Summary:

Dr. Anna Marie Frank, a specialist in mindset and holistic health, discusses her journey from struggling with mental health to becoming a wellness advocate. She emphasizes the importance of mindset in healing and overall well-being, explaining how our thoughts and words carry vibrational frequencies that influence our biochemical makeup. She also discusses the benefits of practices like cryotherapy, sauna, and red light therapy, and the importance of quality supplements. Dr. Frank encourages people to ask questions and educate themselves about their health, and to choose practices and foods that nourish their bodies and minds.

Full Episode:

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Transcription:

Megan Lyons:

Thank you so much, Dr. Anna Marie Frank, for coming on Wellness Your Way. I’m so excited to have you here.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, thank you for having me.

Megan Lyons:

Of course, I’ve read your formal bio to the audience, but please just tell us a little bit about you.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Oh, man. I am a lot for a lot of people and yeah, I really stay in the lane of mindset and holistic health and just through my own journey and my life, it really brought me to this place right now. And I am living my passion, having a brick and mortar people come in every day. I see people, I do speaking engagements, and so it’s like I’m either on a stage in front of a bunch of people or with people and yeah, that’s really what I’m up to these days.

Megan Lyons:

That’s amazing. It’s such a great balance to have that broad reach, but then also that really deep personal connection. I love. I love that. Yes. The balance. So you touched a little bit on your own story. Are you willing to share a little bit about your own story and what got you here?

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, absolutely. So really, I mean, I can go all the way back to when I was in high school. I struggled with my mental health, and nobody would know this if you were to look at me. I was a four sport varsity athlete. I had good grades, I had married parents. I had a roof over my head and it was something wasn’t right inside of me. And I went on to university, played sports there, and I struggled so much with depression and I kept thinking it was like the carrot, right? Once I achieve this, then I’ll feel, once I do this, then I’ll feel, and once I graduated, went into my career. I still wasn’t happy. I had the degree, I had all the accomplishments, all those things, and yet I was showing up in life every day, feeling utterly depressed. And then I had this thing called health insurance.

So I thought, well, I’ll just go to a doctor and they’ll fix me. They’ll give me the right pills. And so I went to a psychiatrist, spent very little time with him. He wrote me three prescription medications, and I started taking them and started to go on a downward spiral. I got to the point where I didn’t want to be alive anymore. I kept going back to this doctor thinking, oh, if they just change my medication, then I’ll be better. And in a nutshell, ultimately I had a little light inside of me that was, wake up, you are the only person that can bring happiness to you. And so I set forth on this journey to really rewire my brain, and it took a lot of little different things done over time. And through that whole process of rewiring my brain and my biology and getting better at who I was becoming in this world is where I started to study holistic medicine and naturopathy and energy medicine, Chinese medicine, Ayurvedic medicine. And I was like, my mind was blown. So, so then just along that journey, I’ve started to help other people heal themselves naturally. And that’s in a nutshell how I got to where I’m at right now.

Megan Lyons:

Oh, that’s incredible. I hate it and love it that so many of us had to have had our own struggles in order to get here. But what a wonderful turn of events that you were able to take that and help so many people now and learn so much about it and uncover what was going on. I think a lifelong learner like me, your list of accolades is extremely impressive. So thank you for all the work that you do.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, thank you. And I think for anyone listening out there too, it’s like there’s all these things we go through in life and it’s all on purpose. None of us are supposed to get through this life without the challenges and the trials and the tribulations and my healing journey didn’t just, it wasn’t like, oh, I just woke up and then I healed my brain and I healed myself. I wish it was that easy. But there were other things along the line like postpartum depression. I had, after my son being told my daughter had a high rate of having Down syndrome and being told you can abort her up to 20 weeks. And I was like, what? She’s totally fine. She’s 11, she’s great. Amazing. And then just other things I’ve been told in the medical community that it’s been all these things that are just like, wait, what?

And I’ve always been very curious and asking questions ever since that original early twenties situation happened. And what I have found along the way is one, Western medicine is amazing at saving people’s lives. Like yes, a hundred percent killing it there. But when it comes to prevention, when it comes to good health maintenance, I think we definitely fail. We get an F on that. So there’s other ways. And so it’s just interesting as I started to really dive into all of these other ways of healing, I’m like, why? I felt like it was a secret.

Megan Lyons:

Yes. And why is it a secret secret? Why is it hidden? I could not agree more. That’s amazing. Yes,

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yes. So anyways, but all of these things happen to us on purpose, and it’s how we choose to respond or react to it, and our mindset is everything. And I think that that’s important.

Megan Lyons:

Well, let’s dive in there because you started by saying, I had this voice that said wake up, and now you’re saying our mindset is kind of the root of healing. I know you’re not just saying, well, all of a sudden one day, poof, you think one thought and then you’ll miraculously better for the rest of your life. But I do know that you have great thoughts on the brain biology connection and how our thoughts shape our health. So can you tell us a little bit more about that?

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah. So what’s very interesting is, well, number one, our brain is the strongest pharmacy on planet earth. So we need to remember that also, we can change how we feel in 150 milliseconds by shifting a thought. And every single thought and every single word that we speak, every thought that we have carries a vibrational frequency and will influence your biochemical makeup. So for example, if you said the word love and you checked into your body just love kind of in your body, it just feels like you just say it and just feel it. And then that if you go and you say the word hate and you check in with your body, it feels very different.

Megan Lyons:

Yes.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

When it comes to healing ourselves and feeling better, we have to really look at how we speak about our life and how we think about our life, and that is everything. And we all have this voice inside our head. I wrote a whole book on it. I call it the Inner Bully, but this voice inside our head that tells us all sorts of crazy stuff, I’m not good enough. That’s not available to me. Everyone else is doing good. Why am I such a failure? And the truth of the matter is, this is not truly who you are. And as Michael Singer and author, I really love says, you are the one that is witnessing that voice, which is like, whoa, that is mind blowing. So you are literally the one that is witnessing the voice, the soul that is witnessing the voice inside your mind, and that voice is like a child. The more attention you give it, the more it will act out.

Megan Lyons:

Yes.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

So it’s really just shifting that voice. I just threw this huge women’s event. It was the first one we’ve done here in Bakersfield, California. We were sold out. I mean, this was something I’d been dreaming up for quite some time. And that inner voice a few days before came in my head and was saying, oh, what if nobody shows up and all these things? And it’s like, is that really going to happen? No. Right. We sold out our tickets. People are going to show up. And it’s like you have to go back and shift your mind by asking open-ended questions to take you out of that. We go in this state in our brain, which is more of an emotional response, and your limbic response, your reptilian brain that is not helping you think clearly. And when you’re in that part of the brain, you actually are cut off from your prefrontal cortex, which is your executive function, thinking, well, of course people are going to show up. People paid for tickets, everything’s going to be fine. Could things go wrong? Yes, but why would I stress about it right now? So people allow stress of the future to worry them, and they allowed the emotions of their past to influence their future. So we are like these emotional rollercoasters and we have to get ahold of it with how we are viewing our thoughts and how we are speaking and our life. So I know that’s a mouthful, but it

Megan Lyons:

Was an excellent mouthful. I’m soaking it all in as I know the audience is. So when we’re in this limbic state, this emotional state, we’re cut off from the prefrontal cortex. Are you saying the answer is to ask yourself these open-ended questions and kind of tap into the rational side? Like you said, no, all the tickets are sold, people will show up. Just get back to that prefrontal cortex, that rational state by asking yourself questions. Is that the key?

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, I mean, that’s a huge key. Breathing is a big part of it, just kind of going back and grounding yourself. Because if we let our thoughts just keep running amuck and we don’t check ’em when they need to be checked, we’ll start believing our own thoughts. We know this to be true. If you tell yourself something long enough, it actually will pave a neural pathway that you begin to think that that story is true. Like my grandmother, she tells everyone, I am a New York time bestselling author. I mean, she knows this to be true. Okay, so bless her heart, and you know what? I will be that for her.

Megan Lyons:

Yes, absolutely.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

But she’s said these things about me and my mom laughs about it, but she’s said so many things about me that have been blown up, blown up, blown up. We all know this, right? This what’s great about grandparents, they make everything so much better and grand, but they believe it. After a certain period of time, they start to believe that. Well, that’s true. And so you have to be mindful because if you tell yourself something, oh, my boss doesn’t like me, my boss doesn’t like me, my boss doesn’t like me. Well, guess what? Yeah, your boss doesn’t like you because you’ve told yourself that. And what we focus on, that’s where energy is going to go.

Megan Lyons:

That’s right. And in that case then you’re assuming my boss doesn’t like me. So you probably avert eye contact every time the boss walks by. You probably don’t do great work because you already think the boss hates you, and you’re actually creating the actions as well that will lead to the boss truly not liking you in that case,

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

And your brain is only going to look for things that confirm what you think. That’s the other tricky thing about our minds, our brain. It’s like when you get a new car and you think you’re the only person that has that car, and then you’re driving down the road in your new car, you’re like, oh my gosh, I see this car everywhere.

Megan Lyons:

Yes,

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

It’s what your mind focuses on. It will always be available to you. So if you’re always focused on what’s not going good in the world, you’re going to find enough things that are not going right in the world. And if you focus on what is going good in the world, you’re going to see so many beautiful things in your life, and we get to choose that.

Megan Lyons:

Yes. That perfectly leads into my next question, which is I saw a blog post, which we’ll link in the show notes, a blog posts that you wrote about choosing happiness. And it really resonated with me because I think somewhere deep in my genetics is this worrier. I was a very strong worrier as a child. I’m heterozygous on comt, which I think of as the worrier, but we’re not talking about that right now. It’s always been kind of my tendency. So what I have done is set up a lot of systems. In my morning, for example, the alarm goes off. I automatically think, oh, I don’t want to. And before I put my feet on the ground, I choose a positive thought, and then I literally walk over to brush my teeth and there’s a positive quote calendar that I flip over. I take my dogs out, and I put on this positive playlist. So I’m priming my brain very intentionally. Then I do my gratitude and my meditation, all of this. And for me, I believe it absolutely works that throughout the rest of the day, I genuinely feel happy. It’s not an act, it’s just that I’ve had to put that effort in to choose the way I want to feel. I’d love for you to comment about that and any thoughts you have there.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, I think the most powerful thing you said is you’re choosing this. So for example, I choose to go pick my children up after school versus saying, I have to go pick my children up after school just by saying, flipping that word, choose versus have to, it feels different in the body, and it allows you to feel like you have more control because at the root of all of us, we want control, which do we really even have control? Who knows, right?

Megan Lyons:

Who knows is right. But that illusion, as long as we’re going to be under some illusion, why not be under the illusion that we can control to choose our happiness, which feels like reality to me. So I’ll take it.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yes. And then the thing is, is you’re choosing things that fill your cup. You’re choosing to do things that add energy, that bring value to who you are, and that is where the power lies. Most people we’re telling people, love yourself, be happy, all these things, but they’re not filling themselves with lovable things. They’re not filling themselves with things that make them happy, truly happy. And we do. We have these crossings of we think this will make us happy. And really it’s something that down the road doesn’t make us happy. So then if we go even deeper, we say, well, why are we deciding already if this is going to make us happy or not make us happy? And why are we already deciding if we’re going to like or not like something? And the only reason we already pre decide that before it has already happened is because we’re basing that or dislike based on our past. So my challenge to people is what if you allowed yourself to feel the very thing that you think you will feel when you achieve X, Y, Z?

Megan Lyons:

Yes.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Right. Allow yourself to feel the feeling, even though you haven’t achieved X, Y, and Z, bring that. Choose that state of happiness right now.

Megan Lyons:

Yes.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

And I think that’s the ultimate hack. If we stick to that. It’s pretty powerful.

Megan Lyons:

It’s super powerful. So I feel like I know what you’re saying, but give the audience an example. It’s like, oh, I will feel happy when I lose 20 pounds, or I will feel happy when I get this job. Take us through whatever example you want and tell us how you would feel that feeling right now.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah. Well one, that was that event that I just did. So this is very, so I was my co-host that was hosting the event with me when I would get stressed and worry and all of that, she’s like, okay, Anna Marie, close your eyes. And then she’s like, what is it that you want? And then I’m like, oh, thank you. And I would put myself in that future space, and I literally would start crying because I was so happy and so joyful. I could see the women in the audience smile. I could see us all interacting. And then that joy, once I sat and allowed myself to feel all the very things that I thought I would feel when, but I felt it. Now, once you have that emotion and you’ve connected it with a visualization, you can drop into that moment at any time, any time.

You just have to create the emotion with the visualization and that stores within you, which is the most amazing thing in the world. Anytime I think about one of the very first times I did breath work, I had the most amazing experience, and I can always drop into that feeling. And once I drop into that feeling, it’s like I probably could win an Oscar for crying at this point in my life. It is so crazy because I’m not a crier, but I can cry like that if I go into that feeling and that visualization of what I had in that moment of breath work. So we get to create that whenever we want. Again, our brain is the strongest pharmacy on planet earth. You got to know how to work that brain.

Megan Lyons:

That is so cool. I love your quote. The brain is the strongest pharmacy on planet earth. I will use that over and over with the TM Annamarie every single time. Actually,

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

I’ll have to give credit to Dr. Daniel a Amen who I’ve had training from the A Amen Clinics because he says that a lot. And it’s just so true. It’s so true. And we all need to be reminded about that.

Megan Lyons:

Amazing. Well, thank you for that reminder. Let’s talk about why we all need to be reminded about that, because I think in general, we all have brains that are not at optimal health right now. So I’m wondering if you have thoughts on why we’re in this state and what are maybe some hindrances to having a healthy brain that are common these days?

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Well, I think our environment is everything and what we’re putting into our bodies, food is information. I always say the body is like a smartphone, and you get to choose what apps you’re downloading. You get to choose what you’re downloading into your app. So for example, your sense of taste is an app. What are you putting in your mouth? Your sense of smell, your sense of touch, your sense of sight. What are you choosing to see every day? Again, everything is downloading information into the body that is impacting all of your cells. And all of this directly impacts the brain. The brain is only 2% of your body, yet it utilizes up to 20 to 25% of all the oxygen, nutrients, everything that you put in. So your brain is literally this energy sucker. So we have to be very mindful about what we’re putting in our body through every single scent in our body or that our body has.

The other element I think, is our culture, this fear-based culture that is, there’s not enough for all of us, and there’s plenty for all of us. There’s an abundance of everything. And again, that’s a state of mind. It’s a state of being. But yet when we feel like there’s not enough, we go to that worry brain. And the thing is, when we are in that limbic state and we are in that heightened sympathetic nervous system response, which is fight or flight, when we’re there for a long period of time, it actually starts to shrink the hippocampus and it starts to impact our memory,

Which is going to impact our brain health over time. And so when we’re in the sympathetic nervous system response, our heart can have, we can have heart palpitations, our blood pressure can go up, our cortisol can go up, our hormones start to shift because cortisol is a hormone. I mean, there’s this domino effect. So it’s getting yourself to a peaceful state where you’re going to actually protect your brain and help your brain health. But I do think Covid was a perfect example of fear, and people were acting a fool. I mean, people were literally going to target and buying all the toilet paper they could buy.

Really? Why were we not buying all the blueberries? Why were we not buying all the fruits and the vegetables? This is crazy town. What are we doing here? If you really think about it, when we go in that fear state, we are no longer using our prefrontal cortex. Our executive function thinking is not happening. This is going to impact our memory, impact our decision making. And so we’re thinking about wiping our butt versus what we’re going to put in our mouth to keep our body healthy, to protect us from whatever big green aliens out there. You know what I mean? It’s just interesting. But we’re interesting beings and we’re complex beings. And the other thing is, I don’t think there’s one right or wrong way to be. I think it’s just all information and we get to choose what to do with it. And I think that that’s important and most people just don’t know.

Megan Lyons:

Yes, really great point. First of all, taking back to Covid, I have never been so impressed by the variety of produce that was available in my local grocery store because no one else was buying it. So I had access to anything that I wanted. And then you see the chip aisle completely wiped out or something. I know. I remember it very clearly. And I think your point is so valid that of course if we’re stressed one time, our brain is fine, no problem. But if we’re constantly living in this state and we’re letting our fear escalate because of the news and the world situation and our constant connectiveness and all of this kind of stuff, it really, it’s putting us in a precarious position. So I’m glad you’re out there helping people.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, it really is. Thank you. And I think another element to that too is how we can get out of fear as well in environmental is to ask questions. So we talked about asking questions when our brain’s telling us all sorts of crazy stuff. And you ask yourself a question, but also ask a question. If somebody’s telling you something that’s not making you feel good inside, don’t go out of your house, wear two mask and do all of this say, help me understand, ask questions, help me understand why. I mean, I’ve had to do this so many times with the different situations I’ve been in with different doctors and things like that with my health, with my kids’ health. And I never used to ask those questions. And so we can get given information that hits us inside and we’re like, oh my gosh. But to get us out of that, oh my gosh, fight or flight state, we go into asking a question to help better understand when we can better understand things. It helps to actually lower our stress. It’s the not knowing, not understanding where it runs rapid and it becomes this big old thing.

Megan Lyons:

Yes, absolutely. Great points there. So questions are one piece of the solution. Let’s talk about a couple of the other pieces of this solution. I want to talk about nutrition and your supplements and your wellness center, all of this stuff. But let’s start with nutrition since it’s my favorite. What are just some general nutrition practices that you would recommend for someone looking to improve their brain health?

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

I think just one, eat real food. I think we’ve made nutrition so confusing and health, so confusing. One, there’s no perfect diet for any human. We’ve never proven a perfect diet, so that doesn’t exist. Agreed. Every human is different, especially based on anthropology. If you go to where your ancestors came from, which I know we’re all kind of a mixed mutt now, but for some, the taller your body, the longer your limbs, the darker your skin, probably closer to the equator your body came from. And that means you’re probably eating more pineapples, more light, fruits and veggies, lean meats, things like that. Now, the shorter your body, the more shorter your limbs, the lighter your skin, you probably came more north and fatty fish are really going to sit well with you and the heartiness of omegas. And so there’s a lot to be said around food. But at the end of the day, fruits, vegetables, meats, and anything that is not packaged and was treated with respect. So if it’s a cow, we want that cow to be out free range eating grass. And if you have a really good farmer around you, like I do, they will be carrot finished beef and

Increase in B twelves. So you don’t want to eat chicken that was in this cage with a million other chickens with bacterias and diseases going all around because it’s just the nutrition profile one isn’t great. And then also I believe in energetics. So the energetics is going to be transferred to your body. And I think that that is definitely not good to eat food that doesn’t have a good source behind it. So eating real food is really the key. I love blueberries are so neuroprotective really great. If you don’t have a sensitivity to nuts, walnuts can be really, really good for you as well. They have a lot of trace minerals in ’em. Celtic salt, Himalayan salt, not using table salt. People don’t realize that table salt is really, there’s no minerals in it. And when you go to the more Celtic salt, the Himalayan salt, you’re going to have a more broader profile, 72, 82 different trace minerals that the body really needs. So I think with the food and we need to quit making it so complicated and always know that when you’re putting food in your body that your mindset around it is that this is nourishing me and this is feeding myself. Because having a bad mindset around food will also disrupt your body’s ability to break down the food, utilize the food, and the whole digestion process.

Megan Lyons:

Really great point there and one that so many people miss because they think, oh, well, I just look at the label and it has 20 grams of protein or something like that, which is great and important, but if it’s not the right quality and you’re not thinking about how it’s nourishing your body and you’re in that sympathetic fight or flight state, it doesn’t really matter because you’re not really absorbing and utilizing all the benefits from that food.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

And this is where Megan people need to work with people like you because this is what you do. And people are not educated, like I said earlier, once you’re educated. And the problem is in our school systems, we’re still telling children that they need to have all these carbohydrates. And 51% of the hot lunch is wheat, and it’s not GMO free and our wheat is sprayed with folic acid and 44% of people have a methylation gene and they cannot process folic acid. They need folate. So we have to go out and be an advocate for our own health. And what that may look like is spending money that your insurance is not going to cover. It may be you need six sessions with Megan to gain that knowledge that you’ll have for the rest of your life, and then you can pass that on. And I think that is truly what I’m passionate about is educating, because it’s like Native American practices, Northern European practices, Chinese medicine, this stuff is not being passed down.

I’ve had to literally go and scrape and learn and find the books, find all this education, and I’m like, wait a minute, you want to tell me that 120 years ago, we used to have some of this stuff in our universities. You want to tell me 120 years ago that our universities, which used to be called colleges back then used to train our doctors differently. Like, wow, I did not know this. So again, asking questions, some things don’t make sense. It doesn’t make sense that to get electrolytes that your body needs to cause muscles to contract to allow the body to absorb fluids. You get it from Gatorade or Powerade, that doesn’t make sense to me. I’m like, wait, and it’s blue. Yeah, how is this healthy? People don’t realize that you can eat an apple, that you can have watermelon, that you can have spinach, that you can have some salt. And these things are actually electrolytes going into the body. I think people just, we got to do a better job of seeking the information and working with people that know something that we don’t know and asking a lot of questions because it’s fun to learn.

Megan Lyons:

It is so fun to learn. And the awesome thing about nutrition in my opinion is that it’s a relatively new science. So we’re still continuously learning new things all the time and there’s always new research coming out, which I find really fascinating. And then to your point, which is so scary that some of this stuff we think is new. It was in the textbooks a hundred years ago and has just been covered up. So that’s just frustrating.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, it really is. I mean, obviously the earth provides everything that we need.

Megan Lyons:

Such a good point. And I think jumping off from that point, one thing that people have been doing forever is cold exposure, heat exposure. Maybe they didn’t have the fancy cryotherapy chambers 200 years ago, but you’re offering a very simple way for people to get those benefits that have been time tested for so long. So I’d love to dive into some of the cool practices that you have at your wellness center in Bakersfield, California. First of all, I went to your website. I highly encourage everyone to go to the website. We’ll link it in the show notes, but there is this incredible menu of services that if I lived in Bakersfield, I would be your number one client. I would be there every single day. It’s so cool. But three that I picked out, cryotherapy, sauna, and red light therapy, I’d love for you to comment on whichever of those is your favorite or all of them or anything you want to share about those.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

They’re all great. And 200 years ago, the reason that people survived, some didn’t, but the ones that did survival of the fittest, their bodies, every time they went from extreme heat to extreme cold, their body had to acclimate and it actually strengthened their cellular function, which is cool. So the hormesis aspect of that is we have a sauna and we have cryotherapy. We also have a cold plunge so people can choose your poison, I guess, micro poison, which sometimes is not a bad thing. Yes. So cryotherapy, for example, you go in, your body experiences extreme coldness for a very controlled period of time, and your body will start to get goosebumps. You’ll start to shiver. This is all a good thing. And then what happens is you step out and your body’s like, wow, I just survived. So you have all this rush of feelgood hormones going on, inflammation drops in the body. This helps you sleep better, which is really good. And so yeah, cryotherapy is really great to help lower stress, increase energy, you’ll sleep better. And yeah, you have, I don’t know, this is a little thing for the rest of the day whenever I do it, I just feel like a little pep in my step, I guess, if you will.

Megan Lyons:

I totally agree with that. I love cryotherapy and I’m curious your take because I don’t like cold plunges, but I think that’s because I’ve gotten good at cryotherapy. I do. Then you

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Need to go to cold plunge.

Megan Lyons:

Yeah, I know you don’t

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Want to get good at

Megan Lyons:

Any of it, what you’re going to say. I don’t want to hear it though, but I really do. I

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Know. I think it was, go ahead. Oh, go ahead. I was going to say, I think it was the Huberman podcast. I think he was saying, yeah, once you start to be okay with it, you’re not getting the benefits, so you got to change it up. So I think you need to go to cold plunge. I feel like cold plunge, even though it’s not as unquote cold as crowd therapy, the wetness, I mean, I feel like it’s way more intense.

Megan Lyons:

Definitely for me, that is true.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Go down, let it get to your neck because the water has to go up over the shoulders and over the neck because that is ultimate a lot of people, I’ll see ’em out there and they’ll have their shoulders kind of up out of the water and I’m like, lower down, and they’re like, it’s like that last little bit takes so much courage to go down.

Megan Lyons:

Yes.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

But yeah, so cold exposure therapy is great. We use a full spectrum of infrared heat with our sauna, and we actually have a lymphatic release shake board that you stand on before you get in the sauna with a little red light boost. So that helps to activate the lymphatic system, which is one of your main detoxification pathways. And people don’t realize for your lymph system, it’s through vibration and movement that the lymph system is going to release toxins, which is, I always thought that was really interesting. And then when you go in the sauna, another main detoxification pathway is sweating. So that’s taking care of two detoxification pathways and the sauna is going to help heat the body, increase blood flow to the brain. A full spectrum infrared sauna is going to help pull out more of the heavy metals, the sweat, there was a study done where they test the sweat of full spectrum infrared sauna, and they test this.

It’s like serum, which is the sweat that comes out versus just a sauna that heats the air up around you. It’s more of just your salt crystals and the sweat is different compositions, which I was like, that’s really interesting. Not that one is better than the other. We actually have both types of saunas here. It’s personal preference. The infrared sauna doesn’t really get as hot as our outdoor steam sauna. Our indoor sauna is a dry sauna, infrared heat. The body actually will start absorbing the infrared heat over time. So the sauna’s trying to get hotter, your body’s absorbing the heat, so they just work in different capacities. I say if you have access to a sauna, do it. Don’t not do it. Don’t try to study for the best sauna. And you’re not doing it until you find the best sauna. Right? Yeah. Analysis equals paralysis.

But yeah, I love the sauna because of the blood flow aspect. The detoxification aspect of it is really great. And then the red light I love because, well, I like red light because about 10 minutes has been shown to increase serotonin in the body, which is your mood stabilizing hormone. But a lot of people love it because it helps with the skin, fine lines, wrinkles, discoloration, but it also helps increase mitochondria function, which is the little battery. And all of our cells, you have trillions of these cells, and as we age, that battery kind of starts to go down, so we need to recharge that as well. And so yeah, those are three great great ones you picked out.

Megan Lyons:

Oh, fantastic. I’m so excited to sign up for my next session. But I would be remiss if I did not ask you for another one of your lines of work, which is supplements. This one is available to anyone, don’t have to live in Bakersfield. So I’d love for you just to take us through maybe one or two of your favorite supplements from your line to Wet People’s appetite and then they can go to your website to learn more.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

So well, I originally formulated three brain Nutraceuticals because literally I was meeting with clients and scanning them, testing ’em, seeing what they’re deficient in, seeing what type of brain they had and what nutraceuticals would be best for ’em. I was sending ’em to the store to buy five or six different products to equal. I’m like, why has not anyone put this in one product? For example, our Calm U, which is one of our top selling products, it has everything that’s in the Calm U. Everything in it is an active ingredient. And I formulated it because again, I was sending people to get six different products at the store to get what this Calm U does. And it just kind of helps calm that limbic system, help calms the mind, but it doesn’t make you sleepy. So we have people that get calm, they play with the dosage of what they take.

It’s not something you have to take always in forever. That’s the other thing I believe with supplementation, many supplements, it’s just for essentially fill your cup. Once we get your cup full of the raw materials that you need, then it’s just a little microdose here and there. You don’t have to keep pushing it and pushing it and pushing it. So the Calm U really helps take that layer of yuck off of you. I guarantee you within seven to 10 days, if not sooner, you’ll have a sense of just inner peace. You’ll be dealing with situations that are stressful and you’ll be like, oh, I totally dealt with that a little bit better. This is what men and women say all the time. It takes that layer of yuck off the top and you function as you should, but most people don’t realize how anxious they are.

So Calm U is just a beautiful blend. And then we have our Happy U, which helps with serotonin production and our Bright U, which is neuroprotective, it has all the anti-inflammatory properties. It’s actually the first one I formulated because I had six different products on my counter and I was looking at ’em and I’m like, oh, I could do this one for sure. And then I started to just really be present with my clients and what I was sending them to the store to get. So that’s why I ended up with the first three flagship products, calm You, happy You and Bright You to really help people. And then I think the other product that people just go nuts over is our liquid Whole U. It is bioavailable prem, methylated fatty acids, amino acids, minerals. It has literally, it’s taking 20, 25 pills at the same time, but it’s a liquid shot that you take every day.

And I absolutely love it. I was taking a lot of pills every single day and that really helped cut that down big time. So my remedy that I personally take is I just do the whole you shot every day and then I take bright you every day. And I will admit when we put on our big event, I was taking Calm You every once in a while, I was like, oh gosh. And then I have to remind myself, this is excitement. This is excitement. Yes, exactly. Yeah. And then I’ve gone through periods where I take the happy you as well. So it’s just, again, it’s not something always in forever. I just play with my dosage and all that. But yeah, some of our products, most of our products are a two month supply, so we limit the footprint, the plastics, all of that. So it’s very intentional how I created our products and they just work. So that’s what I have to say about that.

Megan Lyons:

That’s amazing. I’m just imagining the audience and myself too. I need all four of those just thinking, oh, thank goodness someone has put all of these together. Because first of all, there’s a whole lot of stuff out there in the supplement world. There is. And second of all, even if you’re doing your research to get good quality supplements, for me, I have zero problem taking a jillion capsules per day, but most people are not like that. It’s very frustrating. So then they have to choose amongst all the good ones and you’ve just put ’em all together. I very much appreciate that.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

I mean, you do make more money when you sell five different things. I’ll admit that. But it’s like it’s just the right thing to do, honestly. And then all of our products, when we get the raw materials in, they’re tested for being pure before they even leave, after mixing and doing all that, they’re tested again to make sure what’s being said that’s in the capsule is in the capsule or that’s in the liquid. Is in the liquid. And so it’s just the right thing to do. We’re a small little company and I think that it’s just we need more small businesses and people that care to produce products like this. It’s not easy and it’s not cheap to do it, but there are options out there and I think it’s like 55 bucks for a 32 day supply. It is very worth it.

Megan Lyons:

Yes, there are so many far, far more expensive supplements out there than that.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

And I always tell people too, just because your product’s expensive doesn’t mean that it’s doing something absolutely great. And there are some products that are expensive and they’re doing great things, but I think for the most part, people just don’t know what they’re taking. And if they’re taking bees that are not methylated, they’re doing themselves a disservice. So you just really got to know what you’re putting in your body.

Megan Lyons:

Yeah, it’s true. I agree with you that just because it’s expensive doesn’t mean that it’s great. On the flip side, it is unfortunate that there is a multivitamin out there at whatever drugstore that’s $8 for a six month supply. And the very first thing that I ask people to look at is, okay, what form of B vitamins are they using? It’s not methylated then we know already. I know already it’s probably not the best quality product. So I love that you’re calling that out. Not everyone has to spend a gillion dollars all the time, but if it’s too cheap to be true, it might be worth looking into. Yeah,

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

I actually had a lady that came in. She’s had three children and she had them when she was young and she had been, she’s been trying to get pregnant again. And whenever I have clients come in to meet with me, whether it’s in person or remote, I always have them send me everything they’re taking and I don’t want to see the picture of the front of the bottle. I want to see the ingredients in it. And so she was in person and I scanned her, did a bunch of stuff, realized that she has an issue with methylation. And those of you out there that are like, what is methylation? Pretty much if you take a vitamin or you put something in your body, your body converts it to make it bioavailable. So you can utilize the raw materials, and if your body is not doing that, you can have something called homeo cysteine that builds up in the blood just causing all sorts of issues.

You don’t have the raw materials that you need for your body to do basic maintenance inside, and this over time can cause different ailments going on. So anyways, she comes in and she’s being challenged with getting pregnant. She’s like, well, I know I’m older, but all my hormones are testing and I’m looking at what she has. She’s taking folic acid on its own with a multivitamin that is all synthetic, that is not methylated at all. So she is literally twice a day microdosing poisoning herself and wondering why she’s not getting pregnant. I have no doubt in my mind this woman is going to get pregnant. It’s just okay. I think she got, I don’t know, want to call out Costco. I love Costco. Costco has great options, but I think it was from Costco, but it’s like, okay, you’re going to spend 15 bucks or you could spend 50 bucks and nourish your body because you’re going to have more problems in the long haul putting that junk in there. So again, it’s education, right? People don’t know. She thought she was doing the right thing. This is what her doctor told her to do. That’s right. She’s follow directions.

Megan Lyons:

So sad is that she was probably told take folic acid by maybe a well person.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

So many women are

Megan Lyons:

Too. Yeah, we just don’t know the whole story. So I’m so grateful once again that you’re putting out that whole story and you’re really making your information accessible to the public and your options like your supplements. So I would love for you to tell people all of the ways that they can learn from you, work with you, benefit from everything that you’re putting out there.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, thank you. So you can go to www.happywholeyou.com and that’s our website. You can see the supplements that we offer. Then if you are anywhere close, we get people that travel to Bakersfield all the time to come to happy you. It’s a pretty cool experience. We’d love to see you here or we’re also on Instagram at happy whole you. And yeah, just reach out and we’d love to work with you. We work with people in person and we work with people remotely as well.

Megan Lyons:

Amazing. We will absolutely link that website in the show notes. And please, like I did, audience, please go there and just look around. You will be amazed by all of the great work that you and your team are putting out. So thank you so much this time. I wish we could have spent four hours chatting, but you shared so much information and I really appreciate your time and your wisdom today.

Dr. Anna Marie Frank:

Yeah, thanks for having me.

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