 Hey everybody, good afternoon. I am excited to be here with my friend Dr. Trevor Cates. We were just comparing ski stories because we both live in ski areas and love to ski and at least here in Boulder, Colorado. We got, gosh, if you've been watching the news, it's like the snowstorm of the decade. I think we got over two feet in some places. So unfortunately, the roads were all closed, so I wasn't able to get up to the slopes, but we do share a love for those slopes. And you're in Park City, right, Dr. Cates? Yes, I am. I know. I'm so jealous. We didn't get all the snow that you guys got. It was always great. It was like powder day. I'm out. Oh, it's so funny. I have one employee who likes to ski and I'm like, if it ever has a really great powder day, we'll just like secretly, like Dr. Jill and Natalie are sick and we're going to be on the slope. It hasn't happened yet, but anyway. Well, thank you guys for joining me. Just a few housekeeping things. You know, you can find all of our old videos on my YouTube channel, which is just under my name. Jill Carnahan. You can find all of these recordings if you've missed any of them. And my new podcast is now launched. So you can find me on iTunes and pretty much anywhere podcasting is happening. I'm there and you can find all these episodes there. Here on Facebook, you can watch this. It'll be recorded. So if you've missed the first part, you can come back. Today, I am super excited about my guest, Dr. Trevor Cates. We've known each other for probably over a decade, gone in the same circles and everything. And today we're going to talk about skincare and particularly how the microbiome and skincare relate the gut skin connection. So we're going to dive into all things skincare related. I know Dr. Cates and I both want to live vibrantly healthy and well. And the more important thing is not that there's anything wrong with visiting a plastic surgeon, but for me, I want to be vibrantly living from within so that I show a glow on the outside, but it comes from this way of lifestyle and even the kind of products that we're going to talk about because these things all matter. And I know most of you women, maybe some of you men watching are going to really enjoy some of the tips and tricks that you hear from Dr. Cates today on how to optimize your skin. Because as we'll talk about Dr. Cates, it's kind of this mirror. She talks about the mirror from within. So we'll dive into that. I want to briefly introduce her. And then without further ado, we'll jump right in. So Dr. Cates, Dr. Trevor Cates is a bestselling author of the book, Clean Skin From Within. I'll be sure and leave a link here and in all of the avenues where you might find this show for that book. If you want to purchase your own copy. She's a founder of the Spa Doctor, a natural skincare line. She received her medical degree from the National University of Natural Medicine and was one of the first women licensed as a naturopathic doctor in the state of California. She currently lives in Park City, Utah where she helps patients from around the world achieve naturally glowing skin. She's been featured in various TV shows including The Doctors and Extra TV. She has interviewed over 250 experts on the Spa Doctor podcast and hosted her own PBS special, Younger Skin From Within. She believes the key to healthy skin is inner and outer nourishment with natural and non-toxic ingredients. So welcome Dr. Cates. So good to have you here and to connect again. I would love to just start out by how did you get into this realm? Tell us a little about your backstory of how you got here. Yeah absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. It's so great to be here talking about skin. So you know it was interesting. I've been seeing patients with a naturopathic position for 21 years and it was really when I was at the at the Waldorf Astoria Spa and I was running these two-week weight loss programs. This was about 10 years ago. Now I was running these weight loss programs and at the end of the two weeks the patients would say, Dr. Cates I've lost this weight. I feel great but what surprises me is my skin. I didn't know my skin could look this like you were talking about. So vibrant, so healthy and with their skin issues were going away but also they just noticed a more vibrant glow about their skin and to me it made sense. Of course your skin is an outer reflection of overall health but I realized with so many people saying how surprised they were I realized that oftentimes people look at you know the conventional approach to skin is when you have a skin problem to do something topical to suppress it or to for women to wear more makeup to kind of hide different things but I wanted people to realize that skin is actually an outer reflection of our overall health and it actually ties into my own personal journey and what led me to become a naturopathic physician which is as a child I had a lot of allergies, a lot of health issues that showed up on my skin and that was one of the things that flared up the most is itchy rashes, mysterious bumps, hives, eczema I was reactive to everything and my parents took me to see a lot of different conventional doctors and I would have allergic reactions or adverse reactions to everything and so I was this sort of difficult case for a lot of them and I remember even at one point one of the doctors said you're just going to have to move because she's allergic to everything and Virginia where I was growing up and so thankfully my parents didn't give up and they kept searching and they actually eventually found a holistic practitioner that they took me to and what I realized after that is you know I had this incredible recovery from my skin and my allergies my overall health issues I felt healthier more vibrant you know showed up on my skin and when you have skin issues or anybody who struggled with skin issues it can really affect your self-esteem and I remember as a child being so embarrassed by the skin things that I would I would have and I didn't feel like a normal kid so when it cleared up not only did I physically feel better and the itching of that but also just feeling more confident in my own skin and so I remember also thinking why did I have to go through all of this for a holistic approach to be presented why did I go through all the struggle why wasn't it just presented you know as like everything else was presented to us and that's kind of like read this passion in me at a young age and what I found out about naturopathic medical school later on I thought okay this is what I want to do so now I can help other people avoid hopefully these painful paths and like go into more of an integrative holistic path and so so it kind of came full circle and I realized when I was at the Waldorf story I realized I really need to write this book on skin because it is you know our skin is our magic mirror and it gives us great clues about our health and it's often one of the early warning signs that shows up for our our health and when we look at our skin and the issues especially chronic skin issues or even just the sort of dullness dry you know just not that that vibrancy of our skin there's something behind it and I could talk more about the root causes behind that but things like inflammation gut microbiome nutritional deficiencies hormone and balances blood sugar issues oxidative damage these are really the root causes behind so many skin issues and of course you know they're related to so many other health issues so there's this connection there. Oh gosh I love and thank you for sharing and and I'm sorry you had to go through that but gosh what a beautiful thing to have that transformation and then the information and to bring that with the passion because you know what it's like. I so understand Trevor because I grew up with eggs and allergies skin issues galore grew up on a farm and the farm was corn and soybeans and probably mold on those corn and soybeans and so many things and like your parents my parents at one point were like this farm is killing you in a sense of like how much it was harming my health and that all of the things in the environment but again probably gut which we'll talk about and nutritional imbalances and things were also the underlying cause and the same way my parents finally took me to like a chiropractor who kind of knew some nutrition and those were the kind of things that helped me and it's funny I was just talking to someone earlier today about my journey and I remember that chiropractor telling me you know Jill you could go into a chiropractic medical school or any of these realms but I actually think you maybe should go to allopathic medicine and start to shift the conversation because I have my heart was a hearted and naturopath just like you like I had just I feel like there's so much value and probably more value in some of these you know more natural ways of healing which is what we both use nowadays but if as we kind of shift the story and bring the awareness out it's so important because a medication isn't going to clear your skin up from the inside out and cause any permanent change and I can say that mold was definitely I grew up on a farm and mold was definitely an issue in our house in fact I had I couldn't leave anything on the floor I lived in the basement of our house I couldn't leave anything on the floor because if I left it on the floor for more like a doll or something on the floor for a stuffed animal for more than a day it would have mold growing on it wow oh my gosh now that's what I tell patients now if they have like you know fruit and a basket on the counter or shoes in their closet they get moldy well that's a pretty good sign wow and you know interesting I have to take a little tangent on this because of course I love to talk about mold and mold wrecked my skin I had horrible cystic acne sometimes in lectures I show the pictures and people are just like gasp when they see my face because it is just completely covered it's kind of a miracle that I can now have clear skin after all that I've been through but our skin is resilient and mold is such a trigger that C4A which is one of the split complement products that causes massive inflammation is known to cause cystic acne so it's no wonder that people have trouble even as adults in an environment where there's a toxin like that so you just mentioned some really great categories I'd love to just dive briefly into all those the gut and the oxidative stress and do you want to talk about some of these underlying factors and just dive into each one just a little bit yeah yeah absolutely and so when I was doing research for my book and I was going back and I was looking at looking at patterns and my patients and I discovered that there are six root causes behind skin issues and I talk about them all in my book and but I also realized that not everybody has all six of these issues so I actually created an online skin quiz so people can go and take that it's theskinkwiz.com and I created different skin types and I actually gave them I gave them all human names because you know I like you we see our patients as people not just a skin issue or you know health issues so they're amber, olivia, sage, emin and heath they're these skin personality types and the way I categorized them was based upon several root causes so I encourage people to take that because sometimes it's going to be a bit overwhelming when we talk about you know all of the root causes and we probably don't even have time to talk about all of them today but I do think it would be great to talk about the microbiome I definitely want to dive into that one today because there is so much really fascinating research unfolding about the microbiome and just so for people who aren't familiar with what what is the microbiome so we have these different areas of the body where we have these microorganisms that live in on and protect and so in a healthy state in a balanced state they can help restore health maintain health but when they get out of balance that's part of what are the big triggers that happen so a lot of what we talk about with the skin is the skin microbiome and the gut microbiome because the gut microbiota when that is out of balance that can cause imbalances in the all the microorganisms that live on the skin now the microorganisms that live on the skin are very different than the ones that live on the gut for obvious reasons like our skin is exposed is exposed to the air our skin one of the biggest functions of it is to provide a barrier to the outside world and so it needs to have certain microorganisms that help protect our skin from from the environment that we live in but what's also very fascinating about that is what's around us is very very much impacts our skin so like who we live with if we have pets in the home our hygiene practices whether we you know like use you know lots of bleach and clerics and things like that of cleaning agents or whether we um you know we live on a farm or an urban environment there there's so many different factors in our environment that play a role externally as well so we want to when we're looking at the skin microbiome and helping it in its resilient state we want to do both internal and external support and I really do think that the majority of the root causes some more than than others we want to come about it from this approach of internal and external so just I know from experience of for many years like basically 10 years of my nature of health and medical practice I focused really exclusively from the inside out and helping people with skin problems and then but then when I was researching for my book and I was looking at creating a skin my skincare line the spot doctor skincare line I started to realize the importance of also putting things on the skin that we can't just do it all from the inside out which a lot of it does come from that but also we need to be mindful of what we put on the skin so it's really a two-part and if you only do the external or you only do the internal you're really missing out and when I made that connection with my patients and started using that both internal and external approach that's when really saw the difference happening wow I love that so I want to talk about you know how do you approach in your book you have kind of a two-week program of how to start to shift and then I want to talk about like ingredients and skincare what we have to watch a lot of people don't know what they're putting on their skin is toxic and what to avoid so let's start with like where would you start with your clients on the a few weeks to start in this process of getting clear skin yeah absolutely so in my in my book I lead people through a two-week program and so there are four different aspects of the program there's clean plate clean slate clean body and clean mind so the clean plate section has to do with the foods that we eat and we want to you think of of course food is medicine right so we can actually help either we could either with the what we choose to eat we can either trigger the root causes like inflammation or got microbiome imbalances or we can actually use food as medicine to help address them so eating anti-inflammatory foods rather than more prone inflammatory foods or foods that help support the gut microbiome like high fiber plant-based foods and eating like a diverse variety of produce things like that we know that helps support the gut microbiome so so that is a really of course a really important part of it is the food the clean plate portion but there's also the clean slate so I just like I mentioned what we put on our skin and so there are certain things that we want to avoid that actually are toxic to our bodies overall and we could talk more about that as well but there are also things that actually can create imbalances with the skin microbiome that we put on the skin and some of these things we think we're doing a really good job we're using natural products but yet they actually can still disrupt the skin microbiome then the third part is about clean body because what it's not just about what we put on our skin but also what else is in our environment that could be toxic to us or or triggering more of these root causes and helping support our body's detoxification pathways and a lot of times people think of detoxification they think the liver maybe the kidneys but the skin is also a really important detoxification organ we perspire we sweat through the skin that's one of the ways we get toxins out of the body so our bodies are so wisely designed to get toxins out we want to do things to support and then the clean mind section is about stress management and mindfulness practices because stress is a like it can be kind of toxic to the body and if we don't manage it well then it can be a contributing factor to especially inflammatory skin issues triggering you know increasing cortisol in that and that inflammatory response that happens so it's really I like to talk about all four of these and I know a lot of us people either want just want to talk about food or they want to just talk about skincare products but it is and before we dive into like talking more about skincare I do want people to know it's really this overall approach that gives you the best results gosh I couldn't agree more because the diet's huge but again if you have a toxic living situation or toxic chemicals or using the wrong products every single piece that matters it's interesting as you're going to have questions I think the audience would want to know on each section there's a few things first of all foods people always want to know um are there any foods like obviously like in my practice with auto immunity environmental toxicity gluten's usually a no go for most people are there a few foods that you're like these are generally good for clear skin to totally avoid what's your thoughts on like say gluten or dairy or sugar or what are some of the things you'd say generally for clear skin you want to mostly avoid these foods all right well I think it's important first of all to have a great relationship with food and I never like to think of food as bad and that thing is as bad it's just that certain things are better for our skin than other things we do know that sugar is one of these triggers for inflammatory skin conditions and for you know and and also for acne and accelerated aging because with accelerated aging it causes glycation issues if you're eating too much sugar or your blood sugar is just as elevated um and we're you know not in a balanced state and also really can trigger acne breakouts too and it's just overall inflammatory but you also mentioned gluten and that is definitely another big one that I oftentimes see now I'm not necessarily saying it's it's the thing for everyone but it is one of the more common ones and in my book about I talk about 10 different ones but I you know I think if you want to just narrow down start with a few different ones to maybe to start eliminating and seeing if these could be triggers for you I would say sugar gluten and dairy those are three of the big ones I totally agree um so and again like I love what you're saying too I always hate putting people in a box and making the box smaller and restricting and causing disordered eating um but there is a general trend to inflammation that we see these foods often associated so I like that we've kind of clarified that now clean slate what I thought about now with our um post-covid kind of in the middle of figuring out this pandemic a couple things first while we're putting alcohol all over our skin all over our body and my take is alcohol is really not good for our skin and it destroys the natural microbiome so the two things I would love your thoughts on are um alcohol products and some of these products and cleansers that may not be helpful and also mask and mask me um and thoughts about you know again we may not always have a choice of in public wearing or not wearing that but any tips on both the stuff that we're causing to sanitize our environment hands and how that affects our skin and then what we're doing to our face by having these um artificial kind of materials on our face yeah no it's definitely a challenging one because we you know the alcohol and the hand sanitizers is there to kill off um you know our healthy microbiome in a way right you know the viruses too but we lose we actually destroy some of the healthy protection from so I would say use you know try and use them minimally as much as you know when you're out and about and you can't wash your hands um then you know using the hand sanitizers and if you do when you do use hand sanitizers try and use the ones that don't have a bunch of other ingredients and also that have aloe and that because then aloe is is naturally hydrating you can usually find those but check the ingredient list because a lot of them they have fragrance and a lot of other things that we don't need and I do want to remind people that hand washing is actually better than using a hand sanitizer for multiple reasons it's actually safer for you and protecting you against micro you know the bad bugs but also helping maintain your your healthy microbiome it's it's a it's a better choice so just using just basic soap and water on your hands um but and then just saving the hand sanitizers when you absolutely or you know can't get to a bathroom and need to use it and maybe even carrying your own so that you're not going you know somebody says you know here use you know use the one in our store say I've got my own I've got mine you know that way you know it's in it because some of these are kind of scary honestly the ones that are out there so but you know of course we want to respect all of the regulations out there and you know being able to go out and about there's all of that but I do feel like and I do want to talk about masking but let's talk some more about about you know cleansing because it is one of the things that people we tend to overdo the the hygiene practices so when you're at home you don't need to be using these hand sanitizer products you're in your own environment and um you know so you don't have to use these but people are oftentimes still overdoing it and you know we're talking about hands here and hygiene but also we want to talk about the face because this is one of you know the areas that we want to protect and hey we're all we're all planning on living longer so we want our skin to be able to keep up with us right we're feeling great we're eating healthy but let's maintain our skin too so a lot of people are using cleansers on their face that actually disrupt the skin microbiome that actually um strip the skin so these foaming sudsies kinds of cleansers they actually are that squeaky clean feeling that people are used to feeling is actually not a good thing because it's stripping away these natural oils and our skin um our our skin has done best with a mild acidity to it whereas a lot of cleansers a lot of soaps face washes they have actually have a high pH so it disrupts that natural uh mild acidity which then disrupts the skin microbiome what does that mean while that's going to mean your skin is going to be more likely more sensitive to breaking out and various things acne eczema um and also premature aging so it really needs that support and so when we start our our skincare routine with a a foamy sudsy kind of cleanser we're just uh depleting it so I recommend people to use instead more of an oil based cleanser that actually has a lower mildly acidic but like 4.6 to 5 is more of an ideal um under 5.5 a lot of cleansers if you test with a pH strip in also moisturizers you'll see that a lot of them have a higher pH which doesn't support your uh natural skin pH and microbiome so that's an important part in skincare and um just starting with that step of using a really good cleanser and and I would say just as someone you know who who has a history of eczema and still I have that tendency to sensitive skin what I notice is all these hand sanitizers and you know wash even washing my hands more my skin I was starting to get some eczema on my hands and my skin was so dry so um when I'm at home I actually use my face cleanser on my hands because it's this oil based cleanser and it is so much more hydrating to my skin and still my skin still feels clean but without being stripped so it's important to maintain that barrier function of your skin and when you start to get that dry or the eczema or anything that means that your skin barrier function is breaking down and and when we talk about the gut we call that leaky gut right but when we're talking about the skin we can have actually leaky skin oh yeah and that's classic with both of you and I having eczema we're prone to that so I want to dive into gut next thanks so much for clarifying just a couple of things we're going to dive into we're going to talk about your product line but I did want to mention I didn't plan on bringing this up but we're talking about hand sanitizer I do have one I put a link there and it contains hemp oil coconut oil um aloe extract and hyaluronic acid so I have this all over my office and like uh Dr. Kate said when I'm at home I'm not even using this I'm using regular soap and water or I love the idea of using your cleanser but if you're out and about want something in your purse or your office I did include a link to my foaming hand sanitizer which is actually really moisturizing compared to the other ones out there so you can check that out so let's dive into the gut and then I want people to hear about your product line um so let's talk just briefly yeah about gut and of course we could spend two hours on SIBO and SIFO and dysbiosis and yeast and all that but let's just touch on like do you recommend any like probiotics and specifically or um how does the gut and skin why is that so important you and I both know that's true yeah absolutely and I I did promise I would mention like some tips on mask knee so I don't want to forget about that too and also I can I have I have a blog on my website at the spot doctor people can go and read that I'll I'll include that link in all the um so I'll get that from you and we'll include that as well okay perfect um because I know there's so much to cover but um and and you know the gut is so important and just skin reactions overall even people with mask knee a lot of times are forgetting about their gut health and if they're tend to getting more of that you might want to take a look at your gut so um you know let's talk about that I definitely with my patients it's one of the things that um I do often will will test with skin issues is I see when people have chronic skin problems they oftentimes have gut dysbiosis issues as well yeah yes so so a lot of it has to do with helping support the gut health with the healthy diet getting like I said lots plenty of fiber getting um lots of a variety of produce what we found is when we if we eat the same things all the time even if we're eating a lot you know vegetables um if we're not eating a variety we're missing out on more of a diversity of um nutrients but also it helps with the gut microbiome so eating more trying different things getting creative and really getting in those those fiber rich foods um and then you know there are uh the prebiotic rich foods as well as the probiotic rich foods which I'm sure that you talk to people about and then if that's not enough then looking to things like probiotics prebiotic probiotic supplements and those can be helpful and if you're trying to do it on your own and you're still not getting results then work with a functional medicine doctor or a naturopathic physician who can do some testing to to find out what exactly is going on because you might have some imbalances that need some really specific treatment yeah this can go really deep so you can start something then your own in a couple caveats that I've learned that treating guts is um if you have trouble I we love I love foods first love that that you're talking about Dr. Cates and I would agree the one caveat is if you have histamine issues and histamine issues trigger skin issues like they do in me then fermented foods sometimes bone broths and things that would typically be really good nourishing gut foods can be a trigger for you so just be aware that just because someone says bone broth is good for everybody or um keeper is really good for everybody for you if you have histamine issues just be aware if you feel like you're flaring that may be an underlying thing and then um and even certain probiotics with like lactobacillus KC I can be shown to raise histamine whereas lactobacillus rhombosis or bifidobacter is shown to lower and spore probiotics are usually a good idea for almost anyone so those are little caveats if you're struggling find a good doctor to kind of guide you in the gut um I did find your article in mass knee and I posted it so that's up already um and then uh and if you want to say anything about that and then I want to talk to you about your products in the last 10 minutes here yeah absolutely no I mean I think that that the blog has some tips and um there are just some simple things that that you can you can think about and and um and use when you're if you're having to wear a mask especially for prolonged periods of time if you're have that requirement and you're having to go to school or work and and and and needing it but yet you're having skin break out so there's some tips like just be mindful of the type of material that the mask is made out of and then also what are you putting on your skin under the mask and are you able to take the mask off periodically and actually use a good cleanser that helps um kind of clear up your skin give it a clean slate and then put the mask back on that those are some some some brief tips one other thing I'm thinking pretty simple and I'd love to know your opinion but I'm assuming for women um maybe less makeup is more if you're going to wear a mask you probably shouldn't be wearing a lot of makeup underneath it right because I'm going to clog the pores and right yeah no absolutely that's I'm saying like what are you putting on underneath you don't really need to wear it and if you're taking it on and off it may not be as much of an issue for you but I mean you know what I I you know I I think as women I we really we love to kind of a lot of us anyway like to kind of get you know do our hair and makeup we like that part but um what I want your goal to be is to not need to wear makeup so if you're you know if you're looking at addressing the root causes of your skin issues you won't have anything to hide anymore you won't have the breakouts you won't have the the discolorations in your skin the imbalances in your skin you can actually heal that and so if you happen to have to take off your mask and you know you don't have makeup on you're not going to be embarrassed about it that's what my goal is for you and then if you want to wear makeup and you want to enhance you know your natural beauty you can do that make sure you're using clean products though I love it and I couldn't agree more because I had a lot of issues between cancer crones mold in my 20s and 30s and I think my skin is clearer now than it ever was before and what I find is I'm much more lap to go out on a hike I don't wear any makeup and I feel confident about my skin now because again that internal it's really freeing you know just to not have to and again nothing is makeup I love putting on my makeup but it's fun to be able to go out without it when I have all people know how it was to have lots of breakouts really really difficult skin and it was almost embarrassing and shameful to go out with how how I felt how bad it looked before and that was my issue but it's I really really get that um well let's talk a little bit about your line um I've used it I love it so tell us a little about what you have for your products yeah absolutely I wanted to create something for my patients for myself my my daughters you know my family and you know my friends that because the thing is what I was finding is that people were telling me well I want to use natural skincare products as I realized there are all these toxic ingredients and skincare products but I don't think the natural products work that's what people kept telling me so I I know of the healing powers of nature so I started to dive into the research look at what may be may have been missing from the natural skincare lines out there and that's when I started to learn all this about the skin microbiome the pH of the skin and the importance of maintaining that pH and then also certain natural actives and you know just like with our supplements we want to have the purest most potent form of these nutrients and herbs in our supplements we also want that with our skincare products so I noticed that a lot of natural skincare lines they were starting to kind of you know not use the purest form not use them and like enough of the ingredient to actually create results so that's what led me to create the spot actor skincare line because I wanted to take in all these key aspects of what will make a natural product truly effective because I wanted to be able to be able to feel like natural can be effective yes it is so I created a four step skincare system it's a cleanser serum moisturizer and a plant-based oil blend and and I wanted to create it in a simple system all with a pH that supports the skin and with these natural actives so that's what I created and as you can tell I mean you know you're using the products it's amazing the results that can happen when you use a really great natural skin care line that supports healthy skin and we I you know I I knew it was going to be amazing when I launched the company five years ago but we continue to get these incredible testimonials from people and they you know they use the products for 30 days and the results that they see in their skin is is pretty phenomenal and I honestly before I turned 40 I didn't really think much about personally about skincare products but I think in my early 40s I really started to think okay I need to start looking at this personally too and I'm so glad I mean I'm 48 now and I'm so glad that I did because I look back at pictures from my 30s and I feel like my skin is in many ways healthier than it was when I was younger because of using these products and adding it into a healthy routine oh I could not agree more with you and the same thing right around 40 I was like oh and for me like sun is that we didn't talk about sun but I was a sun worshiper for most of my life and when I hit 40 I was like oh I've got to really protect my skin and I wish I would have more before but again a lot of times because of um uh changing the reactive oxygen and really getting our skin nutrients we can reverse some of that damage um but talk about sun real briefly because that's a big one isn't it yeah it is you know and when I talk about oxidative damages one of the root causes we we think about scan a lot of times that's you know that that sun um exposure can accelerate that oxidative damage but um you know it's tricky because we we also we'd love the sun because it helps with our vitamin D levels and we enjoy getting outdoors because of the health benefits of being in nature and being outdoors and you know you and I both we live in beautiful places that where the outdoors is a huge part of our lifestyle right so um I think it's important to be smart about the sun don't be afraid of the sun I want you to be able to get out and enjoy it but using um you know especially when we're looking at you know going into spring and summer months when the sun is stronger we're outdoors more we're more have more exposed skin thinking about trying to avoid the middle of the day when the sun is it's harshest trying to go you know earlier and then later in the day and certainly when you go out in the sun doing your best to wear the biggest thing first is to think about hats and coverups and then also sunscreen so I would say but use shade to your advantage don't forget about that as well hats are really key but also and certain coverups as well but um when it comes to your face using a sunscreen that is more of a mineral sunscreen rather than a chemical sunscreen I believe is a healthier way to go for your skin and your overall health problems with a lot of the chemical sunscreens is that they contain ingredients like oxybenzone which oxybenzone is a known endocrine disrupting chemical hormone disrupting chemical which is one of the big concerns and a lot of skincare products is this class of chemicals that has been linked I'm sure you've talked about this been linked to a lot of hormonal imbalances and health issues that result from the exposure to that so we want to reduce our exposure plus it's not good for the environment too and the some of these ingredients have been banned in places like Hawaii because the impact on the coral reefs and things like that so using more of the zinc oxide based sunscreens are way better way to go and also another great thing about them is you get instant protection with zinc oxide when you're using a chemical sunscreen you have to wait for that chemical reaction to happen in your stand but if you really start thinking about like what is exactly so but using the the more mineral they create more of a barrier function so immediately they have that protection which is also a great thing for kids because telling kids to wait 15 yeah it's not how these happen oh thanks for clarifying I couldn't be more I love sunshine it's so important for vitamin D so a little sunshine we do still need this but again like I used to be hours in the sun with baby oil back in the day I can't even imagine I was not planning on before we end and then I'll give you a chance to kind of leave us a blast today I'm going to share a little picture with you guys of me from I think six years ago and then a year ago and how different my skin is already this is going to kind of blow your mind and I'm going to be real vulnerable here to share this is totally it's for the moment can you see that picture so on the left is six years ago in the midst of mold I mean my skin you can see the lines and the different stuff there you can see the target you see my eyes I mean there's real and the one on the right is a year ago I feel like I'm even more shiny than I was a year ago but I think you can see here like what it does to take the the initiative change your skincare regimen I'm going to share links to your products Dr. Kates because I love them and we've also developed a brand new NAD cream that I want to share because I feel like that's been a game changer on top of the other regimen that that we're recommending so this is just to show you like this is real life this is for the moment this is me six years ago and a year ago and can you tell the difference there I'm almost embarrassed to show but if it helps people understand like it really does make a difference that was when I started to say I think I was probably 39 and now I'm 44 and I think one of the things I was like gosh I'm looking older than my age and now I think I've actually reversed that so where I look at least my age maybe a little bit younger and you clearly do Dr. Kates you look amazing you glow you're a perfect poster for your own skincare line so I wanted to be sure and share that to give you guys encouragement that I live this Dr. Kates live this this this is stuff that I'm practicing every day I'm trying to find good products I'm trying to do what I tell my patients to do because I have the same issues that you do and I've had all kinds of skin issues that I've overcome but it's possible it's possible and that's what's exciting well any last final words to leave us with encouragement and I'll like I said I'll be sure and link all to your products on here and everywhere else that you find this video you know I want to leave your audience with a tip and that is to grab a garbage bag and go into your bathroom take some time to do this when you do your spring cleaning it's a great time to do it go and look at your personal care products start looking at the labels and here's another thing is if it's been sitting there for a while and you don't know how long you've had it just throw it away these products do have a shelf life they do expire the spot doctor products we have a two-year shelf life for our products which is kind of it's a little unique and the natural skincare world but we have a nice natural preservative system that we use but when especially with natural products you want to be mindful of that if and try and avoid the ones where you don't stick your fingers in the products you're contaminating your products mold can grow very easily and open containers that's why we also most of our products come in pumps or even you know with one that we have a mass that has a lid that opens we have a used a little spatula that comes with these so that you're not contaminating put the lids back on and then throw get that garbage bag throw away any products that you don't know how long they've been sitting there they're expired and also start learning about toxins and skincare and trying to start making that shift brings a great time to do that awesome thank you so much for your time and your expertise it's just been great to reconnect and hear all the good stuff happening and hopefully we'll have a few more good ski days before the season ends absolutely thank you for having me on Dr. Joe you're welcome thanks so much