Extend Podcast with Darshan Shah, MD

Have you entered midlife and started gaining weight, feeling exhausted, waking up foggy, losing motivation, or noticing your mood shift while your labs keep coming back "normal"? For a lot of women over 40, that answer does not bring relief because they still feel off, and this episode explains why thyropause, the midlife decline in thyroid function, is so often missed, dismissed, or mistaken for aging, burnout, depression, or menopause.
We dive deeper into this in the Extend Podcast with Dr. Darshan Shah with Dr. Amie Hornaman. We break down why TSH alone is not enough, how thyropause overlaps with perimenopause, menopause, and andropause, and why the real fix starts with a full thyroid panel, proper T4-to-T3 conversion, and a personalized plan built around optimal function instead of "normal" ranges.
Dr. Amie Hornaman, also known as The Thyroid Fixer, is the founder of the Advanced Thyroid and Hormone Clinic and host of The Thyroid Fixer Podcast. After being misdiagnosed six times herself, she built an international telehealth practice focused on thyroid and hormone optimization. With her clinical experience, book, supplement line, and features in Forbes Health, CBS News, and Fox News, she is one of the most credible voices on why thyroid dysfunction is missed and how to properly address it.
What's discussed
(1:16) Why Dr. Amie was told her labs were normal despite clear thyroid symptoms.
(3:05) The symptoms people often miss, from weight gain and fatigue to hair loss and brain fog.
(5:33) How thyroid dysfunction can look like ADD, early Alzheimer's, anxiety, or depression.
(6:55) What thyropause is and why it often overlaps with perimenopause, menopause, and andropause.
(9:55) Why TSH alone is not enough and what a full thyroid panel should include.
(13:12) How T4 converts into active T3 and why reverse T3 can block thyroid function.
(22:09) The connection between low thyroid function, chronic disease risk, and immune function.
(41:02) Why GLP-1s may not work if thyroid and hormones are not optimized first.
Listen to this episode of Extend with Dr. Darshan Shah on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to understand why "normal" labs may not be the full answer, what thyroid markers actually matter, and how optimizing thyroid function can change your energy, metabolism, mood, hormones, and long-term health.
Thank You to Our Sponsors:
Momentous: Head to livemomentous.com/fiber and use code DRSHAH for up to 35% off your first order. 
Learn more about Dr. Darshan Shah:
Website: drshah.com
Clinic: next-health.com
Instagram: darshanshahmd 
 
Learn more about Dr. Amie Hornaman:   
Website: dramie.com 
The Thyroid Fix book: thyroidfixbook.com 
Instagram: @dramiehornaman 
Facebook: www.facebook.com/groups/dramie 
YouTube: youtube.com/dramiehornaman 
TikTok: @dramiehornaman 
7-day Thyroid Healing Kickstart: fixyourthyroid.com/7daykickstarter

If you think your skincare routine is protecting your skin, this conversation may make you look at your bathroom shelf differently. You've been taught to treat your skin like something cosmetic, something you maintain for how it looks. But your skin is your largest organ, it has its own biological age, and if you are not supporting it properly, it can become a constant source of inflammation and damage that goes far beyond appearance. 
We dive deeper into this in Extend with Carolina Reis de Oliveira, PhD. We also break down why most skincare products are not built to target the biology of aging, how senescent cells drive visible and invisible skin aging, and how OS-01, discovered through machine learning, is designed to slow the spread of these dysfunctional cells so you can actually support your skin as part of your longevity strategy. 
Carolina Reis de Oliveira, PhD, is a stem cell biologist, tissue engineer, and co-founder and CEO of OneSkin. She has spent over a decade researching cellular aging, building human skin models in the lab, and developing epigenetic clocks to measure biological skin age, with her work on OS-01 validated through peer-reviewed research, making her one of the leading voices translating longevity science into real-world applications for skin. 
For a limited time, you can try OneSkin for 15% off with code EXTEND at oneskin.co/EXTEND That's 15% off oneskin.co with code EXTEND
What's Discussed:
(2:02) Why OneSkin started by asking what actually targets skin aging at the cellular level.
(4:02) How popular anti-aging products can cause inflammation and damage.
(9:25) The three main drivers of skin aging: senescence, inflammation, and collagen breakdown.
(11:24) Why UV exposure is responsible for most visible skin aging.
(21:33) How OS-01 was discovered through machine learning and peptide screening.
(26:33) Why too many actives can overwhelm the skin instead of helping it.
(32:58) How aging skin can contribute to inflammation inside the body.
(37:12) How skin biological age can be measured with epigenetic clocks.
Listen to this episode of Extend with Darshan Shah, MD on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to understand why skin is not just cosmetic, what actually drives skin aging at the cellular level, and how to start treating your skin like the longevity organ it really is.
Thank You to Our Sponsors: 
Timeline: Timeline powered by Mitopure just dropped the price. Check it out at timeline.com/drshah and get an additional 20% off your first month with code DRSHAH.
IM8: Try IM8 today with a 30-day money back guarantee. You can get 10% off your first order with code DRSHAH at im8health.com/discount/DRSHAH. 

 
Learn more about Dr. Darshan Shah:
Website: drshah.com
Clinic: next-health.com
Instagram: darshanshahmd 
 
Learn more about OneSkin: 
Website: www.oneskin.co/ 
Instagram: @oneskin.co 
TikTok: @oneskin.co

The gut and hormones have always been treated as two completely separate conversations in medicine, and that disconnect is quietly behind some of the most frustrating symptoms women experience in midlife. From bloating and brain fog to autoimmune conditions and weight that will not move, the answers have been there all along, hiding in a connection nobody thought to make.
We dive deeper into this in the Extend Podcast with Cynthia Thurlow. We also talk about why perimenopause is the ultimate litmus test of how well you have been living your life, why every woman deserves a conversation about hormone replacement therapy regardless of her age, and why the gut microbiome may be the missing link behind why so many women start HRT and still do not feel better.
Cynthia Thurlow is a nurse practitioner, internationally recognized speaker, and host of the Everyday Wellness podcast, with over 25 years of experience in health and wellness specializing in perimenopause, menopause, and intermittent fasting. Her second TEDx talk on intermittent fasting has garnered over 15 million views, and she has been featured on ABC, FOX 5, KTLA, Medium, Entrepreneur, and The Megyn Kelly Show. She is the author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation and the upcoming book The Menopause Gut, one of the most important and underexplored conversations in women's health today.
What's Discussed:
(4:27) What the gut microbiome actually is and why perimenopause changes everything about how it functions.
(9:40) How accumulated childhood stress and trauma ages the ovaries faster and pushes women into menopause earlier.
(20:05) How to assess where you stand with your nervous system and the simplest ways to start improving it.
(31:59) What the estrobolome is and why it may be the missing link behind every perimenopausal symptom you cannot explain.
(37:32) How to reinvigorate your estrobolome and get your gut back to actually processing hormones correctly.
(43:44) Why every woman deserves a conversation about hormone replacement therapy and what most practitioners are still getting wrong.
(49:59) The truth about oral contraceptives that a generation of women was never told.
(56:52) The first two or three things every woman should do if she knows her gut is off.
 
Listen to this episode of the Extend Podcast and walk away finally understanding why everything you have been doing for your hormones, your weight, your energy, and your symptoms has not been working, and what the one conversation nobody is having, could change about all of it.
 
Thank You to Our Sponsors: 
Momentous: Head to livemomentous.com/fiber and use code DRSHAH for up to 35% off your first order. 
 
Learn more about Dr. Darshan Shah:
Website: drshah.com
Clinic: next-health.com
Instagram: darshanshahmd 
 
Find out more about Cynthia Thurlow: 
Website: www.cynthiathurlow.com/  
Instagram: @cynthia_thurlow 
Facebook: www.facebook.com/cynthiathurlowofficial
Podcast: www.cynthiathurlow.com/podcast 
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/cynthia-thurlow 
YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/@CynthiaThurlow
Substack: https://cynthiathurlownp.substack.com/
Twitter/X: https://x.com/_CynthiaThurlow
Pre-order: The Menopause Gut: www.penguinrandomhouse.com/the-menopause-gut-by-cynthia-thurlow

A lot of us are doing everything we can to stay healthy, taking supplements, wearing trackers, getting our labs done, and still ending up sick. And if you are like most people, you probably thought that was on you, that you were not disciplined enough, not consistent enough, or simply not doing the right things, but that is not the case. The system we have been relying on was never designed to keep us well in the first place, and expecting the Western medical system to manage your long term health is like expecting a fire department to landscape your garden. 
We dive deeper into this in the Extend with Steve Martocci, Pranitha Patil, and John Sullivan. We also chat about why 30% of people have dangerously high blood pressure and have no idea, why four out of six top selling creatine products on Amazon contain zero creatine, and why doctors receive zero training on supplements in medical school yet are expected to advise patients on them every single day. 
Steve Martocci is the founder of SuppCo, a platform that has catalogued over 300,000 supplement products and built the industry's first independent trust scoring system. Pranitha Patil is the co-founder and Chief Business Officer of Function Health, which offers comprehensive lab testing across hundreds of biomarkers for $365 a year. John Sullivan is a senior leader at Whoop, the performance wearable that introduced medically cleared continuous health monitoring to everyday consumers. If there is any panel qualified to tell you the truth about what it actually takes to stay healthy in 2026, it is this one.
What's Discussed:
(13:12) The supplement industry's trust problem and why four out of six top selling creatine products on Amazon contain zero creatine.

(20:17) How to build your own N-of-1 health roadmap using lab work, wearables, and supplements working together.

(39:58) The single highest leverage investment you can make for your health right now that has nothing to do with money.

(43:26) Why 30% of people have dangerous blood pressure and have no idea.

(46:50) The FDA, the supplement industry, and where the line should actually be drawn between regulation and innovation.

(53:12) Why the Western medical system was never built to keep you healthy and what to do instead.

Listen to this episode of the Extend Podcast and finally understand why the system you have been trusting with your health was never designed to keep you well, and what it actually looks like to take that power back into your own hands. 
 
Thank You to Our Sponsors: 
Momentous: Head to livemomentous.com/fiber and use code DRSHAH for up to 35% off your first order. 
IM8: Try IM8 today with a 30-day money back guarantee. You can get 10% off your first order with code DRSHAH at im8health.com/discount/DRSHAH. 
 
Learn more about Dr. Darshan Shah:
Website: drshah.com
Clinic: next-health.com
Instagram: darshanshahmd 
 
Learn more about John Sullivan: 
Instagram: @johnjsulli 
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/johnjsulli/
 
Learn more about Pranitha Patil: 
Instagram: @pranitha/ 
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/pranithapatil 
 
Learn more about Steve Martocci: 
Instagram: @smart 
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/stevemartocci

Most high performing executives will spend thousands optimizing their glucose levels, their sleep, and their body composition without ever stopping to ask why none of it makes them feel any better. The answer almost never lives in their labs and it almost never lives in their training program. It lives in the identity they built their entire career on top of, and the silent narrative driving every decision they make, that tells them their worth is only as good as their last result.
In this episode of Extend, I sat down with Steve Chua to explore the real root cause of executive burnout and why fixing your physiology without addressing your identity is like putting the right fuel into the wrong engine. Walk away from this conversation with a completely different understanding of what is actually driving your performance, your exhaustion, and what it is going to take to finally lead from a place of genuine strength instead of fear.
Steve Chua is an executive life and leadership coach with over 30 years of experience working with international leaders and organizations, and the founder of Steve Chua International and InsightOut, a coaching and consulting firm that empowers leaders to grow from the inside out. He operates from the conviction that healthy leaders create healthy companies, and his unique ability to help individuals resolve past conflicts, gain clarity in the present, and align their purpose and vision for the future, has made him one of the most sought after leadership coaches in the world.
Check out Dr. Shah's Sleep Optimization Workbook here: https://www.drshah.com/sleep
What's Discussed:
(3:24) Steve's personal story of comparing himself to his brothers, failing out of Oxford, and standing on the ledge of a building at his lowest point.

(5:57) The difference between living for value and living from value and why most executives are running on the wrong fuel.

(7:46) The three levels of identity work that create lasting change: self awareness, self management, and self leadership.

(11:34) Why picking up your phone first thing in the morning is the equivalent of eating a sugary breakfast for your brain.

(21:06) Why high achieving executives become the bottleneck of their own companies and what that reveals about their identity.

(37:49) The three things people lose when they burn out and why burnout is almost never just about working too hard.

(44:10) Why your 40s and 50s are not a midlife crisis but a shift from success to significance.

(51:30) The four life questions that when answered change everything about how you lead and how you live.

 
Thank You to Our Sponsors: 
Momentous: Head to livemomentous.com/fiber and use code DRSHAH for up to 35% off your first order. 
IM8: Try IM8 today with a 30-day money back guarantee. You can get 10% off your first order with code DRSHAH at im8health.com/discount/DRSHAH. 
 
Learn more about Dr. Darshan Shah:
Website: drshah.com
Clinic: next-health.com
Instagram: darshanshahmd 
Learn more about Steve Chua:
Website: stevechuaintl.com 
InsightOut: insightoutcorp.com 
Transformational Leadership Podcast: insightoutcorp.com/podcast 
Instagram: @stevechuaintl/    
Facebook: steve.chua.net