Brian (0s):
This week I interviewed Dr. Alexander Guyer. She's a board certified physician, metabolic health expert and founder of the Guyer Practice. Her clinic is dedicated to a root cause focused approach, helping patients reclaim energy, balance hormones, and optimize whole body performance. We discussed how she uses peptides to optimize health along with Important Labs to look for The problem with too much restriction. Why weight gain in midlife isn't your fault and her one tip to get your body back to what it once was. Really enjoyed my interview with Dr. Guyer. I know you will too. Thanks so much for listening and enjoy the show. All right.
Brian (40s):
Welcome to the Get Lean, Eat Clean podcast. My name is Brian Gryn and I have Dr. Aleksandra Guyon. Welcome to the show.
Aleksandra (46s):
Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.
Brian (49s):
Yeah, thanks for coming on board certified physician, metabolic health expert, and you have the founder of the Geer practice. And what, what year did you find your practice or did you start your practice?
Aleksandra (1m 2s):
No, we've actually only been around for about three years. So we started in 2022. I started my career as an ER doctor in a very different part of the medical world doing the, the traumas and dealing with a lot of chronic illness and really became interested in how to help people never get to the point where people are often at with chronic diseases in the er.
Brian (1m 28s):
Yeah, I have a good friend of mine, he's in his sixties now, but he did ER for a long time and then I think it was enough was enough. It's, it's probably pretty stressful, huh?
Aleksandra (1m 39s):
It's very stressful and it's, and it's a revolving door, especially when it comes, you know, there, there are the traumas, the accidents, the things like that, but most of the time you're seeing the same same individuals with chronic illnesses who are getting worse over time.
Brian (1m 55s):
And so you were like, I gotta get outta er and, and help people more on the preventative end. Right?
Aleksandra (2m 2s):
Yeah, that's right. And I, you know, I think I was always more aligned with, with that, and I felt like there was a lot of gaps in my medical education. You know, I had a conventional medical education, MD, university of Maryland, and a lot of sort of the treatments that I learned were, were, seemed like bandaid solutions and like we were missing the real, you know, we were chasing the smoke, we were missing the real fire, which I think there's a lot of reasons why medicine has gone in that direction that are more related to financial, political things, but Sure. But I always felt like something was, something was missing. We were missing a fundamental understanding of why people were what, where they were.
Brian (2m 46s):
Yeah. And you mainly work with like midlife women? Is that like your main, what's, what would you say is like your, your niche that you
Aleksandra (2m 56s):
More Actually, I work with both men and women. Okay. I work with mostly high performers, so people at all ages, mostly people don't start coming to see me until they're in their thirties, forties, fifties, sixties. But I have 70, 80, 90 year olds who are still, you know, kickings at life and, and wanting to stay that way. And that's mostly who I work with.
Brian (3m 22s):
And for, for, for these individuals, do you have like a baseline that you start with? Like maybe you take some, you do some labs or how do you, how would you say you, like start someone on, if they just come to you? What, what would you start 'em with? Yeah,
Aleksandra (3m 37s):
Yeah, yeah. I think it's very personalized. We don't really protocolize things, but most of the time there's a reason why people are coming in. A lot of it is word of mouth, but you know, some people are coming in strictly for weight loss. They, they say, my friend lost weight with you guys. But not only did they lose weight, they gained muscle. They got really strong and they kept it off. And, and that's one avenue in which people come in where, and some people are just, I, I work with a lot of people who just don't feel like they're performing where they want to anymore. Whether that's athletically or just in their life. Professionally, people want more energy, better sleep.
Aleksandra (4m 18s):
So it really depends, you know, everybody has their, their reason why they kinda find their way to us. And, and then we go from there. But most of the time we do labs. We try to understand, I, I usually spend at least 45 minutes with somebody to really understand where they're at in life and what's important to them. And I think that's often what's missing in medicine too, is really trying to get an understanding. I think if you could get somebody talking about their life and like really get to know them as a person, you can build a much better treatment plan and with their goals at the forefront. You know, medicine can be very paternalistic where doctors can say, Hey, that's not really important, or Don't worry about that.
Aleksandra (5m 3s):
Let's talk about these things that are, you know, maybe important to me.
Brian (5m 8s):
And before we got on air, you mentioned a little bit about peptides is something that you've, you've started implementing in your practice. What, what led you down that road? And I know a lot of people have used them for, you know, weight loss and things like that.
Aleksandra (5m 23s):
So yeah, we started using, so, so I actually bought my practice from a doctor who was retiring and he had an internal medicine practice with a weight loss program that had been there since like the eighties. So, and he had a great structure and I took over his primary care patients, his internal medicine patients, and then sort of reworked the weight loss program to be more about metabolic health and really based on the latest science when it comes to body composition. And So we started using some GLP ones as well, which I think could be a great tool which kind of popularized peptides and you know, people, like you said before, people have been using peptides kind of underground for 20 plus years, but the GLP ones were a proof of concept to the larger population that these things really work.
Aleksandra (6m 19s):
So we started using other peptides, you know, I worked with a lot of hormone issues as well for both men and women, but really health optimization. So there were some people who we got their metabolic health under control. They were, you know, their body composition was on point, their hormones looked balanced, but there were still some places where they felt like they weren't performing like they wanted to. So whether it's wear and tear injuries from a lifetime of being in sports or the military or just very high levels of stress and burnout, I found peptides to be a great tool to sort of opt once we've built a foundation of metabolic and hormonal health to just have another layer there.
Brian (7m 5s):
Yeah. And I was explaining to you, I had a Jay Campbell on who was, well it's not live this second as we're recording, But it will be once this comes out so people can take a look at that. And he talked about how the normal way of doing peptides is, is not the right way. He actually uses a very small dose and titrate teaches people to use like titrate up from there and very small dose and work their way up. Is that something that you work with on your clients? Yeah, yeah.
Aleksandra (7m 35s):
I mean, I really believe that the minimal effective dose of anything is what we should be using. And I do think it's very personalized and, and I've seen a very different response. There are some people who respond beautifully to micro doses, to really small doses. And my goal is really just to tune up your system to respond to the other good habits that you hopefully are working on your life. So, you know, and it, and it can go both ways, whether somebody's already kind of optimized and done all this stuff and, and they just want to keep going and feel better, then sometimes we can use micro doses.
Aleksandra (8m 15s):
But there are also people who are so burned out or dealing with such bad injuries or inflammation that they can't start doing the strength training I want them to do. They can't really do the walking, they don't have the energy. And sometimes we use peptides to build people up So they actually can start making those healthy habits that we're looking for.
Brian (8m 35s):
I'm actually curious because just for my own good I've, I've not used peptides, but I've had some wear and tear, you know, I, my body 'cause I've been lifting for 25 years. Is there, is there one that you like for people who are maybe just dealing with, you know, some soft tissue injuries and things like that? Yeah, yeah,
Aleksandra (8m 52s):
Yeah, absolutely. You know, I think BPC 1 5 7 is one of the most popular peptides and it's fantastic for wear and tear injuries and just people who've been, you know, bodybuilding, athletic for a long period of time. I also have used it myself just for kind of chronic musculoskeletal issues and there's just nothing like that in conventional medicine. I can give you a brief description of what it is And what it, what it does if you'd like. Sure. So it's naturally produced in your stomach and it stands for body protective compound. So it's something the stomach makes to pro to protect the stomach lining from being broken down by the acid that's in there, But it can also travel outside our gut to areas of inflammation or areas of injury and basically recruit all the cells that are necessary to heal those places.
Aleksandra (9m 47s):
So what people usually notice is faster recovery from workouts. And if you are dealing with an injury and you do a subcutaneous injection near a place of injury near the shoulder, near the knee, just use a lot faster. And you know, in conventional medicine what we have is surgery ibuprofen or pt that's like all
Brian (10m 11s):
That's pretty Yeah. They, they'll give you like an an i I went, I went to an orthopod and he gave me an anti-inflammatory.
Aleksandra (10m 19s):
Right.
Brian (10m 21s):
Which I st I took for like a week and I was like, I don't really wanna, I don't know, I'm just, I'm, I'm sort of yeah. Anti that. Not to say that that doesn't have a place it, I'm sure it
Aleksandra (10m 29s):
Does, right. I mean, yeah, I, it it's sort of a bandaid solution. It does maybe reduce inflammation a little bit, but it's not going to create a healing environment. And the BPC 1 57 actually does, I mean, there are animal studies particularly on the Achilles tendon where they cut animal achilles and then injected the BPC and it just grows back together or otherwise that would take a very long time or a surgery. So I think it's, it's a very cool aspect of regenerative medicine that gives us another tool that we wouldn't otherwise have.
Brian (11m 7s):
I'm curious, I, I don't know if there's a peptide for people who have sinus issues. Yeah. I mean, oh, okay. My, my wife is dealing with, you know, seasonal allergies and sinuses and feels like her head's gonna explode. Is there, and I'm sure a lot of people up in the Midwest are dealing with that.
Aleksandra (11m 25s):
Absolutely. Yeah. There's two that I like in this class. So one of them is something called thymus and alpha one. And so most peptides are not FDA approved or they have not gone through the f FDA approval process. Thymus and Alpha one has gone through it in Europe, so it's approved in Europe as treatment for certain viruses. But it basically, you have a, you're born with a thymus gland that lives in your chest that basically balances out your immune system and builds a healthy, resilient immune system. And it gets smaller and goes away as we get older. And the thymus and alpha one basically replaces some of what the thymus was making before and can balance the immune system again to not respond to things.
Aleksandra (12m 13s):
It's not supposed to like allergens in the environment and respond better to viruses. It's also, you know, our immune system's always seeking out cancer cells, so it's very good for preventing and sometimes uses an adjunct and cancer treatment. So that one,
Brian (12m 31s):
So is that two, is that two separate peptides or one thymus and Alpha one, one
Aleksandra (12m 35s):
Thymus Alpha it's one, oh,
Brian (12m 36s):
It's called Thymus Alpha one. Okay. Yeah,
Aleksandra (12m 38s):
It's called Thymus and Alpha one. Yeah. Or TA one is another way to, to say it. And I've used it, especially with people with seasonal allergies. I use it myself during allergy season. Oh, do
Brian (12m 50s):
You? Okay.
Aleksandra (12m 51s):
I might start getting sick. I I do a little round of that. And again, it's just one of these sort of treatments that teaches your immune s system not to react to things that's not supposed to. So rather than just blocking histamines or putting a bandaid on things, it can be, it's kind of works in that regenerative sense.
Brian (13m 14s):
Interesting. Yeah. And you give yourself for something like that, like you talked about giving yourself a shot for that PPC 1 57, your knee or shoulder in that area where there might be some inflammation for something like this, where would, where's like the general place you would give yourself? Usually
Aleksandra (13m 31s):
In the, in the abdomen or in the belly?
Brian (13m 34s):
In the, in the belly.
Aleksandra (13m 35s):
Yeah, that or the sides anywhere where you have some soft tissue. Okay. So all peptides are, and you've probably, I don't wanna go over stuff you guys already talked about, but they're
Brian (13m 47s):
Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, yeah,
Aleksandra (13m 49s):
They're short chains of amino acids and that's what proteins are made of that you eat. And I'm sure people are familiar with BCAAs and amino acids. So the thing about that is that if we took them by mouth, they would just be broken down to those amino acids and digested and never leave the GI tract. So that's why they all have to be injected because they are such simple structures that it could never get to where it wants to go through the GI tract. But with an injection right under the skin with a tiny insulin needle, it can basically go where it needs to in the body, but most people do their injections in the belly or in the sides.
Brian (14m 34s):
And with your clients, are you getting it for them or, or do you have a site that you, you know, you go to or, or how do you
Aleksandra (14m 42s):
Yeah, we work mostly with compounding pharmacies. Okay. So this is, yeah, this is kind of a, there are a lot of peptides on the internet right now.
Brian (14m 56s):
Yeah. And
Aleksandra (14m 57s):
Safety is a really, really tricky thing. There are a lot of unsafe peptides on the internet. So I, I work with pharmacies and companies that do testing that I've gone and visited, that I've actually seen the testing with the appropriate peptides, those certificates of analysis. There are companies that have fake ones. One of the most dangerous things, I think, is that when you make a peptide, most of the time just the byproduct is something called an endotoxin. So just in the usual production of peptides, most of them will have endotoxins and there's a very expensive step to remove those and the compounding pharmacies and some of the higher end labs go through that step.
Aleksandra (15m 48s):
And then we'll send it for independent testing to prove there's no endotoxicity. But if they don't, then that can cause lifelong inflammation that can stay in your body forever and be very dangerous. So it's kind of the wild west.
Brian (16m 2s):
Yeah.
Aleksandra (16m 3s):
I don't really recommend for people to go, you know, Google search and just do whatever to work with someone who understands the landscape a little bit and can and has experience.
Brian (16m 15s):
Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, it's like, you know, supplements, same thing, right? Like it's the wild, wild west a little bit like you gotta really know your source.
Aleksandra (16m 23s):
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And I mean, with supplements sometimes there'll be stuff in there that you don't want or none of what it actually says it is. I think it's even more dangerous. I mean, you're doing an injection into your body and you could be putting something in there that is not gonna go away. So the risks are there for sure.
Brian (16m 46s):
Is there, I'd like to ask this question to most my guests. Is there something, I mean, you've been in the medical field for a long time. Is there something that you've changed your mind on?
Aleksandra (16m 55s):
Oh, that's a great question. My gosh, I feel like I've changed my mind on so many things. You know, my, my training, again, my training was conventional. And let's see, I guess one thing to talk about would be just cholesterol and statins and all those things. You know, I, I was trained that this was sort of the, the golden standard of making sure that people don't get heart attacks and strokes. We gotta get their cholesterol low. Right. And, you know, I've, because my, of my interest in metabolic health and wellness, I've really, this has been a real interest for me because I think the area's so muddy, like what do we do with cholesterol?
Aleksandra (17m 41s):
Is saturated fat bad for you? And I think what I've come to is that in a lot of ways we still don't know, but I think that when it comes to diet sources of saturated fat matter more than actually having it. So I think that some of the studies that we have on red meat in particular are the bad effects are more due to the hormones and the antibiotics that those animals were treated with rather than the actual content of, of what that is. And also, cholesterol really needs to, and I think the biggest driver of dietary cholesterol is fiber.
Aleksandra (18m 23s):
You know, high higher fiber diets is actually what gets rid of higher cholesterol levels. And some people tolerate higher cholesterol levels without it ever causing heart attacks or strokes or atherosclerosis where others don't. And I, and that's a nuanced discussion, but it's something that I've definitely come 180 on And now I treat it very differently. And I don't think that there's a, I can't, like, there's no blanket statement of everyone should be on statins, no one should be on statins. But I think it's extremely nuanced and definitely changed my mind over the years.
Brian (18m 58s):
Yeah. I mean, statins is a billion dollar industry, so I always are a little wary of, of, you know, these industries that make, there's so much money, like you were talking in the beginning, in the pharmaceutical industries. And So they don't want you to really know. I mean, I, from a lot of people that I've had on the, on the show, we've talked about cholesterol. I mean, and that's only one number, right? I, I feel like you wanna sort of dig a little bit deeper and even LDL you can dig deeper than that if you really wanna see like, like the real, the root of the problem, I guess is what I'm trying to say is because even having higher LDL might not be problematic for some people.
Aleksandra (19m 39s):
Exactly. I mean, I personally carry a very high LDL. Sure. I do not take a statin. Yeah, I am. So I think that, but I have patients on statins just to, you know, there are people, so the, another number that I think is really important is your high sensitivity CRP, which is a marker of inflammation and especially of endothelial inflammation. So the endothelium is the inner part of your blood vessels. That is where those plaques form. And I think this is an important discussion just to kind of frame it, you know, we often think about health span lifespan longevity, the number one killer of Americans is heart disease.
Aleksandra (20m 23s):
Sure. So if we wanna talk about longevity and healthspan, the first thing that I care about is how do we not let the number one killer kill you? So make sure that you're protected. So, so looking at that endothelial inflammation, because cholesterol particles are always gonna be in your blood. They do a lot of things, but if the walls are healthy and there's no inflammation, they're just passengers on a highway passing through. But if the walls are unhealthy, then they're gonna start bumping into those walls and forming those plaques. And that endothelial inflammation is more related to, to sugar and insulin resistance and really how, and your body composition too.
Aleksandra (21m 10s):
The more lean muscle you have, the the more protected you are.
Brian (21m 13s):
Yeah. And I've always talked, we've talked a little bit about like h like triglyceride to HDL ratio as far as measuring cardiovascular and metabolic health. So that's a good ratio I think is, you know, a good one to look at as well.
Aleksandra (21m 28s):
Yeah, absolutely. Yes. I think there's, there's, you have to look at all of it in a context. If, if your doctor just sees a high cholesterol and reflexively gives you a statin, right? For most people, I don't think that's the right to do it, the right way to do it. I mean, I, I'm also a fan of the cal coronary calcium scores to understand if there is any plaque buildup. If you are someone who's already built a lot of plaque in your arteries, and if you have, then we need to be more aggressive and there's not much room to say, Hey, maybe this isn't hurting you.
Brian (22m 7s):
And as far as weight loss, you know, obviously peptides are like a supportive tool, I would say right to to to the underlying, which is would be healthy lifestyle and, and good choices. What, what are some of the choices that you help your clients make when it comes to maybe eating and, and physical fitness and things like that?
Aleksandra (22m 28s):
Yeah, So we, our weight loss program is a little different. You know, in this age of GLP ones, everybody has started becoming a weight loss expert and they give you a GLP one. Yeah. You, in three months have
Brian (22m 42s):
You used, I'm sorry to, I interrupt you, but I have you, 'cause we talked about it a little bit on the last show, but GLP two and I know three is in trial is what I've heard. Yes,
Aleksandra (22m 52s):
Yeah, yeah. I'll, I'll touch on all of those. But yes, there's a lot of clinics popping up that are just kind of giving you a drug and sending you on your way. We have always had a weight loss program where we meet with people every week. It's a little bit labor intensive, but, but we do ask people to either on telemedicine, give us a 15 minute check in every week because, you know, my goal for patients is to build muscle and lose fat. I don't actually really care what the number on the scale is. Sure. I want you to have more muscle and less fat. So, you know, we talked about muscle is very protective. I'm sure that you're always talking about this, but muscle is also your metabolic engine.
Aleksandra (23m 38s):
So if you want to maintain a healthy weight, you have to have muscle. And one of the biggest downsides of these, of these peptides at GLP one, so if you do them and that's all you do, you will lose muscle as well. When you come off, you will just the weight. So of course we push for people having adequate protein. 'cause you can't build muscle without adequate protein. And I think fiber is really important as well. So the protein goals differ by level of activity by male, female, by your ideal body weight. But I'm pushing people to, you know, a hundred grams of protein is very much the low for like a five foot zero inactive lady and we go up from there.
Aleksandra (24m 29s):
But I think having at least 20 to 25, 28 grams of fiber in your diet per day is also really important. Again, because we want to optimize that metabolic health. So metabolic health is about what happens to food after you put it in your mouth? Does it get stored as Fat or does it get used for energy? And I want you to be like a metabolic engine where, you know, the things you eat give you energy, but you do not store excess fat. The things you eat are building muscle, are feeding your gut microbiome or feeding your brain your organs, but you're not storing all this excess inflammatory fat that's gonna make you sick in the long run.
Aleksandra (25m 10s):
So that's kind of, I mean I I also try to be very nutrient positive. You know, I think diet culture has done a big number on a lot of people, especially women where it's all, you know, in previous decades have been about calorie restriction. We had all our cardio queens doing, you know, an hour and a half of cardio a day to try to burn all those calories and eating rice cakes. And that is not a way to get metabolically healthy. We need to nourish the body, do that strength training, get enough nutrients, and then most people will reach a body composition where they're really healthy and comfortable and comfortable.
Aleksandra (25m 56s):
You can actually maintain it with those habits.
Brian (25m 59s):
Yeah, I've always thought like having the lens of nutrition through of like just focusing on nutrient-dense foods as like the centerfold of everything because you know, then you're providing your, you're feeding your body the right things that it needs to perform. I think if you take, if you whatever you're eating, like what am I getting from this? It's like, if you take that perspective, and I, I think it, it, it can be difficult sometimes because it's not always easy in the middle of the day to have a, you know, I don't know, beef liver or, you know, like something. But nowadays I will say, I mean I'm not a huge supplement guy, but you know, now you, you can get obviously su supplements that can help you build up your, you know, micronutrients and, And you know, make sure that you're at least getting like you talked about maybe even some fiber and things that maybe you're not getting normally.
Aleksandra (26m 57s):
Yeah, absolutely.
Brian (26m 59s):
Yeah, go ahead.
Aleksandra (27m 1s):
So when it comes to the GLP ones, we can talk about what's out there, what it does, risks, benefits. So the first, well there was a liraglutide came out first, but that really doesn't work for weight loss. So then semaglutide, which is ozempic and wegovy was the big blockbuster drug. Of course there was an ozempic craze and that is a GL that is a simple GLP one agonist and it works by ipro increasing your body's production of this hormone called GLP one. And it is a peptide and it does have some side effects.
Aleksandra (27m 43s):
So it's the GLP one with the highest rate of side effects, which for most people is nausea, potentially even diarrhea or vomiting. So some people don't have any of that and they do great. And, but then the GLP one and GIP agonist came out, which is the peptide name is Tirzepatide and that's marketed as Zep bound and manjaro and it added a second receptor called GIP, which reduced a lot of those GI side effects and made it more effective. So people are starting to lose more weight with, with tirzepatide. And now we have IDE in phase three clinical trials, which has a third receptor, that's the GLP three.
Aleksandra (28m 30s):
So it's GLP one agonist plus GIP plus the glucan glucagon receptor agonist. And it adds the benefit of fat burning at rest and it seems to preserve muscle a little better. So that's in phase three clinical trials and I think in the next six to nine months, we should see that on the market as well.
Brian (28m 55s):
Interesting. Yeah. And, and would you say your knowledge of peptides, is that something that you've just grown on your own or did you like, I'm assuming now you could probably go to maybe have, there's like certifications regarding peptides, is that
Aleksandra (29m 8s):
Yeah, yeah. So, so I learned from doctors who were doing this a little longer than me from, you know, courses and books. I've read several books. There are books out there and, and actually a lot of original literature too. I mean like papers, like the research studies just going in and I learned little by little, you know, over, I, I spent probably a couple years reading, studying, trying to understand, talking to other people who are using them and then getting a, a small amount, you know, and, and starting with one or two and using them with clients, with patients.
Aleksandra (29m 53s):
But Now I, I've actually been doing some clinician clinician education as well, so,
Brian (30m 1s):
Yeah. And which ones you do use for yourself? You mentioned a few used.
Aleksandra (30m 6s):
Yeah, so I've, I've, I like to kind of try things before I offer them to people to have an understanding how they work and, and of course not everything 'cause that's not possible, but I've cycled through a number of peptides Right Now I am using the THYMOSIN alpha one because it's allergy season on the east coast and I tend to have pretty bad allergies and it just keeps, keeps it balanced and I don't really have those symptoms when I take it. I'm also using BPC 1 57, I have some arthritis in my knees. I'm gonna Patagonia on a long biking trip in like 10 days.
Aleksandra (30m 50s):
And I, it just kind of up levels and protects my joints. So I'm kind of ready for, for a bigger athletic endeavor. And I'm using some morelin also, which is a growth hormone promoting peptide. Okay. So those peptides allow you to sort of get a little more outta workouts, build healthy muscle.
Brian (31m 17s):
Which one's that?
Aleksandra (31m 19s):
It's called Lin. There's a, there's a few of them in this category. Lin is the mildest one and it actually went through FDA approval for children with short stature or getting that there are, Testin is another growth hormone promoting peptide that's approved for HIV patients who have visceral adiposity or too much fat around their organs or in their belly. But all this whole class basically works by increasing your natural production of growth hormone, which especially in women in our forties, we start to lose. And you know, the athletic performance sometimes starts to suffer, but I use it with a lot of men as well.
Aleksandra (32m 6s):
And for myself, I will usually do a month or two every six months or so just to keep my muscles healthy and make sure that I'm not losing muscle and that I can maintain the level of activity that I want for for my lifestyle.
Brian (32m 27s):
Do you miss the er? Yeah.
Aleksandra (32m 30s):
What a good question. I've been watching the pit lately, I don't know if you've seen it, but it's so realistic. Okay. But I've had moments where, you know, where I miss sometimes the, the action, the big resuscitation, the traumas where you have like this incredible save and, and you bring somebody through, but mostly absolutely not. I love sleeping at night. That is so great. And I feel like for the most part, my job is so much more fulfilling now.
Brian (33m 6s):
Yeah, I that makes sense. I mean I'd imagine it's like anyone who, who, who's in a profession where there's a bit of a adrenaline and there's like sort of this th somewhat of a thrill or you know, like you gotta be really on your game and then you sort of that that goes and then you're like, well where am I gonna get that from? It's like, yeah, yeah,
Aleksandra (33m 26s):
Yeah, yeah.
Brian (33m 27s):
It's like the former athletes, right? They're so used to performing under such high stress and then they stop and they don't really know what to do.
Aleksandra (33m 35s):
Right. It's absolutely like that. I think it's taken years for me to kind of recover my nervous system from being from that kind of hypervigilant, you know, you walk into a shift, you have no idea what's gonna come through the door, whether it's, you know, a newborn or an old lady with a stroke or Right. Accidents, you know, you just, you have to be ready for anything at any time. So I could feel that damaging my body. Yeah. You know, I think and maybe some people are better equipped to co to handle it, but I, from an, from my early days in the er, even though there's a lot of parts of it that I really liked, I could feel that
Brian (34m 20s):
It was taking a toll. I knew
Aleksandra (34m 21s):
It was taking a toll. Yeah. Just my, my health.
Brian (34m 26s):
Yeah, it's interesting. I mean sleep, it's one of those things, I'm sure you deal with it with your clients, but like I'm lucky I'm, I'm pretty good with sleep. I actually just to, to test, I just wanted to, to confirm I got an aura ring just to sort of, okay. Yeah. I've only had mine for a few months but I only really look at it for the sleep score. Do you use it for anything else or? No,
Aleksandra (34m 47s):
That's exactly how I use it too. Yeah, I, yeah, well it, I do use it for like the cardiovascular age sometimes. Oh, okay. I like the ego boost of it telling me I'm five years younger than I think I'm, but,
Brian (35m 5s):
But for the most part, yeah,
Aleksandra (35m 7s):
It's sleep.
Brian (35m 8s):
I wonder what your sleep score would've been when you were doing the er.
Aleksandra (35m 11s):
Oh my gosh. You know, for the last two years I worked exclusively nights. So I worked 10:00 PM to 6:00 AM which actually worked for my kids' schedule because I could put them to bed and then I would go to work and I would come home and I would get up with them for school, get them to school and then I would go to sleep until, until they got outta school. Oh yeah.
Brian (35m 33s):
It
Aleksandra (35m 33s):
Was actually more regular than, usually the shift work is rotating, so a few nights a week you're, or a few nights a month you're on nights, a few nights you're on the swing shift and you're at the hospital till 11 or 1:00 AM So we working nights worked for me in the sense of that my schedule is kind of regular but yeah, it turns life up, upside down.
Brian (35m 56s):
Yeah. Sleeping during the day and working at night. Yeah. How long did it take you to adjust, get back to normal? Not, not that long or no,
Aleksandra (36m 5s):
See what if normal? No, no, no. Actually I was really surprised how quickly my body went back to sleeping at night and it was very, that circadian rhythm is such a strong driver. It was, it was a huge relief.
Brian (36m 22s):
Yeah. I'm, it's amazing how resilient the body is. You know, you could do a lot to it and it can bounce back. Now obviously as you get older, which probably maybe you found that it was more difficult than when you started probably
Aleksandra (36m 35s):
For sure a hundred percent. I think that, yeah and, And you know, that's mostly what I do now is just, you know, help people. That's why I don't see many people under 40 because most people are still kinda rolling with the punches and, and once we get into our forties, fifties, sixties, beyond, then things don't always act quite as quickly.
Brian (37m 3s):
Yeah, well that's good. I mean my sleep scores, I've been pretty good. I'm usually in the eighties, I've had some nineties, which you know, that was mainly on vacation, but occasionally, yeah. And I have, we have three dogs, we don't have kids, but the dogs sometimes can disrupt sleep. But I do think that should be like at the forefront of anyone, especially over 40, is just making sure that they just protect sleep as much as possible.
Aleksandra (37m 31s):
Absolutely. Yeah, I mean there's so many reasons and it's, I think we live in a culture that undervalues sleep and there've even been studies that have shown that on average we sleep two to three hours less than people did 50 years ago. Demands on our time are, are so much greater and it results in a lot of chronic illness. Plus we talked about that growth hormone, which is so important for building muscle energy and it's only produced at night and really between the hours of 10 and 2:00 AM so people are not asleep during that time. They often miss that sort of rebuilding hormone.
Aleksandra (38m 11s):
So sometimes you can be doing everything else, right, but if you don't have that quality sleep, it can affect metabolic health hormones, just the way you feel overall and the way you're performing.
Brian (38m 23s):
Was there a peptide is, excuse me, is there a peptide to help with sleep?
Aleksandra (38m 27s):
Yes, there's a few. So those growth hormone promoting peptides that we talked about, Smolin Tess Morlin, they actually, because they improve your growth hormone production at night, it deepens the quality of your sleep. So often people feel more rested, deeper sleep and they get better sleep. There's another one that I love for sleep, which is something called penal panion. And it is a bio regulator, you only have to take it for three weeks once or twice a year. And it restores the circadian rhythm and basically restores your pineal glands ability to produce sleep hormones in the way that it should.
Aleksandra (39m 16s):
It was developed in Russia and, and it seems to have a lot of longevity benefits for brain health as well, reducing neuroinflammation. So that one's been very powerful. It's actually one, I haven't tried myself, but I, in a number of patients who said that they had sleep trouble their whole lives, they did this for three weeks and felt like, you know, it, it restored something that was very powerful. There's, there's another one called Deep Sleep Inducing Peptide. I'm still on the fence of that one. The data doesn't seem that strong. There's not a lot of human data and I haven't really, I've used it some with myself and my patients. I just don't, I don't think it's a needle mover.
Aleksandra (39m 58s):
So it's not something that I prescribe very often. Yeah.
Brian (40m 3s):
Well this was, this was a great conversation. Where's the best place for people to find you?
Aleksandra (40m 8s):
Yeah, So we are on Instagram at the Gaer practice. It's G-A-J-E-R and we have a website, it is the gaer practice.com and if people are interested in working with us, there's a big button there that says book a free intro call. And those are very low pressure calls that just, we can give you information whether we can help with whatever you have going on or not. And yeah, that's usually the best way to get in touch.
Brian (40m 42s):
All right, well this was an enjoyable conversation and Dr. Guyer and I appreciate you coming on the podcast and sharing some knowledge, more knowledge on peptides. So yeah, I think it's great, you know, blending, you know, like you said, you, you, you know, you did traditional medicine for a while, er and blending new and old And you know, I think we have to, you know, always update and find new ways to help optimize. So Yeah. Yeah, it's worth it. So I will put links in the show notes for everyone to find you and yeah, have a great rest of the day.
Aleksandra (41m 15s):
Thank you.
Brian (41m 17s):
Thanks for listening to the show. I know there's thousands of podcasts out there and you chose to listen to mine. I will put a link in the show notes if you want to connect with my guest. And if you are looking for one-on-one consulting with me, I will put a free 15 minute link so you can set up a call to see if you're fit for my six month health breakthrough program. So thanks again, feel free to rate and subscribe. I would love that to help support the podcast. And till next time, have a great rest of the day and I will see you on my next podcast. Thanks so much. Thank.
