I was the woman looking at my Apple Watch and saying, I got 2,200 steps today, and I'm sitting here preaching to everyone else that they need to get up off their butts and move, and I'm not doing the same. It is morning exercise. It is done before the world wakes up and I can go about my day without it hanging over my head. I feel productive and good. So movement is my number one non-negotiable that is scheduled before everything else.

Michele Folan:

Yeah. You're a good woman. I do not do that first thing in the morning, but I do try to get it in sometime in the morning. But then sometimes it's four o'clock in the afternoon. So it just, but it gets done, right? That's the most important thing. Exactly. Whatever it gets done, just make sure it gets done. Correct. All right. You do work with clients. I would love for you to share with the listeners how you how you work with clients. What does that look like? So I do have a private practice.

Christa Tyler:

Um, you come in, we go over all of the information that you bring, goals, your struggles, what health diagnoses you're dealing with. Um, I like to look at family history as well if you're perfect health, but sometimes we know that these familial diseases may be creeping up. So we can start putting a plan and a program for eating to abate that and keep that at, you know, under wraps. I do a lot of food journaling, mood journaling, poop journaling. It's the weird one, but elimination is super, super important. Um, I can do one-on-one sessions. I have some groups that I run as well. And I really, my biggest philosophy is I want to meet women where they're at. So you might, I might not have some perfect program for you, but I will tailor a program to be able to work with you, meet you where you're at and get you results, whether it's weight loss, whether it is simply gut health optimization, or I have a few clients that are just nursing home proofing themselves.

Michele Folan:

Ah, yeah.

Christa Tyler:

Yeah, that's a big one. It is a big one. And it's a, you know, it's a program of movement, it is a program of eating, stress management, sleep, social emotional connections. It all comes into play within private practice.

Michele Folan:

That that's my goal. I am I am uh nursing home proofing myself right now. It's my big goal. All right, Christa, where can the listeners find you?

Christa Tyler:

Instagram is probably the easiest at your gut goddess. Feel free to DM me asking for a friend, and I will shoot you over. I put together a recipe book and just a food mood poop journal to start understanding your body's uh rhythms and what's happening. So DM me there and I'll get it over to you.

Michele Folan:

Wonderful. Christa Tyler, thank you so much for being here today. This was so informative, and I will put all your information in the show notes so everybody has uh where to find you. Amazing. Thank you so much for having me. This is amazing. Thank you. Thanks, Christa. Thank you for listening. Please rate and review the podcast where you listen. And if you'd like to join the Asking for a Friend community, click on the link in the show notes to sign up for my weekly newsletter where I share midlife wellness and fitness tips, insights, my favorite finds, and recipes.