Dr Louise Newson: [01:00:00] This week's podcast is a great listen. I've got two Jain monks from the US on my podcast, Siddhali and Anubhuti. They're talking about the Balance docuseries that they've just created. It's taken two years to be produced, directed, and it's the most amazing series that you'll watch. It focuses on perimenopause and it focuses on the injustice of women who aren't being listened to, aren't being believed, aren't being adequately treated. And it takes us on their personal story as well about their own perimenopause and what they do to improve their symptoms and their future health. So last time I saw you both was in real life. I had this whistlestop like visit over to the US. We were in New York, hailing Ubers. Running around and then I came to the ashram and had the most beautiful calm, relaxing time there still thinking about the mantras and what I learned and it was amazing and now you're on a screen and hopefully coming to see you in a few months, couple of months' time now so I have so much respect for you the two of you as individuals, of your commitment what you're doing. Honestly, when I have really difficult times, I just think about you two, because you're so calm and you're so peaceful. And what you represent for others is just really powerful. So I want you to just explain a bit who you are and like even how you've come together because it's, it's unusual, you know, to have one female Jain monk but there are two female Jain monks in front of me from the US. So people might be wondering, like, where's this conversation going? And I want a bit of intrigue. That's fine. So can you just explain the two of you a bit about your background?

‍Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:01:58] Why are we making movies about perimenopause and menopause?‍

Dr Louise Newson: [01:02:03] Yeah, we'll come to that as well, like how did that happen?‍

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:02:05] So we're Jain monks. My name is Sadhvi Siddhali Shree. ‍

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:02:09] And I'm Sadhvi Anubhuti.‍

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:02:11] And so Jainism focuses on nonviolence. And that was the draw for me. Non-violence, we... we think that, oh, you know, I'm a good person and that's how we typically think, but are we looking at, are we violent in our thoughts? Are we violent in our actions? Are we violence in our speech? Are we violet in our intentions? And so when we talk about spiritual development, it's such an important step to include in our lives because how are you gonna lead a pure positive life if you're not practising nonviolence. And so part of nonviolence as well is helping others in like reducing suffering, practising compassion. And so through nonviolence, it's coming into writing books, making movies, making documentaries so we can help alleviate that suffering.‍

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:03:05] And we as monks, you know, we are not traditional monks, we're very kind of outside the box, progressive, modern, you can say, monks. And we try to find ways that are completely, you know non-conventional to reach people, to help people. And one of the ways that we have found that's been very effective has been through the power of filmmaking and storytelling. And so we have two documentaries on human trafficking, more specifically sex trafficking. One documentary on animal cruelty. And now we've decided to really focus on perimenopause and why it started with our own journey going through perimenopause. But once we started learning more about it, the topic and the problems around it got so big that we were like, okay, we need to educate women, but we also need to highlight all the problems around this topic. And we need to really highlight all of these things so that we can really impact women's health, improve women's health, and really make a difference. And when you really learn about all the injustices around it, all of the pain and suffering that women experience during this time. And especially, it's a silent suffering a lot of times. And the consequence of not being educated, I think it's tremendous. And so our goal is to really reach as many women as possible and help as many people as we can in this life.

Dr Louise Newson: [01:04:29] It's amazing, isn't it? I mean, someone described menopause and perimenopause to me recently as a silent epidemic. I don't think it is silent, but I think as women we've been silenced, which is different to it being silent, that also we've been misunderstood and misrepresented for many, many years. And as you know, I'm very interested in the history of hormones and the history of health of women. And women have been tormented often with their changing hormones, but they've been locked up in asylums, they've been given straightjackets to wear. They've had really barbaric treatments inflicted on them. But often, by doctors who want to help but don't know how to, because they've not understood what's been going on. So I almost forgive those doctors in the past for what they've done, because they were trying their best. But now, we know about hormones. We know about this great flux of hormones that occurs in perimenopause. That we know that our hormones really fluctuate, they're generally reducing. It can cause a lot more symptoms actually than in menopause itself. So we do know about it and we have safe, effective hormonal treatment available. But I think in my mind, and I'm really keen to hear what you think, there are two big injustices that go on. One is that women aren't believed, they're not listened to. They're just being told they're making it up and almost go away, you're annoying me. And those stories really haunt me that I hear every day from women. But the other thing is the injustice of not being given an evidence-based treatment. Because as a physician, I can't think of any other area in medicine where it's so poorly managed, where people are turning away from the evidence and the guidelines. And giving other treatments, for example, antidepressants, which are so much easier to access than hormones. So those two injustices are the ones that keep me going with my work, but I know having watched this amazing docuseries that you've created come to life, is that that resonates quite a lot with you two as well.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:06:51] Yeah.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:06:52] Go for it.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:06:54] I mean, it's like you're telling me two points of like injustice and it's just so many of them. It's like hard to pick which ones, but the fact that doctors don't get education, enough education on perimenopause and menopause, to me that's one of the greater problems that we have in part of the injustice. It's women are going to see their doctor and the doctor, they don't know anything about menopause. They don't anything about perimenopause. And like you said, women are not being believed. But I think part of the problem is not that they don't just believe them, is that they have the knowledge and the education, right? And so I think that's one of the bigger problems. One of the things that we're hoping that will change with this docuseries is that education will be increased in medical schools. When you know that it's gonna happen to all women, 100% of women will go through menopause. It's hard to believe that the doctors are not getting enough education and training on this. No education and training at all on how to prescribe hormone therapy and that's the other side of it is that you know they just don't know how to prescribe it and so they stay away from it because they just hear the negative headlines from it and they just you know push it away they don't want to mess with, mess with it or deal with it and so I think that's a really big, big problem.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:08:11] I think for me, I feel like not being educated while we're growing up. I didn't know about the word perimenopause until I was 38. She came across a social media video and I was being moody, ragey, not sleeping and she's like, I think this is you. I think your hormones...

Dr Louise Newson: [01:08:32] Really? I didn't know that.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:08:34] It's called perimenopause. And it was interesting because someone on our team, she was like, I feel like a little bit more progressive and educated. And she's like, well, maybe because you live at an ashram, if you're like living under a rock and so you don't know. And it's like no, we're just not educated on our bodies. And I think that's why even when we teach our workshops or our guests, students come here, wherever we go with doing like test screenings, people are so grateful that we have made this series because they actually don't know what's going on with themselves. And to your point about the silent epidemic, you could say, I feel like that's where I was and that's what inspired me for my own reason to make this film. Because when you're suffering in silence for two and a half months, you don't what's on with your body, you're doing everything right, you do meditation, you do mantras, you feed cows, you met our cows, right? And it's like, you know where we live and we live in a very peaceful and natural environment and we should be happy and all of these things and I was just suffering inside and in a really dark place. And so I feel like that knowledge is power and having that knowledge you can make your own decision, right? So even at the beginning of my journey, I was trying to figure out how to do things naturally. I remember trying to look for like little drops like to help me boost whatever I'm going through, but it didn't work until someone told me about hormone therapy. And that's the route I decided to go. But what's interesting is, is even making the decision, right? So here at the retreat, we are more naturally focused. We teach breathing techniques. We do yoga, like you do yoga. So we have this holistic approach. And for me to even consider, or you could say "Western"... going to the doctors, like that was something to overcome. And so that's why I think education is important, whether someone's exploring the natural approach or the medical approach, however you wanna call it, unless you have that education, then you can't make the right choice. And that is something you say in the docuseries.

Dr Louise Newson: [01:10:52] That's so true. I was listening to some people talk on the radio recently and they were saying that women are now having more severe symptoms because they're hearing so many negative things about perimenopause. They're getting these symptoms, whereas if people had really healthy lifestyles and they looked after themselves and they didn't have people like me talking about all the negative symptoms, everything would be so much better. And I sort of smiled to myself thinking well, I know myself, when I was perimenopausal, I didn't recognise it for longer than you, it was about six months. And I, you know, I do have a healthy lifestyle, so I couldn't have made my lifestyle better. I know my yoga practise was stiffer and I wasn't doing it as much, but you didn't have a clue and you can't have better lifestyle than what you have. So I don't think that adds up really, does it?

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:11:46] And that's a message that we wanna make sure women hear is that no-one can escape it. This is coming to you, it's coming to all of us, right? And we do, we live a very healthy lifestyle. We do a lot of breathing techniques. We do yoga, we do meditation. We do lot of fasting to keep our bodies very pure. We, you could say, I mean, yeah, we have work and we do have some stress, but nothing compared to what's out there in the world. And then suddenly out of nowhere, we didn't even know the word our bodies started to change and there are different symptoms for all women. So she had her own symptoms and I didn't know I was going through it until I saw my blood work and, you know, I had a lot of body deficiencies. My progesterone, my estrogen were at the lowest level, like in the red. And so, you, know, it's the symptoms are going to be different for everyone. But the point here is that even if you have a very healthy lifestyle, this is a physiological change. And there is nothing that you can really do to prevent your ovaries from not producing the ovaries that you used to produce in reproductive years, you know.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:12:56] And to that point, I feel like even when you add hormone therapy, it's not your fix-all. You still have to work on your nutrition. You still have to exercise. You have to do all of these things. And I feel like some people miss that point even for those who are using social media to educate people. It's not like the doctors are pushing hormones. It is like one aspect of a greater whole, but I think a lot of people might miss that. But it's so important that's why it's part of our series.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:13:27] Yeah, I don't know where we would be without doing all the things we've been doing for years.

Dr Louise Newson: [01:13:33]Yeah, I think this is the thing, it's become very binary almost, it is like, you take hormones or all you do lifestyle, but actually, regardless of whether you take hormones or not, we all need to look at our lifestyle, you know, and I think that's, but that happens, right, whether you're a man or a woman or a child, whether you've got diabetes or raised blood pressure or you're perimenopausal, we should be looking at our lifestyles. So in my mind, that's like a it's mandatory. Do you know what I mean? Regardless, it's a non-negotiable thing we should be doing and we can all be honest with ourselves and improve what we eat or the way we sleep or the way we look after ourselves. But I've learnt the most really from listening to stories and it's real honour and privilege to be a doctor and have people come to see me and before I started my clinic, I was a GP obviously and then a doctor in hospitals before and I've worked in some really really deprived areas and I have heard things that you would not believe if I told you or you know things that I never really realised happened to people and the impact of something that's out of your control affecting you when you're already having a really difficult life is something that I think is really harrowing and you know we're very privileged as in, you know, the way that we, the three of us live, we're very calm. We've got lovely love around us, we've got support. We've nice people, we've got kindness. But a lot of people don't have that. They're really struggling. And they're struggling just to keep things together. And then the hormones start changing. Their mental health gets worse. They might be turning to addiction. They might shouting more, and an abusive partner. The children might be hearing this turmoil going on. They might be giving up their jobs because they can't think and concentrate. And this is like so raw. And the stories I hear are so awful that they keep me working, but they're stories that are in my head. So you doing this docuseries is a really powerful thing because they're, we see a lot on social media, but they are only short clips. There have been other sort of documentaries, but they've sort of made it quite glossy. And it's not a glossy experience for a lot of people. So just explain why like your docuseries is firstly going to be more impactful, I think, but also what the, because it is the rawness of it that really appeals to me. And that's not an insult. I hope you take that in the right way, but...

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:16:23] I think it's showing our vulnerabilities, right? So we are showing you what we're going through. Here's us visiting the doctors and asking questions and really not knowing anything like one of the questions like am I gonna be on hormones for the rest of my life? Like I didn't know because I thought well maybe if I just take this for a little bit then I can go back to my natural lifestyle and so showing this honest vulnerable journey, the, the journey that you know we're monks, we're teachers and we run an ashram but we have our own struggles too. And then we also meet women who have entrusted us with sharing the raw and powerful and deep stories and their own struggles in their own ways, not just hormones and perimenopause, but miscarriages and fertility, having suicidal thoughts and being near that or being dismissed by a doctor. So the women featured in our series are very, very vulnerable, which I think helps other women who watch it relate to this series.

Dr Louise Newson: [01:17:28] I just want to remind you that I'm the founder of the free Balance app, which you should all be downloading so you can learn so much more about your hormones from and also monitor symptoms if you're having them. So just head to the App Store or Google Play and download Balance app. We learn from others, actually. We learn good and bad things from others, of course. We're learning all the time in life. But to hear some of those stories and the way women have been treated, what's really sad for me is that most people who watch it will be going, yeah, that's happened to me or my friend or my relative. It's not unique. And what I really want to do in my lifetime is to instigate change for the better. And I really hope that by listening to some of the awfulness that you do portray in the docuseries, it's going to accelerate that change quicker.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:18:30] And one of the things too about it, you know, when we think of this, and I want to ask you too and maybe you can tell us a little bit more about this, but it's the long-term effect of perimenopause or the lack of hormones in the body, which is one of things that really struck me. When we think of perimenopause and menopause we think it's a momentary thing. It's gonna pass, right? And we hear a lot, like, just push through it. You're gonna just, just a few more years or just one more year or a few months and then you'll be over with it and that the symptoms will pass. But the long-term effects, to me, that's like the greatest thing. It's like, I think all women need to recognise this consequence of perimenopause and menopause. Can you tell us a little bit more about that long-lasting effect that will, perimenopause will have on women?

Dr Louise Newson: [01:19:23] Yeah, and I'm really grateful that you've asked that because I think in the US it's worse than misinformation than over here actually where, because even when we went out, do you remember we went for a lovely supper in New York and a few people on the table were going, oh, I'm through my menopause. And I'm like, what? You're still alive. You've got no hormones, like. And so there is this sort of marketing spiel almost that it is a transition, it's a phase in our life. So we get through perimenopause, we get through menopause and then we come out the other side. And as you know, I worry a lot about the metabolic effects of not having hormones, the inflammation in our body of not having hormones, the effects of diseases. And that's really important when we think about long term health and our health span versus our lifespan. And it's quite hard. To think about that when we're in our 30s, 40s and 50s, how are we going to be when we are 80? But I really want my brain to be as active as possible for as long as possible. But I want my body to be, as well. I'm, as many people listening know, I'm quite scared of osteoporosis, especially of my spine. So I want my bones to be strong as possible, and of course I exercise, and of course I have vitamin D, and of course I have calcium-rich foods. But I also know that hormones help build the bone. And my risk of osteoporosis is so much higher without hormones and all our inflammatory diseases. And this is where I feel that women have been shortchanged really because menopause has traditionally been just about some symptoms, this transition. Whereas whether women have symptoms or not, they've still got this increased risk of all those inflammatory diseases and bearing in mind the most common diseases we have as women that we die from are heart disease and dementia. We've got to be grown up and thinking actually what can we do to reduce that risk of diseases and taking hormones will reduce the risk and it doesn't mean that everybody who takes hormones will be healthy forever and never have diseases and the same way it doesn't mean that people who don't take hormones are going to get heart disease, dementia they've just got this risk but what you're right in is that people aren't told that. And my, I feel my main job is as an educator, really, to give people information so they then make choices. You know, you are the least judgmental people that I've ever met. And I try not to judge people about their choices. I've treated, over the years, many patients who have been smokers, many patients have been drug abusers, many patients who have been alcoholics. I would never judge them because I don't know the consequences, their life, how it's been to lead them to take certain habits. But I'm there to help them and it's the same with these conversations. But the problem is, women and men haven't been told the full story about hormones.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:22:23] We like a lot of education and that's why this series is, it's gonna try to cover all of it. And hopefully it's going to help women make an informed decision. It will empower women so they can take control of their lives and hopefully they will find the right doctors, physicians that will support them on their journey because it's tough out there. There is not enough help, but there are doctors but not fully supportive of treatment. And one thing I'm noticing and I want to ask you about this because we've spent already over two years working on the series and things have been changing very rapidly during this time. Like when we first started, perimenopause was not yet a big topic of conversation. Now it's becoming more mainstream. But also I'm starting to notice a shift. I saw a lot of people and doctors educating us on hormone therapy, which I think it's great. But I'm starting to notice a shift to non-hormonal medications. Like, you know, can you tell us what's happening right now? Give us an update on what's happening in the world of menopause and hormone therapy and non-hormonal therapies.

Dr Louise Newson: [01:23:35] Of course, so one of the things is that people have been scared away from hormones for the wrong reasons since, as you know, the WHI, the Women's Health Initiative study, scared literally the world away from hormones. And in the US, before the study 40, 4-0, 40% of menopausal women were prescribed hormones and now it's less than 5%, it's gone really low in the US. Over here in the UK, it was 30% of menopausal women were prescribed hormones. And now it's 14%, so just under half. Because people were scared because they said risk of clot, risk of heart attacks, risk of stroke and so forth. But that was with older types of synthetic hormones. So over the last 20 odd years, people have been really scared of hormones. And so we've been trying as like the doctors, people who write the guidelines, try to think of other ways to help, especially with symptoms. So they've been looking at the symptoms. What do we do? Oh, low mood is a symptom. Let's give antidepressants. Oh, let's think about other treatments that we could perhaps give. So maybe some, I don't know, some non-hormonal, vaginal moisturiser or lubricant to help with those symptoms. Let's think about antibiotics for urinary tract infections. Let's thinking about the nerve pains that people get. Let's think about amitriptyline or gabapentin or pregabalin. There's lots of other non-hormonal drugs that have crept into guidelines over the years. Many years ago, it was very much, it's a hormonal problem, let's give hormones. And that's why HRT prescribing was really increasing. And even as long ago as the 70s, they realised that women who took hormones were healthier. They had less risk of diseases. And they felt better, their wellbeing was better, right? So that's a good thing as well. So that was why HRT prescribing really, really carried on increasing until all these scares that have come in. So women are still getting symptoms. Guidelines still were written, but drug companies were still making drugs. And, and so there have been lots of drugs that have been used in an off-licence way for different symptoms. And some of them might help, some of the often don't help. A lot of them have side effects. If you think about gabapentin and pregabalin, the so-called gabapentinoids, they're highly addictive drugs. When they first came out, everyone started thinking, great, this is great. This is going to be safer than hormones. But now they're controlled drugs. There's a real addiction problems with them. They're horrible. So there's, now we're trying to get people off those drugs, but they're still mentioned in guidelines. So people are still thinking about what else can we do? And I talked to you about this from someone who is not sponsored by Pharma. I do nothing with pharmaceutical companies. My work comes from evidence and clinical experience, but there's been some new drugs that have come out. There's two of them that are neurokinin receptor antagonists. So they block something called neurokinin in our bodies. And they actually first were produced to help as, well, they thought they might work as neuroleptics, so to help with people with certain psychiatric conditions, but they weren't very effective. But they noticed people weren't feeling so hot in the studies. So now they've been marketed for the vasomotor symptoms. And there is evidence they'll reduce the hot flushes and sweats, but they've only been compared to placebo. Normally when you bring out a drug you compare it to the gold standard and the gold standard of course as you know is hormone replacement therapy. They haven't done head-to-head studies with HRT, it's just with placebo and they do reduce incidence of hot flushes. They might help sleep as well and that might be because people are getting less night sweats, who knows. But when you look at neurokinin it works not just in our thermoregulatory zone of the body, it works throughout our whole body and system. And it can affect other levels of hormones. So it can reduce levels of our own hormones, estradiol, progesterone, testosterone. It will reduce serotonin. So it often lowers mood as well. And it has other metabolic effects in the body. Some of them we don't know. One of the things that worries me is that it blocks an important protein called kisspeptin. And kisspeptin is a protein that stops cancer spreading in the buddy. So obviously we've got lots of defence mechanisms in our body. We want to be as healthy as possible. If we have cancer, the chances of it spreading are as low as possible. So this kisspeptin is blocked by neurokinin receptor antagonists. So one of the things that worries me is that these drugs are being marketed, if you like, to women who can't have HRT, so women who've had breast cancer. That's a whole conversation in itself, where the women who have had breast cancer can hormones because a lot of them still can. So, if we don't know what happens long term if we're blocking this kisspeptin, does it mean that their outlook from cancer could be worse? And I'm not saying it is, but I'm not saying isn't because we haven't got the studies. There was a small study in the Lancet that showed that there was an increased incidence of some types of cancer in women taking these drugs. But the problem is when drugs come to market, then you have, as a drug company, they have a patent, so they have period of time where they can make their money. Obviously, it's about making money. So these drug companies have spent a lot of money. There's two drug companies who've made these two different drugs, but they're both in the same class. And just doing a bit of Googling online, it's about $2 billion they've paid between them to get these drugs to market. So they have to make money. So these drugs companies sponsor, I think probably every menopause society across the world. I can't, I haven't looked at all of them, but the big ones they sponsor, and they sponsor conferences. I was at a conference a few months ago and the big fancy hotel had a big flag with the sponsor, you know, all the people who were working on the board and the panels were paid for by, if they weren't paid directly, their travel and everything was paid by these companies because they're like the diamond sponsor or whatever. So they're trying to help. So that's going to influence people. One of them, I know... I think it was the year before last, they did an advert in Super Bowl for the drug, this was for fezolinetant, and I think, it cost about seven million to have an advert in Super Bowl. So, you know, they're trying very hard to get the money back and I get that, but what I find really sort of sad or disappointing or maybe perplexing, I'm not sure which adjective to use, is that I see doctors on social media pushing these drugs and saying how great they are, it's really good to have a non-hormonal treatment. Especially for women who have breast cancer. Well, if I've had breast cancer, there's one choice, whether I take hormones or not, but the other conversation is not just give me a drug that's not been tested. We've got very short-term studies in these drugs and very short term data for women who've had breast cancer you know, it really scares me. I have a responsibility as a doctor to not do harm. And, you know, we share uncertainty with our patients. And if I'm giving hormones to women who have had breast cancer. We share  uncertainty, but we know there are established benefits from HRT for the bones, for the heart and so forth. With these drugs, it's very uncharted territory. And I'm quite a cautious doctor, so I want to be really careful. So it's, but when there's money, money talks, so it's difficult.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:31:12] Definitely important to get this information out because it might make women be more confused with what they're learning about hormone therapy, but then they're hearing like, oh, these non-hormonal treatments could be more harmful.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:31:27] Even for us, you know, we, as we were exploring and interviewing the doctors and learning more and trying to understand hormones and what they are. So we started learning about, well, there's synthetic hormones and then there's, you could say natural hormones.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:31:44] Bioidentical.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:31:44] Bioidentical, right? That's the new term. But what was really, well cool for us is that, you know, they come from, the natural ones come from yams and soy. But people don't know that, right? Even birth control is synthetic. When can we have the yam, soy-based for those who want to take birth control because there's less side effects when you take, you could say, the more natural hormone. From your side, what is the conversation with the synthetic hormones versus the bioidentical, the natural hormone? Because I think that that is the missing piece because even in the WHI, yams and soy type of based hormones were not studied yet. So why are we still even doing synthetic?

Dr Louise Newson: [01:32:34] It makes no sense, does it? It's like, you know, giving you, I mean, I often say to people, it's like giving you fresh strawberries or strawberry candy or sweets. Like, you could label them both strawberry, but they're very different in the body. And we have to be thinking that. And people are realising more, you know, contraception wasn't even marketed as contraception. It wasn't licenced as contraception initially, because they didn't do studies on contraception, it was just about bleeding, but it's synthetic, it doesn't have the same effect. So everyone that's scared about HRT should be scared probably about synthetic hormones. But it's a different conversation and I know like the work and the research that you've done for the docuseries helps unveil that as well because this is a really important conversation to move this conversation away from the harms of taking hormones and looking at the benefits. We have to be thinking about the benefits of taking natural hormone replacement as in the body identical, the bioidentical, it's just the same structure as our own hormones, which makes it very safe.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:33:39] That was important for us as we decided how we're going to, you know, develop the storyline, develop, you know, what what topics are we going to cover? Because we have, you know, two different audiences, some with, like, the very strong ideology natural is the only way. And that's that's my life view. And that is what it is. And I think that's represented in Sadhvi Anubhuti's journey. And, you know, that's, that was hers. And for me, it was, the other route. But having that knowledge because you have to have a deeper knowledge that even be willing to be challenged, right? Because be okay being challenged and maybe the docuseries will do that for people where it's like, wait a minute, I believe or I look at life this way or I'll look at hormones this way. But am I willing to be challenged? Am I willing to listen to these different doctors, experts and the women and be open to exploring something else because I feel like there is a harm where we're so locked into one idea and it becomes so rigid. And that's for experts, that's for doctors and that's for just people in general. Unless we are open people, then we're always gonna stay stuck. Whereas you can be open, learn, understand things in a different way and then you can still make a choice from there. And I think that's what the docuseries also does. It challenges people, it will challenge the viewer. We challenged ourselves as well. And even again, like we were like, we're taught like that's what we practice, the natural way. And it's like, oh my goodness, I'm gonna have to go to doctor. I'm going to have to get a prescription. And then it's, like, wait a minute, it's natural, right? So, but unless we're okay being challenged and learning to trust our body and our mind and ourselves, you know, by ourself without the input of others, I think that is also a missing piece. We need to learn how to make decisions for ourselves based on what we're going through.  [01:35:40][120.5]
Dr Louise Newson: [01:35:40] Absolutely, it's changing conversation and changing perspectives. Thinking about natural is actually having hormones and there are risks of not having hormones. So there's lots, lots to think about, lots of excitement. I am so excited. I've seen so many parts of the docuseries, but to actually see it all together is going to be super exciting. And I just look forward to seeing the feedback and the response from people, men and women who watch it. So, before we finish, I'm going to have to ask for, I think, two take-home tips from each of you, otherwise you might argue and you can't argue over if I only give you three. So what I want to know is four reasons why people should watch the docuseries when it comes out, which is called Balance, by the way, just for people to know, because I love the fact that our app's called Balance, your docuseries is called Balance and they were chosen for different reasons, but it's just lovely having this unity. So four reasons why we should be watching Balance docuseries.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:36:42] For me, I'll do two reasons, you'll do the other two. For me, it's all about education. When you are educated, you will know what's going on with your body, which is affecting your mind. And with that education, you'll maybe stop blaming yourself. You'll stop criticising yourself. You'll stop judging yourself and actually have more compassion for yourself because now you're understanding what your body is going through. Second is, to my point earlier, it's learning about the body, but also challenging, being open and being willing to be challenged on your ideas. This way, you can make an educated decision.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:37:20] Yeah, I think Balance is going to empower women, like she said, it's the education, it's just the knowledge that it's gonna come through the series. We have the top experts in the nation, all of the US, and we have the talk expert in the UK, Dr louise Newson. And the information that they share with us, it's just completely incredible. All women need to hear this message. They need to here this education, this information, because it's going to change everything that you know about the woman's body, about the experience of perimenopause and menopause. And I think that it's an injustice that women don't know, that don't have this knowledge. So I think it's gonna change women's health. I think is gonna change the education that's coming forward. And it's going to change how we view perimenopuse and menopause. I think I gave you three or more, but I think everybody needs to watch the series.

Dr Louise Newson: [01:38:12] Indeed.

Sadhvi Siddhali Shree: [01:38:12] And thank you Dr Louise for trusting us with your expertise and your story. We are 100% always behind you and we know you behind the camera. You've visited us here at the ashram, you've met our cows, you know.

Sadhvi Anubhuti: [01:38:28] You're you're one the kindest hearts that we know. And we personally have seen your heart, your passion, your work, and how much you deeply care about women. Like it's incredible. So you have a legacy that you are already working on that you're doing so much for women. And we're so grateful to you and all the work you've done throughout the years.

Dr Louise Newson: [01:38:49] Oh, don't make me cry, but thank you very much, thank you.