 First caller is Lexi from Alabama. Hi Lexi, how are you doing? How can we help you? I'm great, how are you? Good, thank you. Okay, hi. I want to thank y'all for everything y'all do. It does not go unappreciated. You got it. So I've been listening to y'all for about two years and I've almost listened to every single episode. And when I was 13, I was diagnosed with anorexia and I'm now recovered. And in 2020, I started running and now I run about six to seven miles, six days a week. And I straight train for about an hour and a half, five days a week. And I average around 25,000 steps. I'm 411 around 100 pounds and eat around 2200 calories. And I've never gotten a period. And I recently just got lab work finding out I have low estrogen and testosterone and as well as severe anemia with a hemoglobin of 7.7. So I was wondering if y'all had any, I feel a little lost and I was wondering if y'all had any guidance. I have a feeling you're going to know what we're going to say to you too. Lexi, first off, thanks for coming on. And I appreciate you sharing your diagnosis and kind of what you're doing and coming on. I really appreciate that. And I appreciate you saying you're lost, but I'm going to tell you how I feel over here based off of what you just said and some of the numbers you gave me. This is, it's very clear what the answer is. I don't feel lost at all. Now, sometimes when people present some of the stuff that you said to me, like, you know, I haven't got my period, you know, hormone levels are off. Sometimes I feel a little lost because it's hard for me to kind of figure out what's going on. And we have to kind of look at what they're doing and change a few things, see how their body responds. But every once in a while, it's very clear kind of what's going on. Okay. So first thing I want to say, Lexi is exercise tends to be abused by people who are recovering with body dysmorphia type issues. So people who are recovering from anorexia or bulimia or orthorexia or what's been nicknamed bigorexia, right? This is like, you know, people that feel like they're too skinny and just want to build a lot of muscle. This might have been what I had. We tend to get into exercise and then the exercise starts to become how we kind of abuse ourselves. Okay. So it becomes a little more sneaky. The connection to, you know, not eating is still there. It's just now shifted and morphed into beating yourself up with exercise or trying to burn everything off or distract yourself. It could typically be one of those things. Running of all the forms of exercise is the most likely to be abused by somebody who had anorexia or bulimia. The nature of running, the persistent, you know, tolerance of the pain, the distraction. They're like just going for it and just weathering the storm type of deal for whatever reason seems to parallel with people who are recovering from things like anorexia and bulimia. Based off of what you're telling me, it's very, very clear that you are way overtraining and way under eating. Okay. So what we need to do is reverse out of what you're doing. Now I want to ask you, Lexi, if when I say we're going to really reduce your exercise activity and we're going to increase your caloric intake or the types of foods you eat because we're also going to focus on some nutrient-stent foods due to the hemoglobin levels. When I say that to you, what's your visceral reaction? How does your body feel when I say we're going to start working out way less and start eating more? The thought sounds great, but I think it's easier said than done. Yeah. What's the feeling in your body? When I say that, what's your visceral reaction? I think my body would react very well, but I'm fearful. Yeah. Okay. So you feel the fear in your body right now while I'm talking about it? Like, uh-oh. I don't know if I want to do that. The feeling of it, right? You can logically think this is a good idea, but the feeling of it doesn't feel too good. Kind of feel scary. Right. Okay. That feeling is going to stick with you while you do what I'm about to tell you. So you're going to have to ignore those feelings of fear because if you don't, then you're going to go back to what you're doing now. So we need to dramatically cut down your running. In fact, and I don't know if this is too much at once and I don't mean it physically. I mean mentally. If you were my client and I knew you would do whatever I tell you, I would immediately have you stop running. Completely. Completely. No more running. You can keep doing your steps, keep walking. I would do no running. I would take your five days a week of strength training for an hour and a half and I would have you do two to three days a week of full body training. I would have you do maps and a ball. For diet, I would have you focus on nutrient dense animal sources of protein like red meat. Red meat and eggs would be the primary sources that I would have you focus on. If you do what I'm saying, I would not be surprised if your period came back quickly within 30 to 90 days. And those numbers start to change shortly thereafter. So that's what I would love for you to do. Now, if that sounds like it's too much, then what you would do is you would cut back on as much running as you feel like you can consistently tolerate. Well, the goal would be what you just said. So if that if that's really scary to do that, you still you would want to head towards that direction. You just want to do it incrementally if you can't do that. But that would be ideal. Yeah. I mean, literally if you just stopped running right now and just went and did lifting full, you know, full body maps anabolic style and, you know, made sure to eat good protein and nutrient dense animal sources of protein, you would your body would react in a very positive way. The mental psychological aspect is going to be the big challenge. Right. Okay. Thank you so much. Yeah. Are you are you working with anybody like a therapist or someone through this process? We're looking. It's kind of hard to find someone good in the area. Today I went to a and I went to a natural naturopathic and they gave me some some medicine to take. Like I was on zinc too. Right. And they gave me a few other. Yeah. I would like to let's get you in the forum. So I'd like to have some support Doug to give you some access to the forum so you have access to us as you go through this. So if you go and come up with any challenges or have any questions, we can be there to help support. And then if you don't have maps anabolic already Doug will also send you maps anabolic. Do you have that yet? I do not. Well, thank you so much. Yeah. We're going to send that to you. And so this is going to be a tough process. I really recommend you work with not you look a naturopathic medicine specialist or functional medicine practitioner is great. But I think you should work with someone who's going to help you deal with the psychological challenge of removing what is right now your drug which is exercise and just kind of distracting yourself or beating yourself up. Because when you remove that whatever those feelings are that you're either avoiding or you know blunting are going to come up in a big way and it's going to feel kind of challenging. But I will say this Lexi on the other end of this if you do this. You're going to you're going to come out so just so much better off across the board. Like you're going to feel amazing physically mentally you're going to feel so strong and balanced. Everything's going to come right to your young and your body's in response so well to what I'm saying. But the the the detachment from this this relationship is going to be kind of it's like it's like breaking up with a toxic boyfriend. It's like you know you need to do it but when you do it you still got to break up with them and you're like I'm lonely what do I do now type of deal. So it's going to be a tough a bit of a tough road ahead. Let me ask you a question Lexi is anything that I'm saying right now surprising or did you think like deep down like that's probably what I need to do. Yeah no I knew. Yeah. She's been listening to show for a long time. Why what's prevented you is it is it just the fear of doing those things of cutting those things out. Yeah. Yeah. That's tough. Do you have any friends or anything anybody that you work out with that's doing this with you? No. Okay. You have us. You have us now. You're in the forum right now and I would love to hear from you. I want to add one thing too to the thing all the advice that we're giving right now. When you get maps at a ball there's going to be a temptation from you to want to go through it like a circuit to just keep on moving and pushing yourself pushing yourself. Do the rest periods. I want three minute rest periods from you. Long rest periods and all I want you to think about is getting to a place where you can just get stronger and stronger trying to add weight to the bar. So your goal from these workouts is to get stronger to be able to lift more weight not sweat really hard burn lots and get through the workout as fast as you possibly can. Take your time through it. Give yourself long rest periods. Try and add weight to the bar week over week. That's the way you want to focus through this program between that and focusing on the meat and eggs like Sal was saying. I actually don't think you're going to need to boost your calories too much right now. If you just focus on those foods. 2,200 calories for a four foot 11 girl. It's around 100 pounds. It's not bad. It's not bad calories at all. I think you're just we're burning way too much. Yeah. You're depleting the hell out of your body with the amount of running and training. Yeah. You're just I mean, but just simply by shifting the choices of food. I think you suggest it, which is perfect with eliminating the running and cutting back from six days to three days of lifting. I think the calories aren't too bad. Actually, I think you're going to be okay. Now, ultimately we'd try and get up, but that's not a bad place. No, you'll build strength. You'll build muscle. Your body will start to feel more solid. But you know, let me ask you this if you don't mind answering this and you have to answer this if you don't want to. Was the anorexia tied to body dysmorphia or was it a control thing for you? I think it was a mix of both, but mainly control. Okay. So, okay. So I'm glad I asked. Okay. So here's what I want you to do. We're going to use that to our benefit now until you start to work with a therapist who can really work with you deeper on that. When you feel the urge to run or work out or beat yourself up in the gym, is there something you can do that is an alternate? Something you can replace it with? So like, okay, instead of running, oh, what do I do now? I want to do something else. Some people do journaling. Other people will, you know, listen to a book or read a book that is uplifting. Other people will do something restorative. Like yin yoga, not power yoga, not the kind of yoga where you're like beating yourself up. I got to say that because that's what people tend to do. But like the slow breathing meditative type yoga is another option. Is there something that you can think of right now that you might be able to switch to that other thing that's maybe a healthier option for you, you know, mentally? Um, yeah, I think so. Okay. Okay. Do you know what that is? Would you mind naming that or is that you want to keep that to yourself? Yeah. Um, I've started a little small business of baking, um, healthy desserts. So maybe just focus on that. Hey, I like that. Here's the thing with people that have, uh, issues with control, although it can go in a bad way. If you learn how to harness it, you're going to be kick ass in a lot of areas of your life, including business. And most entrepreneurs struggle with this. In fact, this is why Adam will say one of the biggest hurdles for entrepreneurs is figuring this out because then they get to a certain point and they can't control everything. And then they got to move out of it. But initially you can harness this and really become kick ass. So I think that's a good idea when you get the urge to go run, go beat yourself up, focus on your business. That might be a good strategy. I like it. All right. Thank you all so much. Thanks, Lexi. Let us know how it goes in the forum. Okay. Okay. Thank you for everything. No problem. Hey, man, when I hear stuff like that, it makes me so, but I hope she takes the advice because her body is going to, and she's going to respond at her age. She's, her body's going to respond so well to what, you know, what we told her. But what's happening for people listening is she's, she's literally beating herself up and depleting her body with the amount of exercise that she's doing. Her calories and nutrients aren't enough to match that activity. And, but it's more than that. Even if she were eating enough, it's just too much on her body. The stress is so high that her body does not want to have a period. The hormones are reflecting that and the nutrient levels are depleted because she's, she's sucking nutrients out of her body to try to repair all the damage. Yeah. It's always interesting to see kind of how that shifts into a different form and it can, it can be sneaky like that. Like it's, especially in health and fitness, it's like we want to pursue things that benefit our body. And so it becomes like an obsession of getting healthy, but then we, we sort of overdo it in that direction. I actually think that she's going to see incredible results just by simply cutting out the running and reducing the weight. Oh, huge. That alone will do it. Because I mean, she's, she's 95 pounds for 11. 2200 calories is not a bad calorie intake. So she's just, she's just tipping the scale over. She's just tipping the scale over. She needs to recover. She's just overtraining. Yeah. She's just overtraining right now. She's not, what's harder is when someone is, is grossly overtraining and grossly under eating. And she's not. Right. I mean, she's under eating for her activity and nutrients, obviously. Yes. And the reason why I said focus on nutrient dense foods is more to replace what's not been, that's gone. She has to eat more now to make up the difference and then get to a level of balance. But I mean, you, you, you cut out, I mean, six days of running completely. And you, Six to seven miles a day. Yeah. And you reduce that. And then all of a sudden 2200 calories is actually probably feeding the body pretty well. So I think that, that's going to make a huge difference. So long as she falls. I mean, she knew. I mean, she said she listened to every episode. So you know she knew. She needed to hear it. Yeah. I think that's, I think that's what happens a lot of times when we get these questions like this. I think people know the answer. I think they just want to hear. Well, when they call in, what happens is they're ready to hear what they know. They just need that one last, you know, push or whatever.