"Dr. Amy Loden Tiffany is a Christ-follower, wife, and mom of five, as well as a triple board-certified physician, TEDx speaker, and bestselling author. She is the founder and president of Vitality Medical & Wellness Consulting, where she helps high-achieving women optimize their health, hormones, and longevity through a faith-centered, science-backed approach."

https://vitalitymwc.org/

Linked In: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amy-loden/

Instagram: @‌dramytiffany

YouTube: @‌dramytiffany

Welcome to 12 Minute Converse with Jesus Believers.

God chose first to have a conversation with us, his creation.

Our prayer is that this listening space brings growth and transforms your life forever.

Praise God for you, Amy.

It's a great pleasure to connect with you.

What part of the world are you in today?

I'm in the United States in Missouri, right in the middle of the country, St. Louis.

Do people say Dr. Amy, Amy, Dr. Loden, Dr. Tiffany?

Most people call me Dr. Loden.

I have a few people who are, we'll just say they have gray hairs and they're less young, okay, and they call me Dr. Amy.

Now from the get-go, hormones and faith, how do they even come together?

Yes, you wouldn't think they do, but God designed our bodies, right, and God designed everything perfectly, intricately, and probably at the time, most people think of the ancient world, they weren't living to be in there.

Women weren't living to be in their 50s, 60s, and 70s, and so you don't really see this addressed in scripture, and it seems kind of like a goopy topic, but God created our bodies.

We know that our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and we are to steward whatever resources we've been given, and one of those resources is our bodies.

So when it comes to hormones, the way I look at that is it's just part of stewardship.

It's part of taking good care of our body, because we know that when women don't have the right hormone levels for a variety of reasons, menopause is the most significant one, they don't feel as good, they're not as productive, and most concerning to me as a believer is that they're not able to do the work that God has called them to do for his kingdom.

Yeah, let's tap into that.

Being a believer in the space, what is that like?

So within the medical space, and then separately as a business owner, it's not always the easiest thing to just come up and talk about faith in the United States.

It should be.

I've been in other parts of the world where it is,

so I know it's possible, and that's something that I'm really working to grow on in my own

journey, is how do I bring up faith with my patients, and most of my patients are not believers,

so they don't have the hope and the light that has been shared with me, and so I see my role as

being someone who speaks to God's goodness in their lives, helping them see where God is acting,

whether it's a tough time or a great time, but seeing that they are loved, they are cared for,

and that he definitely wants to reach them with that same love, and so I see myself as a conduit

for that, but that means I have to open my mouth, I have to be brave, and I have to say, hey, do you

realize that God's really working in your life, or can I pray for you, or this is how God has

worked in my life in that same situation, and then leaving the results to God and not worrying about

the outcomes, because he already knows what they will be.

Who in your family is responsible for you having this courage, if you had to pin it to one?

So I have great faith models.

I've been very blessed to have all the significant players in my life as a child and young adult within my family who pray, who believe the scriptures, who try to act out and live them imperfectly, of course, but I've got great role models in that from multiple, multiple people.

Is there a time you didn't believe or weren't this courageous?

I wouldn't say I didn't believe, but there were definitely times from my training in medical school, lived in New York City when I did my residency, there were definitely times that when I'm wearing my physician hat, I did not feel equipped or enabled to say anything.

I will note that those limitations were never directly put on me externally in a way that was explicit.

It was more the implicit culture.

We don't talk about this.

We only think about science and results, and that implicit expectation, I really let settle in my psyche and heart rather than telling God, this is scary to me, and I need you to take it and do something with me because you haven't given me a spirit of fear.

Where I am today is very different than where I was 10 years ago, and I hope and pray it's different than where I am 10 years from now.

If you could leave a message for yourself 10 years from today, listening to this conversation, what would that message be?

Make the decisions that will leave you with no regrets.

And so if that means stepping out boldly in faith more so than you're doing, then do it.

Everyone fears failure, but dying people fear regrets, and don't die with those regrets.

And we don't know how many days anyone has, so we need to be cognizant of this could be our last day, and if this is my last day, who am I going to meet today that needs to hear, feel, and see the love of Jesus?

Are you married?

I am.

I have a great husband.

Do you have children?

I have five.

What's life like having a mother who's running this side of a belief?

If you'd asked me that five years ago, I would have been a very angry, frustrated, bitter woman because I had four kids at the time, my job, I had 3,000 patients, I was working 60 to 70 hours a week, and I was essentially sacrificing my health and my children, my faith on the altar of career and success.

So five years ago, I left all of that and created my own business, and we're almost to hit our five-month mark this coming June.

And now I have five kids, and we are able to design the business around the family.

And I think that's really what I have to do as a Christian woman and wife and mother is the business supports my family.

My family does not support the business.

Let's get into the medical side of things.

Where are you seeing women losing momentum in understanding that what they're experiencing is hormonal versus this is what life is supposed to be like?

I think a lot of women are told exactly that.

This is just part of it, suck it up, buttercup type of mentality.

The other thing I think is that women, at least in the United States, are told this is just part of aging, and you just have to learn to live with it.

And the truth is, we don't have to have the same experiences our mothers and grandmothers did.

We can have very safe experiences.

And from my perspective, I don't think women realize how much they're losing, particularly women in the church.

I don't think they see how much their health is impacting their ministries and their callings, whether that's in their home or corporately.

They're not able to do what God has intended them to do because they don't understand their own bodies.

They don't understand hormones.

They don't understand how things change before pregnancy, during pregnancy, after pregnancy, before menopause, after menopause, all the things.

And at least in the United States, the medical system is not set up to support women in these transitions well at all.

It's very much run as many people through the hamster wheel as you can, but it's not focused holistically.

Spirituality is not considered, and we're not truly healing people.

We're putting Band-Aids on problems rather than getting to the root solution.

What are some of the symptoms that are indicators that those that are listening could say, okay, yeah, I probably should go through with seeing a doctor today?

Yeah.

So it's a variety, actually.

Historically, people thought it's just hot flashes and maybe some mood swings, maybe some night sweats, less desire for your spouse or partner.

There was a lot of confusion.

And today we now know that there are estrogen receptors on every cell of the female body.

And so when you lose estrogen production, if you don't replace it, every cell of your body is impacted, whether that's musculoskeletal, whether it's your liver, your heart, your brain, kidneys, it doesn't matter.

It's going to be impacted.

And so that impact is felt in different ways.

Sometimes it's silent and you see it in blood work results.

Sometimes it's very visible and it is tremendous mood swings with rage and inability to sleep and all sorts of mental health disorders.

Sometimes it's the dementia that kicks in early or the first heart attack because nobody was doing anything preventatively and paying attention to labs.

So it really can impact any way for these women.

And the key is if it's different than what she recognizes as her baseline, then it's worth considering.

And I would be remiss, of course, not to mention that weight gain, particularly when people have changed nothing in their lifestyle, but weight gain around the belly, one of the biggest signs.

In closing, is there anything else you'd like to share?

If you don't know the Lord, please talk to someone today because today is the day to come to salvation.

If someone's listening and the answer is, no, I don't know the Lord, what would you have them say?

So we can go straight back to what Jesus said.

He says, I am the way, the truth and the life.

No one comes to the father through me.

And he invites every one of us to come to him.

He's waiting.

And so if you, all you can do is cry out to the Lord.

Romans 10, 13 says, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Just believe in your heart that Jesus is Lord.

Believe that God raised him from the dead, that God accepted his death in your place, that God resurrected him because his sacrifice was perfect.

That's the ease of salvation.

Believe that, confess it, go tell somebody else.

So easy.

We make it so difficult, but it's easy, easy.

And it would be just a beautiful, special thing for me to get to heaven someday and realize that somebody heard this show through the work you're doing and they were able to come to the home court.

And that would be to his glory.

Amy, a pleasure.

I treasure.

Thank you for being on What is Inspired by 12 Minute Converse.