Validation and Empowerment: What EDS Patients Need to Know | Office Hours (Ep 190)

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Dr. Linda Bluestein: [00:00:00] Everything is connected to everything else, and if you're having poor sleep, that is going to impact everything that's going to negatively impact how your immune system functions, how your connective tissue functions, your muscles, your gut's not gonna work as well. Your parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system is not gonna work as well.

So really working on improving sleep is so important.

Welcome back every bendy body to the Bendy Bodies podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Linda Bluestein, the Hypermobility md. A Mayo Clinic trained expert in Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome dedicated to helping you navigate hypermobility and live your best life. Today's episode was inspired by listeners questions. One of the questions was about an introductory series, so I'm gonna share some things today that I want all patients to know.

Another listener asked for how to find a doctor for [00:01:00] their teen that has possible hypermobile EDS or HSD and a grandmother asked about addressing pots that might be driven by mast cell activation syndrome. I am also excited to be joined today by one of the producers from Human Content Aron, who is even wearing his VIP Bendy Bodies merch.

Hello, Aron. How are you? 

Aron Korney: I am doing great. How are you, Dr. Bluestein? 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: I am doing great as well. I have my shirt, but I'm holding it on my lap. 

Aron Korney: It's okay. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: I'm not wearing it at the moment, but if that allows me actually to show people what a VIP shirt looks like for people watching on YouTube. 

Aron Korney: By the way, can I just say.

My bendy body shirt is one of a kind today because mine is ice cold. I just took it outta the freezer. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: What? 

Aron Korney: Hear me out. Take it outta the freezer. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yes, 

Aron Korney: I know I sound crazy and I'm still gonna sound crazy when I explain why, but I'll sound less crazy. That's the goal. You can tell me. Okay. Alright, so we're taping.

[00:02:00] Today and again, thrilled to be on with you again. Peop apparently people didn't hate me last time. That's great. Very, affirming. They loved affirming, 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: they loved you. They loved you. Yes. 

Aron Korney: Yeah. Very, affirming. Great. I can, carry that with me. but I realized this morning that the load of laundry, I, I'm sure we've all been there. I like did my laundry last night and I was like, okay, I'll put it in the dryer this morning. And I'm like, okay. And I start working all day and then suddenly I'm like, oh wait, that load of laundry has this shirt in it. So I load up the laundry this morning and I run it. 'cause I loaded it last night, but not run it.

Sorry. That's how it was. And so I pull out the soaking wet cold, dripping wet bendy body shirt about 40 minutes ago and I'm like, you know what? You're going in and I ring it out in the sink, throw it in the dryer, and five minutes before this, it's nice and dry, but it is so hot and we're in a heat wave right now in California, and so I threw it in the freezer and the moment it was time to record, I pulled it outta the freezer.

So I have a nice [00:03:00] icy shirt on and I feel crazy, but hopefully I sound less crazy. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: That is hilarious. Well, you know what's funny about that? A lot of people who listen to the show have a lot of problems with temperature tolerance. So they don't tolerate heat, they don't tolerate cold. so that's a new hack.

You know, if you take something out of the dryer and or it's just so hot. I thought you were gonna say that you put it in the freezer just 'cause it was so hot. But writ, yeah. You take something outta the dryer and it's super toasty, so sticking it in the freezer is a great idea. 

Aron Korney: That sounds like something a non neurodivergent person would've done.

No, mine was. Yeah, 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: I love it. I love it. That's awesome. Okay, so excited to have this conversation with you today and be sure to stick around until the very end, so don't miss any of our special hypermobility hacks. As always, this information is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for personalized medical advice.

Here we go.

Okay, Aron, I'm so excited to have this conversation with you. So today we are going to be talking [00:04:00] about things that I wish every patient knew. The goals of this conversation are to empower people, to validate them, reduce overwhelm, and provide actionable starting points. So first we're gonna talk about the big thing that so many people experience, and I don't know if you've.

Heard people say this from, you know, producing the show and or seeing the comments, but people are constantly told that they're imagining things. Have you, seen that, or that they're making up their symptoms or, yeah. 

Aron Korney: Yes. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: And it's so, so frustrating for people. There are such common symptom patterns that we see that include pain, fatigue, brain fog, symptoms of dysautonomia, like dizziness, temperature intolerance like we just talked about, and mast cell activation syndrome.

And symptoms can be just all over the place and people can be struggling with so many symptoms at so many different points in time. And people can start to feel like maybe I am just crazy because I go to the doctor and I go to this doctor and I go to that doctor and none of them know what's wrong with me.

[00:05:00] So maybe it's just me. Maybe I'm just crazy. 

Aron Korney: It's interesting. We notice people that excel because of hypermobility. differentiators. I'll say, I'm no doctor. I'm a podcast producer, so I'm gonna use my lingo. But like, you look at like famous musicians or something, or like, wasn't it like Rachmaninoff or someone like, like there's famous musicians who like, have like very wide hands for like playing and famous viol, like violin players and stuff, and like sure they have hyper mobility in their joints so they can do exceptional things and everyone celebrates it and no one talks about it, right?

So it's interesting that. It's dismissed. If there's something about you that's causing the problems, but I don't know about you, but for me it feels validating. It's like, okay, cool. Why should I feel like I'm imagining it and I'm crazy? 'cause it's a bad thing for me. When, it's a good thing for people, they lean into it and celebrate it so easily.

Like I think both sides of the coin should be equally valid. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, I think that's such a great point. And people speculate all the [00:06:00] time about different people, you know, Elvis Presley, did he have EDS, Michael Jackson, you know, Michael Phelps, like, 'cause you know, there are some signs that are really visible.

So it's kind of ironic because at the same time that we say these are invisible illnesses, they're also highly visible because you can see people's joint range of motion, often when you're watching them on tv, if you're watching the Olympics or something. So it's really, fascinating unless you actually take a goniometer, which is the.

Those, that device that, you know, kind of looks like a math tool, that you can use to measure the joint range of motion. If you don't use that, then it's hard to estimate exactly, you know, what the, degrees of hyperextension, for example, in someone's knees. But you, know, if when it's extreme you can really tell, oh, that person is really hypermobile.

Aron Korney: And everything's so interconnected, right? Like, isn't there, the interstitium or whatever. Like our whole body has like this network of membranes where everything in flames and relates to each other, and it's all just like this domino system where like. There's no, there's nothing, there's no benefit [00:07:00] in wondering if you're crazy about it or imagining it.

It's so valid that there's a million variables happening, that if something's not working for you, there's probably a mystery to, to look into. You're like, you're not crazy. You're valid. Even if it feels like it's psychosomatic, it's stems from somewhere, right? It's all, what's the term? It's all comorbid against, on each other, so I don't know why, gaslight yourself.

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah. But a lot of us do, including myself. I did that for sure, be before I was diagnosed and I thought that, oh, well, if the doctor tells me that there's nothing wrong with me, then they must be right and I must be wrong. So I definitely, gaslit myself for sure. 

Aron Korney: And I feel like, correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel like a lot of women also I've heard, complain about the fact that they feel like doctors are more predisposed to dismiss their complaints about anything phys physiological.

Dr. Linda Bluestein: I definitely think that's true. Yeah. And, there's certain other categories of people, like I think moms will get labeled as, you know, munch houses by [00:08:00] proxy. or you'll like, you know, intentionally making their kids sick. Right. They'll get labeled with that, I think more easily than, males do.

So, yeah, it's really tough and, only you know what your body feels like. Nobody else knows what you feel in your body. And we're gonna talk more later about how to. Think of the sensations that you have in your body, how to present them to your doctor in a way that you're more likely to get a diagnosis and not to get overly attached to labels.

'cause sometimes that can lead to what's called a fixation error. So I like to say pain is the body's way of asking for change, but it could be a whole host of different things. So it might be that you're doing some small thing in your everyday life that you know the pain is telling you need to do that differently.

Or maybe the pain is a sign of some big problem and just because a person has EDS or HSD doesn't mean that they can't have other problems. Right? So you could have appendicitis or something. You know, some other thing going on. even though you have those conditions, or maybe the pain is just telling you that your nervous system needs [00:09:00] some adjustment, because you have what's called central sensitization, and we'll talk more about that later.

but figuring that out for me that was going on in my own body really helped me a lot. Okay, so I mentioned about central sensitization and why focusing just on the diagnosis can be really challenging and can actually stall progress. So sometimes I have had patients where they've come in and they're talking about, you know, my CSF leak headache, or my migraine headache, and even if they've been diagnosed with migraine headache.

They may or may not actually have migraine headache. And so if they're using that term over and over again, it is very possible that people won't look deeper and see, oh, well, is there headache from, you know, temporomandibular dysfunction? Is it from cranial cervical instability? Is it from a CSF leak?

Is it from elevated intracranial pressure? Like there's all these other things in people with EDS and HSD that can cause. Headache. So we wanna make sure that when we are talking to our doctors that we are explaining what our symptoms [00:10:00] are, and ideally that we have a document that's organized and now you have all these wonderful AI tools that you can use to help you organize the information.

And you know, you can even have it organized in several different ways. So. Bringing your information to your doctor in several different formats can be really helpful. So you can go to, you know, whatever your favorite AI platform is, and you can put in the symptoms that you have, the information that you have, and you can ask it to organize it by, chronology.

You can have it organize it by systems. So like all the neurologic things are together, all of the gastrointestinal things are together. all of the pain problems. Having different documents like that can be really helpful. So you can bring several different things to your appointment and you can say, I have several different documents.

I'm not sure which ones you want to see, but if you have those prepared, I can be super helpful. I really like having those documents anyway. 

Aron Korney: Yeah. You know, by the way, when, when, just doing a little bit of armchair research before this [00:11:00] episode, I was just looking into kind of some of the, like the unknown unknowns of what can cause problems for people who have EDS, especially someone who doesn't.

I was learning about it, and I know you know all about this, I'm sure, but I started learning about the, glymphatic system of like how our brain. Right. Like does its own like washing and cleans off, like myelin sheaths on neurons and kind of for everyone. It's like your dishwasher of your brain while you're sleeping.

Right? I, I dunno if that's oversimplifying it, but that, it's just, so interesting how like. It's just so clear how pervasive EDS is on so many different levels. Again, this is me being outside of it and you're like, yeah, of course Aron. but yeah, I didn't realize that ev it even extends to like hypermobility and like floppiness in like the piping of that drainage system and that's why you have fatigue and like sleep issues.

And there are like issues with like how collagen and vitamin C [00:12:00] are like distributed from it all and it's just like. it's, I can see how it starts to become such like an overwhelming system of you really do need to make sure you are communicating and being transparent and vulnerable with your practitioner, I would imagine for these things.

Because it, it is so hard to keep track of all the different areas, that could be playing into why you are feeling X, Y, and Z. And I just, as I've started learning about it more, And, while knowing that you and I are gonna do this more, like I've been surprised and a little overwhelmed by how many things you as practitioners have to keep track of to sleuth it out.

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah. Sleuth it out is exactly what it is. And the thing that we're taught in medical school, we're taught about so many different systems, but we're not taught about the interconnectedness of all of these systems. So, so many people think that. Somebody has joint hypermobility or somebody has a connective tissue disorder, [00:13:00] you know, that's gonna affect their joints, but they don't realize that it's gonna affect so many other aspects of their body.

Maybe they'll be aware that they could have, you know, stretchy skin or something like that, but they don't think about, like you're saying, how you can have fatigue from so many different causes. Impacts your sleep, impacts your ability to, you know, process food through your digestive tract. I mean, it, your connective tissue is everywhere, right?

So literally connective tissue disorders, like at the Ehlers Danlos syndromes, can affect everything in your body. 

Aron Korney: Yeah, it also just. To me, it also, I guess I'm just thinking about it from an emotional standpoint again, because I don't experience it, is I would imagine it also, it's probably good to also be vulnerable with your loved ones and close ones with it then too, that you don't always know.

What is going on with you and you're figuring it out. And please be patient with me as I am trying to figure this out too, but I'm not always at a hundred percent and using that vulnerability probably [00:14:00] to help feel less self-conscious about it because you've gotten in front of it. I don't know how you, I'm curious what you think about that, but I'd imagine that's a big aspect of working with patients too.

Is that non physiological side of it. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, definitely. And it, and definitely that interaction with family members because it's. It's really, hard if you're in a couple relationship or, you know, if you have parents or you're dealing with a child or whatever it might be. when there's other people involved, it can be very challenging to try to figure out as the other person, you know, how do I support them?

And we're gonna talk about that in a future episode. How do I support this person who's suffering from all these symptoms? But at the same time, like, they have their own life, they have their own things that they're dealing with, right? So I think it is important to be vulnerable and honest and say, you know, I don't wanna be a burden.

I feel like. You know, I have all this stuff that I'm dealing with and I'm trying my best to manage my symptoms, but it's overwhelming and, you know, just sharing how you feel. I think that's a great idea. I think that's a great point 

Aron Korney: Dr. Bluestein have, like I know you have before, but I'd imagine [00:15:00] the more we on this show where you can talk about kind of the I know you're not married to family therapist, but like that idea of family dynamics and interpersonal dynamics in a family unit, I'd imagine that's just such a massive world.

In, the EDS community of figuring out how to navigate that and make sure that you self-advocate while also recognizing it's hard for those around you and that whole dynamic, right. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: It's really, hard and I see the full spectrum. I see couples and families that have, you know, great relationships and they're able to navigate these things, you know, pretty well.

And I see other couples where it's, really challenging the person, the patient, you know, might have a lot of needs and the person will be really supportive. The spouse will be really supportive of the partner. For a number of years, but over time then they start to get resentful or, and or they start to feel more like a caregiver and less like a partner, 

Aron Korney: which is valid.

Right. It's you can't help it. It's valid. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, exactly. It's not fair. [00:16:00] Not 

Aron Korney: fair, but yeah. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Right, right, right. And I think for. Everyone acknowledging what their needs are, I think is really important. I think that, like you said about the vulnerability and communication is, so important and the same thing, you know, you can apply that into the relationship with your doctor and your doctor's appointments.

you know, I tell people all the time, try to describe and feel what you're feeling in your body, but try to be more objective about it rather than anxious. I'm a very anxious person, so I have to really, work on this. as I know that, you know, after working with me now for a couple of years, That, you know, I really have to work on my anxiety because once you start getting into that anxious mindset, it makes it harder to interpret your symptoms. And it makes it harder to know like what's connected to what. And the other thing is if you're in a doctor's appointment and you're leaning more into the anxiety and less into the like storytelling reporter type of, you know, mindset, then.

What ends up happening is the other person is gonna focus on your anxiety. Does that make sense? Like they're gonna feel your anxiety. Yeah. [00:17:00] 

Aron Korney: Yeah. And as a practitioner, I imagine you can't help it, but sometimes it makes you need to put up a bit more of an emotional wall because of all the people you work with.

And it might actually work to your own detriment as the patient to get too anxious because your practitioner then. For their own self-care has to step back a little emotionally and not get pulled into that, vibe. Because if they spend a 40 minutes with you on that and then they go the next patient and they bring that energy, that doesn't help anyone.

So it doesn't help either of you. But at the same time, I would imagine it's so hard for anyone when they're already feeling, pardon me, but like if you feel like shit, it probably is hard to also then wanna be like. Dang. Now I have to also be really emotionally vulnerable right now when I already feel guilty about the fact that I couldn't, go run these errands today that I needed to do for my family.

And I am just like needing more, like an extra nap today. Like I, that's [00:18:00] already enough for me and enough emotional and physical baggage. I don't wanna be vulnerable. Also, like it makes sense why it's so much, it's like, it probably feels counterintuitive to somebody. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: And it's really, hard. 'cause most people want to be doing a lot more than they can.

They want to be more active, they want to be contributing more to their household. they don't wanna be going to the doctor. They don't wanna be sitting in the doctor's office. you know, they don't wanna be listening to, oh, well now I have to not only go to the doctor's appointment, but I have to do it in a certain way.

And I'm not saying that's right or that's fair, but you're right. The doctor will be seeing, you know, some, sometimes 30 or 40 patients in a day. So they're gonna hear over, you know, and in like a typical practice, a lot of people will see that many people in a day, 20, 30, 40. And so they're gonna be going into room after room And so if, they walk in there and what they're really feeling is like this incredible amount of anxiety, it's gonna be hard for them not to attribute most of the [00:19:00] things to the anxiety. Even though you have all these physical symptoms that are probably driving that anxiety. 

Aron Korney: So, correct me if I'm wrong, then the takeaway I would imagine for the patient is it's just like going to the gym or exercising or anything else you do, is it's not about not bringing that to your practitioner, to your, whoever's working with you, but it's about you gotta exercise that muscle.

You gotta be vulnerable with or you don't have to, but I'd imagine being vulnerable, family, being vulnerable with your, practitioner, and figuring out how to balance that so that you're being considerate and constructive for them. Consider it constructive for yourself. It's just a journey, I'd imagine, but not engaging in it, it sounds like is the, bigger danger.

I would, think because then you're not addressing half of the human experience of the emotional side of it, which is. You know, everything affects everything. is, that, fair to say as a, podcast producer, not a doctor? Is that fair to say? 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah. no, I agree.

It's just, it's really hard because [00:20:00] ideally the doctor would say, okay, so you're telling me that you have these symptoms, and I'm also sensing that you have anxiety about it. And ideally they would talk to you about your physical symptoms. And then they would talk to you also about your anxiety, but in reality, they might have seven minutes.

They might have 10 minutes. So it's gonna be easier for them to focus on, you know, what they feel like is important. So that's why I think your point is excellent about the practice, practice plan ahead. Really think about what you wanna say, really think about what you wanna focus on so that you are most likely to get what it is that you want out of that appointment.

Aron Korney: Yeah, well beyond the aspects of what maybe needs to at some point be another mental health focus on it all. It sounds like, based on where you and I were headed on this, do you have other, I, just thinking about other things we were gonna talk about today, do you have other, like, patient tips to talk about beyond that?

Just one. Emotional side of things. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Well, also, I think another thing that's important for people to realize is that sometimes what starts the problem [00:21:00] is not the thing that perpetuates the problem. So for example, if we use head pain as an example, it could be that you start out having migraines or cluster headaches or sinus headaches or something like that, and over time, something else.

Develops and you still have head pain and maybe you can't really distinguish one type of headache from the other a lot, although sometimes people can, but sometimes a different type of head pain will take over and maybe now the head pain is from cervical instability or Chiari Malformation or CSF leak or something like that.

So keep in mind that what starts the problem and what perpetuates the problem might be two different things. I've, seen people before where they're on tons and tons of supplements, like 20, 30 supplements, and. Then I start looking up like some of the supplements they're on, 'cause some of them I'm not familiar with, and some of the symptoms that they're describing can be related to those supplements.

And it's like, well, maybe you're having a lot of tingling because you're taking so much B12, you're taking way too much. B12, for example. [00:22:00] Maybe we need to change, maybe we need to back off. 'cause a lot of times people like to prescribe, but they don't like to de-prescribe. They don't like to stop things. So I have had lots of patients where I've said, let's stop a bunch of these supplements and let's see what's going on and that this is where this comes into, like what started the problem.

'cause oftentimes they'll say, well, I had this problem though before I started the supplement. Something else could have been going on at that time. It could have been related to, you know, a nerve that was more transiently pinched and now you started these supplements and now the supplements are, you know, it's making it seem like the symptom is continuing, but it's actually a different cause.

So I think that sometimes pain problems are like peeling an onion, you know, you kind of have to like just deal with it in layers. And once you deal with the first layer, now you can deal with the second layer. And especially people with. EDS or Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and connective tissue disorders. You know, we often have so many different symptoms, so many different problems going on that we just have to address one layer at a time or else we get really overwhelmed.

Aron Korney: Yeah, and I remember that was [00:23:00] originally in the script for Shrek when he talked about ogres being like, onions you peel. And I remember that was just, it didn't work with the audience in the test screenings. And they went back to the ogre thing, but sorry, that's just a random trip, in fact. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Oh, that's funny.

Never would've, guessed that, never would've guessed that. So, and I just realized that I've been using the terms EDS and HSD and I haven't really defined those. So let's explain what those are before. We're gonna be, taking a break shortly and addressing some listener questions. So the Aler damos syndromes are a group of connective tissue disorders, of which there are multiple subtypes that are rare or.

Ultra rare, like literally a handful of people in the entire world have some of those subtypes. But the hypermobile type is actually much, much more common than all of the other subtypes combined. So we think that probably out of all the people who have EDS. Probably 80 to 90 or even more percent have Hypermobile EDS.

And Hypermobile EDS, unfortunately, is the only [00:24:00] type that does not have a genetic known genetic marker. So we don't have a biomarker yet for hypermobile EDS. You can't just go to a lab, get a test and say, oh, you have hypermobile EDS. So. I get this question all the time about genetic testing. If I don't suspect a different type of EDS or, you know, another, connective tissue disorder like Louis Diets syndrome or you know, Marvin Syndrome, something like that, then genetic testing is not going to confirm.

Hypermobile EDS and oftentimes that information gets used almost against somebody like, oh, see, your test was negative. and hypermobility spectrum disorders is kind of the, like catchall term for, you have joint hypermobility, which means your joints have greater than expected range of motion, and you have symptoms related to joint hypermobility, which again could include pain fatigue, GI symptoms.

You know, nausea, vomiting, you know, gastric reflux, you know, joint subluxations, dislocations, stretchy skin, all kinds of things. You have symptoms related to your joint hypermobility, but you [00:25:00] don't have enough things that meet the criteria for hypermobile EDS or another condition to your, explain your symptoms.

So I just realized that I didn't define HSD or hypermobile EDS yet, and I just wanted to throw that in there. 

Aron Korney: Yeah, I think that helps. And I, by the way, I like that. You're holding our hands and introducing key terms, and hopefully you do it throughout the rest of the series as like as you are teaching us the bigger picture so that we're getting like, like core contained terms and also understanding that it is an abstract, wider discussion.

So I can't speak for others listening to you. I'm, your, I'm, you're on the stage and I'm your one audience member right now sitting in the front row clapping, but I'm, I think that's very helpful. Thank you. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: It's hard because I feel like even, I feel like sometimes I'll run into people who really understand like some of the nuanced, complex topics, but this core aspect of the it, it sometimes gets lost in the shuffle.

So. Okay. So let's talk a little bit before we take the break. [00:26:00] Some of the most overlooked contributors to pain and other symptoms related to hypermobile EDS and HSD because I feel like this is something that, you know, a lot of people don't realize and they think, oh, but I need to get to a doctor and I need to get a diagnosis.

Yes, a diagnosis is super important, and whether you have a diagnosis of HSD or hypermobile EDS, We're, gonna treat those basically the same. The treatment plan is basically the same for both of those conditions. And things that we want to address include things like sleep disruption. it's interesting that you mentioned glymphatic.

'cause you and I didn't plan this. We, well, we, I mean we communicated a tiny little bit in the show notes, but Oh, 

Aron Korney: we vibe. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: I say we vibe. It's 

Aron Korney: physical. I gotcha. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah. Yep, because. It's, it is. Everything is connected. Everything is connected to everything else. And if you're having poor sleep, that is going to impact everything that's going to negatively impact how your immune system functions.

It's going to negatively impact how your connective tissue functions [00:27:00] your muscles. It's gonna, you know. Just cause you more fatigue. Your gut's not gonna work as well. Your parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system is not gonna work as well. So really working on improving sleep is so important.

also, as I just mentioned, the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system. Our nervous system is, I think about like a teeter-totter. So a lot of people that have EDS, they are in sympathetic overdrive. So the sympathetic nervous system is the fight, flight, or freeze part of your nervous system. It's like, you know, you almost get in a car accident and you feel your heart racing and all of that.

That's your sympathetic nervous system. And the parasympathetic nervous system is what we call the rest, digest and restore nervous system. So. When people have EDS, oftentimes they, they may or may not have pots, but they might have dysfunction of their autonomic nervous system and their sympathetic nervous system is on overdrive, which of course is gonna cause more anxiety, more problems with sleep, and, all kinds of other issues.

So definitely [00:28:00] working on the vagus nerve, which is the biggest and most important nerve for the parasympathetic nervous system. And also super important for your, gut, but working on, you know, getting that. You know, more active and getting your parasympathetic nervous system more active, can really make a difference.

Does that make sense, Aron? 

Aron Korney: Yeah, it does. It also, again, it's, I go off of what's front of mind for me is me and also Rob, two of your producers both have sleep apnea and we talk about it a lot. It makes me wonder is, that common also then, because you're talking about sleep issues and you're talking about like joint and myofascial and right issues, and I know that.

It's tied to your jaw and your, mouth, mouth muscles. I know very clinical terminology here, right? Relaxing when you sleep and falling back to close your windpipe. Does, do you see a correlation that could also be a part of, if you have EDS or anything? Absolutely. You might also absolutely [00:29:00] wanna get checked for that if you're having sleep issues.

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yes. 

Aron Korney: Okay. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yes, So, you, I know you said you're not a doctor, and I know you're not a doctor, but maybe medical school is in your future because you're, absolutely right. It's never too late. 

Aron Korney: Be an old man when I finish. Yeah. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: because you're absolutely right. So yes, the tissues in your body are gonna be more stretchy, more, extensible.

And so yes, we see young females who normally you would never even think could have, sleep apnea, but, they do. So we test a lot of people for sleep apnea because it is so, so much more common in people with EDS and HSD than it is in the general population. So yes, that's a super thing. It's a super important thing to, to look for, and it's a little bit trickier to treat because if somebody does come back with sleep apnea, then, you know, just even wearing like the mask can activate their mast cells, they can end up with a rash around the mask.

Like for CCP, a p. There's all kinds of oral [00:30:00] devices, but if you already have jaw problems, that can make your jaw pain worse. So it could be really tricky to treat sleep apnea if and if somebody's already normal weight or maybe they're even underweight so they don't have weight to lose. it can be really tricky.

Aron Korney: Yeah. Well, ladies out there listening, I just went through it all and got diagnosed and got it all. You can look chic and envogue, and wear all the appliances. They are minimalistic and, you know. A little alluring, so don't be afraid to get tested. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, absolutely. don't be afraid to get tested because even though I said, you know, that it's diff it can be difficult to treat.

It's super important information to have. and another thing I should point out is people who have Chiari Malformation can also have central sleep apnea. so they can have sleep apnea. That's also driven by the, central drive for breathing. In addition to obstructive sleep apnea, which is what you're talking about, where you get obstruction.

Yeah, you can, so you can actually have, both people can have both obstructive and central sleep apnea. [00:31:00] 

Aron Korney: My understanding with central sleep apnea is it's also tied to like how your body regulates, like CO2 and oxygen and everything. And yeah, I just learned about that yesterday actually.

All about how like, yeah, your brain can just tell you to stop breathing even if there's nothing physiologically occurring. So. Again, it's also complicated, which is why it's good we have doctors like you who know this. 'cause it can feel overwhelming as the patients. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: it can feel overwhelming. But this is also why so many of us are so, reluctant to prescribe, you know, sedatives for sleep.

Because if you're taking away somebody's drive to breathe, when you, have sleep apnea and you stop breathing, your oxygen saturation goes down and it. It's either your oxygen is going down or your carbon dioxide going up, that's gonna cause you to start breathing again. And if you give someone you know that has sleep apnea, if you give them sedatives, then it's probably going to have to, your oxygen's gonna have to go lower or, and, or your CO2 is gonna have to go higher before you start breathing again.

So your oxygen saturation is gonna go down [00:32:00] even lower. So your brain is getting deprived of oxygen even more than if you. Didn't have those sedatives. So yeah, it's really important. And we know that people with EDS and HSD are more prone to neuroinflammation or inflammation in the nervous system, and they're also more prone to central sensitization, which is, you know, the processing of pain signals.

And when I realized that I had central sensitization, this was such a huge light bulb moment for me. And you've probably already heard me talk about this on other shows, but. Episodes of this show, but when I learned about central sensitization, I was already. Like, you know, working as an anesthesiologist, I had already had my spine surgery and I was in so much pain.

I had gone back to work, but I was really, struggling. I was having, you know, I was still having to wear lead sometimes, and I was having a really tough time. And I came across this lecture by Dr. Dan Claw, who's like the world's expert on central sensitization, and I was like. Oh my gosh. That's what's happened to me because I knew that like I couldn't tolerate [00:33:00] bright lights anymore, and I, knew that my nervous system was like so sensitive to everything.

Smells, lights, flashing lights. Like if I was driving and, or if I would go to a show and there'd be like some flashing lights, I felt like I was gonna have a, seizure. I never did. But, so, A lot of people experience this, and it's really important to know that it's very, common with EDS and HSD, and if you think about it, it makes sense if you have joints that are constantly like not in quite the exact right position, or you're constantly kind of tweaking your tendons and your ligaments a little bit, and you're having all of this.

Input into your, your nervous system, your pain nociceptive system. it actually is going to get sensitized because it's kind of a protective thing that if you have an injury, you don't wanna get another injury. Like if back in the, you know, a hundred years ago if you were already injured and you can't run away from the tiger, now you're really gonna be in trouble.

So, you know, it's probably somewhat of a, you know, evolutionary, thing. Have you heard about that before? [00:34:00] 

Aron Korney: No, that's fascinating. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, It's, geez, it's super, interesting and it's, I emailed one of my colleagues when I was writing my very first paper before I even had my clinic.

I was writing a paper and I emailed them and I asked them, what percentage of your patients do you think have central sensitization? And it was, part of a multi paragraph article, or I mean multi-paragraph email. And they wrote back and they literally just wrote four characters. 100%. 

Aron Korney: Yeah. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: That was the reply 

Aron Korney: again for me sitting here.

It's just, it just makes me wanna just encourage everyone to remember whoever your practitioner is, make sure you have someone like Dr. B here who is passionate about it. Yeah. I, she didn't ask me to say this. I, sure you're like, Aron, don't pander. But I'm just, it's just like, it's, I'm fortunate for practitioners I've had who do this too.

It's like you want someone who's passionate about this and thinks about it and is engaged with you on it. yeah. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: You want someone who's curious, I've, heard people say, well, I don't wanna go back to [00:35:00] that doctor because they didn't even know how to pronounce Aler Danlos. Well, I can tell you there are people who can pronounce Aler Danlos just fine, but they're jerks and there's other people who can't pronounce it at all.

And they're super compassionate and they want to help you. And if you, go to somebody and they're curious and they want to help. That's almost more important because they're gonna refer you to the right people. They're gonna be able to, you know, learn over time and you know, you're gonna have to form a team, right?

That's the other really important part of this, is you're gonna have to form a team in order to, get the things that you need. 

Aron Korney: I'm ready. I'm ready for you to like, be like, like to rip the top of your shirt and be like, and that's why this Saturday me, I'm going to face off with these sos at the arena and just have the most like dorky doctor, like throw down.

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Ah, that's hilarious. That, would be fun. That would be fun. Well, it's just hard 'cause I, you know, I see people, I'm not saying that, you know, not, I can't [00:36:00] see everyone, but first of all, I can't see everyone. And I love doing this podcast. I love educating people. I love educating the masses because it's so important for people to learn about these conditions and advocate for themselves and understand what's happening inside their own body so that they can really get.

You know, their best care and, feel their best. and I do love seeing patients and I love coaching clients as well. And at the end, we're gonna talk about what the difference is, but at the end of the day, people are gonna have to go to other people, right? So learning how to navigate those relationships is so important.

And people tend to either like this boom and bust, like they. Often people get super deconditioned or they might be overexerting themselves. So learning to pace is really important. learning to use your nutrition to get these key ingredients to build your tissues in the proper way, is so important because everything that you eat changes the chemistry in your body.

So in general, especially people with active mast cells, mast cells that de granulate really easily, we wanna avoid things [00:37:00] like dyes and process and refined sugar. We wanna do a lot of swaps like Dr. Stevens discussed in episode 180 7 from, the UVA EDS clinic. 

Aron Korney: Well, in the spirit of being flexible and self-care and rest, should we take a break?

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, we probably should. We'll take a break and we'll be right back.

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Okay, we are back with. With [00:38:00] Aron and Aron, I think that you have a couple of listener questions you're gonna read to us. 

Aron Korney: Alright. Our first question today is from Kimberly and I know last time I tried to do voices, but I'm, not gonna do that today. Alright. Your podcast has been a lifesaver. I found it just the right time to help my 15-year-old daughter, I believe based on research I have done that.

She may have EDS, probably heads, she's hypermobile. Officially diagnosed. We live in Alaska and I'm struggling to find a doctor who will evaluate her for EDS. I feel like the diagnosis is important for our path forward and for setting up accommodations at school. Do you know of any providers I should contact any resources to help us get her diagnosed?

Dr. Linda Bluestein: So I really love this question because it's such a common question and I don't know anyone in Alaska that I can recommend. Unfortunately. However, I do have a couple of resources that I really want to share with people. So one is from the Disautonomia support, network, and their [00:39:00] website is disautonomia support.org and they have a healthcare provider map.

We will have the link in the show notes and they compiled this from patient recommendations. I really love this because. Although they didn't vet the list, I mean, they're not going around and checking out all the doctors and nurse practitioners and PAs and physical therapists and occupational therapists and all the different kind of healthcare providers that are on this map.

they are get compiling these from patient recommendations. So at least there's something there where. People had to be added in that way. So I really, love that resource. I think it's a really great resource. The Aler Damo Society also has a healthcare professionals page, which we will also include in the show notes.

they do theirs a little bit differently, so the way theirs works is somebody has to submit their name, so. People are submitting their own name as compared to the other one where patients are recommending them. So just important to understand that because I've had a number of people say to me, oh, I went to somebody who was trained [00:40:00] by the EDS society, and it's like, well, if you saw their name on that society professional page, that doesn't mean they were trained by the society.

the society does offer something called the ECHO Program, which is really fantastic and it's great education and any healthcare professionals that are listening right now that are. Interested to learn more. I highly recommend that you sign up for the LERs Dan Los Society Echo Program. however, it's important for patients to know that a lot of the people on that society professional page have done the ECHO program, but not everybody.

So that's just another important thing. And also I would encourage people to do the coaching with Rebecca Gluck, who is the physician's assistant I recently hired for Bendy Bodies. She's really doing a fantastic job. She has so much experience. She worked with Dr. Claire Frank Amano for, a couple of years in her genetics clinic and she's been working for the EDS society for a quite a few years, working their helpline.

So she has a lot of experience. She's talked to many people with EDS and HSD, and so that's [00:41:00] a great resource as well. 

Aron Korney: You know, it's, interesting. It gets me thinking also about how, you know her daughter. I think, let me see her. She says she's 15. Yeah, she's 15. There's just, you know what I, dug into before we recorded this was, the idea of growing pains and how 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yes.

Aron Korney: I didn't notice. Yeah. I didn't know it was coined in 1823, that term. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Oh, wow. 

Aron Korney: It's, yeah, So, you know 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: that I did not know. Yeah. 

Aron Korney: Yeah. So, you know, you take it as valid as you do. Back then with ice pick lobotomies, right? Like, and all the other crazy things they were doing. so yet an, dismissal of, and what was that for, women hysteria, right?

Like just it goes into the bucket, with growing pains of, oh, we, we don't know what it is. Let's just call it this one blanket thing and just move on. So it just kind of, it's interesting that there definitely seems to be this, we were talking earlier about how. A lot of diagnoses [00:42:00] seem to, not be taken seriously for adult women.

it sounds like also maybe that this growing pains idea has drifted out far enough into children too, and teenagers that we are subconsciously wired. Just to think that the complaints of teenagers for this stuff are not, to be like hyper critically sussed out, you know? 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, No, that's okay.

That's okay. I, it's ironic because this. Email or me this, question came from somebody different from this pers other person that I saw in coaching last week, but their stories are like identical as far as I, you know, I know very little about this person who sent in the question. I know a lot about the person I saw in coaching last week, but they're both 15.

They both are getting this, you know, neglect. No, you're fine. There's nothing wrong with you. Which, that's, this is a story that we hear over and over again, and I feel like, you know, most pediatricians or family doctors, they probably know how to do a few basic things. And then if those things [00:43:00] come back negative, then they say, you know, you're fine.

Instead of saying. The tests that I've done so far haven't shown anything, so I don't have a good explanation of what's going on with you. but, you know, having some other suggestions, it's, unfortunate that kind of, the default is to be like, oh, so you must be crazy. It's very, it's more than unfortunate.

Unfortunate is like the understatement of the decade. Yeah. 

Aron Korney: Yeah. It feels like the dismissal of, youthful issues, either being phases or, just temporarily passing is a recurring theme. I think it ties us. Here's your segue. I think it ties us actually into the next question too. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah. 

Aron Korney: You want me to read that?

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yes, please. 

Aron Korney: All right. This one is from Margaret who says. Our teenage granddaughter, who I believe has MCAS or MA as well as Hypermobility, has just been told she may have teenage Disautonomia. The brochure from BC Children's Hospital reads exactly like the symptoms of MCAS. The [00:44:00] brochure suggests things like exercise, nutrition.

No addressing of food sensitivities and other lifestyle changes. It suggests it should pass in five to six years. Could you please do a blog post on it? Thanks. We are awaiting her genetic testing as I, as her grandmother test to have two variants relating to classical EDS. Thank you for your wisdom. Five to six years, is that right?

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah. So with, three exclamation points at the end of that and, totally get this like. It's, ridiculous. Oh, so we should just wait five to six years. Like this is a critical time of this person's life. And that's why I love, love, love getting to see teenagers, and I love it when parents bring in their teenage kids because they have an entire lifetime ahead of them.

And if we can get them feeling better and getting them more active and more engaged back with their friends, like it changes their entire trajectory. You know, instead of being disabled when they're 20, hopefully they're going to be, you know, in school or. Working or doing something that they enjoy. So I love to get to see [00:45:00] kids at this stage of, life and at this stage of their conditions because it can make all the difference in the world.

So I know this person asked specifically about writing a blog post. I did wanna share three blog posts with this person that I think they would be interested in, and we will link all of those in the show notes. MCA or mast cell activation and dysautonomia are like in the title of all three, but I don't know if the URLs completely match up.

So we're just gonna put the links in the show notes so you can check those out. But I will also plan on another blog post because this is a very important question and it leads perfectly into our hypermobility hack for the day. 

Aron Korney: Right. Before we go into that, I just had a question for you, which is, just correct me if I'm wrong, but again, if this was left for five to six years.

Since this is related to mast cells and brain inflammation, leaving it for five to six years is going to only leave this critical developmental period for a child, where their brain is growing [00:46:00] and changing and so much happening, and it's gonna be occurring during occurring severe, five to six, six years of inflammation, I would imagine from a developmental standpoint, let alone physiological mental health, all those things.

That's gonna impact development for a child, right? Like you're making decisions to hold it as the practitioner that risk that. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's just crazy. It's, I talked to Dr. Baker Knight about this the other day on an episode of the podcast. If we don't identify things fairly early on, unfortunately, you know, they tend to just get worse and worse Right? So it's not like, I mean, I guess there's some things maybe they're gonna get better, but if you think about EDS and HSD and the comorbidities, like dys, adenoma and mast cell activation syndrome, if people aren't supported in some way, if they're not able to start doing some of the, you know, movement that they need to do to start feeling better working on their sleep.

Maybe they're taking some supplements or changing the foods that they're eating and all of these things in the men's PMMS, [00:47:00] method that I really like to use. But if they're not able to do those things, if they're not identifying what's wrong, and instead they're told, ah, just come back in five or six years, or whatever, it was that this person was told, yeah, it's only gonna get worse.

And not only that, it's gonna become this. Huge tangled mess that you're not gonna be able to sort out what's causing what? what we started out talking out about at the beginning that what starts the problem and what perpetuates the problem are two different things. So I had a patient once that was told to just like stay in bed all the time and she had actually hurt herself in a dance class where they were trying to work, like work on the splits the whole time, hurt her hip and she literally spent 18 months in bed.

And within 30 days after I started working with her, and I wish I could tell you that all of my patients did this. Well, they don't, but she came back 30 days later and said she was 90% better. She had been told to stay in bed for, and there were imaging was all normal like, but she wasn't given anything to [00:48:00] do.

She wasn't given anything else and she thought, okay, things hurt, therefore I shouldn't. Be active. And so she just got more and more deconditioned and she had been a dancer. So you know, that's an example of somebody who, she was young and just one visit, one conversation and explaining like how all of this is interconnected, explaining how pain processing works, you know, made a huge difference for her.

So I wish everyone had to turn around that quickly. I really wish that was the case. It's not, but at least sometimes it happens. It happened once. 

Aron Korney: It's a reason not to, you know, not to let it, we, don't need to get into it for what me, what I've been through and stuff too. And others I know, and others, you and I know, but it's why not to, you know, you can feel as bad as you want to feel, and that's valid, but only you can be the proactive one to not give up on yourself.

Because if it's not one thing and it's not the hundredth thing, it might be the hundred first thing. It's great to [00:49:00] hear that you had somebody who early on had it, but you and I both know people also who gave up and stayed miserable to their dying day and people who didn't give up and it took 10 years.

You know, it's, you, have to be, you have to be your best champion and then surround yourself with the best team you can. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, absolutely. And, my favorite line is never give up. It's, hard, obviously people suffer with a lot of things, but yeah, never give up. should we move on to our hypermobility hack?

Aron Korney: Sounds great. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Okay. So the hack for today is gonna be about treating the mast cell, so. People have probably heard me say this, but when I first started my practice, I thought, okay, all these people have EDS and then there's this small subset of them that have mast cell activation syndrome, and those are the ones I'm gonna treat with like mast cell stabilizing drugs.

No, that's not the way it's worked out. I've really found that working on stabilizing mast cells in the much broader population of people that have EDS and HSD, [00:50:00] can be really, beneficial because mast cells are present in nearly every tissue. So when we stabilize them, we can have widespread effects across multiple organ systems.

So if we can re reduce mast cell mediator release things like histamine, prostaglandins, and cytokines, we can reduce inflammation, we can improve symptoms that are present in the skin, the GI tract, the cardiovascular system, the nervous system, et cetera. And we talked earlier about neuroinflammation. So improved nast cell control can reduce neuroinflammation and that can improve brain fog.

Pain, fatigue, you know, pain, sensitivity, mood, et cetera. So I really think that the most important thing for by far the majority of my patients is stabilizing mast cells, that grandmother was getting at. Because stabilizing mast cells can also help with autonomic nervous system dysfunction, and it can improve the symptoms related to that, like the.

Heart racing, the lightheadedness, et cetera. So that's the hack for today. Not necessarily a unique hack, but it's a reminder to [00:51:00] everyone that mast cells interact with nerves, blood vessels, or connective tissue, like everything in our body. So treating the mast cells can lead to improvements that might be even greater than a lot of other single interventions.

Aron Korney: And if somebody's listening who is saying, you've given me a lot to think on today, it sounds like there's a lot of dominoes that fall. Mast cells might be the first domino to be looking at for it all. And you're saying you wanna focus on that? Where do I start? What's my first step to focus on just that first core root?

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Great question. So identifying triggers. So it's really important to figure out what things seem to be causing problems for you. And it's really hard when you're presymptomatic now that I'm not presymptomatic, like I can figure out, oh, I did this and then that happened. But when you have. Pain, you know, headache, abdominal pain, nausea, you know, fatigue, all these symptoms.

It can be really hard to correlate. [00:52:00] Oh, well I just went down the, you know, the aisle and target that. not to, you know, single out target. Of course, Walmart and all the other stores have this too, but like, if you go down the aisle that has all of the, you know, fragrances, so like the. Laundry detergents and things like that.

If you go down that aisle and you're like, I don't feel good, like, maybe you have multiple chemical sensitivity, maybe that's a trigger for you. Maybe smells are a trigger for you. So if you can start to act like a detective, like we talked about at the very beginning. If you can start to put on your detective lens and say, one of my jobs is to figure out what things might be making my mast cells unhappy, and this is not to make you more anxious.

Again, you're gonna set your anxiety over here and you're gonna put on your detective lens because you're gonna say, you know, for, a period of time, not indefinitely, but for a period of time, I'm probably gonna have to modify these things in my environment. So whether it means getting an air purifier.

A water purifier changing up the fabrics, changing up the laundry [00:53:00] detergent, changing up the things that you're, you know, breathing in the air. you know, you get something new delivered. You let it sit outside for a while to air out before you bring it inside. changing those kinds of things can make your mast cells happier.

So that's kind of the first step is identifying those triggers and what are triggers now are not going to be triggers forever. So just don't be anxious about it if you're like, wow, I think everything's a trigger. Just, you know, do what you can to try to, you know, whether it's mold in your environment or you know, other, you know, fabrics or things that you're in contact with.

you know, start trying to pay attention to those things 

Aron Korney: and find a right practitioner to start investigating with you, right? 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yes, exactly. 

Aron Korney: Yeah, I think that helps. I think that helps kind of frame where to begin. 'cause it can feel so overwhelming and I'm sure that's why a lot of people, we know that's why a lot of people.

Loyal and first timers alike. Appreciate what you're doing for us all to just really frame it. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: And yes, the, [00:54:00] that's the first step is identifying the triggers and then we've talked in a lot of the other episodes about, you know, some of the medications that can help. There's supplements that can help, you know, so the whole entire reason for doing this show.

The entire reason is because of people who are going around and saying, there's nothing you can do for EDS, and that makes me seriously wanna cry. Like it just is so upsetting because you have people like these 15 year olds and these teenagers, and if they hear that, and if their parents hear that and they think, well, there's nothing I can do anyway.

It's just tragic. It's absolutely tragic. And so that is the entire reason for doing this show. 

Aron Korney: I think you're help, you're helping. You're helping everyone understand. How in their struggles and in their journey. It's a weird combination of very careful, deliberate thinking and also very efficient.

Whack-a-mole and kind of playing the two together. 

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, beautifully stated. Be beautifully stated, Aron. Well, thank you [00:55:00] so much for, chatting with me today. I really, enjoyed this. It was really fun. 

Aron Korney: Thank you for having me back on.

Dr. Linda Bluestein: Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of the Bendy Bodies Podcast. If you'd like to go deeper, I share additional education, clinical insights, and resources in my newsletter, the Bendy Bulletin, which you can find on substack@hypermobilitymd.substack.com. You can also help us spread the word about connective tissue disorders by leaving a review, sharing this episode, or sending it to someone who needs it.

These small actions truly make a difference in raising awareness about conditions that are still widely misunderstood. And don't forget, full video episodes are available every week on YouTube at Bendy Bodies Podcast. As many of you know, I offer one-on-one coaching and mentorship for both individuals living with connective tissue disorders and.

And people caring for them. You can learn more about these options on the servicesPage@hypermobilitymd.com. You can find me, Dr. Linda Bluestein on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok X and LinkedIn, all at [00:56:00] hypermobility md. As part of our collaboration with the UVA Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome Center, we also wanna share some of their helpful resources for questions or appointment inquiries.

You can contact the UVA EDS Center at our uva. EDS center@uvahealth.org. Again, that's the letter R as in Robert uva, EDS center@uvahealth.org. You can find answers to common questions at uva health.com/support/ EDS slash faq. Our incredible production team is human content. You can find them on TikTok and Instagram at Human Content Pods.

As you know, we love bringing on guests with unique perspectives to share. However, these unscripted discussions do not reflect the views or. Opinions held by me or the Bendy bodies Team, although we may share healthcare perspectives on the podcast, no statements made on bendy bodies should be considered medical advice.

Please always consult a qualified healthcare provider regarding your own care. For more information about the Bendy Bodies program, disclaimer and ethics policy submission [00:57:00] verification, licensing terms, HIPAA release terms, or to get in touch with us, please visit bendy bodies podcast.com. Bendy Bodies podcast is a human content production.

Thank you for being a part of our community, and we'll catch you next time on the Bendy Bodies Podcast.

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