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The Dark Side of GLP-1s No One Is Talking About

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

Release Date: 08/01/2026

The Dark Side of GLP-1s No One Is Talking About

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

Karen Martel grew up with a front row seat to diet culture most of us only felt secondhand. Her mom didn't just live it, she ran a weight loss center. Butter was called Vaseline. Popcorn was the enemy. And by her teenage years, Karen was deep in an eating disorder that would shape her relationship with food for decades. In this conversation, Karen gets honest about that history, and about something she still checks herself on today. Because here's the twist. We told ourselves we moved past the thin obsession. Body positivity was supposed to be the turning point. But somewhere in the last two...

Quick Hits: Sex, Lies & Liberation: What You Were Never Taught About Female Pleasure with Susan Bratton

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

Welcome to Quick Hits — where we bring you the most impactful moments from past episodes in under 15 minutes. Today’s clip comes from one of our most replayed conversations. If you want the full episode, check the link in the description below. Have you ever thought about what you truly want in your sexual experiences? Are you curious about the often misunderstood aspects of female anatomy and how they play a critical role in pleasure? This episode with Susan Bratton, who is the “Intimacy Expert to Millions,” promises to unravel these mysteries and more. Can long-term relationships...

Beyond the Pepcid Claritin Trend: Real Solutions for PMDD and Progesterone Sensitivity with Dr. Liz Bartmen

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

In part one, Dr. Liz Bartman and I broke down why PMDD happens: the histamine surges, the GABA receptor glitch, the progesterone metabolite that either calms you down or completely wrecks you depending on your unique biology. If you haven't listened to that one yet, start there, because this episode builds directly on it. Now we get into the part everyone actually wants to know: what do you do about it? We talk about why popular fixes like DAO supplements and strict low histamine diets usually fall short, and what to focus on instead, starting with your gut, your liver, and your nervous...

The Molecule Your Doctor Never Mentioned That Controls Your Libido, Energy, and Heart Health with Cathy Eason

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

You've been told menopause is a hormonal transition. It's also a vascular one, and almost nobody is talking about it. In this episode, Karen sits back down with Cathy Eason, Chief Science Officer at Berkeley Life, for round two on a molecule most women have never heard of but should know by heart: nitric oxide. It is tiny, it is a gas, and it touches nearly every system in your body. When estrogen drops in perimenopause and menopause, nitric oxide production drops right along with it, and that decline may be quietly connected to your fatigue, your brain fog, your blood pressure, your blood...

The Histamine Hack, PMDD, and Progesterone Sensitivity: What's Really Going On

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

If you've been on social media lately, you've probably seen it: women swearing that a combo of Pepcid and Claritin, ordinary histamine blockers, gave them their life back during the worst days of their cycle. It sounds too simple to be real, and honestly, it kind of is. But the reason it's working for some women and doing absolutely nothing for others is the whole story, and it's a story almost nobody is explaining correctly. In this episode, I sit down with one of my all time favorite guests, Dr. Liz Bartman, to go deep into progesterone sensitivity, PMDD, premenstrual dysphoric disorder, and...

Quick Hits: Decoding Fibroids: Unmasking Causes & Effective Solutions

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

Welcome to Quick Hits — where we bring you the most impactful moments from past episodes in under 15 minutes. Today’s clip comes from one of our most replayed conversations. If you want the full episode, check the link in the description below. This weeks quick hit we are jumping right into a very important topic: uterine fibroids. Maybe you have experience with fibroids, or maybe you do not even really know what they are yet. Either way, this is a conversation every woman should understand. Fibroids are incredibly common. It is estimated that up to 75 to 80 percent of women may...

Pellets, Periods, and Not Giving a Damn: A Midlife Hormone Roundtable with Dr. Amie Hornaman & Elle Russ

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

This is not just a conversation about hormones. It is a conversation about what it means to age as a woman in a culture that is obsessed with youth, terrified of wrinkles, and wildly uncomfortable with female power after 40. In this roundtable episode, I sit down with Dr. Amy Horniman and Elle Russ to talk about the very real physical, emotional, and identity shifts that happen as women move through perimenopause and menopause. We get into everything from early perimenopause symptoms, thyroid issues, SHBG, testosterone, progesterone, estrogen, libido, vaginal dryness, hot flashes, pelvic floor...

Quick Hits: The Testosterone Replacement for Women Conundrum: Libido Highs and Hair Loss Lows with James O'Hara

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

Welcome to Quick Hits — where we bring you the most impactful moments from past episodes in under 15 minutes. Today’s clip comes from one of our most replayed conversations. If you want the full episode, check the link in the description below. James O'Hara is a family nurse practitioner who utilizes a utilizes an integrative approach to health which combines lifestyle interventions, appropriate supplementation, and medications when indicated to empower patients to feel better and live longer, healthier lives. Today we're speaking with James about testosterone replacement for women plus...

The Truth About Female Desire, Orgasms, and Sex That We Were Never Taught with Dr. Sally Greenwald

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

If you've ever wondered why you don't want your husband to walk through the door and rip your clothes off anymore, this episode is for you. If you've ever quietly believed something was wrong with you because you don't orgasm easily, or at all, this episode is for you too. I sat down with Dr. Sally Greenwald, a board-certified OB/GYN with specialized training in menopause medicine, and what she shared genuinely stopped me in my tracks. We were taught to protect ourselves from pregnancy and disease. We were never taught how our bodies actually work. No one explained the difference between the...

Quick Hits: The Hidden Influence of Sunlight and Circadian Rhythm on Blood Sugar & Metabolism

The Hormone Solution | Menopause, Perimenopause, & Women's Midlife Health

Welcome to Quick Hits — where we bring you the most impactful moments from past episodes in under 15 minutes. Today’s clip comes from one of our most replayed conversations. If you want the full episode, check the link in the description below. With Dani's guidance, we're exploring how simple changes in light exposure and grounding can revolutionize metabolic health, particularly for those grappling with conditions like PCOS, hypoglycemia, acne, or weight loss resistance. Dani shares her personal journey and expert insights on how morning sunlight can reset circadian rhythms, enhance...

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In this conversation, Karen gets honest about that history, and about something she still checks herself on today. Because here's the twist. We told ourselves we moved past the thin obsession. Body positivity was supposed to be the turning point. But somewhere in the last two years, that shift started reversing, and Karen has a theory about why.

This episode goes places most conversations about GLP-1s and peptides don't go. What happens when a tool built to help women stop obsessing over food becomes another way to chase an old, dangerous ideal. Where the line sits between healing and harm. And why the doctors prescribing these medications may be the biggest blind spot in the entire conversation.

If you have ever felt caught between wanting to feel good in your body and worrying that wanting it too much says something bad about you, this one is going to land differently.

In This Episode, We Cover:

How growing up around constant food restriction shapes the way we think about our bodies for life, even decades later
The uncomfortable overlap between old school diet culture and today's biohacking and peptide obsession
What it actually looks like when GLP-1 use crosses from health tool into disordered territory
Why so many women are afraid to admit they still count calories or obsess over their weight
The real conversation around microdosing, maintenance doses, and why more is not always better
What doctors are missing when they prescribe peptides without any follow up program
The connection between hormones, HRT timing, and whether you even need a peptide in the first place
Why shame is the wrong response to someone using these tools, and what to offer instead
The long term risks nobody is putting front and center, from bone loss to malnourishment

Who This Episode Is For

This episode is for the woman who has spent years managing a complicated relationship with food and her body, whether she calls it that or not. It is for anyone curious about GLP-1s and peptides who wants the real picture, not just the highlight reel from social media. And it is for the woman in midlife watching her body change in ways diet and exercise alone will not fix, who wants to understand her options without judgment.

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