Dana Skaggs (00:01.442) Hello friends and welcome to Phoenix and Flame. Joining us today is Amita Sharma. Now Amita is co -founder of NourishDoc, a holistic wellness platform focused on empowering women in perimenopausal years and beyond. She shares her personal struggles as a perimenopausal woman in corporate America, which I'm excited to hear about. Amita, welcome to Phoenix in Flame!
Amita Sharma (00:33.91) Thank you, thank you so much. I love the work that you're doing, Dana. So I'm excited for us to exchange ideas and help women who are listening to your podcast.
Dana Skaggs (00:45.93) Yes, yes, I happen to be in that age bracket myself and I know it is a real struggle and I have patients that come in and talk to me that are dealing with that as well. So Amita, I'm interested in, you had mentioned your experience in the corporate world and kind of trying to use those to try to help other women have a better time of that. So kind of take us back, if you would please, and just kind
Give us a background of where you have come from, where this idea came from, and just kind of wind around and we'll just do that Amita Sharma (01:24.854) So I started getting these strange symptoms and to be honest with you, I had no clue that I was perimenopausal. I didn't even know the word perimenopausal, just to be honest. We are taught menopause in our biology classes and that we know, but I did not realize that 10 years, my God, it's going to be a roller coaster ride.
Especially at workplace, you are completely caught off guard because you are not aware. Nobody tells you, at least in my case, nobody told me or prepared me. And then suddenly you're having a heart flash in the middle of a meeting and then you're having some strange irregular periods is one of the first symptoms for perimenopause. That's what I started having, completely caught again being surprised, don't know what to do. And then you're kind of
muddled up a little bit or and bewildered and perplexed in the sense like who do I go talk to at work because there's not Anywhere that you see by the way You can go and talk to someone about this particular wellness there's a lot of wellness perks on drinking water and running and You know peloton all those things, right? But I you don't see this being kind of the Dana Skaggs (02:40.492) Yeah, yeah.
Amita Sharma (02:46.578) or the mainstream at all. In fact, nobody talks about it. So that's really what my reaction was. Hey, am I going to be discriminated for age, right? If I go talk to someone, honestly, I was embarrassed. I was like a little kind of like, what am I supposed to handle this? Suddenly all these things come to me with surprise. So those were my reactions working in the corporate world. Dana Skaggs (02:59.683) Mmm. Mmm.
Amita Sharma (03:16.406) And now the things are much better. We are talking about it, you know, more because thanks to media. But so I think even now I have talked about 3 ,000 women around the world. Even now women are, you know, saying the same thing, what I'm talking about.
Dana Skaggs (03:37.794) Yeah, I love the fact that you're opening up that space because I'm a firm believer in we need to give words. We need to create platforms where we can talk about things because it's happening nonetheless. It's going, know, whether we're talking about perimenopause, depression, anxiety, know, fill in the blank, it's there. Just because we don't talk about it doesn't mean it goes away. And this is something really talking about gender disparity because
Amita Sharma (03:58.102) Yes. Dana Skaggs (04:05.974) women already, let's just be honest and say, in general, women can have a more difficult time in the corporate space for various and asundery reasons that we've talked about other places and other podcasts. And this is something, like you said, you were afraid that if you mentioned it, was there going to be some kind of age discrimination? This is not something that
have to deal with. it's, you know, we're going along trying to do our job. And one of the symptoms of perimenopause that I have heard a lot of women talk about is the irritability, this ease of becoming angry, just, it's not, there's nothing else in their life that's changed. They're not facing something out of the ordinary, but their hormones are shifting and they're unaware of that. And they become extremely easy to become angry.
at work and things that people do and say around them at work and at home cause them to be very, very irritable. Did you have any symptoms along those lines or aware of other women who struggle with that as
Amita Sharma (05:14.686) don't have the irritability but mood swings, yes, it's one of the common symptoms as you were saying. I did have anxiety issues, know, moments that, my God, all this anxiety and borderline depression, I would say that, not, but I did get into the dark spaces where it was difficult for me to come out of it until I talked in my brain to myself to get out of it, right?
Because, and there's a lot of pressure if you think about it, typically perimenopause starts in 40s and you need the money because you're not ready to retire in 40s, right? So that's exactly what happened to me is that a lot of pressure, financial pressure, you have teenage kids in my case, right? And then suddenly all this is happening. I think I had anxiety. Dana Skaggs (05:52.151) Right.
Amita Sharma (06:09.478) not only because of the petty menopause but also lot of other pressures that women at that age group face, even today they face that. Dana Skaggs (06:14.84) Mm -hmm.
Dana Skaggs (06:20.332) Yes, and you bring up an excellent point. It's difficult to tease those two things apart because women, when we are in our 40s, like you're pointing out, that is a very high pressure stage of our life. There's a lot going on. And so then you have the changes of the hormones that are happening and it's very difficult to tease apart. Am I anxious because of all of these things because I'm having
do all these responsibilities in my life or am I anxious because I have shifting hormones? And it's hard to figure out what's going on, but it's good that I like the fact that you're looking at it holistically and looking at the entire person and seeing because that so many times I think people will look at just one area and they because we are a whole person. It's like what we're thinking, what we're feeling, what's going on medically, physically, spiritually, it's all together. So that is...
Amita Sharma (07:19.614) Yeah, that's really the issue is the medical system treats us like in the compartments, right? So, hey, you have a headache, go to the headache doctor or if you have, you know, hormone, go to the hormone doctor or whatever. But holistic, we are not just compartments here, right? We are what we are thinking in our head is also going to reflect on our physical being and whatever is physical, emotional. So it's all mind and body connection. And that's what I, you know,
I mean, at least that's what I'm trying to advocate is the whole mind and body connection and look at yourself in a holistic way. That's how you'll be able to embrace when you embrace the holistic lifestyle, you'll be able to at least take care of yourself in a holistic way rather than popping pills, which we are programmed to do with any problem. Dana Skaggs (08:04.184) Yes.
Dana Skaggs (08:13.686) And I think something else that you're hitting on as well is that so much of the time we women are programmed in different ways to be very caring for those around us, but we don't frequently make enough space and time and effort and money to provide self -care. And I've talked to quite a few women who they feel guilty if they're trying to
focus on themselves or show any concern about their own experience. They feel ashamed, they feel guilty. That inner critic jumps in and starts accusing them of their being selfish. They need to be thinking about other people. So I really like that what you're doing is helping to create that space for women, like women that are listening right now that might be going through this to have that grace, to have that self -grace to be able to care for ourselves. Amita Sharma (08:46.272) Yeah.
Dana Skaggs (09:10.986) What was most helpful for you in that when you're in that space and you were trying to take care of yourself, what worked best for you and what did you maybe find out that didn't work so
Amita Sharma (09:24.616) Yeah, so I have to change my entire lifestyle, my daily routine. And that is something that I was not paying attention to before. And that's what really worked for me is really focusing on my dietary modifications, my lifestyle, you know, taking on the movement, going into the yoga breathing, taking some Ayurveda principles and incorporating them, even acupuncture.
Aroma therapy. So all these things I incorporated in my lifestyle. And what didn't work for me was I never used to pay attention if I'm eating processed food as an example, or not really paying attention to my movement on a daily basis. So those things actually didn't work for me. And I would get bloated every time I eat something processed food, meaning fast food or whatever.
And I did not realize that I thought I'm eating healthy, I'm fine, just one cheat day, two cheat days, but you don't realize that the bloating and the weight gain, my God, I was like so overweight, I can't even begin to tell you, if I show you my pictures, you won't even recognize me. So, but these are common symptoms for women, mid -aged women, it's a very, very common symptoms.
So what worked for me is getting rid of all these processed foods and changing my diet and really replenishing it with the nourishing foods, bringing in the movement, different type of exercise, not just one cardio you do push, push, push, that's not gonna work. You have to bring in lot of other things and helping your mental state is so important as you know, you being in the space. So this was not just one thing that worked.
I should say that they were small, small bite -sized things that I started incorporating in my lifestyle. And now it feels like that's just how I live.
Dana Skaggs (11:21.49) I love the way that you frame that as bite -sized steps because I think sometimes we as women get overwhelmed. It's nice to have choices and it's nice to know you can exercise more, can get acupuncture, you can get massages, you can eat better. It's nice to know that there's all these options to help us feel better. But before we can even do any of that, to be honest, sometimes we start feeling ass over elbows. Wiff
Dana Skaggs (11:58.851) do first? You what? How do I start in? You what's a you mentioned baby steps? So like, what is the baby step that someone could take if you're listening? And they're thinking, my gosh, there's so many things do. I just want to I'm just going to go home and crawl under my covers. I just it's just so much. I just can't even face all of it. I'm just going to crawl under my covers and pull the covers over my head and ignore all of Amita Sharma (12:15.68) Mm -hmm.
Dana Skaggs (12:26.969) So you mentioned baby steps. So what is something that you felt like and what do you think is the most important? If somebody could do one small thing today, if they're listening and they're thinking, okay, and I have mental space to do one small change in my life, what would you recommend that they start? Amita Sharma (12:35.574) Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Amita Sharma (12:45.911) Food as medicine. It's so important what you put inside, you know, in your body is so important. So if you can start eating right, when I say eating right, there are so many different things that one can do, but at least starting from cooking the food, fresh food, as an example, and incorporating plant -based diet as much as you can, at least you can have two days a week or something if you're a meat eater, then
get rid of the red meat if you can, or put it in moderation. These kind of things will start making so much difference. You will start feeling much better because we have a, as we start aging metabolism, as you know that that changes and you have a hard time digesting these red meats, right? So you really need some foods that are nourishing your inner body. so simple things like plant -based diet, even fish is good.
and getting rid of processed food, replenishing it with some prebiotics, probiotics, getting, taking care of your gut health, because gut health and mental health is all connected. So these are the changes that I highly recommend that women at least start with paying attention to what is it that they're eating, starting with the food first, and then slowly adding in the movement part, which we talked about earlier, because you can't add everything in one day, it's not possible.
Dana Skaggs (14:11.747) No. Amita Sharma (14:11.754) took me years, you know, it took me a lot of time to come to where I am now, but that was a diligent way of, okay, I'm going to start doing this now.
Dana Skaggs (14:24.377) Fabulous. love it. So I'm kind of wondering when you were at the office when you were still working in the corporate space and you were struggling with some of the more, you know, mental emotional layers of perimenopause. What did you find to be most helpful when you were trying to do your work and you're trying to be productive and trying to meet your deadlines and do all the things and have interaction with your co -workers and this type of thing? What did you find was most
helpful to you in managing the anxiety and the depression. Amita Sharma (14:59.764) be honest with you, at that time I was miserable. That is the honest truth. I was having a very hard time concentrating on work, being productive at work. I typically had lot of anxiety issues. I had to calm myself down. I did not even know all the tricks that I'm talking about now. I was very, very miserable. I did not know the tricks of breathing or food or all these things.
At that time, think I stayed miserable for quite a few years. I took breaks in between. So what worked for me is I, instead of working like a full time, with a full time job, I started consulting and I started taking breaks in between my consulting gigs or roles. So then I gave myself a little time to compose myself and relax myself. And so that's one thing that I started doing. Dana Skaggs (15:34.283) I
Amita Sharma (15:59.348) And see, that is also not good because had I stayed in a full -time job, I would have climbed the corporate ladder. Instead of that, I did not know how to take care of myself. So instead of that, I said, I don't want to quit, but maybe I can start, you know, kind of downsizing my career in a way that I can start taking consulting roles as opposed to climbing the ladder to the next level. Now hindsight, of course, it worked out good. I'm sitting in front of you,
But for millions of other women, know, they think of quitting, believe it or not, or they think they're so embarrassed to talk about this issue. The data, you know, says that I think about 30 -40 % of women, mean, it's a huge number, they think of quitting the work or they think of cutting back their hours. And I'm one of them because I cut back and do, okay, that's how I should.
rather than thinking of what I'm saying now in the holistic lifestyle. At that time, I didn't even know that I could do Dana Skaggs (17:06.927) Right.
That makes a lot of sense. And really I'm hearing you say that if there's some listeners now that are going through what you have gone through and how you so adequately and greatly describe that, it's almost like if they gave themselves permission to reach out to someone, because what I'm hearing you say, sometimes we don't know, we know something's off. We're not exactly sure what it is. We know it's more than one thing or two things, but it's kind of all together. It's not just
Amita Sharma (17:35.526) Thank Dana Skaggs (17:38.093) things in their own little world. It's all together. It's created this stew that we're having to deal with. It's almost like giving themselves permission to possibly go to either a primary care person or a therapist just to start somewhere and get some support, get some feedback. mean, was that your did that help you along the way or did that happen later?
Amita Sharma (18:05.814) I did seek help, but I think that one of the issues that I found is even in medical colleges, this particular topic is not discussed or taught to primary care physicians as an example. And that's what we typically go to as a first step. And if they are not aware of this entire journey, then it gets very difficult.
And that's one of the reasons why I started this NARISH talk is because to help women at least learn about what is going on with themselves and how to start taking the steps. the system, maybe in next few years, it will start coming together. But as of now, even now, lot of primary care physicians are not trained in this whole menopause journey for a woman, believe it or not. Dana Skaggs (18:57.773) Yeah, I believe you.
Amita Sharma (18:59.146) You can't just suddenly start going to, okay, I go to this, I go to this, I go to this. And then I did, I did. And then I got all my blood tests and said, nothing's wrong with you. I'm like, what? Something is wrong. I don't know what is wrong and I'm going crazy. Right? Because it's very, it's very like a scientific, right? Dana Skaggs (19:14.093) Yeah, yes, I'm so, so glad you were here.
Dana Skaggs (19:20.055) Yeah. And you advocate, what I'm hearing you say as well is that you advocated for yourself, that people were telling you, wait, know, know, Amita, your, your lab work is fine. There's no problem here. And you're thinking, yes, there is a problem. Amita Sharma (19:25.673) Mm -hmm.
Dana Skaggs (19:35.351) And so that's fabulous. And I want to encourage other people, you know, the listeners to self advocate and follow in your steps and do, you know, really pay attention to how they're feeling. And if the lab work doesn't show it, if you know, when you're going to something's not right, just to keep pushing until you can get the answer. I, know, I was looking at something, it was sort of funny, but not really on social media about how
if men had to deal with these perimenopausal symptoms, then there would be so much more research done. There would be so many more, there's so much more dollars put toward it if they had to experience what we experience and not to downplay. mean, I know men have their own struggles in different areas. I've had, you know, men on my podcast before talking about what it's like. Amita Sharma (20:22.922) Yes.
Dana Skaggs (20:32.983) walk in the masculine path and the struggles that they have as well. But it's hard when we're as women are going through all of these things and feel as if the medical community or something doesn't really care enough to take that much interest. Amita Sharma (20:37.27) Amen.
Amita Sharma (20:50.378) Yeah, and you know, the other thing was, if you look at a couple of decades before, women were not in the workforce as many women as it is now. So I know my mom never worked, you know, so we are coming in the generation of women that we are financially independent. We have been working and the women's body is not designed to take so much stress, right? There's so much stress at work, so maybe.
That's one of the reasons that so much research, medical research, the dollars have gone into the men's health, not on the women's health, because women always took a backseat, know, raising families. That's what we've been programmed. And it's culturally agnostic. I'm shocked. I thought I was coming from a culture where we have been programmed, but I've talked to millions of, so many thousands of women and they all say the same thing. It doesn't matter which culture you're coming from. That's the other thing, right? So.
Dana Skaggs (21:43.811) That's it. Amita Sharma (21:43.976) So that's we've always been in the backseat, but now women are at the forefront. Today we have a woman presidential candidate. I mean, think about it, right? So that's why one of the reasons that, you know, when we have now started coming to the forefront, dollars are probably going to start flowing hopefully in future.
Dana Skaggs (22:07.489) Absolutely. So I was wondering if you could take a few moments and really educate us a little bit more about nourish doc. What exactly is that? And tell us the background and how that's meant to help individuals help women who are going through these these perimenopausal symptoms.
Amita Sharma (22:28.095) So, Navish talk is really about creating a holistic wellness platform to help women when they're transitioning into peri and moving on to the postmenopause. The idea being that understanding what perimenopause entails and what the postmenopause entails and then based on the symptoms because every woman is different but based on each and every symptom what we've done is we've created all the holistic
bite -sized information that women can start taking and making changes into their lifestyle, changing their habits. Like I said earlier, in the diet, in the movement, the yoga, breathing, some of the aroma therapy, some of the CBT, hypnosis, counseling, all that we've tried to create sort of like programs so that simple bite -sized information can be taken in on a daily basis to start.
at least embarking on this holistic lifestyle journey and that's what we're trying to do in NARISH DOG launching an app which is going to be super affordable priced at less than $10 per month so that women each and every woman can say okay now I know this is what's happening and then you go to the doctor and you are more informed you are more empowered you are more aware
Dana Skaggs (23:48.259) That's wonderful. do they, is there a place on it? Like when they download the app where they can like journal what's happening. So when they go in to see their primary care person, they can pull up the app and say, here's the symptoms that I've been having. Here's when they happened. It'd be kind of, it sounds like this wonderful place where you can just kind of go and just download, sort of mentally download into the app what it is that you're feeling so that when you go to see a,
Amita Sharma (24:03.668) Thank Dana Skaggs (24:18.394) your provider, then it's right there. All the information is right there in the app. Amita Sharma (24:22.238) Yep.
Absolutely. So one area is where you know, you kind of understand from the international experts what to do, what changes to make. Then the other area is you start logging into your symptoms and then on a daily basis or whenever you want to. So at least you start documenting how you're feeling. It's not just the physical as we were talking about earlier, it's also the emotional. There's no lab test that measures my anger, right? Or a mood swing. So I wish there was. So you can start doing all
those things. so that really is the idea. And then when the time comes later on, we are going to partner with naturopathic doctors around the country. So if you want to talk to a naturopathic holistic medicine expert through the app, one -on -one, we'll have the ability to do
Dana Skaggs (25:15.297) Wow, that's amazing. So I know sometimes apps are able to create communities. And I know that must take another level of technology that I'm not, that is not my wheelhouse right now. But I know from I've participated in similar type apps before.
and really benefited from the community encouragement and hearing other women discuss what they're going through and being able to get feedback from them and you feel like, gosh, I'm not alone and so -and -so reported feeling this and is there a community aspect to the app or is that something that's maybe on the docket to happen?
Amita Sharma (25:55.974) Yes, there is a community aspect as well, you know, that women can interact with each other, join different kind of groups. Also, on a weekly basis, depending on, you know, what plan they are in, we are going to have experts, different experts on a weekly basis. One, could be gynecologists, the other we could be psychologists. The third we could be, as an example, a movement person.
even sexual health person is the sexologist. So women can understand the complicated intricacies that is involved with their phase that they're going through. It's not just one thing, right? So that's the other thing for us to really encourage the interaction and keep it open the dialogue for women to come in and ask questions openly from the experts as well. In addition,
to the community that they can interact with the peer -to -peer or other women. So these are two things from a community point of view that we
Dana Skaggs (26:56.449) I love that. That is amazing. So I can see women who, whether they're at home or whether they're in the corporate space, being able to access the app and get ideas, get feedback, get encouragement to feel more normalized, to feel like they're not alone. So they can manage what's going on within their body. So they can go, whether it's into the home or into the corporate space and really be their absolute best self. can, you know, do check all the boxes.
and complete all the tasks and be productive and be powerful and just be the amazing women that they were meant to be without being obstructed with these other things. It just sounds fabulous. This is amazing.
Amita Sharma (27:39.605) That's what I'm just trying to learn. I learned from my torturous, torture years, which I explained to earlier, and tried to distill that information. what we did was we researched, we went around the world and talked to almost 3 ,000, 4 ,000 holistic experts and women to put this information together. So all the information that is inside the app is from
holistic experts around the world on different different topics as I said on sexual health, the sexual health program Even for skin and hair a lot of women start losing their hair. So so many things start happening So the idea is to really encourage them to empower them that you know, yes This is a natural phase of life, but you can be proactive, right? You can take care of yourself really at the end of the message is self -love self
Dana Skaggs (28:34.175) Absolutely. This is awesome. So Amita, let us make sure that the listeners know if they're thinking, gosh, I want to know more about Amita. I want to be able to get in contact with her. I want to find out more about what she has going on. I want to find out more about NourishDoc. Where do you want them to go?
Amita Sharma (28:56.598) website www .narishdoc .com and if they want to get in touch with us there is a form on the website but they can also send us an email hello at narishdoc .com and we are on all the social channels so very easy for women to get a hold of us
Dana Skaggs (29:14.905) fabulous. This was this has been really fascinating. And I just love the fact that you're championing this cause for women. And like you said earlier, it's an area that a lot of women don't talk about, and especially if they're in a corporate space, when they are working alongside males that just don't understand they're they're walking their own path. And so not wanting to bring it up for fear of like you said, of being, you know, dismissed or disregarded or not really paid attention to or
I mean, discriminated in some kind of way. So they just kind of sit alone with it. And this would really be a way for it normalizes it and gives them a safe space to get some good ideas and reach out to other women that are going through this. So they can, like I said, really be their best, most powerful selves. This is awesome. Thank you Amita for coming on Phoenix in Flame. Amita Sharma (30:06.006) Thank you so much and appreciate the work you're doing. Thank you.
Dana Skaggs (30:11.881) Awesome, awesome. Now listeners, I know absolutely that you have heard some things in this podcast that you're thinking are wonderful and you may have a friend or coworker or a family member that you're thinking, my gosh, she has got to hear what Amita Sharma has to say. So take this episode, copy and paste the link, send it through text, send it through email, put it on your favorite social media sites, get the word out. Let's grow our Phoenix and Flame community.
so we know that we are not alone. I'm Dana on Phoenix in Flame.