Meet the Host, Lauren Bernick

Season 2 is starting off with the host of Age Like a Badass Mother, Lauren Bernick, telling you about her journey and why she started this podcast. She shares meeting her husband of more than 30 years at her first job when she was 15 and he was 20. He was going to marry someone else but she convinced him that he was marrying the wrong person as the invitations were going in the mail! She talks about her years as a stand-up comic, her diagnosis of two blocked arteries when she was 46 year old and how she reversed her heart disease and easily lost 20 pounds and has kept it off since 2015. She speaks candidly about why this podcast about aging well is personal and important to her.  Message her above if you have anything you'd like to share.

https://wellelephant.com/ - Download Lauren's free whole-food, plant-based cookbook, Cook Your Way to Health, and find out more about her online class ACE Plant-based Eating

Photo credit: Hannah Kaminsky
Music credit: Grayson Allbritton - composer, keyboard

ACE Plant-based Eating Course - Wellelephant.com use discount code ACE40 

Transcript

Lauren Bernick (00:02.222)
Hello friends, I'm Lauren Bernick. I am your host for Age Like a Badass Mother. And I just thought that I would tell you who's in your ear holes so you can know a little bit about me. This is season two, welcome. I'm actually flying solo this season. My dear friend Lisa Rice from season one is busy with her various projects, but.

You never know, maybe she'll join us here and guest host with me from time to time, I hope so. But anyway, I just wanna introduce myself, tell you a little bit about me so you can know how I ended up doing this podcast. I guess I'm just gonna start with when I was 15. I won't start at the day I was born, but at 15, my life kind of changed for the better.

went to go get a job at the Houston Post. I grew up in New York till I was 10, then I moved to Houston. So the Houston Post newspaper was in my neighborhood and they had a telemarketing room and the kids would, you know, the teenagers would go and get jobs there and call up people like, hello, do you want the Houston Post newspaper delivered to your house? And so I went in to get a job and here comes the boss, the most

beautiful man I've ever seen in my whole life to this day comes walking down the hallway with his big gorgeous blue eyes and his dimples and his beautiful hands that I noticed right away. And he shook my hand and I thought I had touched an electric fence. And right then and there I was like, I love this man. I'm gonna marry him. Before I even said one word to him, I felt like I had known him.

my entire life, I felt like I was just dizzy. And this man, Andrew Burnick, told me he could not hire me because I was only 15 and you had to be 16 to get a sales job. And so I was like, nah, I kept calling him every day or just going up there, I could walk up to this office from my house. So,

Lauren Bernick (02:20.888)
for like a week, I'd either call him up or I'd go up there and I'd be like, hey, are you gonna hire me? And he'd say, no kid, I can't hire you. And then I would just repeat. And finally, I went in there and I said this again and he looked at me and he goes, well, it is a sales job and you do seem to really want it. He was a little bit clueless. So he, I think I could say this, this might be illegal, but I'm sure.

doesn't matter anymore, but he, think he lied on my application of how old I was and said I was 16. And so I got this job and worked there for probably, I think until I went to college. And man, I just went to work on this guy. I was like, I loved him. you know, it was the eighties. So I realized none of this would fly at this point, me being 15, him being 20, I'm sure he would want you

know that nothing happened until I was 18. That was part of what I just loved about him. He was just so calm and polite and hot and all the things. Anyway, so I just went home and I told my mom I was gonna marry this guy after I met him and she didn't seem to be bothered one bit by the fact that he was 20. Like I said, different day. He had a girlfriend at the time and

You know, they were very serious. And then I guess, I think I was about 17, 18. We, you know, kissed here and there and little dates, but it was no big deal. We were mostly just friends. But I think I was like 17 or 18 years old and he told me that he was getting engaged to his girlfriend and I was just sick to my stomach. I just knew that this was my husband. He was marrying somebody else. Long story short,

The invitations were going in the mail and I just told him, you are marrying the wrong person. I love you, I love you with all of my heart. Nobody's ever gonna love you like I love you. And sure shit, he called off his wedding, cause he knew it too. And she was a lovely person and I'm sorry to her, but this was, he was clearly meant for me because now we've been married for more than 30 years. We have three grown children.

Lauren Bernick (04:46.478)
He is still the love of my life. I honestly, he's like the roots to my tree. I don't know where I would be without him. He's honestly just amazing. This man makes every decision with me and the kids in mind and I love him. I just love him. So that's my story of how I met Andy and now we're empty nesters. We live in Austin, Texas.

and our nest consists of Judy, our tortoise, and Daisy, our dog. And yes, we do have a tortoise and that's just ridiculous, I know. But don't get your 10 year old kid a tortoise because one day they will move out and forget to pack their tortoise and you will still have it. So that's how we came to get Judy. So he's a member of

And his name is Judy, he's a boy. When we named him, we didn't know he was a boy. And if you wanna know how to sex a turtle, the boys have the concave shells so they can get on top for turtle style. So, you know, now you've learned something about tortoise sex, so your day is complete. So I spent most of my life in sales.

I worked at a dating service when I was in college and then they bought a singles magazine and then I ran the singles magazine for them and did all kinds of ridiculous things. But I learned how to do sales from working at a dating service because it was a high dollar item and you had to close the sale right then and there. So I really honed my craft there. Went on to

the director of advertising for basically a pharmaceutical journal for like 25 years. But it was for small pharma, not the big bad pharma. It was for compounding pharmacists. And I learned a lot about hormones and all kinds of things that, know, a compounding pharmacist makes medication specifically for a patient.

Lauren Bernick (07:03.534)
So like if it's a hospice patient and they can't swallow a pill, they'll take the active ingredient and turn that into like a suppository. So they're really problem solvers and it was a fascinating career. And I left at the end of 2023. So I was the director of advertising. I sold all the ads in this journal for over 20, 25 years and it was a fantastic career. And I finally decided, you know,

I wanted to do this podcast and I wanted to do some other things. And it was completely terrifying to leave a great job to pursue this. But I started thinking, if I don't do this now, when will I do this? And so I was fortunate enough to be able to do it. So at the end of 2023, I left my stable career and started doing this. I'll get back to that in a second. But I also did...

When I was younger, I did a lot of improv, sketch comedy shows, I did stand -up comedy. When I was a kid, we used to vacation at the old borscht belt. Perhaps you've heard of it. That's where all the Jews used to vacation in the 60s, 70s, 80s. Kind of started dying out by the 80s, but my mom was single, a single mom, and she did not discriminate.

against me going anywhere. So if she went to a nightclub, I went to a nightclub. I had a very free and open childhood. And so I remember being a kid and going to this hotel in the Borscht Belt called Kutcher's. And I went to the nightclub and we'd always see these various Jewish comics, know, David Brenner and Buddy Hackett and Robert Klein. And I just looked around and all these people were dressed up.

and these comics were making the people laugh and people were drinking and smoking and having fun. And I looked at these comics and I'm like, is this a job? Because if this is a job, this is the kind of job I want. I don't wanna sit in an office. I wanna be doing something fun like this. So in the back of my mind, I always thought that I wanted to do standup comedy. And so I think I was about 35 years old by the time I got the...

Lauren Bernick (09:24.334)
balls up to do that, because that's a little terrifying. So, started at 35 and worked the local clubs in Austin and kind of worked my way up and won funniest mom in Austin one year and then went on to compete in Roseanne Barr's funniest mom in America on Nick at Night. I made it to the semi -final. So, there were thousands and thousands of people that started out

I got into like the top, I think there was like 50. Anyway, didn't make it onto the reality show and that was for the best. And probably because every time the camera came near me, I ran in the other direction. So not much of a reality star and I kind of had been done with it at that point. It was hard to like, know, I had little kids at the time and

You you'd go to the club, you'd be at the club until midnight or later, and then you'd come home and you'd have to get your kids up for school in the morning. It just really didn't suit my lifestyle anymore. And I felt like I had conquered it as much as I wanted to conquer it. so I always have had creative outlets, but that was really kind of a fun one and not something that a lot of people get to do. so that was one of the more interesting things.

Fast forward to 2015, I went, I have had high cholesterol my entire life. Probably, well, I know now it's familial, it runs in my family, but also my mom was like a prolific dieter. She always had us on the Atkins diet as kids and she was a typical.

good mom, but 70s mom, drinking her tab, cola and smoking her cigarettes so she could stay skinny. And she was always on the Atkins diet, which was the precursor to the keto diet. So it was just high fat, high protein, barely, maybe some vegetables, but no fruit, no beans. I mean, it was just like, we'd mostly eat, I'd wake up in the morning, she'd be frying a hamburger.

Lauren Bernick (11:43.886)
smoking her cigarette, frying her hamburger. That would be my breakfast. No bun, God forbid I had bread. For lunch, I'd have like bologna and cheese, nothing else, no bread. By the time I got home from school, I was starving. Long story short, started smoking when I was 15. That was okay with her, because again, it could help you keep your weight down. But she told me to just smoke in the house. Don't go out and smoke on the street like a common whore. Just keep it in the house.

By the time I was 18, my cholesterol was 300. And in 2015, my cholesterol was still like 300. And I had like 20 extra pounds on me. And the only doctor I ever saw was my OBGYN. And she said, I want you to get a calcium CT scan. And let's see if you have heart disease because you just can't get your cholesterol down. And I had tried, I tried to eat a healthier diet at this point in my life.

And so I went and got the calcium CT score and it came back that my arteries were 75 % worse than every other woman my age. And at that time in 2015, I was 46 years old. So I had two blocked arteries and the cardiologist told me, know, you have very serious heart disease and there's really nothing you can do. You're just gonna have

take a statin for the rest of your life and eat healthy, just eat like skinless boneless chicken, a little fish, some healthy nuts and seeds and avocado, healthy fats, olive oil, eat low fat dairy and fruits and vegetables. And I said to him, that just doesn't make any sense to me because that's exactly what I'm eating now. I had really tried to get my...

self under control at this point. wasn't a Atkins dieter at this point. I was really trying to eat healthy. And so this just didn't make any sense to me that the doctor was telling me to basically eat the diet that I've been eating for like, you know, 15, 20 years. And he's like, well, you have to take a statin. And from my work at the journal, the pharmaceutical journal, I knew that pharmacists really thought that statins are overprescribed.

Lauren Bernick (14:07.372)
They, you know, it helps some people and to tell you the truth, I might be a candidate for it, but I knew that it was not a quick fix and that it caused a lot of bad side effects and that really once you get on a statin, it starts causing you to have to get on other medications because it does stuff to your metabolism, it does stuff to your liver and then you end up

high blood pressure medication, then you end up on metformin for type two diabetes and on and on and on. So I knew enough to know from reading all these scientific articles all these years that that might not be the way to go and that I need to explore other options. So I found my way to the Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease book by Dr. Esselstyn and the Cook book by Jane and Anne Esselstyn.

actually interviewed them season one, I think it was the first show. They did this companion cookbook for preventing reverse heart disease. And the premise is it's a low -fat, whole food, plant -based diet without oil, and it's meant to reverse heart disease. And that's what I wanted. I wanted to reverse this disease. I didn't want to live with it. So I just dove right in. I just, didn't really know what to do. I didn't know what whole food,

plant -based eating was, but I just kept cooking out of that cookbook until I understood it. And really it's just a diet of legumes, so beans, peas, lentils, whole grains like brown rice and quinoa and other things like that, oatmeal, fruits and vegetables. And that doesn't sound like a lot, but out of those things, you could make anything. You could make tacos and pizza and sandwiches and

desserts and all kinds of things. The other key is it's oil -free. I know that sounds crazy, but if you have heart disease and the doctor tells you you're probably gonna have a heart attack in the next five, 10 years, you'll do anything. so I've been eating this way since 2015 and I absolutely love it. A few years ago, I decided, well, I should probably see if this has actually reversed my disease because again, I have

Lauren Bernick (16:31.438)
It went down for a little while. I think my body was in shock from this new diet and I got my cholesterol under 200, but it didn't stay there for long. And now it's back up like over 200. And Dr. Clapper from season one talked about this. Even though I have this familial high cholesterol and I can't really get my cholesterol down to a good level, it doesn't matter

I'm not eating things with cholesterol, not eating cheese and chicken and meat and all that. My body is making this cholesterol. But I thought to myself, I need to see if I've reversed this disease. So I went and I had some very extensive testing done, found a cardiologist in Austin to administer the tests. And it came back that I have reversed my heart disease.

and the cardiologist was shocked. He had told me before he administered this test, there's no way you're gonna have reverse this heart disease. I've never seen that happen, it doesn't happen. And I told him I'd been following this diet and he said, that sounds like ridiculous and you need to do like the paleo diet and just take a statin. Well, he was shocked when this Cleveland Heart Lab panel test came back and said, I have...

very low levels of inflammation in my body, like really undetectable levels. I have no presence of disease. I have high levels of nitric oxide in my body, which is very unusual for somebody in their 50s. Your nitric levels drop, nitric oxide levels drop at this age, but I have high levels, which means that my arteries are soft and supple and not hardened.

Like I'm sure you've heard of hardening of the arteries. That's what happens when you have cholesterol buildup. So even though I've make a ton of cholesterol, it's flowing through my body. It's not sticking to my arteries. I've changed the size and shape of my blood platelets. I've lost 20 pounds and kept it off effortlessly from eating this way since 2015. So, you

Lauren Bernick (18:52.174)
I hate to mention the weight loss because I could tell people all day long, I unclogged two arteries and they just want it. And then I say, I lost 20 pounds and they're like, what, you lost 20 pounds? But it's just one of these great side effects. My blood pressure is fabulous. It's like usually like a hundred over, you know, 60 or something like that. It's wonderful. So I'm not on any cholesterol medications.

I'm not on any medications, nothing for blood pressure, nothing for type two diabetes. And I would have been at this point in my life had I had just taken that statin, gone on my way, continued to eat the way I ate. So I just made it my mission in life. I wanted people to know like, hey, this is an option. You can do this with diet. And so I started WellElephant .com. That's my business.

I give away a ton for free, a lot of information. So I just want people to know that this is an option. So you can go to wellelephant .com. You can get a free cookbook. You can watch all kinds of how -to videos. I have recipes on there, all for eating a whole food plant -based diet without oil. So if you want to reverse any diseases, it's not just for heart disease. This works for

type two diabetes, for gastrointestinal problems, for autoimmune disease, whatever ails you, generally a whole food plant -based diet without oil can cure what ails you. So I named my company Well Elephant because elephants are strong, beautiful herbivores supported by their communities and you are too.

So that's why I started that. But like I said, I give everything away for free on there. If you really are sick or really struggling, I have a course on there too. It's very inexpensive. That really, really helps you to get a hold, to really figure out how to eat this way. So that's that for that part. And then I heard, you know, people aren't living longer, they're dying longer.

Lauren Bernick (21:17.24)
Well, that's shitty. I mean, who wants that? So then I decided I not only want to help people heal their bodies, but to age well in every aspect of life. you know, we started asking the question, why do some people age like depleted versions of their former selves and other people age like badass mothers? There has to be a reason. So, you know, we decided to start this podcast and it's my deepest desire.

to bring people into your life who are aging well in various ways, who can teach us little things and big things so we can incorporate that into our lives. And the main thing is that when you listen to this podcast, I don't want you to get overwhelmed. I don't want you to think, I have to make all these huge changes or it's not gonna work. I hate the feeling of overwhelm more than anything. It just impedes us from taking action.

And I work really hard in my life not to feel overwhelmed. And the way I do that is just by just telling myself, okay, don't think about it. Just take the next little step. Just take one little step. So, you know, if you hear something that resonates with you on the podcast, you can just incorporate that one tiny thing. Like if you, you're gonna hear a lot from.

plant -based doctors, not everybody's plant -based, that comes on the podcast. I want to hear from everybody who's aging well. But a lot of the people that I know are plant -based doctors just because of my work with WellElephant. And you know, so you'll hear a common theme like incorporate some beans or incorporate some nuts. The people who live the longest in the world,

people with the long, like the blue zones, you've heard of the blue zones. The longest living populations eat, you know, beans and nuts and sweet potatoes. So if you can just incorporate that into your life and cut back on the meat, that can be step one. That could just be one tiny thing that you incorporate. You don't have to do everything all at once. Just focus on the one little thing. And once you've got that down, you can maybe incorporate something else.

Lauren Bernick (23:36.046)
But most of all, I just want you to know that you can travel into older age in this way. You don't have to do it the way, you know, we've seen a lot of our parents do it, like, you know, on 10 medications and a walker, and they just spend their day going from the doctor to the pharmacist and watching TV and kind of waiting to die. They don't do any of the things that they used to do. And it's sad. And, you know,

I hate to say that my mother is my cautionary tale, but like I said, she smoked her whole life. She lived on tab and diet coke. I don't know that the woman ever drank a glass of water in her life. And she has eaten nothing but fat and meat and it's really affected her. And she is in her eighties. I do not know how she's still alive, but her quality of life is low.

lives in an assisted living place. She spends 22 hours a day in her recliner and then she gets wheeled down to a meal and eats in the dining room, comes back up and gets in the recliner and watches TV again. And that's not what I want for you. That's not what I want for me. I want you to know that you have a lot of control over how you age, that you don't have to age like

you can just, the most vibrant years of your life can be the later ones if you just keep making small changes. So that was the impetus for starting this podcast. I really appreciate you listening. I hope that you'll spread the word. I hope, like I said, that you'll email me at lauren at wellelephant .com if you have any questions.

I'm here to help you and I just want you to, you know, I keep saying age like a badass mother, like it's a joke, but it's really not. mean, I want you to age well and I want you to age vibrantly and live, you know, the best life that you could live and have a lot of good productive years at the end because I think that the later years can be the best years. So if you have things you want to hear about, email me and

Lauren Bernick (26:00.694)
I hope that we can have some kind of relationship and I appreciate every one of you that listens. I don't take any of it for granted. So thank you so much for listening friends and talk soon.