How Everyday Toxins and Nutritional Deficiencies Impact Your Hormones with Louise Digby

This is the transcript of an interview hosted on Ruth’s Feel Better. Live Free. podcast.

Ruth Soukup: We talk a lot on this blog about how you can improve your health by changing what you eat, by eliminating sugar and processed crap and getting more protein and healthy fat. And all of that is pretty huge. But one thing we don’t always talk about is how all those other toxins are finding their way into your system from sources other than food.

But maybe we should, because it’s a big deal. And after talking to today’s podcast guest Louise Digby, I’m even more convinced that this is a topic every woman concerned about their hormones really needs to think about. So let’s dive in!

Today we are going to be chatting with Louise Digby, who is a registered nutritional therapist, weight loss expert, and the creator of the Nourishment Method. As well as the host of the Thriving Metabolism Podcast, which talks about nutrition, education, science, metabolism, and hormones. Sounds like a good one. And we are going to be talking with Louise about toxic load and nutritional deficiencies. And how those play into your body’s ability to balance your hormones, which honestly is a pretty fascinating topic and so important for any woman who is trying to lose weight and get healthy for life.

And we’re going to dig into that interview in just a second. But before we do, there is one quick thing I do want to mention, and I think it actually fits in with this topic of detoxification pretty well. I wanted to tell you about something new that we have created here at Thinlicious. For women who are just getting started with your health journey, or who are wanting to get back on track, it’s called the 10 Day Sugar Detox.

And it is a guided 10 day challenge designed to help you take what we firmly believe here at Thinlicious is the first, most essential step in balancing your hormones and transforming your health, which is detoxing your body from sugar, and we hosted a few sessions of this sugar detox in the fall. And.

Honestly, they blew us away. It was amazing and amazing to see the results in such a short amount of time. And then we took a break for the holidays. Cause it’s a very hard time to get people excited about thinking about cutting out sugar, right, right during Christmas and New Year’s, but we are going to be back with a brand new cohort for the new year, starting on Monday, January 6th, which I really think is a perfect way to start the new year right. Or to get yourself back on track if you feel like you went a little off the rails over the holiday season.

So if you want to join us for that next cohort, it’s going to be really good. Just go HERE to get signed up.

Ruth Soukup: So why don’t we just start with a little context.

Tell us a little bit about yourself, who you are, what you do and how you got to be doing what you are now. 

Louise Digby: So I am a registered nutritional therapist, and I specialize in helping women over 40 to release stubborn weight by really getting to the root cause of those metabolic issues. So going much deeper than just calories in versus calories out.

And making sure that we’re optimizing health so that. Weight loss is really a happy side effect of just being healthier and you get all those happy side effects that come with it, like lots of energy and better sleep and all that good stuff. 

Ruth Soukup: Yes. I love that. I love that. And that’s obviously what we talk a lot about here on this podcast.

And it’s so it’s so crazy to me. I don’t know how you feel about this, but I, you know, I struggled with my weight for a really long time and spent so many years dieting, and never really understanding that if you can just heal your body, it will do what it’s supposed to do.

And weight loss is exactly that. Like you said, that happy side effect of just getting healthy and it’s such a better way to live really. I wish we could just shout it from the rooftops, which is why I do this podcast. I just, all of the time, I just want to be like. Don’t you know, if you just get healthy and do the things that will nourish your body, everything that you want to happen will happen without making yourself miserable.

So sorry, that was a little tangent. I just love that. That is your mission too. Cause it’s definitely very in sync. So you talk a lot about toxic load. With your clients, and I would love to dig into that a little bit more. So let’s just kind of start with an overview. What is toxic load and why should we care about it?

Louise Digby: So we’re all exposed to toxins all the time from things like pesticides and pollutants and chemicals that are in skincare products and perfumes and cleaning products and candles and all these things that are around us. What And unfortunately, you know, when they come into contact with us, whether it’s us breathing them in or touching them or ingesting them, If something isn’t providing you nutritional value, then there’s a good chance it’s probably a toxin of some sort and you still absorb it and your body has to get rid of it because otherwise it’s damaging.

So the reason why I talk about toxic load a lot is because It is the load of the toxins that is important. We’re never going to be able to prevent the exposure to these things completely, but reducing the overall load is really important, partly because of how damaging they can be to your cells and how that can cause inflammation and DNA damage, but also because it is a really big An overlooked factor in stubborn weight and hormone disruption.

Right. A lot of these toxins are very similar in their chemical structure to our hormones, particularly oestrogens. And so what that can mean is that sometimes they can basically get in the way of our hormones doing what they need to do, binding to our cells and communicating with our cells. So that can cause some hormone disruption that way, but it also We detox and eliminate these toxins via the liver, via specific pathways in the liver that also eliminate our hormones.

So when we have a high toxic load, the hormones can kind of get recirculated around your body rather than being detoxed and that can further disrupt our hormones. So with hormones being so important for, you know, just how we feel generally, but also our weight management is obviously a really big factor that in itself, but then also there’s another way in which you can cause disruption, which is that when we have a high toxic load, when.

One of the ways that our body can protect us from that is by actually upregulating fat storage, because we store some toxins in our fat because it’s out of the way, it’s out of circulation. So your body can protect itself if your liver isn’t coping very well with the toxic load. Your body can protect itself by saying, okay, I’m going to stop burning fat.

In fact, I’m actually going to store some fat so that I can sweep away these toxins out of harm’s way. 

Ruth Soukup: Interesting. I’ve never heard anybody explain it that way before, but it’s compelling, especially if you’re on a weight loss journey. So what are some of these sources of everyday toxins that people might not even be aware of?

Louise Digby: So yeah, I mentioned a few like candles and air fresheners. Okay. Tell me about candles. What do candles do? Well, it’s the fragrances that are in there and what’s created when we burn them as well. So it’s breathing in those fumes and those perfumes You know, and it’s the same for air fresheners and plug in air fresheners and, you know, Febreze, the things that we spray to freshen up clothes.

All of these artificial fragrances, they’re all chemicals and all things that your body has to detox and eliminate and process when we come into contact with them, either via our skin or by breathing them in. So those are a really big kind of group of them. And then, you know, what we find in our skincare products as well, things like parabens and phthalates, these are, you know, things that are very commonplace in, you know, your moisturizers and makeup and shampoos and conditioners, and again because you know, for most women we use so many products, the load can be really high.

And so starting to switch to ones that are phthalate free and free of, my mind’s just gone blank and forgotten the other thing that I said. Yeah. So free from those then it helps to just start reduce, reducing that load down. 

Ruth Soukup: Yeah. I mean, it’s almost overwhelming when you think about it. I mean, I’m going like mentally going through a list of all the things like, Oh, I kind of like my candles.

So how do I make my house smell good? Right. And what, is there a list that you like? Have that, or that you’ll find online of just like all the toxins that you want to be watching out for it almost as how do you, like, how do you even start when you really start thinking about this? 

Louise Digby: Yeah. And it is overwhelming.

Cause like you say, there is just so many things. I mean, I haven’t even listed, you know, close to anywhere near close to all of them, but I think the best thing to do is just to. To see it as a long term change and something that as you run out of skincare products, start looking for kind of cleaner alternatives.

And you know, simple swaps, like swapping your plastic water bottle for a glass or an aluminum one swapping your plastic Tupperware for glass food containers. You know, these are things that. Let’s take a little bit of effort up front, but once you’ve done it, it’s done. So some of the changes are kind of straightforward, but other things take a little bit of perhaps just exploring new brands to find alternatives for what you would usually use.

And I would just suggest waiting for things to run out and then gradually replace things. 

Ruth Soukup: Interesting. So like when you talk about toxic load, right. And how you’ve got all these toxins coming into your body. And it’s not just from food, it’s from all the things that are around us, whether it’s detergents and skincare products and candles and all the things that you mentioned then, and that it does feel overwhelming.

Right. And people are also trying to change the way they eat. So what if you’re going to do something first, what is the, what is like the Number one way that you could, is it like what percentage of Environmental toxins versus food toxins are, do you think are affecting people? Does that question make sense?

Like, how do you prioritize? 

Louise Digby: I think it’s difficult because it will look different for everyone. It would depend on the individual and I would just go with whatever feels easiest, do whatever feels easiest first, because you know, once you’ve, once you made a few changes and you’ve You know, manage to get a few quick wins and it builds momentum and you’ll feel more able to focus on the next thing.

And I think probably one of the easiest things to do is look at switching like food storage containers and water bottles and really build from there. And, you know, like you say, we are. Always thinking about so many different things. We’re thinking about food. We think about exercise and sleep and stress and toxic load.

And, you know, so many things to think about. So even more reason to just pick one thing and change that. And then when you feel like you’ve got the capacity or the bandwidth to start thinking about the next thing, then move on to that. Baby steps. 

Ruth Soukup: So do you think that, I mean, this is so, Really fascinating to me because I’ve focused so much on talking about food and what we’re eating and changing the way that you eat.

And I always tell people, you know, if you’re thinking about food versus exercise, food is 90 percent of the battle versus exercise. Exercise is great for lots of reasons, stress relief and all these things. But if you want to lose weight, you got to change what you eat. But do you think For somebody who’s just listening to this, right?

They haven’t changed their diet. They haven’t done anything. Could you noticeably see a difference in just your weight and your hormonal balance just by swapping out the environmental toxins? 

Louise Digby: I think over time if you made a change to kind of all the various ways that we’re exposed to these things, then it definitely can make a difference.

But if you haven’t made a change to anything else, then I would suggest waiting. Put in your energy towards more focusing on your nutrition, because if we are better nourished and our guts are working properly and our livers functioning well, we’re going to be able to handle the toxic load better in the first place.

So it’s always good to take a two pronged approach and to make sure that your liver is functioning efficiently. As well as ensuring that we’re minimizing exposure to these toxins. But a good place to start is with just making sure you’re nourishing your body as best you can. 

Ruth Soukup: Right. So let’s talk a little bit more about that because you talk a lot about nutritional deficiencies as well.

And how do, how does that play a role into how our bodies handle the toxins? 

Louise Digby: Well, we need various nutrients for our livers to, to work and really for all organs and systems in the body to work properly. We have quite a high demand for nutrients. So if we do have deficiencies, then that can be a problem.

compromise how efficient the liver is in removing toxins and hormones and just things that generally need to be removed from the body. And, you know, that can mean, you know, that you’re not getting enough nutrients through your diet potentially, but it can also mean that you’re not absorbing those nutrients.

So very often when we’re thinking about supporting liver, A good first step is thinking about supporting the gut so that you can actually absorb and get the most out of what you’re eating, as well as of course, you know, trying to pack in the nutrient dense food into your diet rather than focusing on low calorie foods, which tend to be quite nutrient poor.

Ruth Soukup: So what are some of the signs that somebody might be dealing with high toxic load or nutritional de deficiencies? Are there certain things that you look for and that you can tell oh yeah, this is an issue 

Louise Digby: in terms of a high toxic load? I mean, hormonal imbalances generally can be a sign.

I think particularly if you are taking, you know, steps of your diet to make sure you’re getting enough protein and support your blood sugars and managing sleep and stress properly, you know, if hormonal issues are persisting, it could be that you haven’t kind of covered this area of reducing your toxic load.

Being sensitive to chemical smells, you know, if you find that air fresheners or the smell of fuel or those types of chemical smells give you like an instant headache or can make you feel nauseous, then that can be a sign that, you know, it’s kind of tipping you over the edge in terms of when you’re exposed to those things.

And also, you know, being prone to migraines and headaches can sometimes be a sign of a high toxic load as well. Fatigue potentially, but that can have so many causes is always difficult to figure that one out. So yeah, just, I think generally feeling like things aren’t quite right can be a sign as well.

Ruth Soukup: Interesting. So what are some of the most nutrient dense foods? If you’re trying to improve your nutritional intake and avoid deficiencies, what are some of the most nutrient dense foods that you recommend eating? 

Louise Digby: Well, the first thing that comes to mind is leafy greens. They are very nutrient dense but they are also have a lot of nutrients that are very supportive.

of liver function, as well as the fiber, which is really helpful for carrying those nutrients, or sorry, not the nutrients, the toxins out of the gut once we have processed them. So leafy greens are really powerful. And flax seeds are a great option too. Again, nutrient dense, but also really great at helping us bind up those toxins and the spent hormones and carry them out of the digestive system so that we don’t reabsorb them.

And then there’s also phytoestrogens in the flax seeds, which are generally supportive of hormones, although make sure that you have them ground up or rather than whole so that you can get the benefits out of them. Interesting. What about meat? Meat? Yeah. Yeah. So, meat is really nutrient dense especially if it’s good quality, you know, if it’s grass fed pasture raised free range it can be a really nutrient dense food.

And you know, an important part of the diet, I feel in many cases and same for things like eggs very nutrient dense. And if it’s organic liver can be really nutrient dense as well. I 

Ruth Soukup: have not been able to bring myself to eat liver and sometimes do the like liver pills, but I’m like, Oh, I can’t have this stuff.

Smell of it. I just cannot handle the smell. My mother in law used to love liver, but no, cannot do it. So what about supplements? So if you’re like, obviously nutrient dense diet is the best way to get nutrition or nutrient, yes, nutrient rich foods. And we want to get most of our stuff from there, but if you’re really working on trying to eliminate toxins, are there certain supplements that can help with that as well?

Louise Digby: Yeah, definitely. And I think there often is a place for supplements because, you know, even with the best diet, unfortunately, the soil and therefore the food is quite depleted of nutrients compared to what it used to be. So often there is a real need for supplementation. And things like magnesium is so, so supportive of so many things in the body, but very supportive of detoxification as well.

B vitamins, you know, your liver is very hungry for B vitamins. So, and B vitamins are very supportive of hormone balance generally. So. Making sure we have plenty of vitamins and magnesium is a really good start. And you know, other basic nutrients like vitamin C, zinc, again, just so supportive of both those areas.

So those are really good places to start. And then there are other nutrients that Practitioners often use, which are things like sulforaphane which we get from broccoli. It was one of the powerful nutrients in broccoli. And actually you can get a really good dose of sulforaphane by chopping up your broccoli and then leaving it for.

40 minutes before you cook it because it causes a chemical reaction that increases the amount of self sulfurophane. Not easy to say. Interesting. And what’s 

Ruth Soukup: the best way to cook it then? 

Louise Digby: It doesn’t matter too much because the, as far as I understand, the sulfurophane will still be there. But to preserve nutrients, steaming is generally the best way to go.

You can eat broccoli raw, but you just want to be cautious if you have a thyroid issue. 

Ruth Soukup: Okay. Interesting. So how like, and I’m curious how you work with your clients in this, but how does somebody start on a detox journey? Right. When you’re thinking about all these different things and there’s environmental toxins and food and changing the things and what you eat and the supplements It can very easily become very overwhelming, especially if it’s a huge shift from what you have been eating.

And all the toxins that you’re probably putting in your body, all the toxins that are surrounding you, like where, like what, how do you step it out? 

Louise Digby: Definitely in steps. We never. Do a big overhaul and change loads of things at once. Cause it’s just so difficult to sustain. With my clients, we usually start with just getting some core foundations in place you know, making sure that we’re eating enough protein, making sure we’re getting plenty of fiber in the diet, and we’re taking steps that support blood sugar balance.

And then. With most of my clients, we run tests to identify where their areas of imbalance are and what their priorities are. And then that helps to establish where to start. You know, do we need to start with toxic load or is it more gut health? So that takes away a lot of the overwhelm. But if you don’t have that testing in place to help you figure out the priority, what I would say, you know, the order doesn’t matter too much.

It’s about. Just making sure that you take steps that you’re going to be able to sustain in the longterm. So, you know, doing it gradually, which might mean changing one thing a week, it might mean changing one thing a month. Because if we want to make a change, that’s going to stick, then we need to make sure that, you know, we’re not relying on willpower to keep that habit going.

We, we want to make sure that it’s just something that feels natural to us. 

Ruth Soukup: Yes. I absolutely agree with that. I think, and I think that was, you know, Ultimately for me, like what has helped me sustain this lifestyle is because I’ve just over time and gradually added more and more, right? And when something feels like this is just how I live now, then that’s when I know it’s time Oh, maybe I do want to start having magnesium in my water every day.

And maybe they do want to start doing this next piece. And I think that has made it feel. So much more sustainable, but I didn’t used to be like that. I used to be the like, okay, I’m going to do this diet and I’m going to change everything all at once. And I’m going to run every day. And I’m going to, and I would last for, you know, a week at the most or two weeks, if I was really having a good time.

And then it would just be, I would just feel like too much. And then I give up and you go right back to your old kind of your old ways. And I think having that mindset shift of, This is a lifestyle. So I’m going to gradually change all the things that you don’t have to change everything all at once. Even when we, even when you are a type a person and you want to change everything all at once, like it actually is going to stick if you can do it in a slower, more sustainable way.

So with your clients, do you find. Like that there’s typically like the majority of people are kind of in one, one category or not a category, or is it kind of all across the board? 

Louise Digby: You mean in terms of the imbalances that they have? Yeah. What’s most common? We see gut issues. So, so often and not necessarily obvious ones.

It’s not necessarily people who are experiencing obvious symptoms, but because we test most of our clients and that includes looking at their gut microbiome and absorption you know, we often see that. There’s dysfunction there, even when there aren’t obvious symptoms. So, and when you’re working with someone to support their hormones and reduce inflammation and improve their nutrient status and all these things, it’s always so helpful to start with the gut, because like I said, we want to make sure you’re absorbing and you’re eliminating properly.

So that’s a really common thing we see, but. What’s also really common is to see a mixture of imbalances because where all of these systems are interconnected, if you have an imbalance in one system, there’s a very good chance there’s going to be something going on somewhere else as well. 

Ruth Soukup: Yes. And that’s so true.

And then so, and then that is, I think becomes overwhelming because you’re like, ah, I got to fix all of it, but improving one part of it will start to improve the other pieces as well. Yeah, which is really helpful. So what’s something about toxic load that might surprise our listeners? 

Louise Digby: I think probably the most surprising thing is it’s impact on hormones and weight, which we will see already spoken about.

But I think also what’s interesting is how quickly you can. impact your toxic load. You know, for example, with a BPA from plastic water bottles, once you change your water bottle and you reduce your exposure to the BPAs, it’s out of your system in days. So I think that’s really exciting. That actually in terms of what’s circulating around your body, there may be odd bits of it in cells.

But in terms of what’s circulating around your body. You can get rid of it really quickly. So I think that’s quite motivating. 

Ruth Soukup: Yeah. And that’s encouraging too, because you think about that. And I mean, I think about gosh, I’m 46 years old and I have probably been like putting all these toxins. So are they just like sitting there and storing them and they’re never going to get is it hope?

Am I a hopeless cause? But you’re saying no, like it’ll actually, your body is pretty amazing. And it’s ability to cleanse itself and purge itself of all of this. So, yeah. 

Louise Digby: Yeah. And what, in terms of if you were to have a blood test to look at how much BPA was in your blood, that would be what changes rapidly.

As I said before, we do store toxins in our fat cells. So that means that in future, when you lose weight, you will release some of those toxins into circulation. So it’s really good. Generally, when we lose weight, our toxic load does increase. So it’s always a good idea to just be conscious of that. You know, that might be one reason why you might feel a bit under the weather when you first start losing weight, sometimes it can be the reason why your weight might plateau.

If you know, your toxic load is going too high and it’s often a sign to, to keep going, but just to take some measures to support your liver, to keep Which could be as simple as making sure you’re well hydrated, making sure you’re having regular bowel movements and eating plenty of leafy greens, lots of flax seeds and that sort of thing.

Ruth Soukup: Yeah. Interesting. I, you know, I never really thought about that either. Like when I first, when I started my weight loss journey and I lost. About 40 pounds in about six months. And I experienced, and now that you’re saying this, I’m like, I wonder if this is why, but I experienced hair loss when I first lost the weight.

And I almost wonder if it was my body flushing out so much fat and also then flushing out the toxins as well, because I mean, eventually it went away and now it’s been great for years, it was a temporary thing, but it was, that is. The worst feeling as a woman, right? Even your hair starts falling out in big chunks and you’re like, what is going on?

And it’s so, so are there other symptoms that you could experience like with that, as your body is flushing out these toxins, 

Louise Digby: when some people start or change their diet, particularly if it is a little bit more extreme Sometimes they can experience almost like a hungover type feeling or a bit of a flu type feeling, headaches.

And, you know, that can be a number of things like sugar withdrawal. But part of it can be where your toxic load is increasing significantly. And also when we change our diet. Some of the bacteria in our gut will die off because essentially what we eat feeds our gut bacteria. So if you take away a certain type of food, the bacteria that fed on that food will start to die off.

And when bacteria die, they release toxins as well. So that’s another reason why your toxic load can increase when you change your diet. 

Ruth Soukup: Yeah. So how long does it increase for typically? 

Louise Digby: Usually it’s quite a short period of time. For my clients, if they are going to experience anything like this, it might just be the first couple of weeks where they’re feeling a bit off.

And usually when that happens up in the water intake or just Dialing back the changes a little bit, not changing so quickly can just help to ease those symptoms. Interesting. 

Ruth Soukup: So what’s the encouragement, right? What’s on the, what’s on the other side of that? Give the, like, why is it worth it to feel like crap for a couple of weeks?

Louise Digby: Well, when you change your diet or you reduce your toxic load the benefits of that, you release the stubborn weight and your hormones become more balanced. Without the loss of metabolism, you know, when we go on a calorie deficit diet particularly if it’s a significant calorie deficit, we unfortunately lose almost as much muscle as we do fat and muscle is metabolically active.

So when we lose muscle, unfortunately we are reducing our metabolism. And then if we fall off the wagon or if we kind of go back to old habits, then The weight will come back on very easily, but it will mostly be fat and not the muscle that we’ve lost. So the benefit of taking an approach where you’re thinking more about nourishing your body and reducing exposure to toxins is that you can achieve the results of losing weight and feeling better without that really high risk of regain, regaining the weight.

Yes. Yes. 

Ruth Soukup: So true. And I mean, that goes for Ozempic too and the muscle loss, like that’s, we had somebody here on the podcast talking about that a while back about just that, like the side effect that everyone experiences that no one really talks about is the extreme amount of muscle loss that happens when you start taking Ozempic.

And so how does that fit into the toxic load? Do you consider pharmaceuticals like adding toxins? 

Louise Digby: Yeah, definitely. Any pharmaceutical is something that we have to detox. You know, we’ve got to eliminate it from the body. You know, whether it is an over the counter just normal painkiller, or whether it’s more of a prescribed medication, they’re all things that we need to process and eliminate.

And that are going to make your liver have to work that little bit harder and that can clog up. The pathways in your liver causing disruption. You know, of course there are times when medications are essential. So, you know, it’s not to say that we shouldn’t ever be taking anything. But it’s just something to bear in mind.

Ruth Soukup: Right. It’s all adding to the load. So interesting. So what are you working on now, Louise, that has you fired up and is there anything else that you want to share as we wrap up? 

Louise Digby: In terms of what I’m working on now, I’ve recently released an ebook—Reignite Your Metabolism. So that is a really great way to understand more about all of these different areas.

And I can offer your listeners 50 percent off and I can give you a promo code for that as well. 

Use discount code “RUTH” to get 50% off.

Louise Digby: You can find me best way is to go on Instagram and search at Louise Digby Nutrition and then there’s also my website which is louisedigbynutrition.com and you can find all sorts of resources on there as well.

Don’t forget to get signed up for our next 10 Day Sugar Detox, which will be starting on Monday, January 6th.

We’ll see you there!