Episode #910
What if the secrets to better sleep, balanced hormones, and a sharper mind were simpler than you thought?
In this episode, I sit down with Dr. Marie Agnew, a functional medicine expert and trusted advisor, to tackle the myths and truths about health. From understanding how cold plunges boost dopamine to navigating the overwhelming world of supplements, we dig into actionable strategies for improving vitality.
We also discuss how to better support loved ones dealing with chronic illnesses and uncover the surprising role stress, joy, and even environmental toxins play in your overall well-being. Whether you’re curious about hormone replacement therapy, natural remedies for menopause, or just how to feel more energized daily, this episode is packed with practical tips to elevate your health.
Stay connected with Dr. Marie Agnew:
- Instagram: @shift.functional.med
- Instagram: @marie.c.agnew
- Website: shiftfunctionalmed.com
Tune in and take the first step toward feeling more alive than ever before.
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Transcription
Doug Holt 0:00
Well, I’m not a conspiracy guy as much, but when you look at the fact that our government, what they provide for the health pyramid and the food pyramid… I remember in the Bush administration, they passed pizza being indicated as a vegetable so that schools, right, they have to have a certain number of vegetables on the plate—pizza would now qualify. Unreal. And it is so… that really just pissed me off. That’s why I realized this game is rigged.
Dr. Marie Agnew 0:28
Yeah, it’s rigged.
Doug Holt 0:40
Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the TPM Podcast. And today we are joined once again by a very special guest, Dr. Marie Agnew. So, Dr. Marie Agnew is the owner of Shift Wellness, but more importantly to me, she is my doctor.
So, as you guys know, I have access to a lot of professionals all over the world, and Marie is somebody that I turn to whenever I have questions—not only for myself, but also for my family and their needs. She’s become a trusted advisor and somebody that I lean on. And whenever I have anything going on with my health or questions around my health, she is the expert I turn to. Marie, thanks for being here.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:17
Yeah, really happy to be here.
Doug Holt 1:18
I love having you here. So, for the guys that haven’t seen you on the show before, perhaps—and guys, if you haven’t, go back and look at those episodes—but give us a little bit of your background. I know you have about 30 initials behind your name and a whole resume, but give us a short little, like… Tell us, tell the guys, hey, why should they be listening to you today?
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:38
Sure, sure. So, I did my original medical training up at OHSU in Portland, and then I worked in critical care, actually, up in Seattle. I went back to OHSU, got my master’s and my doctorate there. Then I worked for a number of years in primary care and urgent care.
And just like so many functional medicine providers, I felt really disheartened with the system in which I was working—so limited to about 15–20 minute visits. I’d see 35 patients in a day, and the care I was able to give was really symptom-focused. Meaning, I felt like I was kind of just giving people Band-Aids all day long, like really focused on the symptom but not getting into the root cause of why those symptoms were presenting in the first place.
So, I then kind of went on this search. I studied Ayurveda, nutritional therapy, became a yoga instructor. I was really kind of searching pretty far and wide. And then I found the Institute of Functional Medicine, and that was when I realized, right, this is what I’ve been looking for. So, it’s very science-backed, very evidence-based medicine, and it’s a way to really look at the body more as a whole—and really how to look at the whole ecosystem in which symptoms arise from. Does that make sense? So anyway, I got certified in functional medicine. This was back in about… started that training in 2012 or so, and then I launched Shift Functional Medicine in 2019. So, a little bit of a background there.
Doug Holt 3:06
Yeah, and you have a big move coming up as we film this right now. You’re expanding your business, which is exciting.
Dr. Marie Agnew 3:12
Yeah, it’s exciting. Feels a little overwhelming right now. It’s all gonna work out.
Doug Holt 3:15
Well, a lot of the people that listen to this, these are business owners, mostly men. We do have quite a few women that listen to the show. When I think of functional medicine, I think of business, right? So if I were to go in and someone has hired me as a consultant and said, “Doug, my business is not performing,” I wouldn’t just go into one section of the company and go, “Okay, let me just look at this one little section.” I’d want to see the whole process, right? The whole user journey, the whole aspect. And that’s why I think of functional medicine as you’re looking at the whole container of what’s going on.
Dr. Marie Agnew 3:45
Exactly, exactly. I like to use the analogy of insomnia. If somebody’s having insomnia, we are not going to just say, “Oh, take this supplement or change this one thing,” but we want to look at many different aspects of that person’s life to see, well, why? Why is that insomnia coming up? Why do they have that symptom?
Doug Holt 4:02
Yeah, which is one of my problems that I’ve dealt with and with you. And we can talk about anything. I’m an open book with these guys, especially. And speaking of which… you know, one of the other things—I’ll go back to that. One of the other things I like is, even before we actually hit record, we were just talking about, here’s some topics that some of the men are asking for.
And you said you’ve always been an open book and very open to ideas. Whereas other practitioners that I’ve talked to—that are professionals—are so, they’re so in their zone of, “This is my philosophy, and nothing else can go in here.” So when I’ve talked to you in the past about things like the carnivore diet or other things, I was told by another professional that, “Hey, Doug, if you do the carnivore diet, we’re done talking from a professional standpoint.”
And you’ve always been very open to things. And before we hit record, you said, “Hey, look, I have opinions about a couple of these subjects, but I like to talk about science-based evidence. So I’m happy to give an opinion, but I really want the people I work with to be able to give them answers that are backed by clinical research and science.”
Dr. Marie Agnew 5:03
So, so important.
Doug Holt 3:06
Yeah, and you have a big move coming up as we film this right now. You’re expanding your business, which is exciting.
Dr. Marie Agnew 3:12
Yeah, it’s exciting. Feels a little overwhelming right now. It’s all gonna work out.
Doug Holt 3:15
Well, a lot of the people that listen to this, these are business owners, mostly men. We do have quite a few women that listen to the show. When I think of functional medicine, I think of business, right? So if I were to go in and someone has hired me as a consultant and said, “Doug, my business is not performing,” I wouldn’t just go into one section of the company and go, “Okay, let me just look at this one little section.” I’d want to see the whole process, right? The whole user journey, the whole aspect. And that’s why I think of functional medicine as you’re looking at the whole container of what’s going on.
Dr. Marie Agnew 3:45
Exactly, exactly. I like to use the analogy of insomnia. If somebody’s having insomnia, we are not going to just say, “Oh, take this supplement or change this one thing,” but we want to look at many different aspects of that person’s life to see, well, why? Why is that insomnia coming up? Why do they have that symptom?
Doug Holt 4:02
Yeah, which is one of my problems that I’ve dealt with and with you. And we can talk about anything. I’m an open book with these guys, especially. And speaking of which… you know, one of the other things—I’ll go back to that. One of the other things I like is, even before we actually hit record, we were just talking about, here’s some topics that some of the men are asking for.
And you said you’ve always been an open book and very open to ideas. Whereas other practitioners that I’ve talked to—that are professionals—are so, they’re so in their zone of, “This is my philosophy, and nothing else can go in here.” So when I’ve talked to you in the past about things like the carnivore diet or other things, I was told by another professional that, “Hey, Doug, if you do the carnivore diet, we’re done talking from a professional standpoint.”
And you’ve always been very open to things. And before we hit record, you said, “Hey, look, I have opinions about a couple of these subjects, but I like to talk about science-based evidence. So I’m happy to give an opinion, but I really want the people I work with to be able to give them answers that are backed by clinical research and science.”
Dr. Marie Agnew 5:03
So, so important.
Doug Holt 8:00
That’s awesome, man, combining the two. I just… yeah, again, to your point, I felt very zen-like, but I felt very vibrant, if you will.
Dr. Marie Agnew 8:08
It’s a great combination.
Doug Holt 8:09
It is. It felt amazing. So I went into that, and that’s part of my practice now.
Dr. Marie Agnew 8:15
That’s so great. Yeah, cold plunging is really… it’s kind of all the rage right now, but I’m all for it. I think it’s wonderful. And there are a lot of, you know, Swedish cultures where a lot of kids take part in it as well. And you said your kiddos have been kind of jumping in the cold plunge. I think that’s great.
Doug Holt 8:29
They have, they have. My kids are four and seven, so I’ll put them in there, and they’re having fun with it. They’ve been… I’ve had one of our guys, John Oden, who listens to this—he built me a barrel cold plunge that I’ve used for years. That’s hardcore. Yeah, it’s a lot of fun. I used to do it daily. But what was new is combining 20 minutes sauna, cold plunge, 20 minutes sauna, cold plunge, because I used to tell myself I didn’t have enough time, and so I would just do the cold plunge. It was more hardcore. So post-workout, I’d drop right into that cold plunge for, you know, four or five minutes.
Dr. Marie Agnew 9:02
I’m all about it if I know there’s heat coming afterwards, yeah?
Doug Holt 9:07
Well, we’ll get you out here. We have one that we put on the deck here at the ranch. You’ve got to smash the ice to get in because it freezes overnight, yeah? But it’s fun.
What I thought we’d do is answer some questions. So I’ve asked some of the guys in our private community, you know, what they would like to hear from you. I got a lot of them—some were private messages that were sent to me, as well as open messages.
So these are men that have been through our program or are going through our programs, and they just have some questions about themselves as well as their spouse. Does that work for you?
Dr. Marie Agnew
That works.
Doug Holt
Okay. Well, one of the questions—I don’t have to look at my phone because I remember this, because another person who didn’t ask this is very close to me. He’s a guy I’ve worked with for years, and he’s dealing with something similar. And that’s… how can we help the women in our lives, our partners—and maybe it’s the people in general, but the women specifically—that are going through chronic illness and don’t seem to be finding the answers they’re looking for in traditional Western medicine?
Dr. Marie Agnew 10:05
Yeah, great question. So first of all, I would encourage them to consider looking outside of traditional Western medicine, and I want to say that in a very respectful way towards conventional medicine, because there’s a time and a place where conventional medicine is wonderful. If I were to get in a car accident with my kids, I would not take them to a functional medicine provider. I’d probably take them to the hospital. So urgent care, emergent care—I think conventional medicine really shines.
But when it comes to more longitudinal conditions—so conditions that are more chronic, have been around for a while, and also looking at overall lifestyle—it really makes sense to work with a provider that is more functional, meaning looking at all the systems and how they interact together.
So the first thing is, if she’s open to it, I would encourage her to seek out a functional medicine provider. And a lot of times, patients with pretty severe illness will have multiple providers on their team. So I would say, you know, obviously, if you feel supported, stay with your current system of providers and add on a functional medicine provider.
With that, I would encourage them to look more at the root of what’s going on. So oftentimes, inflammation is playing a really big role. Doing a more systematic approach—looking at what types of ways are you fueling your body, how are your macros, are you getting enough protein, are you eating any foods that are more inflammatory to you specifically—and working with a functional provider, you should be able to systematically figure that out.
Do you want me to go into detail about that?
Doug Holt 11:42
Yeah, I was gonna ask you some follow-up questions, just on this.
Dr. Marie Agnew 11:45
I’m not sure what is too, you know, in the weeds, so just shut me off if it’s too much detail. But one of the ways we might do that is called an elimination food plan. So we’re basically cutting out a lot of the more inflammatory foods from the diet, and we’re gonna do that for a period of about 21 days because science shows us that it’s about the half-life of many of the food antibodies.
Once those food antibodies go down after we cut those inflammatory foods out, people oftentimes feel a lot better. So they’re noticing things like, “Oh, my brain fog is getting better,” or “These headaches I’ve been having are getting better,” or maybe their joint pain is improving.
At that point, we then reintroduce one food at a time more systematically—so every three days or so—to see if those symptoms return in any way. And then that is a clue that, all right, that food, for you specifically, is causing some inflammation. So that’s one way to do it.
There’s also blood testing that can tell us about those antibodies, but the more gold standard is to do this elimination food plan.
Doug Holt 12:46
Yeah, and I did both with you. And I’m gonna warn the guys—don’t do what I did recently. I tried some of the foods. I’m gonna try them all.
Dr. Marie Agnew 12:55
That doesn’t give us a lot of information.
Doug Holt 12:57
No, it didn’t. But this is why I think so many people have success from a diet like the carnivore diet that I see. I know a lot of people that will tell me, “Doug, I lost my brain fog, this skin condition went away.” And it’s not the fact, in my opinion—and this is not evidence-based—that they’re eating the meat that’s doing it. It’s the fact they’ve eliminated all the other crap that they’ve been eating.
Dr. Marie Agnew 13:17
100%. I absolutely agree with that. And with the carnivore diet specifically, that can be a really good reset. But then I worry about the microbiome—so basically, the bugs in our gut. Anytime people are not consuming more vegetables or fuel for those bugs in the gut, the microbiome, sometimes their microbiome can become depleted.
So that’s where I would say, I would never blanket statement say everybody should be on the carnivore diet. For some people, it really serves them. But we want to know for you, what does your gut look like? And we can run testing to see that.
Doug Holt 13:48
Okay. And for these guys that are—because I know that, I mean, this is… they’re a person, right? They’re watching their person suffer. And do you often work with, or do you know people as a functional medicine provider? Do you work with other healthcare providers closely, in tandem? Or is there a little bit of a cut-off of like, “Well, you’re, you know, I don’t believe what you’re doing. You don’t believe what I’m doing.”
Dr. Marie Agnew 14:11
No, no. We all should work together because we all can help, is my belief. We’re just looking from different angles or through different lenses. I work a lot with health coaches, work a lot with nutritionists, and then also, sometimes people will have a primary care provider that’s more in the conventional world, and we’re happy to work side by side with them as well. Kind of share notes, share what we’re doing, and really support each other in our work.
Doug Holt
Awesome.
Dr. Marie Agnew
I love that. Yeah, I think that we all, we all want to help. You know, I don’t think there should be any… what’s the right word, like turf fights.
Doug Holt 14:42
I don’t think there should be either, but they come about.
Dr. Marie Agnew 14:46
I don’t believe in that.
Doug Holt 14:49
Yeah. Well, yeah, I think you’re probably more rare than not, unfortunately.
Dr. Marie Agnew 14:53
That’s too bad. To answer your question, though, kind of circling back to how to support a partner who’s really struggling? You know, beyond that, I would say just obviously, like, listen to what they’re going through. I think a lot of times we can have the tendency to try to fix and maybe play in that role of support, love, all those things, and not always try to say, “Well, you need to do this, say that, say this.” But, you know, as a partner, I think we also need to just be that kind of listening ear. I think that helps.
Doug Holt 15:26
No, it does help. It’s something we teach our guys. Most of the men that come through our programs are businessmen, so they’re used to, “Problem? I will solve it,” right? And a lot of times your partner’s not looking for you to solve the problem. They just need a safe place to land and have a conversation. So would you recommend that, if a guy’s in that situation, maybe compassionately listening, going, “Hey, I was listening to this podcast. There was a doctor on there, and she was talking about possibly other things, and I thought of you. Would you like to listen?”
Dr. Marie Agnew 15:57
Sure, yeah, I think that’d be a good path, absolutely. And to these women, you know, if you are listening—and men too—everybody struggling with chronic illness, please do advocate for yourself to have that root cause investigated. Because I hear often from people coming into the practice how disheartened they feel. They feel like there’s really no way to find the root cause or to find answers about why this all came to be. And so I think, continue to advocate for that process of investigation. And if you’re not finding it with your current team, you know, seek other people out.
Doug Holt 16:32
I think it’s very smart.
Dr. Marie Agnew 16:34
You deserve to have that answer because that’s where healing can take place.
Doug Holt 16:38
I agree. I love it. So here’s another question, so I’m just going to read it mostly as it is. This is about lubrication for women. Oh boy, here we go. So with respect to women’s health: What lubricant is less likely to cause a reaction? Rather than endlessly searching or trial and error, what is generally safest? On the other side of this equation, for menopausal women, are there natural remedies or things to help with hormone fluctuations, such as hot flashes and contrasting cold sensations? Or is this just something that’s part of this stage of life?
Dr. Marie Agnew 17:14
Great question. So I’ll answer the first question first: lubrication. Coconut oil is natural, easy to come by, and works really, really well for a lot of people. If you are going to go for more of a marketed lube, make sure it’s all-natural. Paraben-free is really important, because sometimes some of those additives can actually cause skin reactions and inflammation.
For the second part of the question: Hormone Replacement Therapy is phenomenal, and it’s something that… I mean, there’s a lot out there right now, so I’ll just try to make this short. I’m sure many of the men listening to this podcast have heard of the Women’s Health Initiative. That was a study done in the ’90s that scared a lot of people away from hormone replacement therapy, and basically, the findings in that study have been debunked.
We now know that hormone replacement therapy is a lot safer than we ever thought, and it’s something that I find a lot of women feel much, much better with when they are having bioidentical hormone replacement therapy through perimenopause. Perimenopause is basically the fluctuations that can happen up until menopause. Menopause is actually one day—it’s specifically one year after a woman’s period stops. Then you have post-menopause, which is after the period has stopped for a full year.
That is when a lot of women will feel those hot flashes, which is a decline in estrogen as one of the major reasons. Vaginal dryness is also due to a decline in estrogen, so lubrication and also estrogen therapy can help. Anytime we give estrogen, we’re also going to want to give bioidentical progesterone.
Doug Holt 18:52
Why bioidentical?
Dr. Marie Agnew 18:54
Because they’re chemically different from progestin, which is a hormone given that’s not bioidentical, the body will respond differently. So we know now from the science that bioidentical progesterone is most important.
Doug Holt 19:11
And we were also talking, you and I, offline—there’s a third element to this, which is, hey, women sometimes just take longer to warm up than men do. And us guys need to remember that in all of our excitement, women just need a little more attention, a little more time.
Dr. Marie Agnew 19:30
That foreplay, yes. Big, yeah. And there’s also this whole concept of, you know, the gas and the brakes.
This is from a book, Come As You Are, by Dr. Emily Nagoski—I’m gonna say her name wrong, but it starts with an “N.” Guys, they can Google it.
Anyway, there’s a whole chapter that I find a lot of my clients really get a lot from. This chapter talks about gas throughout the day—things like having time in the day for self-care, maybe getting a massage, going for a run, or whatever fills up her bucket. Just having space in the day to do that.
Then, you know, eating well, moving her body—all those things we know that make us just feel better—those can be seen as gas.
And brakes would be maybe coming home from work to, you know, a really messy home, screaming kids, no dinner on the table, and all the things that can really cause a lot of stress for women. That is going to make it really difficult for her to be fully present and energized to connect with her partner later on.
So remembering foreplay is not just about the bedroom, but it can be many, many things before that.
Doug Holt 20:35
Yeah, and we’ve talked about this a lot on this show, and I’m gonna remind the guys, because I need to hear things a lot.
Tim was working with a woman I know, and she was an intimacy coach. Tim was with his partner, and the intimacy coach asked, “Tim, when does sex start for you? Let’s say you’re going to have sex on Friday. When does it start?”
He goes, “Uh, Friday. Like, as soon as it’s on the table, I’m ready.”
And he turned to Tim’s partner and said, “When does it start for you?”
She said, “Monday.”
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yeah.
Doug Holt
Right, it starts on Monday. And so for a lot of these guys calculating in their heads—if it starts Monday for Friday, you should do it Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, you know, keep that flame consistently going as a good way.
Dr. Marie Agnew 21:17
Yeah, that stuff is really, really big for women.
Doug Holt
It is. A lot of our guys have gone through The Anatomy of Arousal and She Comes First, and a lot of books like that, as well as some trainings.
Dr. Marie Agnew 21:28
Great. And side note—I have to say, I don’t think I mentioned this to you earlier—a good friend of mine is actually going through one of your programs right now, and he has found such healing. He actually was headed toward a divorce with his spouse, and they’re in a much better place. So I just, I love the work you guys are doing.
Doug Holt
Oh, thank you.
Dr. Marie Agnew
It’s really impactful.
Doug Holt 21:46
It’s my legacy work, for sure. I love these guys and what we’re doing with them.
We are just opening up a program for non-business owners, so by the time this is out there, that should be launched. We’re able to help a lot more men through the same but tangential program to guide them through.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Fantastic.
Doug Holt
Yeah, it’s amazing stuff. And it’s not me—it’s them, right? I can’t do the pushups for them.
All right, got another one. You ready?
Dr. Marie Agnew
Okay.
Doug Holt
What’s the deal with men’s hormones? How do we naturally keep testosterone levels where they need to be without doing anything crazy?
Dr. Marie Agnew 22:21
Yeah, so I’m curious what he means by “crazy.”
Doug Holt
I don’t know. So I would assume it’d be more than just testosterone therapy. But there’s so much misinformation about that.
I was talking to some guys—I had the UFC fight, had a couple guys over here—and in those conversations, one of the guys mentioned, “Oh, that guy’s probably just on TRT.”
And I thought about it, huh? That was almost like a slap—not a, “This guy’s balancing his hormones.” So he had a negative—my interpretation—a negative connotation on TRT. What’s your take on it?
Dr. Marie Agnew 22:57
I think it’s a phenomenal tool. I think men can use it when their labs show or their symptoms show that they are actually testosterone deficient or don’t have optimal levels. I think it’s a wonderful tool to use.
I would never say, “Let’s give this tool and take away all the other foundational work that one should be doing.” So weight-bearing exercise, eating a whole foods diet, getting plenty of protein, getting good sleep—all those things come into play here, and those all will support natural testosterone or more optimal testosterone levels.
Things like heavy drinking, a heavily processed food diet—I mean, I feel a little repetitive here, but those things really do hurt our hormones, males and females.
So having a more balanced life in that way. Also, sleep comes into play quite a bit too. So being mindful of circadian rhythm—trying to get to bed at the same time every night, waking up at, for the most part, the same time every morning, having a good sleep-wake cycle, getting daytime light—all of those things are really important.
Doug Holt 23:59
I’m gonna go on a side tangent, and I’ll come back to supplementation and things like that. But when we talk about sleep, because it’s one of the things I think about a lot of the time, what’s your belief on setting an alarm to wake up in the morning versus waking up naturally?
Dr. Marie Agnew 24:15
I am a big fan of the alarm, and then ideally, once the rhythm is strengthened, one will start waking up around that time without the alarm.
But what I like about the alarm is regulating how much sleep one is getting and making sure that you’re getting up at the same time and going to bed again at the same time. That will strengthen that rhythm.
We’re rhythmic creatures. Our bodies really like rhythm, so the more we can do to strengthen that, the better. It’s really difficult on the body to go to bed one night at, like, 10 p.m. and then the next night at 2 a.m. It’s really, really hard on us. That’s why people feel so horrible after travel—because their bodies are just confused.
Doug Holt 24:56
Yeah, no, I get that all too well.
Dr. Marie Agnew 25:00
Yeah, and I do hear from men sometimes—and women—”Well, I do my best work at night. I’m a night owl, and that’s when the creative juices flow.”
To that, I would say you might actually do your best work early in the morning as well and feel better throughout the rest of the day. So it makes sense to experiment with it a little bit.
This is not scientific—I’ll give a little disclaimer. In Ayurveda, they actually talk about different times of the day matching with different doshas. I won’t get too into the weeds there, but basically, they believe that the most creative time can be when the sun is highest in the sky (so middle of the day) and also between 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. (middle of the night).
That’s why a lot of people, if they stay up past that 10 p.m. time, feel a lot more creative and get a second burst of energy.
But scientifically, we actually know the body does a lot of “cleaning house” between that 10 p.m.–2 a.m. time. So if we can be asleep at that time, we’re much better for it. Does that make sense? I feel like I got a little out there for a second.
Doug Holt 26:04
No, you didn’t get out there at all. It makes complete sense.
So I used to be the after-10 p.m. work guy. I was a night owl. Then in my early 20s, I was a head strength coach for a while. Being a head strength coach, you’re up at five in the morning—if you’re lucky, that’s a “sleep-in” type schedule.
It took me probably a year or so, honestly. And after that year, I became a morning person. Now today, I find myself getting up at four or five in the morning naturally.
Like, I had no alarm for today because I wanted to be really rested, and I popped out of bed at five o’clock in the morning anyway.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Great.
Doug Holt
And I am definitely—before, if I can get there before the kids get up—that is my best creative time to get the big problems focused on.
Dr. Marie Agnew 26:51
Nice, nice. Yeah. And I hear that from a lot of clients, too. It takes some experimentation, right? You just have to try it out.
Doug Holt 26:58
Yeah, awesome stuff.
Oh, and then I was going to ask—so, based on what I know of this guy who sent me this message (he sent it to me privately), when you think about things like ashwagandha, tribulus, and other supplements that claim to increase testosterone—my feel is that they can, but they can only do so very little. And you’re taking so much other stuff into your body for not much change.
Dr. Marie Agnew 27:27
I have to say, when I run labs and then retest—I always want to test for change, right, to make sure what people are doing is impactful—I don’t see much of a laboratory change, unfortunately. I love the idea of it, I do.
But I do find that when people need testosterone, TRT (testosterone replacement therapy) is the way to go.
Doug Holt 27:47
If somebody hears, “Doug, I’m scared that if I start TRT, I’ll be stuck on it for life,” is that true?
Dr. Marie Agnew 27:55
It’s not necessarily true. Oftentimes, we will want to do other work. So if somebody has a poor lifestyle and they start TRT, sometimes with lifestyle changes, we can actually get levels up and then slowly take them off TRT.
But oftentimes men feel so much better. Maybe we can decrease the dose, but it’s rare for somebody to want to come completely off.
That being said, obviously we’re monitoring levels, making sure we’re not going too high.
Those foundational pieces—weight-bearing exercise, proper nutrition, sleep, etc.—are important to have in play. With TRT, it’ll be case by case.
If somebody’s goal is to come off and they feel very strongly about it, I would never say, “You’ll never come off.” I think it’s doable, but those lifestyle pieces are big. They really do make a difference.
Doug Holt 28:42
I did it on my own, where I was on TRT for a little while—doctor recommended, of course—and then we were trying to have our second child. And so everything I was reading, the research I was doing, was like, “Okay, let’s…” So I stopped TRT on my own, cold turkey—not the best way.
I don’t recall having a significant downfall. And again, hindsight is 20/20. I remember it being that way; I just felt horrible. But I did. I was very conscientious about making sure that the other practices I was doing—I couldn’t get away with the breakfast burrito anymore, you know, like the things that I was using as an excuse.
So I cleaned up my diet and cleaned up my sleep to make sure everything was good. And then retesting and working with you, we decided, “Hey, let’s go back on.”
Dr. Marie Agnew 29:32
Yeah, and you’re also doing the lifestyle pieces. I mean, there’s also just the whole—I would be careful to say—you can never out-supplement a bad diet or out-supplement a poor lifestyle.
Those pieces have to be in place. It’s just not a good approach to give somebody an injection or have them take some pills, because lifestyle—that’s the most important thing. That’s the biggest lever for us.
It’s also the most difficult for people, but your listeners are driven. They can do it with some good guidance. That’s where working with a functional provider can be really helpful.
I know I’m giving some blanket statements, but they’re very general, and that’s because there really is no one-size-fits-all. When you get more granular into recommendations, everybody needs a different amount of different things.
Doug Holt 30:23
And that’s so true. I mean, you have the hardest job in the world working with me, because I was in the health and fitness space for 20 years. And you get kind of, you know, stuck in your ways—like, “I already know all this stuff, and I help…”
I used to teach and wrote a book on performance nutrition, so it’s easy for me to think that I know it and don’t need help. And you do such a good job going, “Well, let’s just try this, Doug. Just because you know it doesn’t mean you’re doing it.”
Dr. Marie Agnew 30:48
Well, there’s also the argument that people can find exactly what they need in their 20s or their 30s, and then, you know, in different seasons of life, our needs change.
Doug Holt 30:56
Yeah, well, I tore my rotator cuff. Apparently, you’re not supposed to lift heavy seven days a week, thinking, “Well, I gotta catch up.”
So, you know, we’re our own worst enemies. But my point really is, coming to a professional like yourself—there’s so much information out there, whether it be strength training, nutrition, or hormone replacement therapy.
Who do you go to? To trust is a question most people have. And you can get—I can get, at least—overwhelmed. You talk to one professional, it’s X; the other one, Y. That’s why having a trusted professional, in my opinion, is a really easy way to do it.
Dr. Marie Agnew 31:38
Yeah, thank you. And it is overwhelming. I mean, you go to social media and everybody’s telling you: vegan, carnivore… There’s just so much conflicting information out there.
I would say the biggest thing to make sure of is that you are listened to, you’re respected, and also that there’s actual lab work being done. Because you can’t just look at somebody and know what they need—you need to see what their biometrics are telling you.
Having a more targeted approach is really important.
Doug Holt 32:09
And I don’t know if we talked about this last time on the podcast or not, but one of my blood work results came back, and you were like, “Hey, we need to talk.”
It was you, and there was also another—I was actually talking to another doctor who was very well known and has been on the podcast. And you both had the same thing. You were both like, “Dude, if you go down this route, it is not going to end well.”
That was eye-opening for me, because it wasn’t an opinion. It was like, “Here’s what the data shows. If you don’t start sleeping and reduce your stress, you’re going to die.” And you didn’t say it that way.
Dr. Marie Agnew 32:46
I read into it. Yeah. Do you want me to talk about what we found?
Doug Holt 32:54
Sure, is that interesting?
Dr. Marie Agnew 32:59
Amazing, amazing. So if it’s the one I think you’re talking about—the cortisol awakening response. Celebrate cortisol, yes.
So we looked at Doug’s cortisol level and cortisone. Cortisone is deactivated cortisol. Cortisol is a stress hormone, and basically, when you have too much cortisol surging throughout the day—running a big business—there can be a negative feedback loop that happens in the body.
At the time, Doug’s cortisol was basically flatlined, meaning there was no cortisol awakening response, which should happen in the morning. It should be like a mountain of cortisol.
Doug Holt 33:35
Hey guys, sorry to interrupt this episode, but the reality is, if you are watching or listening to this right now, then you are looking to better yourself, and I applaud you. You’re one of my people, and I want to give you the opportunity of taking massive action.
So if you haven’t joined The Activation Method yet—it’s our flagship program—do what thousands of other businessmen, just like you, have done and take action. Be one of the one-percenters that actually does the work and takes action.
There’ll be a link in the description that’ll take you right to a page that’ll just give you more information. There is no obligation. Just go check it out and see if it’s a good fit for you.
All right, let’s get back to this episode.
Dr. Marie Agnew 34:18
It should slowly decline through the rest of the day, and yours was just straight across. So we needed to work on sleep, work on stress—all the things—to get that more boosted up.
And I believe we used some supplementation as well.
Doug Holt
We did.
Dr. Marie Agnew
There’s some good data behind just energy, cognition, longevity—all those things tied to that cortisol awakening response.
Doug Holt 34:40
And it’s interesting. We talk about social media as well. You hear a lot about B vitamin methylation.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yes, yes, yes.
Doug Holt
Right? But they don’t tell you why you need it. They just tell you you need it, or people have a problem with it. And I remember—it was a wake-up call for me.
There’s probably a reason I haven’t retested, but you did give me another test. Like nine months ago—it’s still on my desk, right where it shouldn’t be.
There is so much information out there. One of my guilty pleasures is when I have a little bit of downtime—putting the kids to bed or something. My kids are scared once they start; they want to be away from me. So if I’m too close to them, they want to play or just be near me.
So I’ll sit on the opposite side of the room, kind of stretch, but I’ll watch TikToks—my guilty pleasure.
My TikToks are all business, personal development, and health. And so I see so many of these people out there telling you, like to your point, “Hey, you need to work on your cortisol levels,” or, “Hey, you need to have supplement B vitamins or you have no methylation.”
So there’s this one secret test you need to pay $10 grand for to get.
Dr. Marie Agnew 35:49
There’s never one test.
Doug Holt
Exactly. So that’s why it was so interesting to me. And most of the men coming to our program haven’t had any diagnostics done—ever—unless they’ve had to do something for a doctor, let alone an executive-type health screening.
What I found is, just like in business, you need your diagnostic tools. When I saw those results from those labs and other blood work—the last blood work we had—you said, “Hey, your testosterone is lower than it should be. We need to discuss what’s going on here.”
Dr. Marie Agnew 36:21
And there was a very real reason for that that we talked about. But it’s so important to have those diagnostics, just like in business—it’s so important.
I would say, beyond what’s typically given in conventional medicine. And again, I don’t want to talk down on conventional medicine, but the training of more conventional primary care providers is, “Let’s look for the big things that are wrong,” not “Let’s actually cast a broad net and look to optimize where we can.”
So a more conventional provider might run just a basic lipid panel, where they’re not looking at the more advanced markers that we now know are very important.
So I’ll go off on a tangent here. Things like APO B, LP(a)—those are markers I would ask your PCP to run next time you have a lipid panel.
They’re not looking for inflammatory markers. They’re oftentimes not checking a vitamin D level. They’re not looking at fasting insulin, which tells us about your blood sugar.
For thyroid health—thyroid is really kind of the master of our metabolism and cognition—oftentimes they’re just running one marker called TSH, or thyroid-stimulating hormone.
I would ask for more than that. Do you want me to stop all these things?
Doug Holt 37:35
You might want to give them some of the acronyms. So PCP—your primary care provider.
Dr. Marie Agnew 37:39
Or the person who you see for your annual exam, if you are going in.
So anyway, with the thyroid panel, I would ask for a T4, which is a type of your thyroid hormone; T3, which is your activated thyroid hormone; a free T4, which is your unbound thyroid hormone; and free T3. Reverse T3, and then I would also have your thyroid antibodies checked.
That’s more of an upstream exam where we’re looking for things that could potentially cause problems later on down the road. So it’s more of a proactive, preventative approach.
Doug Holt 38:12
These are tests that men in Canada, Cyprus, South Africa, the UK—they could have all these tests run?
Dr. Marie Agnew
Absolutely.
Doug Holt
Fantastic.
Dr. Marie Agnew 38:22
Then it would depend—I mean, cash pay versus insurance—those are all questions to ask your provider or your insurance. It depends on coverage.
Doug Holt 38:34
Yeah. But at the end of the day, it’s your health, right?
Dr. Marie Agnew 38:37
I mean, there are a lot of cash-pay labs, too, that’ll give you discounted prices for a big package. I mean, $200–$300 for a full panel. So not a big investment when it comes to your health.
Doug Holt 38:46
No. I spent my 20s and 30s running a private studio in Santa Barbara, California.
Dr. Marie Agnew 38:53
I love Santa Barbara.
Doug Holt 38:54
It was great. I mean, I got to know these people so well—they’re my family.
But one thing I did see, ironically, is men—now my age—spending all the money they’ve earned to get their health back, right? Their time and their money. They made all this money and income, and now they’re like, “Oh shit, I need to now take care of myself.”
And I think guys more than women—you tell me if I’m wrong—tend to put their health to the side.
Dr. Marie Agnew
You are so right.
Doug Holt
I know I’m one of them. I know. You just reminded me—there was a test that I told you I would do, or we were supposed to do. Was it PSA levels? I think that’s what it was, and I didn’t do it. Out of sight, out of mind.
Dr. Marie Agnew 39:31
Remember what the lab did?
Doug Holt 39:32
Yes, they screwed it up, right?
Dr. Marie Agnew 39:33
They tested passion fruit IgE levels instead of PSA.
Doug Holt
I don’t eat a lot of passion fruit, so it’s probably low.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yeah.
Doug Holt
I forgot about that too. You mentioned it. I just knew something got screwed up. It wasn’t a big deal to me. I was like, “Okay, we’ll just do it again when I get back from progress.”
Cool. Let’s get back to these questions for the guys.
And guys listening—if you have questions that you’d like answered on the show, I’m gonna invite you to email VIP@thepowerfulman.com—like “very important person” at thepowerfulman.com—and I’ll do my best to bring experts in, like Marie here, to answer those questions.
Whether it be about your health, relationships, business—we’ll get into those. But I can’t answer your questions unless I know what they are, guys. Not a mind reader, as most of you know.
But I do have some more questions that were sent in to me that we can keep going through.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yeah, let’s do it.
Doug Holt
Awesome.
This one’s cool. This is something in my house we’re very conscious of—and we try to be as conscious of here at the studio.
You’re going, “What’s this got to do with health?”
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yeah.
Doug Holt
At the ranch—it’s toxins. They’re everywhere. How can we reduce exposure and improve overall vitality?
Dr. Marie Agnew 40:44
Yeah, great question. So one of the biggest things is to have a really great water filter. The Environmental Working Group (EWG), at ewg.org, actually has a database where you can put in your zip code, and they will show you the testing results for your area. They also match it to what type of water filter is best to remove the toxins that have been found. So it’s really great. I would definitely start there.
Obviously, the food that you’re eating is important. I’m a big fan of organic when possible. If that feels overwhelming, again, the Environmental Working Group puts out the Clean 15, Dirty Dozen list every year. They test a bunch of produce and give you a list of the things that are the most pesticide- and herbicide-ridden—the dirtiest.
Doug Holt
Grapes.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Exactly. Peaches, pears. Sometimes it changes year to year.
Then also the Clean 15, which is basically if you’re not going to buy it all organic, that would be the list of things you could get away with.
Try to make sure that as you read food labels—and everybody should be reading the labels of the things they’re eating and giving their kids—you can pronounce those words and understand what’s actually in the food. Avoid things like food coloring.
It’s really disheartening. I have an 8- and a 10-year-old, and it’s wild how much “kid food” just has crap in it—food coloring and things we know are inflammatory and horrible. It’s also packaged as healthy, trying to “greenwash” it—make it look healthy—but it’s really not when you start reading the labels.
Those would be the biggest things.
Also, cleaning products—the things you’re using in your home or office—make sure they don’t have a lot of big chemicals in them. Instead of reading through a list of a million things, I can send Doug a list of the biggest ones I would recommend looking for, so you can maybe share that if people are interested.
Doug Holt 42:51
Yeah, I’ll jump in there. So guys, if you want that list, email VIP@thepowerfulman.com. Our advisors check that inbox. Let them know you want Marie’s list and resources, and we’ll get those over to you.
Dr. Marie Agnew 43:05
Yeah, yeah. And then I would say similarly, any product you’re putting on your skin. I like to say, anything you put on your skin, it’s almost as if you’re eating it because your body absorbs it, yeah?
So things like lotion, shampoos, conditioners, shaving cream—all of those things should be clean. Again, I’ll send you that list. There are definitely a lot of things to look out for.
Doug Holt 43:27
Well, people don’t realize your skin is your largest organ, right? Largest or second-largest organ in the body. You regenerate skin cells, and there are different layers of skin that you have.
Another one I was reading about—and we’re very conscientious about it here because we host so many events for the men and in my house—is scents.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yes.
Doug Holt
Like, the sprays you use, the air fresheners, and things like that. People don’t realize that what you smell is actually a physical particle that you’re then taking into your body.
Dr. Marie Agnew 43:56
Yep. It can be really harmful. Things like those Glade plug-in fresheners—super toxic. Very, very toxic.
Also candles—those can be toxic. You want to make sure they’re more essential oils or natural fragrances and more soy-based as opposed to petroleum-based.
Doug Holt 44:16
Yeah, I hear the argument from some guys like, “Well, the natural candles cost so much more.” And they do, but it’s your health, right?
Dr. Marie Agnew
Your health, yes.
Doug Holt
It’s because they’re not using chemicals.
Dr. Marie Agnew 44:27
I mean, I might be a little biased, but I’d say your health is the number one thing to invest in. It’s really important.
Doug Holt 44:33
Yeah, that’s why I studied it in college. I was like, I’ve got one body. At least I’ll learn this.
Dr. Marie Agnew 44:38
Smart. Perfumes too. Colognes and perfumes—those can be really toxic as well.
Doug Holt 44:43
Yeah, it’s interesting. Coming back from Europe, I was there for a month, and right when I left, this whole Kellogg’s thing kicked off. It just started on social media. I knew about it because I spent some time in my previous life as a consultant for supplement companies.
What a lot of people don’t know is that most US supplements you can buy off the shelves—we can’t sell them to Canada, Europe, or ship them there. They’re illegal because they haven’t been determined to be good for the body.
The same goes for big brands that aren’t allowed to sell what they sell in America overseas. So they change the formulas. In Europe, you can’t have a lot of the red and blue dyes, so for Fruity Pebbles or something, they use something more natural to color them.
Dr. Marie Agnew 45:44
Yeah, which is just wild to me—that we are not in the same boat. The fact that we allow that stuff in children’s cereal… I mean, I don’t even want to call it food. It’s pretty bad stuff. I’m really hoping things will change.
Doug Holt 46:02
Well, I’m not a conspiracy guy as much, but when you look at what our government provides for the health pyramid and the food pyramid…
I remember when—this is going to get political and piss a lot of these guys off, but guys, this is just the truth—the Bush administration passed pizza being indicated as a vegetable so that schools could count it as a vegetable. Unreal.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yeah.
Doug Holt
And it just really pissed me off. That’s when I realized this game is rigged.
Dr. Marie Agnew 46:37
It’s rigged. It’s rigged.
My kids, they go to bed… In the Pine School District, they have a day school. The school calendar will come out with, you know, what the school lunches are going to be.
Doug Holt
Yep.
Dr. Marie Agnew
And they have a day where a school lunch is a cinnamon roll—a cinnamon roll and a sausage patty. I mean, you can’t make this stuff up. It’s wild.
Doug Holt 46:59
Those are the days my son doesn’t want to bring a lunch from home.
Dr. Marie Agnew 47:03
Yeah, exactly. My kids still get their lunch from home, but sometimes they’ll come back and not touch it. And I’m like, “Why didn’t you eat your lunch?”
Doug Holt
“It’s cinnamon roll day, Mom!”
Dr. Marie Agnew 47:12
It’s wild.
Doug Holt 47:14
It is crazy.
I think they’re trying their best to do a good job at the school level—at the local level.
Dr. Marie Agnew 47:19
I think they’re trying. I think more change needs to happen. And of course, it’s easy for me to sit here and say that, and I know there are economic constraints and there’s a lot they’re up against. But I think we really need to do better.
Doug Holt 47:32
I agree, especially for our kids.
You look at… I mean, how do kids get away with the attention span kids have? You’re asking them to sit at a desk all day, right? And then you feed them sugar.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Exactly.
Doug Holt
Then you give them a cinnamon roll for lunch—or for breakfast. I looked at it, you know, it’s French toast, waffles, and all the good stuff.
And I say “good”—good-tasting for a kid. My son, who’s seven—now, this is a very picky eater—but now all of a sudden, he wants hot lunch.
So I’m going, hmm. I’m sure there’s some peer pressure going on too.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yes.
Doug Holt
And he wants to hang out with his friends, yeah.
But also, when I look at it… chicken nuggets, and… okay, let’s see. How are we going to do this and navigate it?
I remember—I know we’re going off on tangents, Marie, so I hope it’s okay.
Dr. Marie Agnew 48:18
That’s okay. I mean, I think I’m guilty of it too.
Doug Holt 48:20
Okay. In Santa Barbara, when I lived there, there’s a school called Peabody Charter School. My brother was the PE teacher there, and he subbed for other classes.
What they did is they had their own organic garden, and it was awesome. They had a chef, but restaurants would send their chefs in a couple of times a week.
Different chefs would rotate, and they’d bring in all organic vegetables. The kids were charged, at a certain grade level, with tending to the garden. They’d sell the vegetables to the chef for cooking. That money went toward one of their events.
And the food was so good, the parents wanted to come eat there. They would sell meals on Fridays. If you were a family member, you could buy a meal. It was restaurant-quality food that these kids were eating—all organic.
Dr. Marie Agnew 49:14
That’s so great. And what that’s teaching the kids too—getting in the garden, getting in the soil, seeing where food comes from. I think that’s all really important.
Doug Holt 49:22
And the economics… okay, if you want to go to space camp or whatever it was—I can’t remember what the thing was—you need to earn money. It costs money to go.
And then you had kids that were underserved or economically underserved—kids that couldn’t afford to go—and this was a way for them to pay for the program.
Dr. Marie Agnew
So beautiful.
Doug Holt
Yeah, it was super cool. It didn’t cost the school anything because you had the community coming in to volunteer, right?
And for restaurants—there are some nice restaurants in Santa Barbara—their head chefs would come in and cook for these kids. These kids were eating like kings and queens.
Dr. Marie Agnew 49:58
That’s incredible. Sounds like an amazing program.
Doug Holt 50:00
I think so. I think we could do more of that.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yeah.
Doug Holt
Getting back to some of these questions as I come through…
Dr. Marie Agnew 50:08
Thanks for sending in questions.
Doug Holt 50:11
These guys are awesome. I didn’t give much time—I apologize. I’ll get better at that.
So yeah, in your opinion, what’s the secret to staying youthful and energetic as we get older?
Dr. Marie Agnew 50:23
I’m starting to feel like I’m a broken record here, but really, the foundations of health: good sleep—that’s foundational.
Making sure that you’re fueling your body well. We know there’s a lot of research about the importance of protein and amino acids. Getting adequate protein is crucial because, as we age, we naturally lose muscle mass.
So making sure that you’re doing weight-bearing exercise and getting adequate protein can help keep that muscle on.
And then also, making sure your hormones look good as well. Testing and really filling in the gaps where you need to, whether it’s specific nutrients via your diet or more supplementation as kind of an insurance policy.
Making sure there’s joy in your life—I think that’s something we don’t talk enough about. We talk about sleep and all these other things, but laughter, joy, and things that really fill you up and light you up are important.
From a more scientific level, that’s also giving you more feel-good hormones like dopamine. Those hormones are good for you and important to have in adequate levels.
Does that answer your question? I feel like this is all very vague.
I would say at a more granular level, working with a provider who’s actually casting a broad net and looking at different biometrics so you know you’re doing what you need to keep levels where they should be—whether it’s your lipids, APO B, LP(a), heart health markers, inflammatory markers like homocysteine, high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, iron levels, thyroid levels, etc.
Really getting a good workup and then working to get levels to their optimal range, on top of eating well, exercising, adequate protein, hydration, joy—all those things.
Doug Holt 52:14
Love it. There are so many comments on that.
Joy is one of those things that so many men, especially—not saying women don’t, but I have a large data pool of men that we work with, thousands—miss.
I even remember when I moved here to Bend, maybe a year or so afterwards. I was in a position business-wise where things were going really well without me having to be involved.
So I’m looking at setting goals: “What’s that next phase? What am I gonna be doing?”
And I remember talking to someone and saying, “Okay, I’m gonna go snowboarding every day, and I’m going to do that. That’s going to be my goal.”
As you know, in Bend, I live at the base of the mountain—close as you could get. I thought, “Okay, this is great. I’ll get the Sprinter van, go up there, I can do it.”
And I remember someone asking, “What do you want to do with your free time for fun?” And I was like, “Uh…”
If it wasn’t competitive sports, I was lost. All I knew was competition—whether in Santa Barbara, playing soccer, beach volleyball, that’s all I knew.
I was completely lost—what to do with my free time other than compete in sports, which I couldn’t do in Bend. So I started another business—which I did do and was a mistake. I was running multiple companies at once because I enjoyed it, but I actually didn’t know what I liked to do with my free time for just pure joy.
Dr. Marie Agnew 53:40
I hear that from a lot of women as well.
For women, it’s more a product of “What’s on the to-do list?” or “What do I need to produce or get done?”
It’s difficult to just sit back and not be productive or not feel guilty about it because there’s always so much that needs to be done all the time.
It’s kind of the same coin, different side, maybe.
Of course, I’m generalizing, but the root cause of that—I wonder…
This is going off on another tangent, but it’s how we were raised. I think it was all about what you produce and basically getting praise for getting things done.
I think that parenting recommendations are shifting pretty significantly, so I’m hoping that our kids’ generation will actually understand that feeling joyful and knowing what they like to do is important.
Doug Holt 54:36
I think, yeah, it’s hugely important.
It’s one of the first things we have the guys do when they come into the program. You know, you’re talking about your friend—I’m sure that’s something that he was talked to about to a certain level.
It goes deeper as the men go through the more advanced programs on really finding not just their purpose, but figuring out what it is that fills their cup.
So many of us—men and women—come home so depleted to our partners and families. We give the best of us to our business and the rest of us to everything else.
Dr. Marie Agnew 55:07
100%. And that fits in with the earlier conversation about libido and lubrication.
For women, spending the day working through the to-do list and feeling really depleted—it’s so difficult for them to feel ready to give more.
Doug Holt 55:30
Yeah, especially with women in masculine roles. How do you allow them to slip into their femininity?
It’s something we teach the guys. There’s a lot of methodologies that we use.
For example, if a woman is in a masculine role—like you manage a business, so you have to be in that area of management, running finances, etc.—how do you come home and slip back into femininity?
A lot of guys will complain, “My wife comes home and I’m just an employee; I just get managed.”
One example we give is to draw her a bath, get her a glass of champagne (or wine, coffee, whatever she likes), and say, “Babe, I drew a bath. Go take a bath, relax, and come out when you’re ready.”
Give her the space to do so, which allows her to recharge.
Dr. Marie Agnew 56:41
Absolutely. And women can own that too—be responsible enough to know that our mindset needs to change and give ourselves time to shift.
I talk with clients a lot about maybe changing out of work clothes into something more comfortable, jumping in the shower, taking some deep breaths, and letting the stress of the day wash off.
All of those things can be impactful in getting into a different headspace.
Doug Holt 57:06
We teach the guys the same thing. We teach them a decompression routine that they do. Everybody talks about morning routines, but people don’t talk—very rarely—about decompression or evening routines.
Dr. Marie Agnew
So true.
Doug Holt
And I think they’re just as important.
Dr. Marie Agnew 57:17
Very important. Yeah. I love that you’re teaching people that. That’s great.
And the masculine-feminine energy is big. It really is huge.
Doug Holt 57:26
Yeah. Most people haven’t been introduced to those concepts.
What happens for a lot of our guys is they’re great men—like your friend, I’m sure—and their wife becomes unhappy for whatever reason.
So they think, “Okay, I’m going to make her happy, so I’ll clean the house like it’s never been cleaned before.”
They’re doing it to get praise, and that’s palpable. They do it time and time again. Eventually, they become more in their feminine than they’re used to.
Thus, their wife has to become more in her masculine than she’s used to. Now you have an unbalanced dynamic.
We teach these guys how to get back to their true essence, which then puts harmony back into the home.
Dr. Marie Agnew 58:18
I love that. Yeah, yeah. That’s powerful work.
Doug Holt 58:21
It is. That’s why a lot of these guys change after a few weeks.
Dr. Marie Agnew 58:25
It’s incredible. And that goes back to the foundations of health, right? Harmony in the home, feeling—it’s just so important.
When we look at health holistically, it’s not just about those biomarkers or the labs—it’s about so much more.
Doug Holt 58:39
It is. And I love the holistic approach because you are a human; you’re unique.
For me, the issues I’ve had with sleep my entire adult life—if I were just given a pill (which I have been before), it doesn’t help at all, right? You’re not getting to the root cause.
When I sat down with you, you were like, “Okay, let’s talk about your lifestyle, your diet, your stress levels.”
One of the things I really enjoyed in our conversations is you weren’t like, “Okay, this is bad. You cannot do this anymore.”
You were like, “Hey, why don’t we reduce this area, see how that works, then check back. Maybe if we add some vitamin D here and some other things, we can get things back in balance.”
It was a very approachable approach, if you will.
Dr. Marie Agnew 59:25
Thank you. I think that’s important because it needs to be doable, yeah? If we give people a list of 20 things to do and ask them to change overnight, nothing’s going to happen.
Doug Holt 59:33
Or at least not for the long term, right?
Dr. Marie Agnew
Exactly.
Doug Holt
It’s not a habit anymore or a lifestyle, yeah?
I think that’s what a lot of us look for. One of the things I want to ask you is a blanket question, which I know is going to put you on the spot.
We talked about vitality earlier—there are certain things you listed off that people could do.
And everybody’s like, “Okay, well, what’s the pill? If I just do this one thing…”
Most people know the general, “Okay, if I want to lose weight, I eat less and exercise more.”
But we get caught up in, “How many international units of vitamin E do I need?”
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:00:14
Or grams of protein.
Doug Holt
Exactly. And we get caught up in that. It’s paralysis by analysis.
So going off that—with that disclaimer—if you were to say, “Hey, if you could do these five things, guys, start with these five things to protect your wellness today and bring back vitality…”
What would be those five things that men listening to this could do for themselves and their families?
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:00:50
Five things, all right.
Number one: Make sure that you’re moving your body regularly. We can get into the weeds on that one because the recommendations will differ for everyone, but body movement is so, so important. Get your blood moving.
Of course, you can always optimize from there, but just start moving your body.
Number two: Stress management and sleep. Can I do a two-for-one here?
Doug Holt
Sure.
Dr. Marie Agnew
We want those stress hormones to not be raging throughout the day.
Understanding how you can calm your body in the midst of a stressful environment is really big. Whether that’s learning diaphragmatic breathing, being mindful of your inner voice and what it’s saying, or recognizing signs of stress—like your shoulders going up, your heart rate increasing, or clenching your jaw.
Figure out how to calm your body. Sleep fits into that as well.
Number three: Gut health. Make sure you’re having regular bowel movements—daily, ideally.
Can I get graphic here?
Doug Holt
Get as graphic as you want.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Okay, gross, but I have to go there. Your bowel movements should not be liquid or diarrhea. They shouldn’t be hard or look like rocks.
They should be more like a snake or a log. If your bowel movements are off, it shows dysbiosis or inflammation in the gut. Dysbiosis means an imbalance in the bacteria or microbiome, so that’s something to investigate and treat with a functional provider.
Gut health is foundational—it’s how we absorb nutrients, regulate hormones, and manage inflammation.
Along with that: diet. Primarily whole foods. Cut out the junk and processed stuff.
I won’t get too granular because food and nutrients should be personalized, but working with a practitioner who can fine-tune what you need will make a big difference in inflammation, cognition, and overall health.
Number four: Hydration. Stay hydrated—your body needs it for every function.
Number five: Joy and connection. Make sure there’s joy in your life. Have things that fill you up and light you up. That ties into everything else.
Doug Holt 1:03:57
Awesome. Yeah, those are good five. Okay, good. Thanks.
So I’ll recount them the way I heard them. Exercise—move your body, get off your butt, right? I used to talk about sitting being the new smoking, so to speak, for health biomarkers. So move your butt.
The second one you talked about is, hey, reduce your stress, bring it down, regulate your body, and also get great sleep.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:04:18
Can I interrupt you for a second?
Doug Holt
Absolutely.
Dr. Marie Agnew
I don’t know if it’s always in people’s power to reduce their stress, right? So I would say more so: What can you do in the midst of stress to calm your body and not react to the stress?
How can you be in a room getting inundated with stressful things but not have any type of a body reaction? That’s where those grounding tools come into place—deep, slow breaths, things like that.
Doug Holt 1:04:42
Yep. And so for guys that are in the Brotherhood or Inner Circle or One Year Mastermind groups, there’s a whole master class on grounded masculinity that goes deep into breathwork. And there are some breathwork classes you guys could do too.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:04:52
Seriously, when are you bringing this out to women? I love everything you’re doing.
Doug Holt 1:04:57
We want to. The master classes are awesome, by the way.
We need to get you in there. But yeah, so eventually we’ll get this to the ladies.
We want to bring it. First, it’s the men. Our whole mission is to save the children.
Our mission statement is, our goal this year is to save 25,000 children by saving their fathers first.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Amazing.
Doug Holt
Right? You’ll love this—I get emotional about it because we have a clients’ wins channel on Slack, where we post every day. People post in the community, share something, and we post it.
So often, there are these guys who are just so disconnected and lost, right? They feel like just a paycheck or what have you, and they’re disconnected from their kids.
We have kids as old as 46 years old to kids as young as newborns, who almost have no connection with their father.
We get these messages from dads saying, “Now I can sit down with my six-year-old daughter and have a relationship. I’ve screwed up in the past, but I’m going to be here every day to prove to her that this change is real.”
It brings tears to my eyes when I see these men go through this metamorphosis. They come in to save their marriage, but really, it’s so much more.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:06:09
That’s incredible—so impactful.
And then you think about how those children will change for future generations. That’s beautiful.
Doug Holt 1:06:15
Yeah. And then we’ll work with the women to bring them into the families.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Love it.
Doug Holt
We’ll get there. We’ll get there.
So we have “move your body.”
We have “sleep and regulation of stress”—I’ll call it that. Is that better?
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:06:31
I mean, how do you feel about that?
In my role, with the time that I have with people, I feel like it’s not as impactful for me to say, “Well, just stress less” or “Have less stress in your life.”
People would kind of roll their eyes and be like, “Yeah, that’s helpful.”
But really understanding that you can have stress coming at you, but you don’t have to react.
Doug Holt 1:06:50
That’s what we teach the guys. We use an acronym called DEER.
Most men are in DEER mode. It stands for:
- Defend their actions,
- Excuse their actions,
- Explain overly, and
- React.
So a triggering event—something most people would probably know it as—is like your wife triggering you. And you say, “Well, I didn’t do this; I didn’t take out the trash because whatever,” and it’s that reaction.
We teach them how to regulate their autonomic nervous system.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:07:21
Thank you.
Doug Holt 1:07:23
It’s been a long time since I’ve been in physiology, but that’s what we’re teaching the guys so they don’t get triggered.
I agree with you 100%. I also don’t know if most guys would recognize right away, “I have to regulate my stress. What does that mean?”
But I’m with you 100%. You can’t always change your environment, nor do you want to, per se. It’s your perception of that environment, I think, that’s a big differentiating factor.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:07:42
Yeah. To make it less overwhelming—just because I want to make sure people have some takeaways—don’t worry about all the big pieces.
Just notice: How do I know I’m stressed? Maybe take a moment and think about it. What are the signs? They’ll be different for each person.
Then pick one tool that can ground your body. For a lot of people, the easiest tool is just breathing. Slow that breath. If you can step outside, even better—not everyone can do that—but just slow your breathing down.
Doug Holt 1:08:13
Yeah, that’s a good way to know if you’re stressed—if you’re holding your breath.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:08:16
Yeah.
Doug Holt 1:08:18
All right, so we got that. The next one—I think you said—I’m going to try to do them in order the best I can—was gut health.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:08:23
Yes.
Doug Holt 1:08:25
Taking care of that.
There’s a lot of research that’s come out, right? If I’m not mistaken, it’s actually the microbiome in our gut that’s affecting our moods, thoughts, and patterns of behavior.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:08:36
Yeah, you’re talking about the gut-brain axis.
In the scientific literature, 80–90% of serotonin is secreted in our gut. Serotonin is really that “feel-good” hormone.
A lot of times, when people go to a more conventional provider with symptoms of anxiety or depression, they’ll often be put on an SSRI (pharmaceutical medication) that’s meant to increase serotonin in the body.
But sometimes, really just treating the gut makes a huge difference for people.
Doug Holt 1:09:16
Disclaimer: You’re not saying stop your SSRI—talk to your doctor.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:09:18
Exactly. But it’s important to look at the body holistically and consider all the factors.
Doug Holt 1:09:20
So the gut’s making the decisions for us?
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:09:22
The gut’s making the decisions for us.
Doug Holt 1:09:24
So it’s not me that eats the cookies?
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:09:26
No, it’s the bugs in the gut.
Doug Holt 1:09:28
Yeah, I’ll let my wife know.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:09:30
For example, if we have Candida in our gut, we’ll often have a lot more sugar cravings.
So that’s an example of how your gut microbiome can influence cravings for things like cookies.
Doug Holt 1:09:40
I love it—blame something else. My thyroid.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:09:42
Exactly.
Doug Holt 1:09:44
So that’s three. The fourth one you said—oh shoot, now I’m going to forget.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:09:50
I think I put food with the gut.
Doug Holt 1:09:52
You did.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:09:53
Those probably should have been two separate ones.
Doug Holt 1:09:55
Eat your healthy food—whole foods. Get away from packaged junk food.
There’s a great app—maybe you turned me on to this—I want to share it because it’s relevant.
It’s called Yuka (Y-U-K-A). Maybe it was you that introduced it to me.
You can take pictures of packaged goods or any foods, and it gives you a rating based on their scale—whether it’s good or bad for you.
For example, if you’ve got Ritz crackers in your cupboard, take a picture of the barcode. It’ll show you what’s in the crackers that’s not good for you, but it’ll also give you alternatives.
So it’s not saying “don’t eat crackers”—it’s saying maybe choose a better option. It’s something the guys can put in their back pocket.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:10:47
Yeah, it’s a great tool.
Doug Holt 1:10:49
All right, so we’ve got food. What was number four?
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:10:52
Number four was hormones.
Doug Holt 1:10:54
Okay.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:10:56
I’m such a hormone fan. They’re just so impactful. There’s so much you can do to optimize and work with hormone health, especially as we get into our 40s, 50s, and 60s.
Again, getting good data and working with someone to optimize hormones is key.
Doug Holt 1:11:08
Awesome. So four is hormones.
And five was finding something to fill your cup. Find some joy in your life.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:11:20
Yep.
Doug Holt 1:11:22
We were talking offline—you’re a big surfer.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:11:25
I don’t know. I enjoy flailing around in the water.
Doug Holt 1:11:27
Spoken like someone who’s probably pretty good.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:11:30
They would not put it that way.
Doug Holt 1:11:27
I mean, that’s an example—like you go out and you seek joy.
Dr. Marie Agnew 1:11:30
Yeah, yeah.
Doug Holt
So guys need to find something that looks like that for them.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yes, yes, very much so.
Doug Holt 1:11:35
Awesome. Well, it’s been so great having you back at the ranch and on the podcast.
Dr. Marie Agnew
Yes, and I’d love to do more.
Doug Holt 1:11:39
So, gentlemen, if you would like the list that Marie has, go ahead and email VIP@thepowerfulman.com.
But also, send in your questions.
And I’ll encourage you, if you’re looking for a healthcare provider, Marie is the person I’ve chosen.
Not to put anybody else down, but I’ve had the benefit of being in this space and knowing some of the best of the best. Marie is one of those people, and she’s who I trust.
I’ll put her information down in the show notes. But if, for some reason, you’re getting this in a clip or something, again, email VIP@thepowerfulman.com and ask to be put in touch with Marie.
We’ll get you all her contact information. Her and her team are absolutely top-notch.
What I want you to get out of this, guys, is:
- You’ve got to take care of your health.
- This trickles down to your family, right?
I say this often, but most men—if I asked you, “If an intruder came into your house, would you risk your life to save your family?”—99, if not 100%, of you guys would say, “Absolutely.”
Well, there is an intruder in your house, right? It could be your family’s health at risk.
So, are you going to do what’s necessary to get out there and be the person who’s advocating for your kids, advocating for your wife, and advocating for yourself to regain your health?
Doesn’t mean you have to be a cover model. You don’t have to be on the cover of Men’s Fitness or anything like that—unless you choose to be, then good for you.
But it does mean taking steps to have more vitality in your life.
We need more great men like you out there leading—leading your families and leading your children.
I do this for my family as well, so make sure you’re taking those necessary steps.
And, as always, as we say:
In the moment of insight—and there were a lot of insights Marie gave—take massive action.
We’ll see you next time on The Powerful Man Show.
