[00:00:00] Rita Black: What supplements should I be taking? Many of us wonder if we should be supplementing our diet, and if so, which supplements are best and which are a waste of money or even bad for us. If you have been wondering, you are in for a real treat because today I am joined by Zoe Karli, wellness expert and supplement strategist, for a fascinating conversation about the top five supplements she believes we should be taking for better energy, balance, and long-term health.

[00:00:35] Rita Black: Some of her picks may surprise you and might just shift how you think about your daily wellness routine. Whether you are already a supplement fan or just curious, you don’t want to miss this insightful and practical discussion. So leave your pill box on the counter and come on in.

[00:01:03] Rita Black: Did you know that our struggle with weight doesn’t start with the food on your plate or get fixed in the gym? Eighty percent of our weight struggle is mental. That’s right. The key to unlocking long-term weight release and management begins in your mind.

Hi there. I’m Rita Black. I’m a clinical hypnotherapist, weight loss expert, bestselling author, and the creator of the Shift Weight Mastery Process. Not only have I helped thousands of people over the past 20 years achieve long-term weight mastery, I am also a former weight struggler, carb addict, and binge eater. After two decades of failed diets and fad weight loss programs, I lost 40 pounds with the help of hypnosis. Not only did I release all that weight, I have kept it off for 25 years.

[00:01:57] Rita Black: Enter the Thin Thinking Podcast, where you too will learn how to remove the mental roadblocks that keep you struggling. I’ll give you the thin thinking tools, skills, and insights to help you develop the mindset you need, not only to achieve your ideal weight, but to stay there long-term and live your best life. Sound good? Let’s get started.

[00:02:20] Rita Black: Welcome, and come on in from the heat or the cold or the in-between. I hope this episode finds you all well, healthy, and vibrant. I remember the saying “the lazy days of summer.” I don’t know about you, but everybody I know is pretty busy. It’s pretty hectic out there in the world. There’s no lazy going on here.

I have been busy, really busy getting ready—a bunch of new content for my membership, which is going really well, and I’m loving doing it. And I’ve been out in the garden. Those are my two places: the membership and the garden.

[00:03:02] Rita Black: I just redid my home office because in the 30 years that we’ve lived in our house, it was the only room that, of course, was left untouched and it was the dumping ground for everything my husband didn’t want, my kids didn’t want. It all ended up in this big pile.

It was so funny because I have meetings with my team, and I cleared out my room before I left it altogether to go into my daughter’s former bedroom to set up my office while the renovation was going on. Before I left, after I had cleaned out everything behind me, they were like, “What’s going on behind you? Because there’s nothing there,” because you wouldn’t believe the mess it was.

[00:03:46] Rita Black: So anyway, it’s all changing. We’re cleaning out the old, bringing in the new. I have a whole new lease on life and I am feeling refreshed.

[00:04:01] Rita Black: So speaking of feeling refreshed, many of you often ask me what supplements you should be taking to either keep your health or improve it. Today I have a special treat. I’m sharing an amazing interview with Zoe Karli, a fitness and development expert, on her take of top supplements to be taking.

Now, before we dive in, I want you to do me a favor. Please go and write a review for the Thin Thinking Podcast. You can do it on your podcast platform—it has the ability for you to do it right there. It only takes a few minutes, but the reviews will help us be seen, bring more people into our thin thinking community, and it would mean the world to me. So thank you, and thank you for being a loyal listener. I really appreciate your being here and the conversation that we continue to have weekly. Your support is really appreciated.

[00:04:59] Rita Black: So now on to our amazing guest, Zoe Karli. Zoe Karli is truly a force of nature—unstoppable and on a mission. After battling debilitating tonic-clonic seizures, she rose from her darkest health struggles to become the founder of Zeta Body, a brand dedicated to optimizing health, energy, and performance.

Fueled by her personal journey, she has built a life where family, health, and business thrive in harmony. Navy ROTC alum, mother, and fierce entrepreneur, Zoe’s mission is to empower others to live their healthiest, most energized life by promoting longevity, peak performance, and an unstoppable mindset.

[00:06:00] Rita Black: She is also on a mission to debunk misleading information about supplements, sharing scientifically backed truths about why proper supplementation is critical for brain function, muscle health, and vitality. Alongside her husband, Dr. David Karli, a world-renowned regenerative medicine specialist, Zoe is shaping the future of health. Together they combine science and passion to empower people to unlock their full potential.

[00:06:16] Rita Black: Hello, Zoe. Welcome to the Thin Thinking Podcast. I am super excited to have you here and talk about many things, but most of all supplementation, which our audience is very interested in—wants to do their best job getting supplemented. But first of all, just tell us how you got into your field of providing this powerful information and providing really great supplementation to people.

[00:06:43] Zoe Karli: Absolutely, Rita. Thanks so much. It’s a pleasure to be here and have access to your followership, so hopefully I can give some little nuggets and some tidbits.

I guess I was just one of those kids that was born super athletic, super energetic, needed something to do. So sports—I grew up playing all through college, after college, and then I was in the military. When I got out of the military, I got out sooner than I had planned, and so I thought, “Oh my gosh, I need a resume.” I didn’t have to worry—I was ROTC scholarship through college. So then I knew exactly what I was doing after college and what I had planned to do, and my tests and things like that, and getting into the military was my resume.

[00:07:13] Zoe Karli: Then a good girlfriend of mine, who eventually ended up marrying my best guy friend who was a Navy SEAL, had said, “You need to talk to my girlfriend. She can help you get a job.” So that’s how that started. I got into sales and business development, and then I am one of those—I don’t like the word “self-starter,” but I guess everybody knows what that means—and just natural entrepreneur, natural drive, and want to solve problems.

[00:07:34] Zoe Karli: I had always been into early phases of supplementation as much as you can when you’re younger, because I was an athlete. Then I got into, after I stepped back from being an athlete and was a normal working human, I was going to the gym, I was lifting, I was still running. I would still do some races. So then I really truly started to understand—and that’s probably my early twenties to mid-twenties—really started to understand the cascade of the body and supplementation.

[00:08:27] Zoe Karli: So supplementing is not a replacement. It is, in fact, the definition of the word—to add in or to help to make whole. So when you’re deficient in something, you need to add in to help make whole, to supplement. Like I said to you earlier, it had always been a passion project of mine, which is, “Hey look, I’m in this body and it’s my temple,” and I had some very unhealthy family members and I watched them struggle with weight gain.

Then obviously, as we know, with weight gain, it stimulates inflammation in the body. Fat is a depot for inflammation. So it’s a negative cascade. It’s pressure on your joints, it’s a natural breakdown of your joints. And then once your joints start breaking down, that causes more inflammation—which is the chicken or the egg?

[00:09:16] Zoe Karli: So I really truly paid attention and understood that, and I knew, okay, as an example, I don’t want to be like that. So what can I do? Because we all, outside of very metabolic disease states and things, I think we all can rely on ourselves—what to do and what not to do, and we all have choices.

[00:09:35] Zoe Karli: So it just was an early thing to me where I think I challenged myself and said, “Okay, if I’m going to be an example in my field, in my career”—and I have always worked with a lot of women. I did a lot of direct sales as well in business development. Oftentimes a lot of direct sale companies have women. So I always had big teams of women. When you have to go to your big events and things like that, there’s several hundreds, two thousands of women. I would always try to encourage, “Hey, come work out with me in the morning,” or “Hey, come do this kind of—we’re going to do this exercise afterward or activities.”

[00:10:16] Zoe Karli: So it was always a big part of me. And then, by the time I—as I shared a little bit—but I started having grand mal seizures when I was like 29, 30, right about 30. It was a little bit of a dark period for me because of what I just told you. I was super healthy, and I got into—it was just a quick moment—but a self-pity party where I had said, “Why me? Why would this happen to me? I’m super healthy, I’m muscular, I’m athletic, I eat well. I don’t really drink, and I don’t smoke. I don’t do any of that stuff. And why would someone like that epitome of health then have a brain issue?”

[00:11:02] Zoe Karli: I didn’t find out—so that was about 30. I’m 41 now, and I didn’t find out until about three years ago that it was because of a vaccine. There were several studies over the course of about 15 years that had shown that when you get a particular vaccine, the risk for females to have seizures after it is significant. It was the first and the only vaccine outside of my childhood vaccines when I was a kid that I’ve ever taken, and now I live with this for the rest of my life. I’m medicated. I know that if I come off medications, I will have a grand mal seizure.

[00:11:41] Zoe Karli: So one of the other things that became super important to me over the last five years of developing a supplement company is brain health. So brain, gut, and body—and they’re all intertwined. You’ve heard, I’m sure your followership has heard as well, “Which is the real brain? The brain as we know it, or the gut as we know it?” And I just always say, your body is your real—you can’t have one without the other. If we have neurocognitive dysfunction when we’re older and our body’s perfect, what does that matter? Your brain’s not working in conjunction with your body, or vice versa.

[00:12:05] Zoe Karli: This is what, as I told you, my husband’s a regenerative medicine expert and has been doing almost 20 years of research on your own stem cells and what it does. He sees this a lot too, as the aging population and dementia and neurocognitive dysfunction declines. But what about when the opposite happens, which is the osteoarthritis part? Your brain is healthy and your mind is sharp, but at 67 your knees are aching and you’re looking at a knee, a joint replacement, and you’ve gained 30 pounds.

[00:12:26] Zoe Karli: So as you and I spoke earlier, fortuitous that he and I got together and got married because I’m a science geek and he’s a real science geek as a doctor and researcher and clinician and world-recognized—people fly from all over the world to see him. So I’m incredibly fortunate to be able to learn by osmosis. But he too also was interested in supplementation. So by having that partner in crime and that right partner that we truly support each other, I realized that, hey, I can—me, just little me—can help like the masses become healthier, but then also what he does, the patients that spend thousands of dollars to come and travel to see him, he really truly can hone in on helping them specifically even more.

[00:13:12] Zoe Karli: So it was great to be able to partner and work through this and start that. So that’s the sort of 50-foot view of start to finish of how I got here. Like I told you, it was a passion project of mine. So to be able to actually say, “Hey, my brand is in gyms and stores and online”—that’s a—I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s something that’s hopefully that will be a legacy that I can leave and that I can truly touch millions of people and really help them. And that I think that’s my purpose.

[00:14:02] Rita Black: It sounds like a good purpose. Sounds like an awesome purpose. Let me ask you this, because again my listenership, my audience, and even myself—what do you think are like, because you get this all the time, I’m sure, and I, we all have curiosity—what are the biggest misconceptions about supplements? Because there’s—you go online, you hear a zillion things. My dad and my husband’s so funny. He comes every day. It’s like a different study. “Use the supplement” or “do this” or “do that,” you know what I mean? He goes down way too many rabbit holes. But yeah, you go online, there’s all this misinformation. What are people’s biggest fears? What are people’s biggest misconceptions about supplements?

[00:14:46] Zoe Karli: I think it’s a multifaceted question and answer, but I—because now I’m in an industry—I see the opposite side of it, which is, “Hey, look, there’s money to be made in the supplement industry.” And so for supplement companies just making a bunch of “me too” products, that’s because there’s money behind it. But then let’s be realistic also—you wouldn’t have innovation and you wouldn’t have new companies that are truly investing in science and investing in longevity and being healthy without it being an industry.

[00:15:21] Zoe Karli: So it’s like the double-edged sword. So I think, and my husband and I discuss this all the time—by the way it’s Dr. David Karli, so that we at least can, I’ll start calling him David—but we discuss this because there is differences in quality. So think about it. And this I think is what is the bigger elephant in the room, which is: if it’s more expensive, does that mean that it’s better? If it’s cheap, we haven’t really studied them head to head. So is it just because it’s cheap? Does that mean that it’s not as good?

And those are all questions that unless you literally had some kind of academia that you could just dump a bunch of supplements in and run head-to-head trials to say, “Is this fish oil better than this fish oil? Or is this B better than this B?” So we have to just say, “Okay, I need to get my core supplementation. I need the best product that I can buy and that I can afford, and that I can be consistent with.”

[00:16:26] Zoe Karli: This is my other biggest thing where people—look, if you’re not going to take it, don’t take it. Supplementation is one of those things where—you and I defined and talked about this too—which is, look, it doesn’t replace things. It fills in deficiencies. It fills in gaps. We all have deficiencies. No one is perfect in regards to all nutrition, going to the gym. So the way I look at it is, all right, let’s get four—let’s get two to five key supplements, and then you need to take them and they need to be of highest quality as possible.

[00:16:54] Zoe Karli: And I do believe that there are some really great brands out there. I probably will get bashed, but that’s okay. Nature’s Way and a lot of the generic—or not medications, the supplements that might be the Kroger brand or they might be the Safeway brand or something like that—I can’t endorse. They’re significantly cheap, which means, think about it, how do you manufacture and keep things really cheap without jeopardizing some quality?

[00:17:16] Zoe Karli: So I don’t know if anybody remembers, but 10 or 10 years ago or so, GNC got in trouble because what they were doing was they were putting—basically the layman’s term is they were putting cheaper product that was a creatine or that was of this, or that was of that kind of protein or whatever, but it was cheaper and they were putting it into a brand and then charging more for it. And then when they—I don’t know, I don’t even know how it came about—but when they went through testing, they realized that product is not actually what’s in the bottle.

[00:17:49] Zoe Karli: So I can endorse Nature’s Way and things like that. I can endorse several other companies that I know from science and research and things like that. So that’s really where I try to help direct people. And I’m very fortunate that I work with some of the best-known quality manufacturers, testing facilities in the United States. The founder of creatine as we know it—as the number one sports nutritional supplement, and now we know so much more about it in regards to women and osteo and neurodegenerative issues and things like that—I call him my business partner, so that’s great. I consult with him all the time. He helped me develop one of my neurocognitive products that I have, and I’m very fortunate. I’m very lucky. So why all the stars aligned? I can’t answer that question.

[00:18:46] Zoe Karli: But you asked a great question, which is, look, we need to do research. But like you said, your husband, he is reading this and he is reading that. And then you don’t even make a decision because you have so much information, you’re confused. So let’s just keep it narrow. Let’s put everybody on two to five key supplements. Be consistent. And then there’s a few other things that you have to do outside of supplementation. And that’s your diet, your nutrition—and your diet is not a stop and start kind of thing, which all of us have struggled with. Diet is truly, it is now a permanent lifestyle. Your diet is your nutrition and we have to look at it that way to where you need to create long-term habits. That’s how you take care of your body.

[00:19:25] Zoe Karli: And then ladies, you have to lift weights. You can’t get around it. It’s not all about cardio. And I know that, and this is true because my mom is 60, my mother-in-law’s 76, I think, and she’s always kept herself in great shape and she did Zumba and all of that stuff, and that’s really great. Cardio is good. It has its place. But ladies, we have a different hormonal axis. And when you talk about estrogen, estrogen likes to build fat. Estrogen also likes to—with its almost inverse relationship to testosterone. So men—look at older men, their muscle density, their skin usually looks a little different than females. That has to do with that hormonal axis with estrogen and progesterone and creating, maintaining muscle.

[00:20:07] Zoe Karli: And inducing stress to make that muscle also puts force on bone, which bone needs force on it in order to grow or to maintain. And obviously if we’re not maintaining our bone structure, then now you’re looking at problems, especially in the later years. If you’re falling, you’re breaking bones and that’s not good when you’re older. We don’t have the same healing capacities when we get older and as we age. So it’s a big—it’s a lot to know, but it can be broken down and you can rely on some fundamental basics that truly can help.

[00:20:53] Rita Black: Okay then that sounds like my next question to you is what are some sort of the fundamental basics that we—if we were like considering something like, if you can simplify that down to something core, because I take supplements, I take probably more than five supplements. Like you’re talking about a core five. But I think for somebody starting out or somebody considering or with kids supplementation, like you said, if you’re getting a quality supplement, it can get expensive. If you knew it was just like, “I just need these five and I can invest in myself, and then these five and these are going to cover my basis, give me a core strategy for my health long-term.” If I’m a woman in my fifties, sixties, seventies, and I’m sure you’re going to tell me that might, that supplementation might change as I get older—but maybe it doesn’t—but what would be your core? Where would you focus?

[00:21:49] Zoe Karli: So it’s a great question, and I always try to tell people this too. You want to be on your supplements, the right ones, especially for females. But men even still share—we’re still a species of the same, which just, we have a little bit of difference in testosterone. So our hormonal axis is a little different.

But vitamin D, if there were two supplements, vitamin D and creatine’s made this huge resurgence recently, but it’s been around for a long time and has a lot of data. But let’s get into vitamin D first.

[00:22:09] Zoe Karli: So interestingly, and I won’t go down all the big words and the molecular combinations and the numbers and all that stuff, but interestingly, there was a study—it was a big cardiovascular study for vitamin D. It was probably about 25 years ago now at this point, and it was a very long-term study, so it was approximately like 10 years. And what they determined and found was that most humans are deficient in vitamin D.

Why exactly? We don’t get outside enough. We’re sedentary. Our diets have changed significantly over the last 50, 60, 70 years. The United States feeds so much of the world that perhaps the nutrition density isn’t as good as it used to be. There’s so many different little parts and pieces. All of those things are true. But why exactly? I don’t know that we really can answer that. Humans maybe have morphed and changed over the last several hundred years and maybe that has something to do with it.

[00:23:26] Zoe Karli: But interestingly, vitamin D is not a vitamin. It is actually a precursor to a hormone. So it is critical to have in the body, and it’s great because you don’t have to get injections, you don’t have to do anything invasive. Supplements do actually work, and that can be proven and it is shown, and it was tracked in this study.

One of the things that they found was that by being deficient in vitamin D, your cardiovascular risk increased significantly, like triple-digit fold, meaning it’s this massive cascade that happens in the body. Cardiovascular disease defined as both any kind of diabetes and any kind of heart attack or heart issue. So that’s what we’re talking about primarily, and it was with both men and women.

[00:24:13] Zoe Karli: So that is key to me. Vitamin D and K, it’s a great supplement. It’s safe. It’s not crazy expensive. My supplement’s approximately $30 for 30-day supply, 5,000 IU, which helps. People, you might be really deficient, and at that point, if you’re really deficient, my suggestion then is what you need to do is you need to find a great longevity medicine specialist, not just a family practitioner that knows how to truly read blood panels.

So you go and you get a full comprehensive blood panel. Your vitamin D level is measurable. So it’s measured when you start and it’s measured again after. So if you’re really deficient, they might put you on 10,000 IUs. But I think that 5,000 IUs is safe for anybody and everybody to be on because the majority of us, and by that 99% of the planet’s population, is deficient in D.

[00:25:11] Zoe Karli: So if you want to reduce your cardiovascular disease, that is something that you can do for the rest of your life. That’s super easy, that’s proven, tested, tracked, studied. And so that’s my number one. My second is creatine.

[00:25:24] Rita Black: Can I interrupt? Can I ask you a little more about vitamin D? I have heard, again, out in the zeitgeist that you can take too much. So is that a thing? And then you mentioned K too. So do you need K to make D work? Because sometimes they’ll sell it together, right? Like they’ll sell it as a combo.

[00:25:45] Zoe Karli: Yes, in general, when it comes to anything and everything, can you take too much? Yes, you can. My understanding of the science and what a lot of my influential medical doctors that I have direct connection with, 5,000 IUs is a great, very standardized, very safe dose.

So from that perspective, like I said, if you really truly are significantly more deficient than what 5,000 IUs a day can do for you, that’s where you need to get the comprehensive blood panel and really truly go to say, “Oh my gosh, I’m really deficient. I need 10,000 IUs,” but 5,000 IUs is going to help everybody. So we’re good there.

[00:26:24] Zoe Karli: My catch on and my suspicion over the last five to seven years, adding vitamin K has been a recent thing to vitamin D. And yes, the combination of them helps significantly with bone and heart and blood flow and lots of different things. And they don’t compete against each other. Like sometimes when you take too many supplements, there’s benefit, but you also diminish a little bit of some of them when you’re taking lots at one time. Again, remember it’s the science of supplements and there’s so much to know.

So most importantly, 5,000 IUs great starting dose, everybody should be on it. It has been suggested by some science and a lot of doctors that I work with to take vitamin D and K at night. Bioavailability is great. Like I said, 5,000 units is safe. Does it really matter if you are one of those people that’s “I got to take everything in the morning, otherwise I forget,” take it in the morning.

[00:27:24] Zoe Karli: So don’t not take it because you don’t do very well with AM and PM. I’m extremely structured, I’m very disciplined. I have my PM routine before I go to bed, and I have my AM routine as soon as I wake up and my feet hit the ground. So if you’re not like that and you know that you’re one of those people where you’re going to forget, don’t forget. Do it in the morning then because taking it and having it on board and allowing it to act and do what it’s supposed to do is the most critical and the most important thing. So did that answer questions?

[00:27:58] Rita Black: That was a very good answer. And can I, before you go to supplement number two, which I’m very curious about and maybe if this isn’t the right time to answer that question, you can postpone it, but the hormonal difference between men and women, how does that change things like with supplementation?

[00:28:18] Zoe Karli: That’s a really good question. It’s probably a very deep question, but remember, women naturally have less testosterone naturally. They have more estrogen. We have to make babies. We do have to carry more fat. We have glands and various things that have to have fat in order to work, and progesterone then kicks in as well as the estrogen’s buddy and component.

Now with the reverse, men have estrogen and men have progesterone as well. Now, when their testosterone decreases, their estrogen and their progesterone can—then the ratio changes. And so because that ratio changes, that affects them in a different way as well. And so men gain fat as well, and men have problems with that.

[00:28:47] Zoe Karli: So I would say the core supplementation applies to both because we talk about bone health when we talk about brain health in regards to immunodeficiencies, but then also the immunity protection from vitamin D and K that you get, that applies to all of us, men and women.

Now men may need more of certain things to better affect their hormonal axis, helping to stimulate testosterone production and decrease estrogen production. Now of course, then you start going into estrogen and you start going into stress levels and you start going into sleep. That’s why I said this is such—this is more than an hour-long conversation, right? This is going to be complimentary, but then also very comprehensive.

[00:29:22] Zoe Karli: So we just have to look at it as, okay, it’s called an axis for a reason. There’s supposed to be balance to it. Women are a little different than men and you need to respect and understand that and then be able to shift that hormonal axis appropriately and accordingly.

So the answer probably wasn’t as specific as needed, but it’s hard to say, “Nope, men must have this, and women must have that” because they do definitely need both. And as I go back to creatine, same thing. Men can benefit significantly from creatine. Probably if you were arguing to say, women benefit more because typically women aren’t supplementing the same way that men are.

[00:30:33] Zoe Karli: And a lot of times—and I’m proud to be of the generation that I hope that I’ve inspired so many of my fellow women to go to the gym and lift weights. It’s not that scary. You can do it. You can have a very structured lifting program. So by shifting that and helping women truly learn how to lift, creatine has become—has been easier for women to supplement because of what it does.

Men typically have always, or maybe I shouldn’t say all men and always, but it has been more common for men to utilize creatine. They want muscles and women misinterpret and say, “I don’t want to gain weight and I don’t want big muscles and I don’t want to look like this.” And no, that’s—you have to go to the gym and you have to work really hard in order to get big muscles. They don’t just blow up like a balloon because you’re taking supplementation or because you’re supplementing your testosterone or you’re controlling your estrogen more. You still have to go put pressure and force on them and go to the gym and lift.

[00:31:22] Zoe Karli: And so I’m very happy to this resurgence of creatine, which by the way, okay, that’s our next supplement that everybody—

[00:31:43] Rita Black: I was going to say, is this number two? I’m assuming it is. This is number two, but what does creatine do exactly? Obviously it impacts muscles and helps you build muscle. Is that it or is there more to it? And why are women—why would men—is it about muscle retention or building that it’s important for?

[00:32:05] Zoe Karli: So interestingly, Anthony Almada is the founder as we know it. 1998 to 1999, he had done a lot of medical research. Creatine was being utilized actually in—if I recall correctly, it was in like the burn victims unit, something like that, or in the cancer unit. And he was reading a paper, and at the very bottom of it said this thing, creatine. And so he started doing research. Why are they supplementing these kinds of patients with this kind of product?

It actually comes from rocks. So it is a—it’s a really cool—it’s a part of a certain kind of family, but interestingly, it’s a naturally occurring non-protein amino acid. So take note, amino acids are actually the precursors to proteins. So there’s lots of different ways that we can get protein. So its main body depot—creatine is in muscles and then some in testes. So in males’ testicles, but for the primary part in muscles.

[00:32:49] Zoe Karli: So what you want to do is—yes, exactly like what you said—is to supplement it so that your muscles can stay healthy. And remember I talk a lot in layman’s terms because it gets—it can be overwhelming, the science, and then you go down the rabbit hole of talking about that for 30 minutes. So yes, and it’s very important to be able to provide the nutrition that the muscles need because what happens, especially with women – guess what estrogen does? It also affects muscles. And because women have more estrogen, oftentimes their muscle consistency… let’s be realistic, if you think of it as flabby or flat or not nearly as dense as males. You know, that thing called having babies and estrogen affects women differently than it does men. Men tend to have higher testosterone, lower estrogen, so their muscle composition is very different than females.

[00:33:56] Zoe Carli: So that’s why a lot of times, like for instance, if you have to have a joint replacement or some kind of surgical joint surgery, they do encourage protein intake before they truly encourage, “Hey, let’s get you on this workout plan.” Unfortunately, when you’re 30 pounds overweight and your knees are hurting, it’s hard to get on a training program that can help.

[00:34:21] Zoe Carli: Part of the reason why they want to do that is they want to prevent muscle atrophy. So again, it’s this whole huge cascade of events and one triggers the next. And so yes, creatine is really good for muscles. A lot of the other things that have been happening over the last 10, 15 years, probably a little longer than that, but this is part of the reason why this resurgence has happened – there’s a lot of neurocognitive benefits.

[00:34:49] Zoe Carli: Crossing the blood-brain barrier, but then also helping truly with some of the neurodegenerative issues like Alzheimer’s and some anxiety and things like that. So creatine has really been able to show over a long period of time… and actually I can send you a link to a really good study that was in 2017 that had tracked that for a long time.

[00:35:07] Rita Black: Oh, please do.

[00:35:07] Zoe Carli: Yep, let people read it. It’s got graphs and pictures and stuff, so it’s really good. But then with ATP, I think everybody’s probably heard that’s your energy depot. So it’s more than just a sports supplement for building muscle. It’s much more, and this is a good note to make.

[00:35:30] Zoe Carli: So some in the science field have really started to push and say that actually our largest organ is muscle and to redefine muscle as an organ. Because now what a lot of… and this has become even more popular over the last decade as well, is that muscle is your longevity.

[00:35:50] Rita Black: Yes.

[00:35:52] Zoe Carli: Think about it. If you don’t have muscle, what helps hold all… I mean, what attaches to your skeleton, what makes everything work? It’s the muscles and the tendons and the ligaments and things like that.

[00:36:06] Rita Black: No, I understand. It’s staggering how much muscle we lose from the age of 55 up on a yearly basis. And I read Peter Attia’s book, which was all about… if you lose like 15 pounds of muscle between 55 and 75, that is really your marker for longevity – muscle retention. So I understand. It’s cool that they’re considering that being an organ because it’s absolutely right on.

[00:36:32] Rita Black: And I do think bringing that more to the awareness of especially people in my generation, in their fifties, sixties, seventies… I think we’re a little undereducated with regards to that, but it’s recent science. It’s recent that this is coming to the fore anyway.

[00:36:51] Rita Black: Can I ask you about creatine? Vitamin D is obviously a capsule. Does creatine… is that like a powder that you add to something? Is that the way I imagine it, but are there creatine little capsules as well? Or what is the best way to take creatine on a daily basis?

[00:37:09] Zoe Carli: Good question, because I didn’t mention… so again, we talked about that 5,000 IU of D and K. So if you look at creatine, a lot of the studies – everybody, everything suggests 5 grams per day is a great starting period. Now if you’re in the gym and you are super athletic and you have a different, bigger, purposeful goal in that way, then a lot of those people are doing more than 5 grams. Especially for women, 5 grams every single day.

Good question – what form do I take? It’s known to be mostly powder. However, in the last probably five years, but in the last couple of years, gummies have made a huge impact on the field because a lot of times people don’t like drinking or they don’t like swallowing big pills. With creatine, you don’t have to worry about that. It’s a powder or the gummies.

[00:37:55] Zoe Carli: And so I’d say I’m not a sweet person. I’m a savory person, so potato chips, right? So I don’t really like the sweetness of it. However, most people do. And if truly you don’t like swallowing things or you’re really just not like a drinker where you’re going to mix a drink and drink it every day, or do a protein shake or something like that, then the gummies are great. You just have to take four to five of them to get a full serving of 5 grams a day.

[00:38:29] Zoe Carli: The gummies can only hold approximately a gram, maybe 1.25, so just check the serving on the product that you would be using. There is one creatine source that I support and endorse, and that is the brand called Creapure. So there are a few other kinds of brands, mine included, that utilize Creapure.

[00:38:52] Zoe Carli: So two sources: one from Germany and one from China. Creapure has a very specific protocol of being able to process creatine – two totally different protocols. That’s the only thing that I recommend and endorse. And so 5 grams.

Now I don’t do gummies. I recommend them if that’s beneficial to you and it’s going to make you do it – great, do it. I am… a lot of my followers know what “beauty juice” is. And so this kind of ties in.

[00:39:17] Zoe Carli: So we have our vitamin D and K and we have creatine. I don’t want to forget methylated B vitamins, and I don’t want to forget fish oil, but I’m going to actually jump ahead and we’ll go into phytonutrients. I’m a big believer in prebiotics, probiotics. I am lactose intolerant, so I’ve always had gut issues. I’m fortunate because I don’t eat a lot of cheese, so it doesn’t stick anywhere or it shouldn’t be sticking, but phytonutrients…

So any kinds of… we have a brand Zeta Body, but the fruits and veggies has a great combination. When I was going through and looking and developing and how do I bring all this stuff together, I didn’t want it too sweet because a lot of times that’s just too much for people and I didn’t want it… my husband says it tastes like dirt, so he says it tastes too much like earth. And that’s a lot of that vegetable leaf flavor.

[00:40:16] Zoe Carli: So I had to jostle around, but I also needed to make sure that I had the right quality and the right amount of those together. Beauty juice is basically the fruits and veggies put together with a scoop of amino acids, which is the precursor to protein, a scoop of creatine and electrolytes. And I drink it every single day.

[00:40:33] Rita Black: Wow.

[00:40:33] Zoe Carli: You can make it sweeter if you want, and you can make it less sweet. And there’s ways of doing that. Creatine, I just take good old fashioned unflavored. Now, it doesn’t absorb into water, but I use the word “micronized.” It’s super fine. So it almost feels like the texture of flour, but you do have to shake it up. And then fruits and veggies doesn’t dissipate either, so you do have to shake it up. And then the amino acids is a fruit punch flavor, so it’s great.

Now, the reason to do that is it gives you prebiotics, that gives you probiotics, that gives you precursor to protein. Women need protein. I think that as we age, we do not ingest enough protein.

[00:41:14] Zoe Carli: So perhaps breakfast doesn’t really contain a lot of eggs and a lot of… I’m okay, I’m a big bacon person. Hate me or love me, I love bacon. It’s not going out of my diet. But a lot of us don’t eat enough protein for breakfast. And then for lunch it might be a sandwich or something like that. I suspect probably only enough lunch meats in there, or if it is a grilled chicken sandwich or something like that, you’re only looking at 20 to maybe 40 grams. And then how much are you eating at night?

A good reference is a gram to your body weight. It’s a good judge – maybe a little more, a little less, but I suspect that probably if you thought about it, are you getting to two-thirds to a full amount of protein every day?

[00:42:02] Rita Black: I do focus on protein. It is important to me just for satiety, and that is something that we do talk about on the podcast. So I think our audience is pretty up to speed on protein as far as just like the value they understand. So tell us about how the scoop of amino acids is a precursor to protein. Would you consider that like within your grams of protein a day part of that protocol?

[00:42:33] Zoe Carli: Yep. So I do try to focus on food. Again, remember, supplementation is not a replacement for that. I am an equal opportunity employer when it comes to protein. I love fish. I love red meat. I love chicken. I love poultry of all kinds. I love seafood. I’m not a huge shrimp fan, but I will eat it if I have to. But everything from… if it’s a protein, I’m not usually very discriminatory. I like them all. So I’m very fortunate that way. I do love to eat a lot of protein, and yes, supplementation is adding in.

[00:43:11] Zoe Carli: And so the good thing about amino acids is that what I found too is that sometimes people get bloated with protein powders, so this is a benefit as well because you can get approximately 10 grams protein per serving of amino acids because they do have their own protein factor as well. Precursor just meaning you need them in order to make and to start the cascade and production of certain things in your body.

[00:43:35] Zoe Carli: So you have the essentials and the non-essentials, and being able to supplement that with amino acids enables you to have that full portfolio. That’s also a difference between vegan proteins and meat proteins – vegan protein is non-complete versus meat proteins, which is complete. So there’s a few of those chains and acids that are missing out of vegan and out of vegetable protein.

[00:44:00] Zoe Carli: I understand veganism, I understand vegetarians. You just have to make sure that you can at least get your protein intake. And then also you have to balance your carbs with that too. So that’s where it’s tough for me when I look at it. That’s where it’s tough for vegans too, if you’re not in the gym and increasing your activity in order to burn off the calories that carbohydrates provide you.

So again, now it’s a whole different perspective that you have to look at. I support it. I just need you to supplement in order to make sure that your body’s getting that complete protein profile. So that’s the basics and the general parts of it. Fish oil would be my next one.

[00:44:43] Rita Black: I’m sorry. Can we go back to that last one? Can you say what it is and the amount, like the serving or the… like you’ve been telling us the serving size because I think it’s really helpful.

[00:44:54] Zoe Carli: Good. One scoop. Some of them vary a little bit from brand to brand, but approximately 10 grams. Some of them are seven, eight, some of them are 11, 12, but approximately one scoop, 10 grams. That’s the way that I love to do it. They have tons of different flavors. I have one flavor. I did a big post and survey to say, “All right, look, I’m not one of those supplement brands that has eight different flavors. Let’s focus on two or three.” That way people will take it, they like it. So everybody picked citrus and they liked fruit punch. So we went with fruit punch to have a little bit more of that kind of berry flavor.

[00:45:17] Zoe Carli: That was something else that I focused on too, was not too sweet because if it’s too sweet when you drink it, if you like sweet, great, but for most people, if it’s too sweet, you’re not going to drink it because then it just tastes… it’s just in your mouth for too long. So one scoop. Most companies will do 30 servings for their powder. And like I said, approximately 10 grams.

So now with amino acids, the word is “acid.” So if you take too much, it’s not a bad thing, it’s not going to harm you. It’s just you might get some acid reflux. So one scoop is good, and again, it’s to help other things work, right? So it’s to add in. It’s only 10 grams, so don’t go thinking that you’re going to have five scoops a day and now you got your 50 and that was really easy. It’s just to help supplement your ingestion of other forms of protein.

[00:46:20] Zoe Carli: Now you can also do a protein shake at some point, and that varies across the board too – 18 grams of protein to about 30 grams protein per scoop. I do have a new launch coming out, which is exciting, but let’s talk about that at the end.

[00:46:40] Zoe Carli: So fish oil. I’m a big proponent of fish oil. It helps from the cardiovascular risk side. It helps with that as well, but it helps to control inflammation and then also it helps with cholesterol, which is also bad for cardiovascular disease risk increase. So again, this is why supplementation is really important because we’re so deficient. There’s great studies out there.

[00:47:02] Zoe Carli: I just recently read a study that said, “Oh, fish oil is bad.” I’m thinking to myself, there’s literally 30 or 40 years worth of data in regards to fish oil. So this one study didn’t really impact me that much in that regard. David for sure has his patients on fish oil. That inflammation control is something that’s huge because remember what we talked about – if I’m going to take stem cells out of your body and I’m going to optimize them and customize them and give you billions of them back into this one particular area, I want the host, you, where it’s going to have as little inflammation as possible because inflammation is what can drive a lot of disease states.

[00:47:45] Zoe Carli: Inflammation is also attached to and very much bonded in regards to osteoarthritis. So that achiness, that pain, that’s inflammation. So we need to reduce that. And then like I said, he’s a big believer in making sure that you have a fundamental supplementation program as well.

All right, so we have D and K, creatine. Those are your two that you must have, if you’re going to be good and behave and you really want to do a prebiotic or probiotic, the fruits and veggies, the phytonutrients that you get from that’s great because that’s pre and pro. Now if you want to take a probiotic supplement, I am a huge endorser and proponent of that as well.

[00:48:27] Zoe Carli: Like I said, with being lactose intolerant, but I can’t have lentils either, so no beans for me. And that’s a good thing just because I get so bloated with them that it hurts. I’ve always done anything and everything that I can to be regular and to make sure that whatever I can do for gut and for gut lining, and there’s tons of studies and there’s tons of information about probiotics, but essentially you want healthy bugs in your gut.

[00:48:56] Zoe Carli: We process so much toxins every day. If you live in a city, you’re outside. If you are not eating well, there’s still toxins and you can get into nitric oxide and you can get into so many different kinds of things. But gut lining is super important. Plus a lot of us don’t have great diets. Like I said, with amino acids, a lot of food and a lot of fruits and vegetables too, have a higher profile of an acid profile. They have a higher level of it, so that can affect your gut too, and varying different kinds of processed foods. All of that stuff that’s in there that’s a toxin that your body has to process.

[00:49:21] Zoe Carli: Think anything that goes in your mouth and goes through, there’s nutrients and things that gets released. It goes through the kidneys, it goes through the liver, it gets into your gut, it passes small intestine, large intestine, and then out it comes. And I do love to talk about poop. It’s just one of those things, but you literally can judge the health and quality of people’s diets and what they’re eating by varying different things. That’s why when doctors take stool samples and they send it off to measure it, it tells a story.

Being able to help any kind of gut measure, a good high quality probiotic. And I talk with Anthony about this all the time – live bugs or dead bugs. And do you do an expensive one? Do you do a cheap one? I just always try to encourage people.

[00:50:21] Zoe Carli: We need 50 billion plus. I personally put our probiotic into a blister pack. So each of them are individually sealed and it’s a size of 30. Have I tested it and ran a clinical head-to-head trial with ones that are in bottles? No, I haven’t. But there’s something that tells me that keeping it in a little bit better of a temperature control and that it’s individually blister packed, I like that. So that’s what I did to help with quality.

[00:50:54] Rita Black: And you are saying 50 billion per day, and that’s one supplement.

[00:51:03] Zoe Carli: Yep. One capsule. You can find… like I said, there’s lots of good ones. Now, for me, I think that, and I do my phytonutrients too because like I said, for me, some people don’t have any kind of ingestion coming out problems and they are regular. All is good, but I am not. So everything that I can do, I like lots of bugs because if they’re going to get in there and do their job and out they come, great. I’ll take as many as I can. So that’s the easiest way to look at it.

Prebiotics basically is the food for probiotics. So you’ll see the kombuchas and the buzz and the prebiotic and the probiotic. By the way, a lot of people ask me, “Is kombucha really good?” because it’s expensive. But for me, yes, it’s not going to hurt you. And there are prebiotics and probiotics in there and it tastes good. So if you enjoy it and it’s something you want to do and you like doing it, then yes, I drink kombucha in the morning just because I really like it. I like that flavor and that taste. But do I need to drink it? No, I don’t need to because I use phytonutrients and probiotics already. But it is a good way to get it if you don’t like other forms of it.

[00:52:15] Rita Black: Wow. So now back to fish oil really quickly – how much fish oil do you recommend? Like how much? How many milligrams? I think it’s milligrams, right?

[00:52:26] Zoe Carli: A thousand at least. And I think you will see that will be more expensive than the lesser ones. And a lot of the studies have been around that range, maybe up to 1300. I know for sure a lot of athletes and sports driven people because they are driving a lot of inflammation, they’re doing up into the twos and the three thousands. We don’t need to do that. Like I said, what we’re doing is we’re building this foundation.

Now, if you go and you get blood panels, and you’re looking at your lipids and you’re looking at your diet and your physician thinks that, “Hey, let’s bump the fish oil,” then yes, that’s great, but I think a thousand per day. And there are plenty of supplements out there that it would be one capsule. And also, if you have swallowing issues or you don’t like taking big supplements, they do have less, which would be four to 600 per capsule, and they’re smaller, but then obviously you would need to take two. So if that’s an issue they also have oil, so you can spoon it… yeah.

[00:53:30] Zoe Carli: Yep. So put it in something, but for me I’m… and it goes down. It works. How are you doing for time?

[00:53:47] Rita Black: We’re good. Yeah, I know. That’s why I take fish oil at night is because then I don’t have to have that fishy taste burped up during… by the time I wake up in the morning, I don’t know, it’s magical. I don’t have any fishy taste.

[00:54:01] Zoe Carli: Yep. Also… and I can’t really say for sure… I don’t know if that has to do with quality or not, but I do know for sure that some brands have a fishy taste burp, some do not. So call it what you will. If you don’t like fish oil burp, use the ones that say no fishy, no fishy taste.

[00:54:22] Rita Black: Yeah. Okay, so a thousand milligrams on that. Got that down. Now is there another one or have we gotten to the core? Do we have another one?

[00:54:34] Zoe Carli: We pulled in the phytonutrients and the amino acids, but yes, basically the core outside of methylated B. Now just to go through B… you mentioned that.

Yep. So again, interestingly how B vitamins, D vitamins and probably… if we pay attention longer because the gut and the brain are all connected and you know which one goes first and which one’s more important, I’m… this is just me, but I’m willing to bet that probiotics does help have an influence too, just from the toxicity that it can flush out of the guts.

[00:55:09] Zoe Carli: But with B and so B12, lots of research there, energy, brain health, and you need the methylated formulation of it too. I like capsules. I do not like tablets. There’s back and forth in regards to tablets. Does your body… can’t absorb some of the nutrients because it has to break down the tablet first. Just think about it, to put in something hard like that takes longer to digest than to pop a capsule where the outer shell basically, if you put it on your counter in some water, you notice that it just disintegrates very quickly. Melts pretty quickly.

[00:55:45] Rita Black: Yeah.

[00:55:46] Zoe Carli: Yep. So I’m a capsule fan. That’s something good to consider as well. Now gosh, there’s tons of different…

[00:55:55] Rita Black: There’s so many different Bs, right? Is there a combination of Bs that you are saying? Like B12, B6… I don’t know.

[00:56:07] Zoe Carli: B6. You do want a combination. It’s good for energy, it’s good for… like I said, it’s funny how it all ties back together in regards to what everything does. There’s a big buzz right now with B12 too. So you just want to have that so methylated. You want it to be complete and again, you’ve got everything from the $15 Bs to the $60 Bs. So again, cardiovascular health, but then also the carbohydrate metabolism and energy. So that methylated formula.

And like I said, look for a capsule. That’s my biggest thing. And so once it’s absorbed into the small intestine, just make your body do what it’s supposed to do, but give it the easiest forms you can to help it. That’s my go-to. That’s at least the fundamental ones. I do take more than that, but I promised everybody that I would keep it easy.

[00:57:16] Rita Black: Do you have this as a list that we can put into our show notes?

[00:57:20] Zoe Carli: Yeah, we can do that. I can absolutely send that to you and then, yeah, I think that would be awesome. I know that was your core, but I think we were going to talk a little bit about longevity too. And then also you mentioned osteoarthritis and we were talking about osteoporosis or osteopenia. Are there other supplements that you… without going into an extensive… but calcium obviously has a lot of controversy around calcium and how to take it and if it makes an impact or if it’s bad for you, if it actually works against you. I’d be interested in that.

[00:57:57] Zoe Carli: For me, I don’t supplement calcium. I love vegetables and because I phytonutrient, I eat vegetables. I get meats. So I get that complete access. I don’t do calcium. The biggest thing, and the more data that I read and the more data that I read is D and K. And so that’s really where I focus, especially with osteoporosis.

So one thing that we had talked about is when women… remember your hormonal axis is different than men. What they’re seeing and what they’re showing is that women actually start the cascade of moving toward osteopenia by our mid-thirties and… are the hormones in our foods bringing on menopause earlier than it should? And gosh, it gets so complicated. That’s why I try to say, let’s focus on five, or at least two to four to five supplements that we can do that really truly have shown to help.

[00:58:41] Zoe Carli: I don’t do chondroitin and glucosamine. I also think, where’s the breaking point to where you’re taking 25 supplements a day? So this is again, I’m supplementing to help with deficiencies and so I’m using my diet and my nutrients and my food, which is what naturally hundreds of thousands of years ago we were doing – eating this. It’s eating certain ways, eating certain things, and not eating things that now we have such access to.

[00:59:30] Zoe Carli: So I don’t do those things. David does talk to his patients about it because obviously he works… so my husband is an orthopedist stem cell expert, males and females alike. Knees, shoulders, hips, and spine. He does fingers and everything else. But those are your big main joints in your body that start to break down.

So a lot of patients will ask, “Hey, what about glucosamine and chondroitin?” It’s not going to hurt you. Does it change and have great effect? Some people say yes, some people say no. So I’m not the expert there. I just know based off of the fundamentals and the science that I’ve been tracking and studying from the longevity perspective that’s not where we focus.

[01:00:13] Zoe Carli: From additional… oh, so fisetin and quercetin, and I don’t want… this is a long one to get into, but just… and we can put this probably more in the notes, but fisetin and quercetin, they have some really cool data. Dr. Sinclair has done a bunch of data on this as well, is that what they do is they decrease what is called senescent cells. So basically they’re also called zombie cells. So they’re cells that die and they’re just in your body. So they’re just taken up space. So quercetin and fisetin has shown to be able to help get rid of those zombie cells.

And so that’s a good thing we do. And we are starting to actually track and do some research internally with us as well, because, hey, I don’t want dead cells if I’m taking your stem cells and I’m making them better, get rid of the dead cells.

[01:01:01] Zoe Carli: So if I can put patients about three months prior on a quercetin fisetin combination, is that going to also help as well? So those are cool things that based off of the biotechnology company that David started in 2010, that we’re able to actually do biomarkers, measure outcomes, track your dose response to stem cells, supplementing.

We’re seeing that the patients that supplement and we track… we have thousands of patients in this database, and Dr. Carli David is not the only one that utilizes this technology, so I’ve been able to grow the company across the United States. Lots of orthopedists are now utilizing this technology to process the stem cells, and then we’re able to track and record based off of the amount the dose of stem cells that was injected to the correlate to the patient’s reported outcome. Now you have a dose and now you have an outcome. Some of the doctors may not use as high of a dose as David does. What do their outcomes look compared to his? So it’s basically this internal registry and an internal case study to say, don’t do it this way, you got to do it this way.

[01:02:08] Zoe Carli: What we’ve also noticed is that some of our doctors actually make their patients supplement for at least three months prior to getting their stem cell injections. And so now we’re starting to see outcomes with that. It’s not correlated yet. We haven’t been tracking it long enough, but from the longevity perspective, longevity specialists, they take blood panels and they take measurements and they do it two to three times a year to see what’s changing and what’s fluxing.

And your body is… that’s why I say your body’s your temple and you got to take care of it. And you got to do it in as many different ways as you possibly can, because we’re like bicycle tires. There’s a spoke and there’s lots of… or there’s a hub, and then there’s lots of different spokes. So you want to keep those spokes healthy so that it keeps working.

[01:02:52] Zoe Carli: That’s another big one – fisetin quercetin. I do take a combination of that as well. And what else am I missing? Oh, zinc. I’m a big proponent of zinc. There’s lots of… and I do take that at night. Some people do get… I don’t know if I would call it maybe like an acid reflux to it. So just be cognizant of that. And then that’s another one that I add in at night. I don’t seem to have any acid issues with it. I just take it at night.

That’s my… I take D and K at night, zinc at night, fish oil. So I take 2000 milligrams a day. I’m super active and I push my body pretty hard. So I take a thousand milligrams in the evening as well. I take a regularity supplement. It’s actually lovingly called “number two,” and then I take my probiotic at night as well.

[01:03:29] Zoe Carli: And then in the morning I’m taking that longevity complex with fisetin and quercetin combination, and then a fish oil as well. My B complex, my multivitamin, and oh, my other one that I love is vitamin C. And I do take 2000 milligrams a day. So I take a thousand milligram capsule in the morning and I take a thousand milligram capsule at night. I have been doing that since I was a kid. My mother was a big believer in supplements, which is crazy. I guess she was way before her time, but vitamin C and especially as kids who get every little buggy… I’ve never had the flu. I’ve never had flu shot. I’ve never had the flu. I guess I don’t know. I’ll chalk it up to vitamin C.

[01:04:18] Rita Black: You’re a super immune human being, but that’s huge. That’s important as well, especially when you… I know plenty of people that they’re always sick, they’ve always got a cold or they get the flu two times a year or something like that.

[01:04:35] Zoe Carli: So those are probably the three to four that we didn’t really get into. But from that longevity perspective, so vitamin C, zinc, fisetin quercetin – and you can do one or the other, or a combination of both.

[01:04:49] Rita Black: Okay. That’s great. And if you can, yes, if you can give me a list, because I’m sure our listeners are like, “I’m driving my car. I can’t write this down.” They have something to refer to. That’d be great.

[01:05:10] Rita Black: Now, what are you up to? You had mentioned a launch and something you wanted to offer our audience, because it sounds like you. So tell us—what’s going on? You have a vitamin company, and you resource from different people?

[01:05:19] Rita Black: Just give us the background, because I’m uneducated here.

[01:05:22] Zoe Karli: That’s okay! So, Zeta Body—ZetaBody.com, Z-E-T-A—was definitely a journey. I work with several high-quality raw material manufacturers. I get one ingredient from this company, another from that company, and then I send all the raw materials to my manufacturing organization in Utah.

[01:05:46] Zoe Karli: They take all of my ingredients and formulations, create the supplement, bottle it up there, and then ship it to my fulfillment center. That setup is pretty standard for most supplement companies. The difference really comes down to where you get your raw materials, from what companies, and their quality. That’s where the “sea of supplements” gets confusing.

[01:06:03] Zoe Karli: One of our standout products is Z-83. I didn’t even get into it earlier, but I had seizures for several years—uncontrolled for about a year—until they were finally managed with medication. So brain health is a big priority for me, especially after having so many concussions.

[01:06:28] Zoe Karli: Tonic-clonic seizures are intense—I’m out cold, seizing, spitting—I don’t remember a thing. It’s terrifying.

[01:06:40] Rita Black: Yeah. That’s scary.

[01:06:41] Zoe Karli: I’ve been stable on medication for 11 years now. But I know I’ll have a breakthrough seizure if I miss more than about two days of meds.

[01:06:53] Zoe Karli: So I worked with Anthony, the founder of Creatine, and my husband to develop something that truly supports both the brain and body. Z-83 is a blend of three unique ingredients:

* Zein, a natural succulent extract that acts like an SSRI (a serotonin reuptake inhibitor), but it’s not a drug—it’s been used for decades to help with anxiety and depression naturally.

* MTN Max, which increases reaction time. It’s a stimulant, but not like caffeine—no jitters.

* A low dose of very clean caffeine.

[01:07:46] Zoe Karli: Put all of that together and it works beautifully. I’ve given it to orthopedic surgeons, busy moms, even my 13-year-old. Everyone says the same thing: “I just feel like I can think clearly, react better, and I have energy—without feeling sleepy.”

[01:08:20] Zoe Karli: That’s huge, especially since the first seizure med I took caused extreme fatigue. I’m naturally energetic, so that was a nightmare. I’d look at the floor and think it looked like a good place to nap. Every day, I fought to stay awake, focused, and energized—and that’s exhausting in itself.

[01:08:54] Zoe Karli: Bringing Z-83 to market was a proud moment. The name comes from my birth year (1983) and my name (Zoe). One day David yelled down the hall, “Just call it Z-83!” And it stuck.

[01:09:09] Zoe Karli: It’s for focus and brain health. That’s also why I’m such a fan of creatine for its neuroprotective benefits. Combine it with Z-83, and you’ve got something powerful.

[01:09:25] Zoe Karli: We’re all overstimulated—no matter our age. I see it with my 13-year-old. Our world is instant: order groceries, book a trip, call an Uber—everything’s at our fingertips. And that causes stress.

[01:10:00] Zoe Karli: That’s why supplementation is critical—not just to balance hormones, but also to support brain health amidst all this overstimulation. Everyone’s anxious, yet we’re also lethargic. Z-83 addresses that head-on.

[01:10:28] Zoe Karli: I was blessed to work directly with the manufacturers of zein and MTN Max, and I’m so proud to bring something meaningful to the world. I think I owe you a discount code!

[01:10:44] Zoe Karli: I’ll create a code for your audience. Let’s say “RITA10” for 10% off. That’ll work for subscriptions too.

[01:11:00] Zoe Karli: So just go to ZetaBody.com, add your supplements to your cart, and if your order is over $50, you’ll get free shipping. Enter the code “RITA10” at checkout for the discount.

[01:11:20] Zoe Karli: I’ll also give you a brief write-up with the top five supplements and a few bonus ones. And I’d love to include more nuggets about the science behind D and K vitamins—from a women’s health perspective.

[01:11:40] Zoe Karli: Plus, I’ll send the link to a creatine publication. It’s an easy, informative read—not just about muscle, but also neurocognitive benefits.

[01:11:57] Rita Black: Wow. This has been so educational. I’ve wanted to bring someone on to talk about supplements for a while. I get asked about it a lot, and it’s overwhelming out there. So thank you for simplifying it and helping us understand it better.

[01:12:42] Rita Black: And hearing about your story and your work with your husband is so inspiring.

[01:12:44] Zoe Karli: Yay! I’m just grateful I could share. Maybe those seizures were part of my purpose—to tell this story and create something that helps others.

[01:13:05] Zoe Karli: Oh! You asked about the launch—let’s talk about that quickly.

[01:13:10] Zoe Karli: Anthony and I created a de-lactosed whey protein—launching soon. That means all the “lactards” (pardon the phrase!) don’t need to take Lactaid anymore. They can still enjoy whey.

[01:13:27] Zoe Karli: I used to avoid whey and take vegan protein, but it would make me bloated. Many people experience bloating from whey in general. Our new product significantly reduces that, plus it’s suitable for those with lactose sensitivity.

[01:13:51] Zoe Karli: De-lactosing breaks the lactose bond differently than just stripping it out (which is what lactose-free means). So it’s truly unique—no one else has it.

[01:14:09] Zoe Karli: It took me a while to get here, but I hope this product becomes part of the legacy I leave behind.

[01:14:18] Rita Black: Very cool. Can people sign up for your newsletter to be notified about the launch?

[01:14:26] Rita Black: Great. I’ll include all your links in the show notes. Thank you so much again, Zoe! I hope we have you back to talk about hormones next time.

[01:14:44] Rita Black: We’ll call it “Supplements 2.0”—now that we’re all a little more educated!

[01:14:54] Zoe Karli: Yes! And I’d love to bring David. He can speak from the medical doctor perspective—it would be a great, complementary episode.

[01:15:05] Rita Black: I would love that.

[01:15:10] Rita Black: Thank you again, Zoe! That was so fascinating. And thank you, listeners, for being here. If you want the list of the five supplements Zoe mentioned, check out the show notes. Zoe’s website is listed there, and you can use the code RITA15 for a discount.

[01:15:33] Rita Black: And if you’re inclined, leave a review on your favorite podcast platform. It means so much to me.

[01:15:58] Rita Black: Have a great week, and remember: the key—and probably the only key—to unlocking the door to your weight struggle is inside you. Keep listening and find it.

[01:16:21] Rita Black: I’ll be back next week. Have a good one. Thanks for listening to the Thin Thinking Podcast.

[01:16:40] Rita Black: If that episode went by too fast for you and you want to dive deeper into the mindset of long-term weight release, head over to www.shiftweightmastery.com. You’ll find tools, resources, tips, and strategies to help you unlock your mind for permanent weight release.

[01:16:51] Rita Black: And don’t forget to check the show notes to learn more about my book From Fat to Thin Thinking and to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode.