Host Caulen Foster sits down with Dr. Stephanie Chan — pharmacist, functional nutritionist, fertility expert, and Director of Education at Brello Health — to unpack how modern life quietly reshapes women's hormones and what it really takes to bring them back into balance. Drawing on both her clinical background and her own journey trying to conceive, Stephanie explains why decades of birth control have transformed a generation of women, how everyday products like candles, detergents, and makeup act as hormone disruptors, and why an undernourished, over-stressed body won't feel safe enough to conceive. Her message is refreshingly simple: skip the handfuls of supplements, master the foundations — nourishment, sleep, minerals, and a calmer nervous system — and let everything else fall into place.

About the Guest

Dr. Stephanie Chan is a pharmacist turned functional nutritionist and fertility expert, and the Director of Education at Brello Health. A mom of two, she's passionate about helping women conceive naturally through evidence-based nutrition and lifestyle strategies that support fertility, hormone balance, and reproductive health. After seeing firsthand — both as a practitioner and a patient — how the birth control pill became the default answer to nearly every hormonal concern, Stephanie now guides women back to the foundations of their health, pairing professional expertise with the lived experience of her own path to motherhood.

Topics Covered

• The two major hormonal shifts in a woman's life — puberty and perimenopause/menopause — and why the birth control pill is so often the only tool offered

• How long-term birth control use can override natural hormone patterns and its connection to trouble conceiving later

• Birth control's real benefits vs. its overuse as a catch-all treatment for acne and painful periods

• The mental and emotional effects of coming off birth control — beyond just the hormonal impact

• Everyday hormone disruptors hiding in plain sight: fragrances, candles, laundry detergent, makeup, and lotions

• Why minerals are the foundation of hormonal health and involved in every metabolic process

• Fertility as a whole-body signal: why an undernourished, over-stressed body doesn't feel 'safe' to conceive — no matter your egg quality

• Rethinking postpartum recovery: why it can take a year or more (not six weeks) to return to baseline

• What's really happening in the years leading up to menopause — insulin resistance, midsection weight, and hormones working against you

• The estrogen–progesterone connection to sleep, calm, agitation, and longer cycles

• Eating for hormonal balance: the role of the gut, why estrogen gets recycled, and the foods to watch (processed sugar, caffeine, alcohol)

• The simplest gut-health upgrade there is — slowing down, putting the phone away, and chewing your food

• How advanced therapies may give the body the boost it needs when age is working against it

• Stephanie's comeback story — from under-eating in her early conceiving years to learning what her body actually needed

Links

• Read the full article on Brello Health
• Watch the full episode on YouTube
• Dr. Stephanie Chan on Instagram: @dr.stephchanrx
• Connect with Stephanie in the Brello community
• Brello Health: brellohealth.com | @brellohealth

The information presented and discussed in this podcast does not constitute medical or healthcare advice and is intended solely for educational and informational purposes only. All listeners and/or viewers should consult with their doctors or other qualified healthcare providers regarding any medical or healthcare related matters.