Transcripts
Well, Dr. Icard, welcome to The Accrescent Podcast.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Thank you so much for having me.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:We were just talking off air that it's you're so in line with the conversations that we're having here. But something that I think is so interesting is in the now six, seven years of podcasting, I don't know that I've ever had someone on to talk about heart health, heart disease really specifically. So it's always exciting to have a guest on to talk about a topic for the first time ever.
But just so that the audience can get a feel for you and get to know you a little bit more, give us a little bit of the origin story. What got you into naturopathic medicine? And then more specifically, what got you so passionate about heart disease, heart health?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah. Well it's kind of one of those things, right? Like life is like it was just faded, you know. even just in in birth order, I am the second oldest and I have five brothers. So I was just naturally like a caregiver, you know. and what happened was our mother got really, really ill with cancer. And I was like ten, eleven when this was going on, and she was a young woman. She
She died at 33 of breast cancer. And I went through that whole journey with her, not knowing anything about anything, you know, because I'm 10, but I went to all of her appointments with her and she needed support and she had a baby. So I would take care of her and her baby. And I didn't know anything, but I thought as a kid, okay, you're going to the doctor, then you're supposed to get better.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Wow, my gosh.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. It's like an equation.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Right. And that wasn't my experience. I was like, what's like what she seems sicker? Like every time we go, she's sicker, she's sicker, you know. And then eventually she had succumbed to the illness or the treatments or you know, whatever. And and so that was obviously a remarkable thing to go to experience as a person, you know. And then I was lost my mom, my dad inherited us, and even just that, like we lived in Alaska. Me and all my brothers are born in Alaska.
My dad was living in Mexico, like not New Mexico, like Mexico. So we me and my oldest brother got shipped from Alaska to Mexico, and then we got separated from our other brothers, and then it was this whole other journey, right? Where with you know, nice enough people didn't really have any business being parents, you know, inherited us. And so then I experienced this kind of like being like a cat, you know, where you have to land on your feet, and there's not really
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:really anyone that has your back or anything like that. And so the other part is I have a son.
And he's almost twenty three. And so when I got pregnant with him, that was my wake up call, right? Because I was like, well, I don't want this kid to not have a mother because that was kind of hard for me. Like I didn't I didn't have anybody that like had my back, you know? And so I decided that there must be something to this health thing. And my my father never communicated anything to me, but he was a bit of a health nut. Like he would do juice cleanses for ten days, like in the nineties. Like nobody like nobody was doing that, you know, and we just thought it was weird.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:And I said, no, maybe he's got onto something here and I better go talk to him because I want to be healthy, because I want to have a healthy kid and I don't want this kid to lose his mother. And that and at that time I decided to like rewrite my story, right? Because before that my story was like obviously I'm gonna die young, probably of breast cancer. You know, like that was that was like this thing in the back of my head, that's how I grew up. And so that's when I started living the holistic lifestyle and you know, just really digging into that and then choosing to leave.
conventional medicine because I was in the hospital doing respiratory therapy and go go more into the holistic medicine. So that's why I'm you know I don't work at the hospital or I'm not a real estate agent. It was just like, you know, I guess it was what I was supposed to do.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yes, yes. I know that so intimately because how I got to where I'm at today is at twenty-five I was diagnosed with early stage breast cancer and went on this whole journey of root cause and I really felt like early childhood trauma, unmetabolized.
emotions were a huge part of why that disease was able to develop in my body. And, you know, that is what set me on this path to where I'm at today. I would not be here today if I hadn't had that diagnosis.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, and that and that was a part of it too, because our house in Alaska with my stepdad was was pretty volatile and and traumatic. And I knew, I knew even as a young kid, like this was part of what made her sick, right? Like I knew there was like this energetic emotional component, and so I I wanted to treat cancer, right? So so so as soon as I got into the naturopathic school, I had to make best friends with the cancer doc, right? 'Cause I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna treat cancer. And at that time
time, I'm sure things have changed. I I'm all bright eyed and bushy tailed, like I can't wait, right? And then every every patient that I met like literally looks at me and like tells me like I'm gonna die. And I'm all
And so we we do the round table, right? As the students. So I'm like, because I had learned about mind body medicine, which I'm sure you're very familiar with and and I was like, Maybe we should be doing some mind body medicine with these people, you know, because like this is ha where they're all at, you know.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. Yeah, their mindset is not conducive to healing.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:That's what I was feeling ex the exactly and they were just like not up for it. They were just into physiology and so I just jumped ship. So I was like, you know what? Maybe it's not for me. And I did do a lot of mind-body medicine. And for a moment I thought I wanted to deliver babies because that seemed like really exciting. But I think what was really exciting was the doctor, the mentor that was delivering babies. Like she was really cool. And I like sleeping at night. So it just it wasn't a good fit either, you know.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm. Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:And I was like, I was like high strong all the time. my god, is a baby coming? Is a baby coming? You know, and I was like, I don't like this. And I I ended up getting into regenerative medicine, which is where I got a lot of the tools that I use now.
And it was I don't know if you've probably haven't d gone this far with it. Then I actually stressed myself into becoming pre-diabetic. So that's where this whole metabolism thing like came in strong. And and again I knew it was myself. I knew it was my fault and I knew a lot of it was mental and emotional because I had been on
like basically since I was like five years old, you know. Right. And and I knew I was burning the candle at both ends. So I knew that that was a huge component of it. And then I had to do a deep dive on metabolism 'cause I wasn't I couldn't accept, you know, being pre-diabetic or or advancing to diabetes. I was like, no And that's that's what made that so important. And the work that I do now I had no it's so weird. I had no intention on on doing this, right?
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:So many interests and and passions, and this client comes in and he doesn't want to have surgery. Well, we can't blame him, that sounds how I would feel. But they wanted to put stents in his heart. So they're Hey guy, you're full of plaque, like yeah, put these in there. And the cool thing is, he said, Well, I don't really want to do that. Can you give me two months? And they did. So if anyone here hearing this, like you can do that, that was really cool. I didn't realize you could do that, you know. And we and they gave him the two months, and so he said, I'm
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:I got two months. What do got for me? And I was really present with him, and that's when the protocol came in. And I I figured it would help him. I was shocked that he was excused from needing the surgery in two months. And and we've just kind of found that to be repeatable. So that's and and and that's that's how we kind of ended up here. Because if you look maybe at your family, I look at my family and the elders, it seems like if we live long enough, this is gonna be an issue, right? It's like you're
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:You're seventy, here's some diabetes and some blood pressure, you know, and stuff like that. Yes.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. Yeah. Almost that this is just a part of aging, that you're gonna get some illness and some diagnosis and then you're just gonna live with it for a long, long time, and that's what aging is.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, bucket of pills and doctor dates is what I call it. So it's time to rewrite that, Destiny.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Yeah. What I what I think is so powerful a part of your story is you I was doing some research and listening to some other episodes you've done and you talk about I was diagnosed pre-diabetic and this was like I was a doctor, I was healthy, quote unquote. I Yes, I was working out, I was eating well.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:I was doing everything.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:And I think that's powerful because I think there might be a lot of listeners who can resonate with that. I feel like when when I have cancer clients come in or clients experiencing cancer, they kind of fall into one of two categories. They're either like, yeah, this makes sense, because I was really living a lifestyle that allowed this to happen, you know, whatever it is, alcohol, poor diet, toxicity, et cetera. Or they come in and they're like, I don't understand.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:I haven't had alcohol in 10 years, I've been gluten-free for five years, I eat all organic, how did this happen? And it's almost I d I don't want to say harder because we're not here to compare, but it is really difficult for them to wrap their heads around because they really felt like they were doing everything right.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes. Yeah. So that's why they call blind spots too, right? And 'cause we d and there's so many things. Like we just don't know what we don't know. And there's been so much misinformation out there. And sometimes even the trying to do everything is adding more angst and cortisol to the system too, you know, and it it's it's just like this this dance of, you know, figuring out how to be a human. What I found with the people that I work with
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:you know, there's your classic cardiac one, right? Like it's like the cartoon character with like the sting coming out of his ears and he's got a little bit of an anger problem, right? They're yeah, okay. Like a lot of people that they they want to yell the first time they call, you know, right? It's that is a thing, but there's also like the stoics, what I call them my stoics, where like they're doing tons of mental gymnastics like all day, every day, and they're just they just carry it well. They put everything inside, but the arteries are still keeping the score, right? And across the
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:huh.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:board and I I I know I work with a lot of you know business owners or retired business owners, but I think it's all people
I mean maybe not like the monks in the Tibet or whatever, but th like they've been living in survival mode for decades and they've had their foot on the gas that even now they probably don't need it on the gas, but they don't know how to take it off. And that's that's that's huge. I mean it's it's it's it's I don't know if we can like quantify it, but it's just as big as the nutrition, this part. This this unconscious survival mode unconscious.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:unconscious addiction to cortisol and adrenaline. it's it's real I d I I've even seen it in in in the labs. Like I'd love to show it to you because I'm like, it's like here it is again, here it's again. And it's I call it like the chronic stress metabolic mess labs. You know, and they look good and they're trying. Like these people you're talking about, like they're trying. They're not clueless, right? But like the like that just catches up with us.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, well and to your point, physically, aesthetically, they look healthy. And yet there can be a metabolic mess going on inside that they're not aware of.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Mm-hmm.
Yes. Yeah.
And that's what I found too after I did my pre-diabetes reversal. I and I started going, well, maybe we should be looking at this on everybody because I got a lot of surprises, you know, like things that I thought would be healthy for me, that I was having low blood sugar all the time when I thought I was tired, you know. So I started putting it on a lot of health forward clients, and a lot of them were like biohackers, and they're like, they're all ripped, and you know, they look all hot. And they were telling me, man, that thing was like a roller coaster up and down and down and going low blood sugar in the middle.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:the night and so there wasn't anybody that I put it on that didn't get surprises.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:And we're talking about like a continuous glucose monitor. Yeah. To be able to track.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Mm-hmm. And you just don't know until you know, right? It's like you just have to pull up the blindfold and you're like, Huh
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. So you got into heart disease spont kind of organically by this client coming to you and saying, I have two months or they're gonna put a stent in me. I really don't want that. What can we do?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, and it was great timing because I had just gone through this metabolic reversal on me and then some other clients, right? So I knew that that was like definitely a pillar. I mean, I would go as hard to say in like all chronic disease. It's like you've got if you've gotta address the insulin, you've gotta get that thing in balance, right? and so I knew that that had to be a pillar. and then I put together some other therapies that I had been using some for ten years, you know, but in a certain order.
and it just s it seems to be repeatable, right? If the patients show up though, right? If they can un we've got to unplug that survival mode 24-7 thing too, because that can really make or break it. Like like
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, well, you know, some I put up a post a long time ago, but it was something like, you can't out sauna anger. You can't out-supplement anxiety.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes, girl. Yes. Yeah, you can't intermittent fast your trauma away as much as we want to. You do need to intermittent fast though, side note.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Yes. Well, this is what I'm so excited to get into. And like we were saying at the start of the episode or the conversation, I have never had someone on to go deep into heart health, heart disease, insulin resistance, and addressing, navigating, reversing some of these things. So but I think what I wanna start with, and if you can speak to it, is what does a conventional approach to heart disease look like? Like if someone were to go to just a standard conventional doctor.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:What are they getting put on? What interventions are they being offered? And then we'll s we'll flip to your approach and how that's different.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes.
Yeah. Well, I mean, there's probably people like either it's you or someone in your family, right? Because it's very, very common they just screen for cholesterol. they change what they say is good on that, you know, and then they want to put you on cholesterol-lowering medication. And I hate that for a number of reasons. One is it's a false peace of mind. It's it's if you really step back and draw it out, it's like
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Arresting the firemen because they're at all the house fires, you know. Like, and it's like cholesterol, most people because it's been villainized, don't realize it's a stress repair molecule, right? You know, so usually a lot of the stuff starts with stress and then it goes down to like cortisol, glucose, insulin, and insulin does a lot of the things we don't like. So they're just but all that's still gonna be going on while we're squishing down your cholesterol, and we think we're good because we have.
this really weird low cholesterol number. So that's that's what that's the biggest issue is that you think you're doing the right thing, but all this inflammation and chaos is still happening. So that's that's
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, and so meaning when people get put on a cholesterol medication, it kind of makes them feel like, Great, my cholesterol's low, I'm good to go, nothing else to worry about.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:It will lower your cholesterol, but it's not getting you to where you want to go.
That's kind of like the take-home fun fact. It's like, yes, it's lowering your cholesterol. But the idea that lowering your cholesterol prevents plaque, it doesn't actually line up. And this is what makes me like bananas, you know? like for instance, there's this amazing imaging that everyone should start doing called Clearly that uses a CT of the heart, loads it up into this AI software and can see exactly how much plaque is in every artery and what kind of plaque.
Cool. But a a case study, for example, they had this guy on t two lipid lowering medications, and for me as a naturopath, it it was kind of cringy because his his his LDL was like fifty or something. I was like, you know, and then the scan full of plaque. Full so he's got very, very forcibly low, weird below normal cholesterol full of plaque. So you know, they go, let's give him more cholesterol lowering medication, and then six or twelve months later.
He's got more plaque, and I'm going, okay, well, obviously this isn't working, right? But everybody in the room is like, yeah, let's do more cholesterol-lowering medication. And if you really go down that rabbit hole, you'll find that there are studies that back this up. So it's like we've been given a paradigm to follow, but if you step back, it's it doesn't really line up, right? So if I'm gonna
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:I wanna say waste my time. If I'm gonna put my energy into something and if I'm gonna take a medication, you know, I wanna make sure it's actually gonna get me to where I wanna go. But the whole system, if I, you know, could be so bold to say it's it's symptom management if we're lucky. At best. It's symptom management, right? That's that's the issue. The second issue is we actually need that cholesterol for other stuff.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:yeah, so then there's that, right? Because your liver's making 80% of this cholesterol. It's not about, it's not that much about what you put in your mouth, right? Your your liver's making it for for physiological reasons. And all of our sex hormones are built on a backbone of cholesterol. And pretty much everybody's low in those these days, you know. We don't need another reason to have less hormones, you know. vitamin D.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah.
huh.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Same thing and also everyone's low in that, right? adrenal hormones and a lot of us Americans get adrenal fatigue because we burn the candle from both ends, right? For decades. And all of that is built on a backbone of cholesterol, not to mention your brain cells that love to talk to each other. They need that cholesterol to kind of insulate the nerve cells so they can talk quickly. And I don't know if you Yeah, go ahead.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right. Okay, so th it's this is fascinating because it's we now we've got an issue on both ends, which is just lowering cholesterol actually isn't directly correlated to the plaque. The plaque can still grow. So we haven't solved the issue.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:In fact, we're now creating a second issue or multiple issues, which is we need cholesterol to be able to produce sex hormones, produce adrenaline, coat the nerves of the brain so that the brain functions properly. So if we keep the cholesterol too low, we're gonna start to have a cascade of events over here and these things that we don't want.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes, yes. And there a lot of people, I mean it's not uncommon for people to get short-term memory loss when they start some of these medications, right? Or if you look at how many decades have we been prescribing these and now all of a sudden everybody's getting dementia, you know, something to look at, something to be curious about, you know. yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:I mean, it's it's giv it's literally giving me a light bulb right now because there's I have someone in my life who for the last couple of years has been showing some interesting memory signs, just small things that you're like, okay, are you really stressed? And but I'm suddenly realizing like I think a couple of years ago she started cholesterol medication. So it's it kind of ringing a light bulb for me.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes.
Yes. Yeah. So so so those that's conventional and then, you know, they'll give you blood pressure meds to lower your blood pressure. which you might need, right? Because high blood pressure is is dangerous. But I find that if people follow a holistic system, they generally can improve their blood pressure and wean off of their medications, right? And as we all know, medications have side effects, you know. or maybe you haven't realized it, but that cough might be from your
blood pressure medication. It's a pretty common side effect, you know? People d then they put it together, you know, when you ask them. But yeah, so it's it's just kind of a cocktail of meds and then there's the stents that the fella didn't want to get. So a stent would be kind of like plumbing, like opening up a tube, right, in the heart.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Got it.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Cause there's too much plaque. There's too much plaque in there. So it's like popping something foreign in there to pop it, and it will open. It's like it's like the cholesterol med will lower your cholesterol, and the stent will open that tube up. And it can improve symptoms. Like if you're having that chest pain on exertion, opening that up and allowing better blood flow can help with that. But here's the crazy thing.
I didn't even realize this at first, that it doesn't extend anyone's life. It's again, it's symptom management, right? And I didn't know this either until I started getting more into this. The placement, but it makes sense when you think about it. The placement of the stent, it's a foreign thing. So it will open up your tube there, but the fact that it's there is gonna make your system wanna make more inflammation and more plaque.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:So then you gotta be like even more on it. And so that's why sometimes people write mean they have I mean, l I hear talk to people that have like twenty stents. So it's like, okay
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:man.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Maybe the stents aren't working. So I didn't know any of this stuff about stents. So so if anyone hears this and then you and you're not a super hot mess and you heard about that fella, maybe ask for two months. Get on a serious program, you know, that focuses on the stress, on the emotions, on the metabolism, right? Because this is where the real big wins can come from in a short period of time. But that's kind of the that's the basic kind of
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:conventional basics.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So let's pivot now then into what does Dr. Melanie ICARDS process look like? How does this differ? How does this go beyond just let's throw some medications? Worst case scenario, we throw a stent at it. What does that look like? Where do we start? When you have someone come into your clinic who's like, I've got high cholesterol, I've got high blood pressure, my insulin's all over the place. Where do they start with you?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Yeah, well we we've gotta get a holistic lab panel, you know, so we can get some pieces that are actually useful, right, for us to look at, right? 'Cause I find a lot of things are missing on on just conventional screening, you know? and then I'm really, really encouraging all my clients, of course they do whatever they want, right? But to get that Cleerly AI imaging and this is another thing. This is this is why I'm so hardcore about it. 'Cause I've had people that looked pretty good on paper. Labs, no big whoop, right?
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay. huh.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:They're not symptomatic. Send them in for the imaging full of plaque. Soft plaque. The dangerous one. And I was like, I can't
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Wow.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Can't even believe it. But w but he would not be motivated to take action, right? Because it's see if we just looked at that and him like, huh, you know, but then thank goodness we sent him to do the imaging and now we're like, we need to get on something like yesterday, you know, and and I never would have expected that. So the it doesn't you just don't know until you look there. That's what I found, you know.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, to your point, just to have something quantitative that there there's something up. Now why do you think it would not be presenting in the labs necessarily, but it is in the imaging? Is it is it just the body's compensating well enough right now?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:They just don't correlate. I just I find
No.
I I I don't I I just it doesn't make sense. It just doesn't core. Like like for instance, I talked to a guy yesterday and he has done really well. He has completely turned his labs around. Like he is ideal on like glucose, insulin, hemoglobin A1c, like almost perfect labs. I they showed adrenal fatigue, right? And I was so surprised that on his imaging that he has a little bit more soft black. But I know this guy, and this is one of these guys that he has ants in his pants.
That make him do the boogie dance, he never sits still. He's there's always a fire. And I told him, I think this is the missing piece because I would expect way better imaging from you. Your labs look fantastic, you know. But like, can you please start doing Tai Chi? Can you please come to the next retreat? Because you're he's because he's on it. He's intermittent fast, like he's doing the gym, he's intermittent fasting. He's his labs look amazing. But like that imaging, like if I just looked at his labs, I'd be like,
le pricey. It's like a l it's: Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're right.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:But I but I'm just saying, I'm just blown away by how we just don't know we can't w I don't think we can even look at the labs and know what's going on there.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Wow. No, tell me, so it's Cleerly imaging. And how is it different from other imaging?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, so this is they just got Medicare approval. It's i it's the best. Okay, so well so what you we've all probably heard heard of the stress test, right? Like the yeah, stress cardiac stress test, right? So that's only good that can have false positives and false negatives, right? It's it's it's more about blood flow and it's only gonna show us large blockages when it works correctly, over 70%.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, nerd out. We we love the details, nerd out for us.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Wouldn't you want to know if it was 60 or even 50? Probably, right? and then and then the calcium score, like that's just confusing and scares people. I mean, I don't know, they maybe should stop doing it, right? So that's a CT scan that tells you that you've had plaque and now you have calcified plaque in the arteries, right? and then they don't really have anything conventional that say, well, this could help with the calcification. They just go.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:You know, and so that's kind of upsetting for people, you know, so they don't have options for them after that. So so I really am encouraging everyone to do this Cleerly imaging 'cause it shows us every artery on the heart. Is it soft, is it mixed, is it calcified? And even before it gets into the tube, right? It can catch it while it's still, you know, in the wall. So even getting ahead of it is and that's incredible. The other place though, pee a lot of people get plaque here, you know, in their in their career.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Sorry.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Carotid arteries. So that you also want to check because some people are more carotid people, some people are more heart artery plaque people. So it's it's a good idea to check both just so you know, right? And the reason is I think
it's gonna get you motivated to take action. I know that's how I am and that's how a lot of my clients are. Like some of them like, I don't wanna know, I don't want to know. But you know, if you were gonna, you know, save to buy a house, you need to kind of look at your your savings account and your expenses and you just you need that roadmap and and we as humans can justify or like make logic out of anything. So it just really helps to see things. So you go, okay, like let's get busy. And then later you can sit and go, okay, I'm gonna keep doing what I'm doing.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah. Well but it sounds too like a much more defined baseline than maybe what conventional testing is looking at. A lot more metrics that we're able to track.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Yeah, and and I I just think it's incredible. So that's where we start and then I have I do a multi-layered approach so it's a it's a multi-system approach, right? Because instead of just focusing on the cholesterol, which is silly, the body is a system of systems. So we can't just focus on one thing because like you see like the like the stress and the emotions are feeding in and the glucose and all these things are feeding in. So if we just focus on one thing, all this other stuff is going on.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:It's it seems overwhelming. People always tell me that when they first start, but then they go, I can't believe how easy it was afterwards, right? So they have to set it up so you get the win. So we start everybody on an herbal detox. So it's all wins, right? So they're like their energy is better, their inflammation's down, their blood pressure is getting better, you know, it's it's win-win-win-win-win. They're so they're getting bought into this, but then we hit them with the the list so they can do the nutritional detox.
Right? Because nobody likes that list, but now they've got some buy-in. So then we tell them, okay, this is the list, it's got to come out for at least two weeks. Like put a date on the calendar. like you're quitting smoking and just and and take it out, you know. And there's always something or a few things that people think they're upset about, but they they never miss it after the first few days, you know. Yeah. Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Uh-huh, okay.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah. And just for clarity, the list of food that they're gonna take out for a time. Okay.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Foods and d certain drinks, you know, like I mean, obviously they've gotta get off the alcohol, coffee, caffeine drinks for two weeks, you know, we do get a little kickback on those from people, dairy, wheat products and and and and a few other things that are just in in contributing to the body burden of inflammation.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah. Okay, so we start with an herbal detox. Well, labs imaging, herbal detox, nutritional detox. Where do we continue to go from here?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm. We've got to get them figuring out what's going on with their blood sugar. We've got to get them to see what's going on because we wanna stabilize that in. We don't want any peaks and valleys and we don't want it high all the time either, right? So that's that's a big part of what we do. I'm gonna just let Sun's dog out here. He's just being crying.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:You're good, you're good. You can go check, yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:and then we get everybody intermittent fasting, you know? and and eating finish eating earlier in the day is very important. Wanna try to get with the sun. Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay. Can we talk about this for a second? Because I I had a nutritionist on last year to talk about blood sugar. And I was interested in talking to her about how blood sugar can be contributing to anxiety or emotions. So we were talking about the connection there really specifically. and it was fascinating about how blood sugar is affecting the nervous system. But
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Ugh yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:huh.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:I'd love to go into this a little bit deeper and also I just have to say this. I have so many men in my life who skip breakfast, like have coffee, skip breakfast, eat a light lunch, and then eat a huge dinner. And I wanna I wanna jump on and go like, can we flip that?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Uh-huh. Uh-huh.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:But at the same time, I don't know, maybe their physiology is different. So I'd also love your input on you mentioned intermittent fasting and is there an order in which we do that or does it not matter?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:So the only thing is like 'cause a lot of people have pushed it down, we just don't wanna be eating late. So f you wanna push it up. So this you know, it's summer, the sun's setting at different times, so I just say just be done by six PM.
Just be done by six famine. And and that's where everything action to like don't work out at night, you know, don't work at night. Cause it's just like think about this. I'm sure you've gone camping, right? and and me too, you know. I'm not a camper, I'm kind of a like a little diva brat, but I've gone, you know, and and in the tent, right? And when the sun goes down, it's black outside. You're going to bed. You go to bed, you know? And then you get up when the sun goes
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Comes up, like, Yay! You know, and so that's kind of like how our physiology thrives is if we just do all the action stuff kind of like in the daytime. And so just doing that, people will lose weight and get healthier, you know, just doing circadian fasting and not even worrying about anything else, just like sticking with the daylight.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. Yeah. I even as you're saying it, I'm like, and I know so many people who do their workouts at night. And
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes.
It seems convenient. It seems convenient. But let Circadian living and circadian fasting do a rabbit hole on that one 'cause that it really clicks. It make it makes sense, you know? we didn't always have like these lights and everything and even that's affecting the hormones, you know, and and the insulin and the girls getting their periods younger, you know, like that's part of it too, right? I I know a fella that he is so cute. He was a
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:yeah. yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:trainer and he was training people at night and he was eating at night and he was working at night and he just became a hot mess to where they were saying that you have fibromyalgia. and he said that basically by getting back on the circadian rhythm and red light therapy he healed himself and he is so cute because he's so hardcore that he doesn't even do lights at night, he does candlelights.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:yeah, I love it.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:I'm like, that sounds like really good mood setting. so those are my goals are to be like him 'cause I'm like, I'd like to get into like doing just candles at night. But he literally re he was just debilitated and just by getting back getting rid of that night schedule and getting more natural light and red light therapy, like he healed himself.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, and the essence of this is y and how this affects blood sugar. You're dumping all this food in, you're doing exercise that then is requiring more energy. Can you just speak to that maybe really briefly?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah. So it's just it's gonna like exercise is great, but it also you're gonna make cortisol when you make when you exercise, right? So cortisol is gonna kinda give you energy. This is gonna inhibit your sleep cycle, right? It's gonna make more inflammation in the body, right? And then all these other things happen when you eat at night too. Like you're gonna get dysregulations, you know, 'cause maybe you eat too many carbs, so then you're gonna get a reactive low blood sugar and wake up in the middle of the night and not know what's going on. also people with, you know, indigestion.
you know, you don't have to deal with that heartburn i as much if you put that put that meal earlier, you know, and and all of these things. It's not just it's not just the blood sugar, but you're not gonna get any of these like balancing things and stuff happening in the middle of the night while you're sleeping, you know, if you move those meals up earlier. And just having people do that, like they'll do six pounds in a week.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Like they'll write me, my god, I lost six pounds last week and I I literally just tell them, like, can you get to two meals a day and be done by six PM? And it I don't literally don't care if you eat the same amount of food, just just less often.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. Wow. That's so profound. It's so profound. And it's funny because it even makes me think I feel better when I first of all, I feel awful if I skip breakfast. I can't. Like I I get jittery, I get wobbly, I get lightheaded. I probably have some blood sugar work to do. But but I feel really good when I skip dinner. I just do. Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:yeah.
Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:yeah. Yeah, so you could say dinner, the best meal of the day to skip for me.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. I feel lighter, I feel more clear headed. But it's so funny. And do you do you have a perspective on I just know a lot of people who will be like, No, I'm not really hungry in the morning, so I just have my cup of coffee. I don't really get hungry until lunchtime. And is that like, good, you're listening to your body honor that, or is that, mm, something might be a little off, we need to tweak it?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:No, I think that's fine. Sometimes we just eat one meal a day and we just eat at one. Yeah. Well one meal, just one big meal a day, you know? but it's it's
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. Okay.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:It's it's better just to not eat late, you know. So a lot of people it's it's all over the map. Like some people do like a ten AM and like a three PM, you know, or or whatever. but I would just say just eat two meals a day, get rid of the snacks, and don't eat late. And whatever way that lands for you is great. The closer together your meals are is better too, because then you have that bigger fasting window, right? And so it's that's better for your blood sugar and your insulin and your stem cells to get activated.
all of that. So like because some people are doing like an 8 a.m. and an eight p.m. I'm like, don't don't do that. Like squish them, like squish them together. You know? and the way and you might go, well I'm hungry. Like I'm hungry. Well if you eat more nutrient dense food you'll stay full longer. And once you get down, like like last summer, all summer me and my son just did like one meal a day and we're like we'll never go back to three meals a day. Like that's crazy. It's like as soon as you finish cleaning you gotta think about what you're gonna eat next, you know
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, I mean you realize how much like time, energy, focus you get back when you're not thinking about food.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Right, and then you have to put that energy to digest it and so it keeps your energy low. And so we just found that we were more creative, we had more energy for other interests when we ate less often. and I know like I grew up the I grew up the same as probably everybody, like three meals a day plus snacks. I was I was a hypoglycemic kid, you know, see, like then I later I got pre-diabetic 'cause instead of, you know, figuring out how to balance that, they were like, just feed her, just feed her, just feed her all the time, right? which was actually a recipe for more insulin resistance.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right. Okay. I wanna spend a little more time on this food piece because I think it's probably one that there's also a lot of misconceptions, a lot of misguidance, a lot of myths around because and again, I'm not super well versed in heart disease and cholesterol, but I do understand that when someone gets a cholesterol diagnosis, the doctor's telling them, like, eat less butter or you know, something and
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Right.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, the the the traditional advice is to go low fat, low salt, high carb. The problem is that is gonna give people worse blood pressure, worse blood sugar, and that leads to more plaque.
And and and and I've talked to people after going to traditional cardiac rehab and and following this advice and getting worse, you know? like ev even a guy that just worked with me last summer and he's a doctor and he's like a boy scout. Like he's got like the studious personality. So of course he did everything they told him the cardiac rehab and like ever I mean, he was a mess when he when he called me. I mean, I was almost like, should I work with him? you know?
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:huh.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:But it was incredible because it we it was crazy because like like he called me and he was desperate and I said okay you know and then he went to go do a cardiac stress test before he started working with me and he literally passed out during the cardiac stress test. Then he was hospitalized for erratic blood pressure, right? and then I I was like, All right, here we go. And this is that's why it was so incredible because in in three weeks his cardiologist weaned him off of
One of his blood pressure meds.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Wow. my gosh. Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:I was like, just kidding. And he's the one that he had followed the conventional advice and just found that he only had, you know, was was not in a good state and and and other people. So the high carbohydrate diet is kind of what led us astray, right? So I grew up afraid of fat. I'm forty-four. You know, everybody wanted fat free, no fat, lean cuisine. I thought it was all healthy with like Lean Cuisines, you know. put them in the microwave
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:yeah, I remember the link cuisines.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:No, I look and like I microwaving ravioli with like margarine. Like what was I thinking? You know? But so so we were afraid of fat and I I really thought if I ate butter I would die of a heart attack. I mean, that was the narrative. And I almost fell out of my chair and not it took me, I had to go to naturopathic medical school, and and the nutrition teacher was like, you need fat to feel full. When we were afraid of fat,
Everyone got fat.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, wow. Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:So I was like, wait, so can I eat butter? Yes. Yes.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Uhhuh. huh. Moral of the story, we can eat butter.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:I've been miss I was missing out on the butter all this time. It's delicious and it's actually really stabilizing for your metabolic system. So the things that we were maybe told that were healthier and and maybe you haven't haven't heard yet is the margarine. The margarine, you want to not do that, and then the seed oils, and they cleverly marketed them as vegetable oils, which sounds pretty sounds kind of healthy, you know. But those are actually oxidizing.
us, which is oxidizing is like rusting from the inside. It's like causing damage to the tissues. That's why antioxidants sound so sexy and healthy because they're gonna help those oxidizing agents calm down.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. So now when you're trying to help balance blood sugar, and then I promise I'll take us off the food piece, but when you're trying to help balance someone's blood sugar, you are coming to them with a list of we gotta cut all this out. Is there a world in which we're working some of it back in? Is there cases where it's, hey bud, you're never gonna be able to eat that again? What what can people kind of look at this?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Okay.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Everyone
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Well everyone pretty much has to go low carb
You know, and and everybody kind of just has to like s say goodbye to like white potatoes and white rice. Okay. Like you might as well just eat a piece of cake. That is just totally blowing your whole dinner right there. Sorry. But at first a lot of people they don't know that they come in pre-diabetic. They had no idea, right? So or diabetic and they didn't even know, right? So I'm like, okay, it's out for now. And then here's the other thing
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:huh.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Ha ha.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:thing they gotta move after they eat. Every time you eat, I love your going to the gym, X, Y, Z, whatever. You gotta move after you eat. You have to move after you eat. The easiest way is to just do 30 squats because it doesn't take very long and it's very efficient. But this gets adding glucose into the muscles. The muscles love glucose. And that's one of the reasons we have too much of it too. It's not just what we eat because when we get stressed, our
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:body thinks there's an emergency. And in an emergency, you know, our nervous systems are wired to run or fight, both of which involve the muscles.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:So the muscles need some fuel for this activity. So that's why the liver would pump out some stored glucose to the system just from stress. Although most of this is in our imagination, we're probably not gonna run or fight, right? and then we and
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right. So there's there's all this unused glucose in the tissues.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes. And that's what's contributing also to the insulin resistance, especially when I said those people that are doing everything that with we have that chronic stress, metabolic mess, because it's just pumping that out all the time. Even if you're you don't have to be yelling at people to have chronic stress or, you know, having a life crisis. It's just a never ending to do list is stressful, having to always be somewhere. Mental gymnastics, like you're the chess master of your family, of the business, of whatever, you know. And the
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right, right.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Where are you?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:that feels like an emergency to the body. so that's part of the problem. And then of course when we're stressed we don't put the healthiest things in our mouth. True. So there's so then that happens. Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah. But doing a little bit of movement after eating is okay.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Everybody should get into that habit that we missed that was missing from the human manual. And and so, like, for instance, if like you you're like, man, I really went to town on that pizza. My you have the glucose sensor on and you see your glucose going up. If you get up and just do the 30 squats, you'll see it go down 20 points in like five minutes, you know? Like it's very efficient. and it's just good. So just get up and move. If you want to go to bed after you eat,
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Uh-huh.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Holy cow.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Bad sign. That's not normal. That's a sign that you're having a reactive hypoglycemia or low blood sugar. So the blood sugar is kind of like a like a pendulum or ping pong ball, right? So what goes up must come down, right? So if you're getting snoozy after eating, there was too the glucose load was too high, and then you got a reactive hypoglycemia.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Leigh Ann Lindsey (45:36.561)
Got it.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:So if you know it was high, get up and walk and do squats before it hits ya.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:before the drop happens. Yeah. And the the activity's helping it maybe drop slower or come down a little bit slower so you don't have a massive drop.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yes. Yes. So so you get it gets even to a normal range, not a hypo hypo range. Yeah. Yeah. So that's the one thing that we all didn't know that we were supposed to be doing that needs to be incorporated into the lifestyle.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Got it. Okay.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. And so for you, is it we we're not worried about fats? We're not avoiding fats. Maybe we're avoiding some of these inflammatory seed oils and the margarine and the fake butters.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Definitely. Yeah. That's an issue because like pretty much ninety-nine percent of restaurants are using seed oils. We have this dream that they would just make seed oils like illegal and take them out of the marketplace because listen, listen, if they did that, America would get so much healthier, girl. Like overnight. Like overnight. I'm telling you.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:yeah. I know I don't know where you are in the world, but or in in the States, but I'm in Orange County, Southern California. So we do. We have like a a cool kind of collection of seed oil free places, which is really cool. But yeah, that's that is not the majority. We are in such a bubble here.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:they probably have some seed oil free spots popping up. Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:It's the future, but it's the past. That's the funny thing. It's the future. So I right I'm in Scottsdale. Scottsdale's progressive too. So we've got like delicious places, you know, popping up and stuff. But when I go back to Florida, it's just like not happening yet, right? But I I I think we're gonna see this more and more because people are getting clued into it, you know. but people still don't know. So like just for those of you that are going, okay, wait, how do I know if I'm eating a seed oil? The biggest one is like canola oil.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:I
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Grapeseed oil, sunflower oil, and these ones. Cause they're cheap and they don't have a flavor, right? so those are the ones you want to avoid because they they're causing inflammation. They're oxidizing us, they're causing that rusting on the inside. And so th that's really contributing to damaging our arteries, but also everything, you know, like the depression, the anxiety, everything. So just take it avoiding eating out if you can, because even
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Even like the salad dressings are gonna be made with seed oils like nine times out of ten. the meat marinades are gonna be in a seed oil base, you know, so it's like you wouldn't even think of places where it is. But that's that is a great thing to try to avoid if you can.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yes. Okay, now a couple more questions I want to get us to, and I'm cognizant of our time, so I'm gonna try to squeeze these in. One is, so herbal, herbal detox, diet detox, glucose monitoring, we've got to get the blood sugar balanced, non-negotiable. Are there any other beyond those, and this is just fun because we're in the integrative world and the biohacking world a little bit, other modalities, resources that at some point you might bring in?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, so I do have everyone do a gut kit after they get through the detoxing because we gotta get that gut inflammation under control because that actually leaks out and causes systemic contributes to the systemic inflammation, right? And everyone's gut is a bit funky these days. you know, especially because we can't avoid all those interesting things that get into the the food sources, right? So I have all my clients do the gut kit once a year. Very, very key
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Is that is that something proprietary to you or is that what it's actually called? okay. Okay. Mm-hmm.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:is what I call it. Yeah, it's herbs. I'm really into herbs. Yeah, it's an herbal kit for the gut. and then and then I have everyone do a calcium balancing therapy because we talked about the calcium getting stuck in the arteries or even like my arrhythmia people that can be calcium intracellularly up causing arrhythmias, right? so we do an orthomolecular ionic calcium therapy. It's not a calcium supplement, right? It's different, way better. So basically goes in and scoops up essentially rogue calcium and puts it back into the bones and teeth, right? So this this is incredible.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay, wow. And that that's like a supplement protocol they're doing. Okay.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, they have to do that. It's very important. Because that's a key component of like the damage in the arteries, right? But also of aging. Calcium gunking up is a huge component of aging. so that is really, really key. And then we have everybody that's got plaque or something serious going on do some IVs with us, right? and what I do with the clients is I do a combination of ozone, ultraviolet light, and
Plaquex and now I'm adding in a little bit more. I'll either add in something for the liver or the mitochondria just because I'm seeing that every it's it's bigger than the cardiovascular system. It's this metabolic chronic stress situation going on that just needs a little bit more there. And then obviously you know we do a we do a
a lot of like you know like gratitude and mindfulness and keeping on the right the right path we do a nervous system reset every Wednesday with like different cycling meditation teachers. I don't always like to say meditation because it kind of triggers some people but you know just we have to learn how to relax because it's not that big in American culture right like there's no siesta time we're hustlers we're we got a side hustle you know we're not taking a
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yes.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. we're doing the exact opposite, which is like let's take time off our sleep. Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah. Yeah. So so that's really important. And that's the one
that might be the most important and that's the one that's the easiest for the for the clients to blow off, right? Like a lot of clients will want to do the IVs, right? But you can't just do the IVs. Like you need to do these fundamental basics to have a good foundation to build your house on, right? And even if you do that and the IVs, if you don't take care of this mental emotional stuff, it will take you out. It will.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah. What I think is so exciting, and I'm gonna lead us into the emotional piece in a second though, is you know, I have I have clients who have the Lyme disease, mold, and that's a long journey. You know, I mean that could easily be a year-long journey of slowly detoxing, but it seems to me like
The heart health can really make a turnaround quite quickly. I mean, you were sharing some client stories of you know, three weeks and these numbers were dropping significantly. That's really exciting.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Yeah, that's that's the thing. It's like that's why I want more people to know about this 'cause it's it's it doesn't take forever. It's it it's it's it's not it's might sound like a lot if this is just you're used to just popping a statin or whatever, but it but it it's not a lot, but like usually in the first two to three weeks, people on blood pressure meds need to start weaning down off of those, right? people that need to lose weight, they're losing weight, like guys up to twenty five pounds in the first month. And and this isn't no injectable peptide.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:whatever this is just really basic stuff right but it's efficient and that thing about the the glucose sensor that's incredible is it it's the best thing I've found for patient compliance right because I can blah blah blah you know all day like nobody cares but like when you see it on your phone in real time you're like man that's a bad snack you know once you know the guidelines and the rules and the hacks then you can't unsee that and I've just I've seen so many people turn around
their eating habits and their health and their lives just, you know, through that 'cause we need that, you know, incentive to like take action.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, I mean you're just you're making me feel like that's something I really need to check in with. When I interviewed that nutritionist a few months back, I had that nudge of, Leigh Ann, you might want to look at this because I think I've got some signs of some blood sugar imbalance and so you're giving me more conviction that it might be time to look at that.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, yeah, and I love berberine too for insulin and and glucose stuff. Berberine's amazing, but yeah, and th th they don't hurt. It looks intimidating the needle, but it's you just pop it on and you're like, okay, that was it and even some of the clients, like myself included, like we get addicted to it 'cause you're like, now it's happening and now it's happening So then, you know, my husband will be like, I think it's time to take a break from that you know
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:V
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. Totally. Okay, last question I have to ask, and then we'll get to just how people can find you. What you've already spoken to this, I feel like, indirectly a little bit, but are there any emotional patterns you're seeing with clients coming in with heart disease, cholesterol issues, etcetera, where you're like, Yeah, there's kind of a common theme where a lot of my clients come in and they all seem to be talking about this thing.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, I think a lot of my clients are doers and they hold a lot and they don't ask for support.
Or even the idea of asking for support is very foreign to them. In fact, I think it's part of our intake, which is like who supports you? And we get a lot of like, I don't know, or no one does. I think that I s hear that a lot. And I s and I see them and I think that they're incredible. And they do all these incredible things for their business and their employees and their family and stuff. And I don't know if they've turned any of that around and like
put it on them. You know, and even like taking action, even for themselves when it's very obvious it's time to take action. it like it a lot of people aren't ready to do it for themselves. But so then we say, well would you do it for your family?
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, yeah. What's gonna be that factor? But to your point bringing in the numbers is so powerful. Okay, so I don't wanna take too much of your time. Wha how can people get in contact with you? What does this look like? Do you have a you mentioned being in Scottsdale but also Florida. Is there one location that you have a physical location?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Yeah, so the physical locations in Scottsdale. And then I also do almost quarterly immersion retreats in Sedona. So that's like a four-day immersion, which is great, because then you get all the pieces, we show you how to eat, you know, and everything. And you get the IVs, and so this is really great for a lot of my people that feel like they're too busy, you know, to like to put to put the time in. So and it's incredible. And I I love that because like on the second day everyone's like, I can't.
Believe I don't feel stressed. Like, I love that, you know. and then we teach you how to detox, we teach you how to balance your your blood sugar, like you just get like that immersion into everything, so you go home with the map. And then I do coaching with people all over the country, and they those people wouldn't come. So I have hybrid, well, they will come and do IVs with me in Scottsdale, but even the people that do the coaching wean down, wean off their meds, lose weight, you know, gain energy.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:get their breath back, people that were short of breath. So like just it's it's incredible by just getting the right map that people can age in reverse, you know.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, it makes me so excited. So we'll make sure some things are linked in the show notes, but where is the starting point? Where should people go first? What's the first step they can take?
Dr. Melanie Icard (:You you know what's probably easiest is just go to the website, which is drmelony Icard I C A R D dot com because on the website there's a link to watch my master class. So if you're like I want to know more about this BioHack Heart Blueprint, you can just click on that and play it. and then I do a live webinar usually once a month, so you can jump on that one and then we'll be live so you can ask questions. And I will have a challenge coming up with the herbal detox and
the metabolic hacks for August. So I haven't gotten that on the website yet, but it should be going up in the next few days because that is like that is where we start with everybody. It's like these lifestyle hats and the herbal detox because it's just win, win, win, win, win. You know, then you're motivated to like do more.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. that's amazing. Well, Dr. Icard, thank you so much. We could have gone on and on. but I think that was a beautiful place to start. It sounds like your website has a lot of resources where people can go learn more, get in contact. I'm I'm gonna be jumping on your website for myself and some people I know as well that I'm sure I'm gonna be sending your way. So thank you so much.
Dr. Melanie Icard (:Awesome, thank you.
