The Menopause Menu
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Kara Wada, MD: Welcome back everyone to this episode of the Becoming Immune Confident podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Kara Wada, board certified pediatric and adult allergy, immunology, lifestyle medicine doc, and autoimmune patient. And as I love welcoming some of my amazing colleagues and friends to the show and this week we have a real treat.
Dr. Susan Baumgartel is an internal medicine physician with over 30 years of experience. She founded her business, MyMDAdvocate in 2022, transitioning from inpatient clinical medicine to virtual medical advocacy arena. While in the 2020 pandemic, while it was raging, her innate creativity blossomed with the launching of Menopause Menu, a free resource and blog website providing nourishing support for menopause and beyond.
Always a keen observer of the human condition and a lover of nature, Susan recognized her strengths as a storyteller and applied them to a variety of non fiction writing venues. Her stories and essays have appeared online and in print on a variety of platforms. She also collaborates with people all over the globe via podcast, live stream events, lectures, and other venues.
And she has just written her first book, which was released late this summer. It is called "The Menopause Menu—From Hot Flashes to Delicious Dishes: A Symptom-driven, Nourishing Guide to Mastering Menopause." When not devoting time to writing or patient consultation, Susan can be found volunteering for Cancer Lifeline, a regional non profit optimizing the quality of life for all people touched by cancer.
She lives in Seattle with her husband of 32 years and is a proud mom to a daughter who is serving as an officer in the U. S. Navy. Susan, I'm so glad we were able to connect and find time to talk all about the amazing things you're doing and in particular, focus a little bit on some things that we love together, which is advocacy.
And spending some time in the kitchen, using food and nourishment in healing ways. Can you share a little bit more about your story, how you got into doing this work you're doing?
Introduction of Dr. Susan J. Baumgaertel
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Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Thank you for having me here. It's just a pleasure to chat with you and to shoot the breeze, as they say. There's so many things I think that we intersect with, especially you, you did, you left out the intermix of holistic and evidence-based principles together.
And that's really has fueled my work for 30 years. I can't believe I've been a doctor for 30 years now. So I practiced clinical medicine forever and I pivoted, but in a good way in terms of I needed a change. I didn't, I really love working for myself, frankly, I think it's just the cat's meow.
And I realized that thinking about my Menopause Menu website that I had so much more to offer. And I thought, 'Gosh, there's a book there somewhere'. That of course, I don't think I could have done had I been in my previous position. So branching out, becoming an advocate in really what I do is help people navigate systems.
I'm a consultant, so I'm still serving as an MD. I can really help them almost fill the gap. A lot of people are between doctors or not sure about where to go or maybe have chronic illness chronic disease. I'm very attuned to that and I know that's something that is close to you as well.
And to me, I feel like I can honor my experience, my expertise and still be a value because I really connect with people one on one. I like that human rapport in that relationship. And it's just it all came together last night, actually with the bow on top, when I had my book launch party to meet a lot of people in person, some of my colleagues, but certainly patients.
And to me that was, Oh boy, tears of joy there. So I love what I do and it's just been a fun journey.
The Menopause Menu
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Kara Wada, MD: What led you to start your blog and your website?
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: So that, I guess I would call it my passion project. That was 2020, like the first year of the pandemic. I think everyone has a pandemic story, right?
I really, I felt, " Gosh, I've got to do something or I'm going to just go out of, I'm going to go crazy". And I knew that I wanted to do something like that. So it was organic and I knew I wanted it to be free. I want it to be for everyone. Yeah, initially I put just for women, but it's really for all people.
It's not just for women, but it really was a kind of like a hub, a place that you can come to under the information tab. There's 16 different sections and actually they correlate with chapters of my book. But then it was also fun, there's a blog, there's like videos, there's recipes, of course, everything I do, there's food in it or flowers.
I felt like it was a good place to put my creative energies that were squelched in my professional role and the pandemic sure didn't help either. So it was an outlet and it was it's nice that I can continue that now. So it wasn't just like a one and done thing.
Kara Wada, MD: I'm curious if you have, and this is just us chatting, but if you have a favorite recipe you've made lately or maybe one in the book that you want to like.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: There is a, see, I have to put my glasses on because I want to get the correct attribution here. So on chapter three, or is it two, see it's all blending together when you write a book. It is chapter three. Always trust your first instinct. The chapter on sleep disruption. And it's funny because one of my patients said wait a minute, the title is Cheesy Veggie Quiche with a Hash Brown Crust.
They first saw this and said 'Hell I'm gonna do this before bedtime, this is too complicated'. And then they read, quote, 'Short on sleep last night? No time for breakfast? This tasty quiche can be made ahead of time, cut into single servings, kept in the fridge or frozen for a few weeks. Now your breakfast is ready in less than one minute in the microwave.'
The whole point is that you're tired, maybe you haven't slept well, you want something fast, it has great protein, it has veggies in it. And I really want to put these on because I wanted to give the correct attribution. And Dr. Heather Schultz is in your neck of the woods, I think.
She's Midwest. This is her recipe. And so I just want to shout out to Dr. Schultz for her fantastic recipe that made it into my book. So that I have made about four times and I mix it up every time, you can put whatever you want. Doesn't have to be veggie. You can like toss in chunks of Canadian bacon if you want to.
But it's so great because of the hash brown crust. And it's just a proud placer.
Kara Wada, MD: No, I'm gonna have I'm gonna have to try that because my kiddos this past weekend, we happened to have some hash browns in the freezer that needed to be used up, and they gobbled them up, so I'm cautiously optimistic that maybe I could, especially if I put some cheese on it that tends to be in a way,
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: You can dice up, you can dice up broccolini or broccoli, you can put the red bell peppers, you can put, I don't know if they like mushrooms, I love mushrooms, but you can put tons of things that really taste good together, they're gonna love it.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah, that sounds fantastic. Oh, cool. And I could see even if someone were plant based, you could easily maybe swap out like just egg in there too.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Absolutely. Yeah. In fact, I think someone I never set out to do it this way, but one of my colleagues actually said ' Hey, this is pretty much a plant based' I think, 'Oh, you're right.'
I think 15 of 16 recipes are basically plant-based.
Kara Wada, MD: Oh, cool. You're like. I wasn't even trying, and it's not that way. So talk with us a little bit more. We know about a little bit about chapter three, but how tell us a little bit more about the menopause menu and...
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Yeah, so I set out, thank you, I set out to write a book that was going to be helpful for women who are perimenopause, menopause, and just maybe recently postmenopause.
And I think I did accomplish that, but it really spans a wider audience and a wider range. As I was seeing last night at my little event I had men there, not just women, but men as well. I think the youngest guy was 25-ish and the oldest was 81. And then women of all ages and that really made my heart sing because I did want a resource for everyone so that was the accomplishment. I also really didn't want a medical textbook. If you have to look up every third word, forget it, it's just too complicated. I also didn't want to dumb it down. There's too much. Don't even get me started on those websites, the snake oil and the, just the Hollywood 'oh, I can tell you everything'. I didn't want, I didn't want it in that venue either. So I wanted it mid range, good advice, evidence based, with a kind of sprinkle of holistic, whimsical stuff. And if anyone knows me, they know that I love flowers. I love art. My late mother was an artist, and so of course I put her picture on the front cover of the book.
So it had to have a look in the feel of those days gone by people had those beautiful, we had beautiful art books in our coffee table. So I wanted to create like a coffee table book where you just could open it up to any page. Could be page 49, and then you just maybe, you only have five minutes, so you just look at it, maybe read a little bit, look at a picture, and then you put it down, come back later. So it's not something you have to read in order, and I think it worked out well, so I'm really pleased.
Menopause Discussion: Then and Now
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Kara Wada, MD: That's incredible. So one thing I'm realizing as I am ticking ever closer to my 40th birthday next spring is menopause has not been talked about.
I don't know that my mom shared very much about it. I don't know that her mom shared much with her. They don't have a super close relationship, and I'm wondering if you could speak to that a little bit.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Oh boy, you're spot on. I'm thinking I'm getting really close to 60 now, so I'm at the other end of that spectrum, but i, too, think about when, first of all, when my mother was going through menopause, I'm sure I was probably going through puberty. Oh my God, what Holy Spirit decided that was a good idea for a household. Hormones! Hormones!
Kara Wada, MD: Actually, that'll probably be our house now that I'm thinking about it, yeah.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Even though maybe now it's more, in the limelight and people can talk about it, even it's not it's not common talk. You don't just whip out talking about vaginal dryness or your period is changing or whatever. I do think that I'm seeing such a shift, a paradigm shift even in the lay press.
There's not a day goes by when you don't see something, and it could be the Washington Post, or New York Times, or some other national, international publication or journal, and it's about menopause, or maybe it's about menopause in the workplace. And, I think that's fantastic. I do think it might get overdone at some point and people are like, 'Oh my god, I'm sick of these articles on menopause.'
But I think for now they are a great service to people because it allows a discussion and it allows, it's a nuanced discussion too, because as we know, women go through this in a very different experience for different women, but there are some common themes. And I think it's nice to know, first of all, you're not alone, but it's also nice to know what to prepare for and how to balance it in the context of your work and your life and in your family too.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah. I'm thinking too, in general, about how the discussion of our periods at least in my immediate family is so different than what I grew up with, and I am hopeful and imagine it will continue the discussion as my kiddos get older. But growing up, periods, especially when I was the age that my girls are now, which is kindergarten and second grade, were very hush.
I remember being on a family trip, we went down to my dad's parents house, and my mom must have had some sort of period problem. It was very hush. My sister and I were very worried about mom. There was just this tense, secretive energy. My cousin was there, who was a couple years older. I'm sure she knew it was up, but she didn't want to spill the beans about everything and I contrast that now where my 20 month old is one morning literally playing with tampons.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Yep
Kara Wada, MD: And you know having these conversations with my girls that you know trying to keep things age appropriate not over complicate things but just say this is part of life.
This happens to mom every month. It doesn't thankfully it doesn't hurt for some people they may, and you want to let me know, these different things. And it's just a big nothing burger, so to speak. I feel like I'm, I personally though, have lived that experience since I was, what, 12 or 13 so I got that under my belt. I suppose by the time they're getting ready for menopause, maybe I'll feel similarly.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: I love the fact that your story says that we're normalizing our bodies and talking about our bodies, especially as women and to other women to be. It's interesting when I reflect on, the industry there, there's a lot of self help, a lot of books, a lot of support, a lot of love and kind of kinship for women who are trying to conceive or they're pregnant or they're going to deliver their babies.
But you don't get that sense 'Let's all come together and talk about it and support you when you're going through pre or peri or menopause' so I think that I hope to see more of that and more stories that are reflecting of ' It's okay to talk about it' because you're right, I think very few of us collectively us have experiences where we've shared things with our mother or if we have an aunt or a much older sister, which I don't we just keep it to yourself.
And so I think as we see more of that generationally happen my hope is that just, this becomes a normal thing aging. We're just aging. We're all aging, right? And midlife, menopause is midlife, and there are a lot of things that happen in midlife, and it's okay to talk about it.
Kara Wada, MD: I recall it has been several years ago now, but one of the very first conversations I heard openly about menopause was on NPR. Someone was probably promoting their book at the time, and I've tried to look to see which one it may have been because in the subsequent years I've been like, 'oh, but I remember hearing that humans and orca whales are two of the species of the few species where there really is this wisdom that's carried on for the culture from post menopausal women and leaders within the societies, which I just found so cool.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Oh, I think I read the same or maybe heard the same. I love that by the way, because I'm in Seattle and by water and we have all these orca pods and so very much. I think back in the 1970s or probably 1980s, I remember adopting a whale.
There's a program to support. So you basically pay, I think it was 50 back then or 100. And basically you got the certificate and it showed, and the whale's name was Blossom and she was in the J pod. They identify them by their dorsal fin. So I got this official certificate. I had forgotten about that long ago until recently.
When I thought ' Oh, I wonder whatever happened wa s Blossom a real name? So of course Google, I'll be darned Blossom they think she's still around. She's like a grandmother by now.
Kara Wada, MD: That's so cool.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Yeah, that whale wisdom, women's wisdom. There's a lot of analogies there.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah.
It brings us back to that lost connection that we so are in with nature. Yeah.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Yeah, very much.
Importance of stress management during menopause
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Kara Wada, MD: Yeah, as I'm here in suburbia. Although where I sit in my dining room slash office I'm quite fortunate that it faces our backyard and there are a ton of chipmunks and little squirrels that live right out here because we have an oak tree and they love acorns.
So every once in a while, while I'm recording or what have you, or on is maybe a Zoom that I'm a little less than excited about. You know, some little rodent creature that probably is trying to bury or dig under our foundation.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: In my book and in my practice and my life philosophy, I always think about ways to improve stress management and I do feel that stress plays a role in so many things. We could talk for days about autoimmune disorder, about chronic illness, about auto inflammatory and autoimmune disorders, auto inflammatory disorders and menopause, of course. And I am so happy in my home office. I have this big window.
I'm on the second floor, which is really like third floor because of our topography. And there's just a bunch of trees and every day, I can get very distracted by the birds because there's a little chickadee or the juncos or lately there's been this sharp shinned hawk family.
I think they had babies they're fledglings and so they're around, of course that means crows because they're interrogating them and then of course the seagulls have to get in. There's just literally, I'm in an aviary and it's so fun because sometimes they really get going and it's just pulls me out into that little realm and I can get right back into where I was and I just had a little, it's like a little meditation moment without even trying.
Kara Wada, MD: That's wonderful. My kiddos have been very fortunate in their preschool daycare. Part of the education program for kids is once a week they have a nature educator come in and many times they're now teaching my husband. 'Oh, yeah, that's the chickadee. Oh, that's, oh, don't break all the leaves because we need to protect some habitat for the salamanders.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Love it.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah, so I have hope for our future generations, not only for our discussion about menopause but also maybe reconnecting a little bit more with our outdoor spaces. Can only hope.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Very much and in my professional career, I developed a program called Menu for Change, which was a 7 year program that ran from 2012 through 2019. I shut it down because our organization was going to be taken over and I just wanted to close it in my terms. But it was really a pleasure to have mostly women, but some men come in and work on weight management and it actually turned more into a wellness program morphed beautifully.
And so I had naturopathic docs, acupuncturist, nutritionist, exercise, physiologist, psychologist. We had so many things in this program. It was so robust. And a big theme of it was stress management. And a lot of it was, I had Saturday morning walks in Discovery Park, which is a massive public piece of land.
It was beautiful. So we had walking groups or, just we had stress management workshops and there are things that you didn't just apply to menopause, but absolutely it can apply to menopause in terms of how to navigate stress. Of course, a lot of it was with trying to think about weight management, but it was to me just I think a sign of the times because I think a lot of people are focusing on that now, rightly.
Kara Wada, MD: Absolutely. And I think you hit upon two, at least two key factors that just on the cusp of starting to pay attention more to the discussion about menopause knowing that it's around the corner are the weight, seeing some shifts there bone health, something else that is certainly come to mind and hot flashes and learning how to get through those.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Yeah. No, I would say weight is often what many women are focused on and frustrated by. But that's, it's almost insidious because it can develop over time and certainly not go away or go away quickly. I think the bone health and lean muscle mass and worrying about where are we going to prevent osteoporosis, that's really front and center, especially the first five years when you're in early menopause, excuse me, early post menopause.
But yeah, hot flashes. Oh boy, as I'm sitting here with my sweater thinking, Ooh, I should just, you learn how to dress in layers and one of the things in my book, which is, here's the glasses again written by a psychologist Cheryl Lehman and it was the first chapter on hot flashes because of course, hot flashes was the first chapter.
I put in the dessert section how to ride the hot flash wave. And Dr. Lehman talks about, imagining the hot flash, that step one describes how to do that, step two, slow rhythm breathing, a lot of people know how to do box breathing and slow rhythm breathing, and then step three, waves in the beach, thinking about each hot flash as a wave and repeating this three step sequence as many times, and this will create a new response pattern that you can activate during an actual hot flash.
And you can read that quick and say, yeah, posh. But actually if you do it, it really, you gain control because one of the worst things about a hot flash is ' Oh my God, it's when I least expect it. And I have no control over this puppy'. You actually do. There are many things to reduce hot flashes.
And when you're in one, it's not the end of the world, even though for a microsecond, it feels that way, but you can actually control it. And that to me is very empowering.
Exploring menopause-related myths and facts
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Kara Wada, MD: Absolutely. I just remember that little, that little taste of them in those first few days after delivering my kiddos, especially my girls.
I assume maybe the estrogen drop was more precipitous. Oh, man. I thought I was septic for a minute there which is when you know, yeah, a little too much or whatever. But quite intense. And thank you. But I would certainly see where those breathing techniques could be so vital.
Do you have a particular chapter that you think would maybe surprise readers to find?
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: I actually think, boy, I'm so in love with all chapters because when you write something, you live and breathe it.
Kara Wada, MD: Oh, gosh. Yeah.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: I would think it's the last chapter. Chapter 16 is about cancer. And I wrote that chapter because I wanted to include maybe addressing women's fears perhaps of cancer and midlife also that estrogen question, but really take that moment and pick apart what's the learning point?
What's the most important thing to come away from? And I think really there are many points, but the big overriding theme was don't be panicked about menopause and cancer. But realize that when we talk about natural menopause, not surgical or drug induced or chemo induced but natural menopause, late forties, early fifties, that's pretty much midlife. What things should you be thinking about in midlife? You're screening for breast cancer. You're screening for colon cancer. You're getting your skin checked for skin cancer. There are things, you're still screening for cervical cancer. So there are things that are not suddenly worse but should be on your radar because that's what it means to be paying attention to your health and taking care of yourself. I think folks may look at that and say 'cancer ,uh oh' but I tried to make that in the flavor of sharing my wisdom as a good permanent care doctor. And then of course I had to, glasses on, I had to figure out like what recipe I'm going to, everything's a recipe.
So I thought long and hard about what I was going to pair that recipe with and I ended up with apricot and cherry cake.
Kara Wada, MD: Yum.
The art and delight in crafting food recipes
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Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: And so here's the introduction. Fresh fruit is always a good thing when it comes to cancer prevention. Think antioxidants. But how food looks and tastes is paramount when going through cancer treatment. Sometimes it's worth revisiting an old recipe and modernizing it to satisfy one's current tastes. This recipe is based on a family favorite for the 1960s, Pflaumenkuchen, which is German for plum cake but it has apricots and cherries instead of plums. Um, Cool picture, that's my target. But the whole point was, when you look at the recipe, you might be thrown, because we're trained, all of us, not just in medicine, 'Ooh, sugar and fat and all this stuff that's not good for you'. It has sugar, it has butter, it has flour, but the whole point is enjoying it.
Having it taste delicious, having maybe close your eyes and you have the memory of something beautiful, a cake that you enjoyed and of course the fruit on top is delicious and visually it's very beautiful. To me, that was just as important as saying ' Oh, a different recipe. Oh, this is really healthy for you because it has these properties because maybe.'
That I think makes surprise people and I think maybe delight people too.
Kara Wada, MD: Yes, and now I want to go make a cake. My daughter and I, we love, something that I have passed down and have kept the same. My mom and I used to always watch PBS cooking shows together on the weekends and years ago it was The Frugal Gourmet and Capriol, who I think was from Seattle if I remember correctly which was, seems so so cool and chic compared to the cornfields of Illinois. Because she used things like crème fraîche, which you couldn't find in a grocery store if your life depended on it where I grew up. But we've been watching America's Test Kitchen and Cook's Country, and thinking about, on the whole, we do try our best to eat a plant forward, Mediterranean inspired type diet.
And yet, we're also living our lives trying to promote the idea that no food is like a bad food or just avoiding diet culture altogether. But last night we were watching an episode where they made this beautiful chocolate tart and the girls are like, 'Oh, Mommy, can we make that?' And so I'm like we have all the ingredients except for the chocolate and the cream. We'll have to pick those up'. So at the, I went one of my secret, not so secret love affairs is Aldi and they have some really great, a lot of times European type products. They are known to have pretty good affordable chocolate. So I picked up some chocolate and some cream. So perhaps we will take a little cue from the plum cake. We'll have the chocolate, which has the antioxidants and just enjoy it.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: I love that because to me, nourishment is also the beauty and the enjoyment, it's not just the macronutrients and what's in the content plus you're creating new memories and you're going off of a memory together that you, so it's just, it's all just this warm fuzzy.
I was going to mention, because I know both of us we have Asians/Caucasian households, and sometimes we draw on cultures that maybe aren't our primary culture. So for instance, when you think about the first chapter again, hot flashes, miso soup is the recipe. Very basic. Probably anybody can make it. But you think about miso, soy, soybeans, phytoestrogens, phytonutrients. And then the tofu in there, oh my gosh, that's just the isoflavones, and just even if they didn't have that delicious, nutritious content, the taste is good and there's some seaweed and spinach and of course green onions and just that salty broth is just to die for.
So that I think is nice to weave into everyone's kind of consideration for what they might want to enjoy and see as nutritious. And oh yeah, it actually might help with certain things like hot flashes.
Kara Wada, MD: And to consider, because prior to meeting my now husband, I maybe had tried miso soup once when we went out to you know the local the place where we actually always went for prom dinners was like the Japanese steakhouse, right?
Because that's the fancy restaurant in medium-sized Midwestern cities. That probably would have been my only experience with it, but I would have never thought to probably make it right until then and so what a cool introduction for folks who haven't had much exposure to foods outside of their comfort zone. To push it a little bit and have something so like homey and delicious and nutritious.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: And I must say he'd start laughing if he knows that we're talking about him. But there's, there are two recipes in the book from him. And the other recipe is oh gosh, gonna find it in a pinch. The other recipe is on the mental health section.
So there's a mental health, gosh, that's so important with menopause. The recipe is Japanese-style fried rice with salmon. And I don't know if you can see, here's the.
Kara Wada, MD: Yum.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: And so there's so much good stuff. Of course the salmon makes it wonderful too. But to me, you think of fried rice, the typical fried, you just throw everything in there and fry it up and it's all greasy.
You can make it a little less greasy and a little bit more thoughtful in terms of the components of it. Oh, it is just like soul food. If you're stressed, you just want some, something quick that just is comforting. Try this recipe.
Kara Wada, MD: And I'm not a huge hot sauce fan, but just a little bit of hot sauce on there.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Hi, you're, you are the helper. Oh, you have two helpers.
Kara Wada, MD: Yes, this is Charlotte. She's my second grader. And Josie. We're talking about food. I bet you guys are hungry. We're talking about salmon fried rice. How does that sound? Cause you girls like fried rice. We usually put a bag of frozen edamame that's already been shelled along with a bag of the frozen mixed veggies and that's a like super quick weekend, weeknight meal. Yes, go get it. Get some for your sister. Go get some mandarin oranges too. They're in the fridge in the cheese section.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: I love edamame. Oh, so good. Yeah, I sense we're wrapping up, aren't we? Because you have, you have many things that you're juggling. See, you are the quintessential woman here.
Kara Wada, MD: We may leave that part in, we may cut it out, I'll leave it to, who knows, we'll find out.
It's real life here, it's the reality and sometimes the babysitter is under the weather and we hope she feels better because that is no fun.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: I'm pretty sure you're gonna leave all this in because your viewers, your listeners need to identify with you and they just did.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah, it was pretty funny. I was trying to record a session with Dr. Kate Mangona not that long ago and it was right before dinner and it is that time between four o'clock and eight o'clock that it really is just this stage of life, it's just a little hectic and learning to roll with it.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: May I give you a compliment? You have a wonderful grace about you that anything that comes your way, you just handle it. So keep that up.
Kara Wada, MD: My Dad, oh, he is known for his sayings, but he, since I was little was always like, 'just fake it till you make it.'
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: And that too.
Kara Wada, MD: No, and so that's always just, the, you're just, to a point.
Where to connect with Dr. Susan
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Kara Wada, MD: But we're, where can people connect with you? Where should they where should they pick up your book. Where can they read your writing? I know you've published some things on KevinMD, but share away and we'll put all the links in the show notes as well.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Yeah. Oh, thank you. I have my own website, menopausemenu.com, and that's where I do a lot of my blogging that includes written blogs, videos, which are not always mine. It could be podcasts and also recipes, and that has information. I have my professional website, which is mymdadvocate.com which has links to other things as well. There's a lot of content on there, but the main kind of public hey, this is fun website is menopause menu.
And then of course my book, which sounds very familiar. It's called The Menopause Menu is available on Amazon. And I'm actually the publisher as well. So it's not under a big publishing house. And I'm really, I'm honored that I can have it out there and available for everyone to enjoy.
Kara Wada, MD: And that's, I was already super excited to talk with you about this and to help spread the word and everything, but also taking notes along the way as we've talked in the background about some other projects that we're slowly collaborating on. So this is so exciting, so inspiring. I know it's already helping so many people, but it really is going to be just continue to do.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Thank you. It was a really pleasure. Thank you for having me on, I really appreciate it.
Kara Wada, MD: Oh my gosh, it was my pleasure. This is so fun. And I'm glad we got to chat more. And I'm sure we will again soon.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Absolutely.
Kara Wada, MD: Thank you so much, Susan. Have a wonderful rest of your day.
Susan J. Baumgaertel, MD: Thank you.
Kara Wada, MD: If you are loving this mix of self discovery and science found here on the Becoming Immune Confident Podcast, I'd love to invite you to sign up for my email list. Hop over to drkarawada.com and hit subscribe to ensure you don't miss out on any insights into new immune system science or how we can harness healing through our daily habits.
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Before we wrap up today's episode, I want to take a quick moment to ask for your support. If you're enjoying the content of the Becoming Immune Confident Podcast, we're bringing you week after week, there's a simple, but incredibly impactful way you can show your appreciation.
You see, leaving a review is like giving us a virtual high five and it helps our podcast to reach even more people who could benefit from the valuable insights, entertainment, and inspiration we strive to provide week after week. So if you're finding value in what you hear, here's what you can do. Open up your podcast app, whether you're on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or any other platform, and give us a glowing five star review we're dedicated to bringing you the best and your feedback helps us fine tune our content to suit your interests and needs.
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Share what you love about the podcast, your favorite episodes, or how it's made a positive impact on your life. Your words, not only brighten our day, but they also encourage others to join our incredible community.
Remember every five star review and every word of encouragement counts, it's like fuel to keep us creating, innovating and striving to make your listening experience even better. So if you're up for it, show us some love by leaving us that virtual high five in the form of a five star review today.
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You rock!
Thank you for being a part of our podcast journey and we can't wait to keep bringing you more amazing episodes in the future.
Until next time, keep shining and keep listening and keep on building that confidence in yourself and your immune system health.
Take care.
