Interview with Melissa Termine
In this episode, we will uncover 3 keys:
- Gradual dietary changes support long-term gut health.
- Enhance gut health with healthier options while cherishing food memories.
- Listening to your body informs better food choices.
A Podcast Transcription
Episode 15: Melissa C. Termine – Empowering women to become their own healthcare advocates and follow their GUT!
Intro
Odiva Vasell: (00:33)
Welcome, welcome, ladies. I’m here with Melissa Crossette, who is a gut health expert, and she’s going to tell us about her own journey to gut health and how women can be disregarded sometimes by the medical profession but can find their way back through really, really learning how to self-care. So, welcome, welcome, Melissa.
Melissa Termine: (00:31)
Oh, thank you. I’m so glad to be here. This is exciting, a great topic to talk about.
Odiva Vasell: (00:37)
Yes, so tell us how you got started in your business.
Gradual dietary changes support long-term gut health.
Melissa Termine: (00:44)
Well, it kind of came about because I got tired of going to the doctor and being dismissed for how I felt and symptoms I was having. I was puffy, yes, I was overweight, but I was puffy, and I could understand that difference because growing up I had a cousin who ended up having several kidney transplants, and so he would be puffy when he was on that medication, as opposed to in between when he wasn’t on that medication to prevent the rejection of these organs, right? So I definitely knew that slight difference. I also hurt, my joints hurt so bad as a classroom teacher. It’s very important to be able to use your fingers on all sorts of things, writing, scissors, you know, the whole thing, and it hurt to do this, where I was envisioning to get through the day in the classroom was putting my hands in bowls of ice so that it didn’t hurt. I mean my whole body hurt, but this hurt the most because I was trying to use the most. And every time I would go to the doctor, whether it was my OB GYN or my primary, and it was, “Oh yeah, well, you’re at the age,” well, you know, you should try, well, and it, you know, they were great female doctors, but that’s what Western medicine does. And at one point, my primary looked at me and she goes, “You know, I have a couple patients, and this is what they’ve been trying. Why don’t you give that a try?” And it was going gluten-free, which at that time there wasn’t as much information out there, and I was like, “What is that?” So I knew two people that had talked about that they were going through figuring out their food allergies, so I reached out to them. I was still eating a lot of highly processed foods and trying to go gluten-free because if you go down the aisles, you will see gluten-free, gluten-free. And then I stumbled upon some information that really, really dug deep into how to live a healthy gluten-free lifestyle, and that just kept getting deeper and deeper. I also had a lot of female issues, and when I would go to the OB GYN and say, “You know, I can feel blood clots leaving me, and let alone I’m standing in front of a bunch of third graders, and I can’t run to the bathroom, right? And it hurts.” And she’s like, “What do you mean?” And so I finally was able to get a young doctor who graciously talked to me, and I was able to get a full hysterectomy, and I have never looked back since. Oh, it was amazing, right? But I had to fight for that, and it seems like every good thing I’ve done I’ve had to fight for. So leaving the classroom, what I wanted to do was to be able to help other women of a particular age, especially mostly Gen X, but around that, where you’re starting to go into perimenopause and the doctor might be telling you, “Oh no, that’s not a thing, don’t worry about that,” or you’re hitting menopause or you’re post-menopause because your needs as women have changed, your hormones, your body, what food it likes, all that good stuff. So also as women, here’s the thing, we’re busy, whether we’re still at that teenage years raising children, which is busier when they were little, sheesh, or after that, and it’s just ourselves. We’re trying to learn how to cook for just us or maybe us and a partner, or beyond that, you want to go out and explore and go out to eat and eat good food. And how do you do that? So I like it, I just want to help people, right? That as a teacher, as a mom, I want to help people to be their best selves. But how do you do that? You have to be your own advocate. In this case, for your health, and we have our lifestyles that we live, and it can be very overwhelming because like my doctor will just go gluten-free, and I’m like, “How do you do that?” Well, you just cut out bread. Well, it’s a bit more than that, right? But feeling that overwhelm, and we don’t need to do that. Life is overwhelming enough. So I advocate one small change at a time because like in “Atomic Habits,” he talks about one small change in your habit, and eventually, it’s gonna snowball and compound, and you’re gonna look back and go, “Wow, that was actually easier than I thought.” That certainly…
Odiva Vasell: (05:53)
That’s brilliant! One small change at a time, because yes, we are in different phases of our lives. Speaking as a Gen X-er, different phases of your life, we find things to fill up. It’s like our life is like we’re digging this hole. It’s not the most pleasant analogy, but this is the hole in the sand keeps falling in, falling in, so there’s always something to be busy about. And even though you’re thinking in your mind, “Okay, I gotta eat healthy, I gotta plan my meals, I’ve got to find the right things at the supermarket,” and then you go to the supermarket, and let’s say you’re having a busy day, okay, that’s gone, you just get what you usually get, right? You’re just promoting one small change at a time, that’s doable.
Melissa Termine: (06:44)
Correct, very doable, very simplistic. I don’t want to say easy because that’s why having someone help you with that, even within a group setting or one-on-one, because via Zoom, I can come in your kitchen, right? I can help you, I can sit with you, and we can go, “Okay, here’s the menu planning.” I love menu planning. Certainly when I was in the classroom, it absolutely became vital, menu planning and meal prepping, because when I got home at night and I was done dealing with 25 to 30 third graders and their families and administration and cohorts, I didn’t want to think, I just wanted to be able to throw healthy meals together and also allow myself one special meal because our family was very into pizza. I found a good pizza place that was gluten-free, and I could put, I call it the adult pizza because it’s all veggies on top with a couple meats, and that was the time to splurge, so to speak, to go out and it was good, it was still healthy and good for me, right?
Odiva Vasell: (08:04)
Yeah.
Melissa Termine: (08:05)
Even though it’s a pizza, it’s a little, but it wasn’t giving up that.
Odiva Vasell: (08:10)
No, no, it was allowing yourself space.
Melissa Termine: (08:13)
Right.
Odiva Vasell: (08:14)
I think that’s so much, so very important when you start eating healthy because I find so many coaches, you know, they want you to be 24/7 eat this, do this, and I see the people that go to the gym like six days a week, I’m like, that’s not even healthy mentally. I mean, come on.
Melissa Termine: (08:38)
You know, when I talk about movement, because a lot of us, like right now, I don’t want to go outside in 100-degree heat in this area, right? Because it’s like, “Ooh,” but I try to go out early in the morning, I try to go out in the evening, at least 10 minutes to be able to get movement because I can recognize it’s really hard right now. But I also do some simple movements next to my computer, so I’ll work for so long, I’ll get up and move. So it’s just some small tweaks. Now I will have to tell you, I do have to set reminders on my phone to get up and move. It’s not an automatic thing. But your nutrition, your movement, are two things that are just really easy to make one small change, one tweak, and sometimes maybe you’re like, “Hey, let’s do two,” because you’re feeling empowered, you’re feeling successful, and that’s important.
Odiva Vasell: (09:39)
Yeah, that is great. Tell us more about making this one small change, and you specialize in gut health, and we’ve all heard of it, and maybe we think we know what that means, but tell us more about what that is.
Melissa Termine: (09:57)
Right, so your gut is your second brain, and your gut specifically is your small and large intestines, but our whole digestive system starts in our mouth and goes all the way down through our digestive process, and our gut is interconnected with our brain, so they talk to each other.
Odiva Vasell: (10:22)
Oh.
Melissa Termine: (10:23)
Absolutely, they go back and forth between each other for multiple different things. As simple as, “Hey, you’re full,” to, “That was really good, sugar, you need more.” It’s all connected, right? You also have that inflammation that happens when your brain’s saying, “Okay, you ate something in your belly, and that wasn’t cool, what was that?” So they’re talking to each other all the time. Your small intestines do one job, your large intestines have a microbiome that is their own, and that is where all the bacteria are that really breaks down your food. We have good and bad bacteria, and you have to have a certain balance of that. You can’t have no bad bacteria; you have to have a balance. So you should have 80% good and 20% bad. But with the standard American diet, the SAD diet, it’s opposite, so you have 80% bad, 20% good.
Odiva Vasell: (11:44)
Okay.
Melissa Termine: (11:45)
So that’s highly processed foods. I know growing up in the ’70s, ’80s, Twinkies, Hi-Hoes, Ding-Dongs, ice cream all the time, boxed cakes, highly processed pasta, you know, all those different things. And let’s not talk about Wonder Bread. I ate Wonder Bread until I was very much… I like crafting and doing things, and I found out that if you added glue to Wonder Bread, it kind of turned into a kind of a porcelain thing, and I thought, “I’m putting that in my body.”
Odiva Vasell: (12:26)
Coca-Cola.
Enhance gut health with healthier options while cherishing food memories.
Melissa Termine: (12:28)
You know, yep. That’s another thing. Oh, and even though, you know, sometimes it’s hard to get away from that because you have to replace what is it that you’re craving from that. Are you craving the memories that you have? Well, I laugh at Hi-Hoes, but I have no desire to have any, but I have a memory connected with that, right? Because my mom would pick apart the chocolate. Now, she was so, and I would just watch her, like, just eat it, but it has a special place as a memory, a childhood memory. Chocolate chip cookies, I used to make those every Saturday morning when, you know, Saturday morning cartoons were a thing, and you’d all gather around because that was the time it was on, and that’s what my brother and I would eat for Saturday morning breakfast, obviously not really the best thing to have every week, but there’s that memory, and now I can… I have adapted that into something else, and I still can kind of keep that memory to go, “Oh, this reminds me of what?”
Odiva Vasell: (13:41)
The concept, healthier.
Melissa Termine: (13:43)
Healthier.
Odiva Vasell: (13:44)
Okay, so I like what you’re saying. You’re saying that we don’t have to just throw away and say, “No, no, no, don’t ever eat chocolate chip cookies.” We can work our way around it to substitute it into something that is healthy but still has that memory attached to it. And I would just say that in my travels, because I’ve lived a bit in Asia and I’ve lived a bit in Europe, and one of the things that amazed me is that people enjoyed eating. They love the food, and a lot of those foods are the foods that we say, “No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, everywhere there’s something that’s so bad for you, you should never touch it.” And I find in America, it’s a very much culture of “don’t, don’t, don’t.” So no matter what you eat, you feel guilty.
Melissa Termine: (14:38)
Right. And, like you said, you should have joy in eating what you’re eating. It should taste good. It should be a delight to your senses, and you should feel good. Like, “I am enjoying this.” Now, if I go out to an Italian place and they have some really good gluten-free pasta, I am not denying myself that experience, right? But I’m going to make sure I’m going to set myself up for success. Also, I’m going to ask them, “Hey, can I order a side of veggies with that?” And I’m going to eat my vegetables first, and not necessarily the salad, because some of the salads are like, “That’s it? That’s all a salad?” So that I can eat my veggies first. It starts that digestive system. It fills up my stomach before I start eating pasta, and then I know I have another meal I can take home with me, just saying. But I can enjoy it, and I don’t feel bad. So those are things that just small little tweaks, you can still go out. My favorite gluten-free and worried about cross-contamination, buffet-style things, I don’t do. I didn’t do before, but too much. But I don’t do because there’s too much cross-contamination happening, which means somebody’s going to use the utensil to serve the salad to also serve the pasta, which has a wheat product in it, and then they’re going to put that back into the salad, and I’m going to come along and use it, and now I’m going to have some cross-contamination. Or because of how they’re set up, the food drops into it, and then somebody goes around and picks it all out, but now it’s been cross-contaminated, and I could potentially have a reaction to that. Now, I am not a Celiac, but I could have, and I just don’t want to. I want to be able to enjoy my food without worrying about it getting me sick. And so there are certain things that I don’t. But you know what? Mediterranean buffets, they are amazing. They are so on making sure everything is exact, and so far apart. You don’t have… I don’t have to worry about that. Let alone the food is from real food. It’s not really processed.
Odiva Vasell: (17:10)
Yes, and that’s one of the things that I wanted to mention when I was saying about the living in other countries. Some people don’t eat meat. Okay, in America, over here, don’t eat meat, don’t eat carbohydrates, don’t eat sweets. But I will say in Asia, when they’re eating the fish and they’re eating the meat that was living, you know, that they did not ship it for hundreds of miles, and they did not inject it with anything, so it was fresh. And then in Italy, with the fresh vegetables and the pasta made by hand, and the cheese, I had to kind of run along with the cheese because the cheese is… it’s still milky. It’s like gonna, you know, fade in my hand. And so you’re putting in these things that just came straight from Mother Earth and no processes in between them, so they can eat these, and you’re looking at them and like, “Why are we telling ourselves no, no, no?” Oh, and I had to add French, and also Italian, eating chocolate for breakfast. But what kind of chocolate is it?
Melissa Termine: (18:25)
So, when I was 16, I got to go to Paris, right? You know, in these school trips, you got to go to Paris. And growing up in America, you need to drink milk. You need to drink milk, and it was like, “It’s disgusting. I didn’t like it.” And going over to Europe and drinking milk there is like a whole another experience. It’s good. You’ll not have the same reaction. But the hot chocolate in the morning with the croissant, yeah. But I can’t eat a croissant here. Now here’s the thing, I have heard that you can go in Europe or other countries and eat the bread and not get sick with gluten intolerances because of the way it is processed, because of the way that is planted, because of the way it is raised, because of the way it is processed. I haven’t had that experience to be able to do that yet, but I follow some people, and they have had that experience. But their chocolate is not full of sugar.
Odiva Vasell: (19:33)
Yeah.
Melissa Termine: (19:35)
And it is amazing.
Odiva Vasell: (19:36)
Yeah. I like what you said about the milk there because my parents tried so desperately to get me to drink milk here, and I could not. My stomach would, and then one day, I guess the milk was on sale, so I bought a little bottle of milk in Italy, and I because I was just going to cook with it, and then I didn’t. So I said, “Let me just taste it.” Drank the whole bottle and felt no queasiness, as well. I didn’t feel that queasiness that I usually get when I eat those foods here. It’s amazing.
Melissa Termine: (20:21)
Well, and that’s why there’s that big push with organic foods and having that label and making sure that the farmers, whether it’s with agricultural crops in the field or with animals, are following that so that you know you’re getting something that is good for you. Unpasteurized milk, I was raised in an agriculture community, and my best, one of my best friends, her grandparents were dairy farmers, and I was at her house, and we had the opportunity because you’re a dairy farmer to try some unpasteurized milk. Now, I have to say, our first reaction was like, “Oh, that’s kind of weird,” but thinking back on it, it was more like Europe than than what we’re used to here.
Odiva Vasell: (21:18)
So all right, so gut health, one step at a time, one small change at a time.
Melissa Termine: (21:27)
Right, right. And then you also have to think of eating good food is self-care. It is the best self-care that you can do, and you deserve to enjoy it too because who wants to eat boiled chicken? I remember back in the day, they talked about, “Oh, to eat healthy for your cholesterol, you can’t…” Why would you get rid of the spices? It makes things taste delicious and everything like, “Well…”
Odiva Vasell: (21:55)
There’s like a trend, like, I remember in the ’80s, there was one time they came on the news. They were like, “Don’t eat apples. You… because of ABC.” And I was like, “What?” And then the next time, it was, “No, bananas.” Then it was bananas. And then it was, “Try these special berries.” It has always been a no, no, no culture or food. And to go abroad and see people eat food and just really enjoy it, for the first time, I was… They enjoy food. They have a lot less health problems. Now, there are some things that are off balance, but I noticed some of the natural foods that they eat balance that, some of the probiotics, we call it probiotics, and we’re here taking all these pills to get it, but they have it in every meal, something that brings about that gut health. How can we do that here in a world that is constantly bombarded by processed foods?
Melissa Termine: (23:05)
One thing that you mentioned is eating as close to Nature as you can. So when you take that potato and let’s say because it’s just easy for example, you mash it down into mashed potatoes, you’ve now processed it, right? You’ve cooked it, you smooshed it down, you’ve added things. But that’s a normal processing to be able to eat in a very loving way, a root vegetable straight from the ground, basically. But now, when you go to the store and you eat potato chips, that’s highly processed because it’s gone through a huge, it’s gone to a factory, basically, and it’s gone through all sorts of different things, and most chips are not done very well as far as health-wise. So then you get that benefit from eating that potato, slightly processed, but now you have that highly processed, and a lot of highly processed foods were taken over after World War II, and there is no food in there. It’s all chemicals, it’s all nutrients added, and that doesn’t do anything for your body. And you eat that for so many years, your body starts telling you, screaming at you, “I’m not healthy. I don’t like this. Please, please do some adjustment so I don’t want to go, ‘Oh, it’s not our fault’ compared to how Europe eats, but we can make some simple changes too. We want to eat as close to Nature, and we want to be able to enjoy our food. We want spices, we want to be able to say, ‘Oh, this tastes good. Let’s have this again,’ instead of going, ‘I don’t want to eat that.’ There is a process. You have to allow yourself grace. Think of all the creamers that you see at the grocery store for your coffee or tea. If you do creamer in your tea, if you read the ingredients, the majority of them, there’s not one natural thing in them. So maybe going from that very highly processed creamer, you go to a creamer that there’s actually some cream or nut milk or something in there and then a few other things that you’re like, “I’m not sure what these are,” but you’ve made that one step to something a little bit healthier, but not taking away the enjoyment of having cream in your coffee because you’re going to totally black coffee, which is really very healthy for you. It’s a process. All right, I’ve gone through that. I now drink very healthy black coffee. I don’t buy my coffee in the store because of how it’s processed. The stuff that’s usually in the store, right? So there’s just different layers to it and simple things to do, but in my head, I always ask myself, “How close to Nature is this food?” If it’s pretty close, I’m doing something healthy for me without feeling guilty about it. You just can’t. You can’t, you know? The other thing is here in America, we tend not to drink enough water. There’s a lot of soda, pop, depending on what part of the country you’re from, and it’s not good for you. It’s all chemicals. It’s just all chemicals. You can’t get around that. Your taste buds and your brain are addicted to that sugar that is in those drinks. So how do you do it? Well, you replace one with eight ounces of water, put some fruit, veggies in it, so it tastes like something. Also, quality water makes a big difference. I have a water filter. It really helps too.
Odiva Vasell: (26:56)
So, from what I hear you saying, it’s just taking that journey step by step, moving away from the one thing that you were kind of craving or addicted to that was a bad habit and slowly adjusting to things that are healthier and healthier choices and doing that one at a time, which is so manageable. I like that. I like that. And then as I said, the probiotics, I’ve tried to make my own, and then it sat there in the fridge. I was like, “Oh man, I’ve got to eat this,” by mashing up the vegetables and pickling them, because in Asia, every meal had that. When I was in Japan, every meal had pickled vegetables, and I was like, “Why? Why are you doing this to the vegetables?” And then I realized, this is good for you. It balances out sometimes. It balanced out the alcohol that they were drinking. In Korea, they have a lot of kimchi every meal, which is full of nutrients, garlic, probiotics, all kinds of even some peppers, which is actually good for you in moderation. Wow. So these types of eating are so balanced, and somehow we’ve got off that track.
Melissa Termine: (28:32)
So, I’ve not tried to make my own. I’ve looked at the recipes from kimchi or pickled stuff, and it’s just like, I like to make a lot of things my own. That’s not… I’m just not there yet, or maybe I won’t ever be there, but you can go to the store, and you can find those healthy options. Obviously, Whole Foods has some really great stuff. Trader Joe’s has some really great stuff. But your local grocery store might too. You just have to look for it, and then you have to watch how it’s made. You’ll have to look at the ingredients because a lot of the pickled stuff has sugar in it, and it shouldn’t have any sugar in it. That’s not how you pickle something. So, I’ve been looking at Walmart, trying to find some stuff, because it’s a very small Walmart where I’m at, and it’s just very frustrating because it’s like, sugar, sugar, no, I don’t want the sugar in there. But then it’s simple, like you were saying, and you’re they just have it at every meal. So then you just add it into whatever you’re eating at every meal, and it just becomes a habit. I love kimchi. I love it. I love it. I love it. It’s so easy just to scoop it out and throw it into a salad, and I do bowls instead of salads, so I put everything into a bowl, and then I eat it like that, and a little bit of kimchi in there, and it’s just amazing. I’m trying to think what else. You just, you add it, you get used to adding sauerkraut is a really easy thing once you get over your hang-up, if you have a hang-up about in your mind about what sauerkraut is and should…
Odiva Vasell: (30:12)
I used to, and then now I’m like, actually, that’s the best part of the hotdog at the baseball game. That is healthy as far… No, I get it. So I just want to talk a little bit more about your journey. You talked about your hands not being able to open and close your hands and you suffering with the perimenopause, menopause. What happened after you started these changes to your diet?
Listening to your body informs better food choices.
Melissa Termine: (30:42)
I was overweight. I didn’t dispute that. I was. Within three to four weeks, people were coming up to me and saying, “What did you do? Have you lost any weight?” which I hadn’t lost anyway, nothing. I hadn’t done anything other than trying to figure out how to get gluten out of my diet. Nothing. And the inflammation in my body started reducing that much that I looked like I had lost weight, and it became easier to use my hands. That was immediately the thing I noticed because I used them all the time as a teacher. I mean, we use our fingers and hands all the time as humans. But… and that, to me, was just like, “Huh, that’s really weird.” When I went back to the doctor, because I go to the doctor very often but because of those little germ factories that I worked with, I would go once a year with strep throat. And so she’s… I don’t know what you’re doing, but you need to keep it up. Because I got on that track, on that record, because once you start to feel good, it’s easier to start incorporating other things, that one small change. Now, I know eliminating gluten from your diet is not necessarily one small change, but it was that was my focus. How do I get rid of this wheat product that is obviously inflamed my body?
Odiva Vasell: (32:17)
And I like what you said about feel good. I mean, that you said it was in three weeks for you, it’s just, wow. But feeling good motivates you to continue because a lot of people will start, they feel better, but they don’t look any different. Because another thing here where condition is, “Okay, how many pounds did you lose this week?” And if you don’t lose it right away, then they feel discouraged like they haven’t done anything. But I like what you say about feel good first.
Melissa Termine: (32:50)
Well, I do have to say, I looked in the mirror and I didn’t think I changed anything. Did not see that. It wasn’t until people were saying to me, and I compared two pictures, I went, “Oh, I do look a little less inflamed now.” A year later, looks tons better. And it took me a year before I really started incorporating exercise. I mean, in the classroom, obviously, I didn’t sit down very much. I did a lot of walking in circles. But I really started being very purposeful about my exercise and movement. And then that’s when it really shifted. But it took a year of trying to work out, and like I said, I was still eating because I still hadn’t gotten there yet, highly processed foods. Well, now you have a lot of coaches, there’s a lot of information. So, you still can get very overwhelmed, like, “How do I start this?” Which is what a coach would help you with, talking with you, having you fill out forms and discussing, “So, what do you normally eat?” And just be honest because we’re looking for patterns. We’re looking for food that loves you. Cauliflower is a healthy food. Awesome. I have to be very careful how much cauliflower I have in a day or my gut blows up with bloating and it hurts, and it’s not good.
Odiva Vasell: (34:17)
Okay.
Melissa Termine: (32:20)
So the cauliflower is small for me.
Odiva Vasell: (34:22)
Listening to the body, and I think yeah, a lot of us are listening to our eyes and our minds, saying, “Okay, that looks good, I’ll eat that,” and then afterwards, you kind of feel like, “Oh, that didn’t feel so good,” but at least I’m full, so that I don’t have to worry about finding what I’m gonna eat later on and I can continue at my job and stuff. Things like that. So it’s more, I find many people, including myself, getting into, “Okay, I’m eating just to fill a space so that I can focus on other things.”
Melissa Termine: (35:05)
Which is one of the things too, is noticing a pattern. So when I sit down to watch an episode of, um, whatever you’re watching right now, and it was the biggest one I just finished watching was The Bear, right? So when I sit down to episode, what do I want to do? What do I want to grab? Well, chips, popcorn. So what can I replace that with? Or what can I do instead? So, um, if I was just starting my journey, I probably wouldn’t want… I well, but I could eat popcorn. But I prepare it. How do I prepare it? Is it in the bag? What’s… Uh, yes. Add some pink Himalayan salt on there. Because now you’re giving your body a nutrient that it does need, and it tastes good. But spray it with olive oil to get the salt to stick. You don’t… I mean use butter too. Real butter is a good thing, but we tend to overdo it because it’s good, where the olive oil still gives you that with the salt, you’re getting that yumminess. Um, when I tend to sit down to… I have this snack, and I adore it. And some of it came from what I did with my kids when they were young. So we have the apple cutter, you know, the one that pours and slices it into pieces. I mean I use that on the apple, so now I have apple chunks. I use my organic peanut butter that I put over it, drizzle over the top. Then I do a turmeric spice blend that I have that helps with inflammation in your gut, and I sprinkle that over that. And then I sprinkle a little bit of protein powder, about half a scoop, and dark chocolate chip over the top.
Odiva Vasell: (36:57)
Wow.
Melissa Termine: (36:59)
Yep, and the turmeric has cinnamon in it, so that cinnamon is something I always did with my kids with apples and applesauce, so it, for me, there’s that memory of that with my children too.
Odiva Vasell: (37:12)
How nice, nice, nice. So baby steps everyone, it can be done. But just the awareness that you do not have to change your entire lifestyle. You do not have to keep beating yourself over the head with “Don’t eat this, don’t eat that, don’t other,” because I remember getting frustrated going to buffets or family picnics and dinners, and people will be at the buffet tables saying, “Oh, I shouldn’t this, I shouldn’t that,” and it’s like, “Okay, if you don’t want to eat it, don’t. But please don’t ruin the picnic or the dinner for all of us by preaching about how bad food is. Just like, let go and slowly change your eating habits one at a time.”
Melissa Termine: (38:00)
Right, exactly.
Odiva Vasell: (38:02)
Alright. So thank you again, Melissa, joining us and enlightening us on the way that we can improve our gut health. I think this is very helpful for many ladies, and I want to just thank you again for coming.
Melissa Termine: (38:19)
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
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Conclusion
In conclusion, prioritizing your gut health is a journey that begins with small, sustainable changes to your diet. By tuning into your body’s signals and learning to make healthier choices that don’t compromise on enjoyment and positive memories, you’re on the path to a happier and healthier you. Remember, it’s not about drastic overhauls but rather embracing the process of change, one bite at a time. So go ahead, savor that healthier snack, create new food memories, and take a moment to appreciate the remarkable communication happening within your body. Your gut, after all, is your body’s compass; it’s time to help it point you in the right direction for a brighter, healthier future.