The Reality of Ozempic & HRT for Fitness Professionals

doctor, people, testosterone replacement therapy, testosterone, give, bloodwork, trt, pellets, product, person, informed, months, told, good, year, put, clients, steroids

Tyler 00:00
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to this week's episode of the gym owners podcast. I'm your host Tyler stone over there's John Fairbanks How are you doing John?

John Fairbanks 00:06
Hello Tyler.

Tyler 00:07
Guys This week we're gonna talk some shit about some popular treatments that are going on, hormone treatments, weight loss, drugs, all this stuff. What this means in the changing landscape of fitness, really health medicine, I think there's a lot of trends that are shaping up to be quite interesting. And I think that the landscape is changing, it's changing quickly. And here's, I think we're going to deliver some good information to help you understand what's really going on here. Before we get started. Join the gym owners revolution Facebook Group link is in the description. Make sure you follow the show at the gym owners podcast on Instagram. You follow me at Tyler F unsewn. That's Tyler, Eff, ironstone and John, and

John Fairbanks 00:43
you can follow me on Instagram at Jay banks f L.

Tyler 00:47
Guys. Medicine has become crazy as far as weight loss drugs, hormone therapy, boner pills, right? All of these things once they're reduced down to a thing once they become mainstream enough to where enough people know about them enough people have taken them. Like you used to have to go to a doctor and look a man in the eye is probably like the guy who gave birth to your kids or whatever. You know what I mean to the person who likes to give your kids their checkups every year. It gives your kids the flu shot. The person you got to tell no to the COVID vaccine because you're not a fucking moron. Like, but that guy, you got to be in there and you got to be like, Yo, bro, my dick doesn't work. What are we gonna do? And like, I think that it is kind of interesting that once they say Viagra, cilicia, once those patents or whatever, like once they basically were no longer able to be proprietary, and anybody could take the active ingredients out of those that make their own medications. That now obviously, there's still a prescription that has to be a prescription. Now, all of the people I know who are on any of that medication, they're going through like telemedicine, it's just online marketing does really well, they run bunches of ads, got ads on social media, got really tight funnels, and email lists and everything. And all of a sudden, everyone I know is getting these pills from bluetooth or hymns or whatever else is out there for this stuff. And personally, I think once the product is in a position to where you know it works and the dosage and stuff is pretty standardized. I'm okay with us. I don't know about you, John, like I have no problem I would much rather call in pay it not have to pay for the visit either to like not have to go in and sit in a lobby to call in and get some like, you know, wild weekend juicy pills or whatever that that seems like something that would make sense to me. Well,

John Fairbanks 02:44
I think it seems to be very consumer centric, which nothing else appears like it's the old school stuff like you have these like their sage, the sage person, this person that's smarter than your white coat, whatever it is. It's super complicated. Now, get an appointment, do all those things. I can't tell you how many times like even the most fundamental piece where like a kid gets one of our kids get sick. It's like strep throat. I know it's strep throat like I know, this is what I just need this to be like, I just need this to be prescribed or I need like, we're having terrible nausea. I just need Zofran so that they can get through the next couple of days or whatever it is. And there's such a racket where there's so many of us in the back of our minds, we're like, they're just after the copay. They just want us to come in so they can pay. You know,

Tyler 03:31
One of the benefits at least from where we're at here is that small town stuff is even growing for me. It's like you could if we if you knew the people I could call in and I could talk to the PA like hey, like I'm sick just have a cough and she would just call it a prescription for it without having to get a visit and very often but that requires you to like have grown up with their kids. I mean, like they they got to know and also like is drug seeking behavior really like fucking like get a Z Pak please. That's just not that. That's we're not that word. So I think outside of like, obviously like narcotic stuff, trauma. I'm all about this stuff moving away from doctors and more into people that actually specialize in this type of treatment. Because this is the thing I see a ton with a huge problem is with hormone therapy with like TRT finally now there's all these there's these online clinics that are opening up where you're gonna go through, they'll send you the stuff you send in bloodwork, give me your symptoms, they'll prescribe you TRT, and they're giving you actual products that you would use that make fucking sense for taking testosterone and they actually are telling you what's going on the biggest racket in my opinion in regards to testosterone replacement therapy is the fucking pellets. Every place that I go to or everybody every like person around here that I hear about who gets on testosterone replacement therapy, they get the fucking pellet injections. Why? Well, because it's about 20 to 30 times more expensive than just actually taking just to sauce Ron, why do we need Have novel cute, really complicated compared to just simple weekly injections that you do yourself and way more expensive products? Why do we need to go to the doctor? Obviously you should be getting bloodwork and shit done. Obviously you should be getting checked as you go. But how fucking risky is it when you're having a three to four month run once these things are put in, like, the levels are not consistent, they're not consistent over that amount of time. If you need changes to make, if you have changes to make to your dosage, you're not going to notice it then for another three to four months. When they put it in the next time and they make changes like it's it's not only is it not as good of a product, it's fucking stupid. It's way more reckless, it's purely a money grab. That's right, that's all I can think of in this is like this is a money grab. This is not what's best for the client, this is more complicated, or for the patient, I'm sorry. This is not what's best for the patient. This is way more complicated than it needs to be. And you could simply have somebody send them home with a fucking vial, and a package of fucking syringes and go here. Pop this one in your cheek, show them how to do it. You can do this once a week. Here's how it's done. John, testosterone replacement therapy should not cost you if you're gonna get prescribed more than like 30 to 50 bucks a month tops.

John Fairbanks 06:18
It's $10 and it's like $10 for four. Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah, it's just not that expensive. It's borderline

Tyler 06:26
criminal, in my opinion, like telling somebody who needs to sauce hormone therapy, that they should get this fucking wacky pellet injection stuff instead. It's fucking dumb. And I honestly believe the reason is that what they're selling is not a better testosterone product, not a better or more like, consistent product at all. Not better for your health and the other what it is, it allows you to go oh, I don't want to get I don't want to mess with needles every week myself. It's like, okay, I get that. But I've always told people people want to take oral steroids and shit over the long term to people like I want to say I'm just ready to take Dianabol I don't want to be poking myself with any needles, I'm scared. And he was like, well, when it comes to testosterone replacement therapy, if you're not man enough to put a needle in your butt cheek once or twice a week, then you're literally not mad enough to be making the real decisions about your health and the risks with this because like that is the lowest risk safest, most easy to adjust with regards to your dosing to your bloodwork, everything, there, that is the best way to administer testosterone replacement therapy, and I'll fucking die on that hill. Okay, but I've overheard guys trying to have this conversation like, well, I just rather take just give me something else. I don't just take anniver or something. Instead, I was like, you're just going to shred your fucking liver. Like, you're just going to make the decision because you're scared of poking yourself that you're going to absolutely destroy your liver and your long term health for this thing, as soon as somebody gives me their aversion to testosterone replacement therapy via injection and wants to go some other route. I know they're making the decision based on all the wrong things. And I know that they're not, they should not be taking testosterone, because they don't even understand what happens when you start taking it. Speaking of the pellet therapy, if you underdose somebody, and they're just not quite getting enough to have to like really feel it'd be impactful, or you're just kind of barely getting them across into a healthy range. And they don't feel much better. A lot of guys will take this therapy for three months, maybe double dip for maybe go for six months, right? That's three to six months of shutting your shit down, completely shutting down, like your balls will start to atrophy, they will stop producing. And I've never heard a single one of these people who get goes through a post psychotherapy after that, to try to actually kickstart themselves back up, what they do is they take this product, it kind of doesn't really work how they want it to, and then they stop taking it. And then a little bit later a year or two later, they go, oh shit, you know, like, I don't feel great. I say well, how's your tea looking? I had a test that it was low, but I did those pellets. And it didn't seem to work that much. So I stopped. It's like, well, now you're worse than you were when you started. That's the biggest thing with this stuff is like if you take it and you're an old guy, like myself, like you, once you get on TRT, someone should have this conversation with you that if you stop you will be worse off than you are right now before we start, therefore, this is kind of a lifetime treatment. This is your one aspirin a day for your heart or whatever this is, but it's not explained. There's no post cycle being ran and it's fucking it's, it's a shame because I do believe testosterone therapy is a good product. I think it's great. I think it really changes a man's life, mental health, all of this stuff, especially later in life, like not needing to go gently into that good night. But the way these in person doctors here are just trying to capitalize on this treatment. They want to sell the service and they want to sell you don't poke yourself. We'll give you this crazy product that you couldn't even imagine putting in yourself. So this way we have to do it and we're the experts and that's why It's expensive. And people turn to that. And it fucking does not do what they said it was going to do. And it's just way, way, way more complicated than it needs to be.

John Fairbanks 10:09
And, and I would even take it another step further where it is, the doctor themselves don't actually know.

Tyler 10:17
They don't know that's the reality of rep who's like, perfect, here's this product, here's how you administer, here's the dose, and then maybe they'll pull bloodwork, but I bet not that consistently. Nobody I know everyone who does this, I start asking about their blood work and what they got, or did they have any understanding of what was going on. And like, nobody was really getting long term blood work after the fact, most people I know who've done the pellets did it for like I said, three to six months and then stopped. So just crash your body's ability to normally produce tea at an age with which you will not kick start that motors not starting up again on its own, give them nothing to mitigate that damage. And then they just go, oh, this doesn't work. So now I'm just, it's going to be worse. Now I'm getting fatter. Now my hormone profiles even fucking worse. So

John Fairbanks 11:01
Here, I'm going to tell my real life story. Yeah. And how you, you helped me, right. So the medication that I take, because I am blessed with horrible blood pressure, is like the best shape of my life that I've been in, like, I'm in the best shape now than I have ever been ever in history. Even when I play college football, I'm in way better health, way stronger way everything. But because of my blood pressure, it's always been high. So they put me and I crazy, just family background of blood pressure, dying of heart attacks, all these things are waiting. So the doctor that I have been, has treated multiple members of my family, and he's like, we have to put you now you're young, let's put you on a more aggressive pill, because you will never come off this. This is not hey, if you lose some weight, you won't have to take your blood pressure medication anymore. He's like, this is you forever, because everything else about your jeans are good. But for whatever reason, your veins are fucking too tight, whatever it's going to be your blood pressure is too high. So I take this medic medicine, which has totally fucked my testosterone and all these other things, right? So I go to my primary care doctors, my cardiologist is doing those things. So I go to my primary care and say, hey, I want to be able to fix my testosterone because I am tanked by this. And it was okay. And there's lots of conversations about abuse of testosterone. Like it's so that's, that's what we start with, right? So we started that. And I'm like, Listen, I'm not looking to get testosterone so that I can do steroids. I'm looking to do it so I can get into a healthy baseline to get everything fucking functional again. Okay, so here is the doctor's plan, the doctors plan was, we're going to start you will, you'll go. Once a week, you'll inject and at least we went right to injections, so we didn't go anywhere else. That's where we went. So we're gonna do injections, you're gonna go once a week for four weeks. Then in month two, you're gonna go once every two weeks. And then in month three, we'll just go once a month. And that was the plan.

Tyler 13:02
I wouldn't say that

John Fairbanks 13:04
plan. I said, Hey, Tyler, Dr. Stone, hey,

Tyler 13:08
This is the plan. This feels off. This feels off based on what I researched on steroids. R Us when I looked up, like what's the T TR t that I'm going to be taking. And then all of these old heads that are on the bodybuilding, fucking forums are explaining and it doesn't track. And so then I asked you and you're like, you will be yourself up so bad if you do what this doctor has told you to do. And the issue is, John is I get what a doctor who doesn't know anything about this does which means that doctors coming in and writing prescriptions for kids that got colds and maybe send any off if you need an X ray, and check in your blood pressure and having their nurses weigh you and they come in and talk to you for 10 seconds once a year. That's fucking that's that doctor's job at that point, and I get it 100 an endocrinologist I don't really know they just don't want to fuck with it. But the problem is, they are treating that like it is a short term treatment and the biggest thing is testosterone replacement therapy is not a one in and one out situation. It is an ongoing therapy much like if you're going to start taking listen to me or start taking like antidepressants or SSRIs show like this like guess what the solution is if you get on these you stay on these forever because walking it back is a big fucking problem. And so the fact once you get involved in TRT like my stance on it is it's a lifetime commitment if you're in it seems like that's the reality so be written so which means don't this is out like I'll I tell a lot of guys to look into it. But I am saying this to you and to everyone listening like this is a lifetime commitment. So the gravity of that is why I think you should fucking inform yourself and do it right. You don't mess yourself up worse. And I think that that is what they would have done to you, John, here's how this would have gone. You have already told me this to him. I'm telling the people here if you would have felt a little bit better after about two weeks you're like Oh cool. Nice, I do have more testosterone, which says I feel better and start to sleep a little better. It takes a few weeks for these results to kind of like for you to start to feel them anyways when you just start TRT and then they would walk down the dose, and walk that down again. But during that entire time, none of this is to kickstart your body's ability to do it. We're not filling a short term gap, we have a lifetime lowering of testosterone, which happens as we age we get beyond a certain age, and we're already below a certain point, guess what your body does. It says, I need you to stop looking so jacked. You've been around long enough you better have your money and your family stuff and more in order. If you're trying to look Jack, you're trying to hook up with chicks. Like we need you to fucking like you cannot be horny, jacked accomplished, known in your you know, you don't I mean, you can't have all of those things from an evolutionary perspective. We're supposed to cash in on all your youth early on, and make families and breed and procreate. That is just I think the way that our bodies are designed to work. And beyond a certain age, it goes, Hey, let's shut this motherfucker down. He's done. He's overstayed his welcome. Let's make sure he gets ugly. Let's fucking get him fat, stupid, useless. Let's make sure his dick doesn't work. Let's keep him out of the gene pool. Now, he had his shot time for the young pups to take over. Now, because of modern medicine, I don't believe that you have to go gently into that good night, especially because I believe the long term effects above a certain age of having low testosterone weight dramatically outweigh the negative effects of taking TRT. So what they would have done is you would have treated this like a short term solution. But during that window in which you're taking exogenous testosterone, your body just is going to check on its own levels. And it goes, No, we're good. We're flush, This cup is full, I don't need to produce any. And once it gets in that well above a certain age starts to produce less, less or none. It doesn't come back on there's no signal for it to come back on there is none. So by weaning you off of it, all they're going to do is make it worse for you. And you will be worse off at the end than you were in the beginning. For what? So once I heard that, you got to find your doctor. And you did. And you went in and told them exactly what you thought you needed to do. Right? And they didn't even know that

John Fairbanks 17:16
Now, but at least that doctor at that point, I don't go to a standard normal primary care, at least I came in and said, Hey, actually, no, I'm not going to do not going to do that. This is what I'm going to do. But I'll continue to do the bloodwork, this is what I'm going to do. And she just said, Oh, okay. To be honest, I really don't know a lot about this. So what's kind of going to do this together? So at least she said that though, but here's what's crazy. If I don't and this is where I really appreciate, you call out the idea of like you need to be informed as the consumer and this is the important part as we're talking about the online doctors, and now putting the power back into the hands of the client of the patient of the consumer is that now that due diligence on some of these things, they must live with you. And for those of you that are listening that are coaches and owners and personal trainers, you do not get to say that steroids are bad TRT is steroids. And everyone that does it are a bunch of fucking loser meatheads, like you, you don't get to just live in that world because that's not what's real. Like you, you have to now be informed you have to like to give that help. And it may be overstepping, but what I'm telling you is that the people that are supposed to know, don't know. And we all know this to be true when it comes to nutrition, holy shit, have a primary care physician start talking to you one if they even talk to you about what you're eating, but they know fuck all when it comes to nutrition.

Tyler 18:41
My wife and I both coach medical professionals and for them, and of course many over the years and there are no people who like there's no group of people that are less informed or more informed than they are about nutrition, they all make all the same mistakes. They're all the same preconceived notions that same fucking bad habits try to explain anything they just don't know any more than you or I do really about how they should eat or really like I know plenty of doctors have got 50 pounds to lose guess what not making any changes that are getting in there you know what I mean? They're not making the dietary changes to do it. So there's also the gap in their case also just between the gap between knowing and doing as well as like even if they knew they don't have the ability to actually execute this good nutrition I view as a fucking medical treatment frankly, like here is the plan you're going to follow this these are the things that we are going to put in your body to make it better and improve. This is a system that has to be done for the long term. There's a lot of medical professionals that are completely ill equipped to guide someone through any of that process either and I think being informed as a consumer when you get into a medical situation situation I was in before because they had basically got like just like borderline extorted for like my CPAP machine at one point where I was like, you know I had to pay like a wedding for the thing I had the visit. I paid for the visit and paid for the overnight thing that all this stuff and health insurer As, but like, then I go and I get fitted for the machine and they set it all up for me and I have that thing. And then I send it home with me. And I pay like 500 bucks a month. Then I get the next bill. It's another five. They're like, Yeah, you got to make a few payments was okay. Sign this stuff. I don't. You're a doctor. You don't mean, oh, you need this. You need this. You are okay, I guess. And I go through it all. And then I see you. And I'm like, wait a minute. I called them up one time. So I keep getting these bills. And this doesn't make sense. Oh, no, you got to pay this every month. I said, But how come? The first two months were like 750 bucks. Well, that all goes straight to your deductible. They're straight out of pocket, your first two months of the year come straight out of pocket. Okay. And then your medicine will cover whatever your health insurance covers a portion of it. I know that sucks. How many of these payments do I have? Because I keep making these $500 payments. Now after these first two? Oh, we have to do 14 of them. Why? So what about what happens when I cross over the year? Oh, well, then those two are out of pocket fully out of pocket as well because that's how it works. Oh. So this whole thing about a paint you have to write you can't just as a kind of just buy this right now. Can I buy this thing? I literally called them to pay with my debit card. I had the money. Let's whatever this is I'm sick of getting bills and eating to pay him This is fucking stupid. Like, let's just get this done. No, we can't do that. And the reason is, it's because it's back and forth between the insurance racket. And it's that you know, I'm in that hospital's insurance, and go into that hospital and get equipment from that hospital's branded equipment play. So they're just kicking all this fake money back and forth, just ripping people off. So I tried to pay at that point after spending like two or $3,000. And then I realized, like, the whole thing was gonna be another $4,000. So I looked this machine up, and I'm gonna buy it on Amazon for like 1500 bucks. And I was like, oh, fuck you guys. It said, Well, here's what I'm gonna do. I said, I got a fucking like, 800 credit score. So because I called and went to pay this, what I'm going to do is I'm not going to pay this, right? You can send all the letters you want, but I'm not going to pay this until somebody forces me to you can go fuck yourself. See you later and I hung up so Fuck you, man. I came to do this right? Now I played hardball. So they ended up fucking after like two years later, I get a summons we gotta go to court for Okay, I'll go. So I told the judge the whole thing. And the judge goes, Listen, I know, it's terrible. I know, this whole thing seems like a racket. And it probably is he said the problem is, and this is the takeaway that you guys need to know, to inform your clients about. And that you need to take it personally, when it comes to any medical situation you're in, the judge goes, the reality is we think it is a doctor patient situation, we think it is a caretaker versus the receiver of the care situation. And it is not transactional, and it is contractual. And it is binding. And this is a consumer situation, this is a consumer business to a consumer, that's all this is. So in reality, you cannot just expect to go to the doctor and have them give you something that's not going to be a total ripoff. You can, because people can there's plenty of products on the shelves at the store that suck and are overpriced and are no good, then there's better out better alternatives there. And you think that the doctor would have whatever the medical equivalent of a fiduciary responsibility to inform you that maybe there's better options for your money, but they're not, they're not required to do that. They're just required to get you into something that will help. And if this checks the box as treatment for this thing, then that's absolutely what they do. So ever since I heard that, I was like, okay, that actually makes the most sense. And that's what I see about this shit with TRT pellets and that type of stuff. That's all this really is that doctors are not looking out for your best interest at all. Any doctor who's telling you like you should get pellets, see them? Why would I use pellets instead of just a vial of testosterone and a date? Or testosterone? cypionate like propionate? Why would I bother with anything other than just doing a weekly injection on my own at home. And all they'll say is, well, you're going to be scared of poking yourself in the butt cheek. That's very likely what that what the whole thing is because they can't there's no way they can tell you that it's better or more consistent, fast, acted faster acting or even like gives you options as far as like mitigating your dose up or down, or being consistent over the course of a week, a month or a year, you're constantly going into peaks and valleys with that product. And if they tell you otherwise, they're fucking lying to you. So I'm not over here trying to sell you anything. I'm not trying to sell you on buying vials, I got no skin in this game at all. But I'm telling you any doctor who tells you that they're kind of a fucking crook. And you need to be more informed. So do not let a doctor who's telling you to do pellets or telling your clients to do pellets. Don't let that be the end of the information that they give you. Don't let that be all the information that you get because it's a huge, huge mistake.

John Fairbanks 24:51
And the reality is what we know to be true is that as a client, if you're a patient of a doctor, when a doctor says a thing, it's like well, they're the doctor So I believe what they're saying. And it just is that, again, it is like being able to be responsible and knowing what your own care needs to be. And again, it is your job as a professional to know the things. But man, you have to be able to be humble enough to say, hey, I don't know. But I'll go figure this out. Like, I'll figure it out for you. And then I can give you a more informed decision from my perspective, because I've had people do that with me. They'll say, Hey, have you heard about this supplement before? I said, No, because there's a bajillion? I haven't I know, I've never heard of that, or

Tyler 25:33
any of them. But tell me tell me

John Fairbanks 25:35
what it is like, tell me what it is. Like, just fundamentally, he's like, Well, logically, like gaining muscle while you're cutting weight. And they have all these studies that show that you can put on a lot more muscle even while you're cutting. And it just the thing that you can like, well, I said, I don't know anything about this, I said, I'll be happy to look into it more, I said, but as a base principle, anything that claims to allow you to gain muscle, while radically cutting weight, and cutting fat is a lie. Like,

Tyler 26:04
realistically, like, even if there is some sort of statistical chance that came out in a study, it's a level of margin that is just not even worth considering. It's fucking insane.

John Fairbanks 26:15
But you have to be able to say, hey, yes, I don't know. But I can give you my educated opinion on X thing. But you have to not allow your position of power in that scenario, to then Trump all because that's where a lot of people are like, Oh, well, this is the diet you need to eat. Like, well, you actually know anything about it. Because people really, especially the elderly, because like, like I have elderly parents and elderly, in laws, and it's if a doctor says anything that is gospel. We don't question any Oh, well, no, the doctor says,

Tyler 26:49
I have a grandfather who is in his 90s. So he's up there. And now he's developed a little bit diabeetus. Right. So he's been trying to lose weight for the last year, a little bit of the betas. And he's gotten to the point now where like, there's, he has to take some water pills to keep water retention down. He's like, really watches this sodium intake, which I'm still like, talking about, but I guess he's mostly sedentary. So fine, I guess between whatever the reasons are, that they think that's why you're bloating, I'm fine with it. But my wife brought some sourdough bread for him. And he says, Well, how much salt does she put in this because I have to like, test to see if I'm getting bloated or whatever like that with this. And so they're worried about my salt intake, Salt, salt, salt, salt, salt. If this is too much salt, my water retention is high. And then I said, Listen, Grandpa, I think that's great. But I'm pretty sure you have diabetes, and it's probably the carbs that are gonna bloat you up a lot more than any salt that's in this bread. Like, what are we talking about here, like, you're gonna, you're gonna eat a whole bunch of fucking bread. And your concern is the salt in that bread in regards to water retention. Like none of this information made its way out of the doctor's office into his head. And I think that it's really important to advocate for yourself, and to be I'm not saying be argumentative, but you should know what you want, and put the doctor in a position to defend why they want things done in a particular way. Here's how I handle low testosterone clients. I prefer coaching like most of my clients are aging men who got weight to lose dads, fathers, professionals, people who've been around long enough to have some fucking money, right and to have a need to lose some weight and also have like a reason to do it because they have a family. That's, that's important. That's probably like two thirds of my client base, three quarters of it in person and remote. And I address it pretty clearly. It's like, you know, if you're having libido issues, you're having erection problems, or you simply like, feel like you're struggling and lethargic and slow. Yes, good nutrition will help and I'm always sure that you can eat well in a way that will boost your testosterone, yada, yada, yada. You're in your late 50s. And since you've had low testosterone for a long time, I'll get to start eating well, and we'll do what we can, but let's not pretend that things are not what they are. So I'd never tell a person they should take testosterone therapy. What I tell everybody who was explaining to me symptoms that sound like low T is that you should go get your T checked. Just go get a check. If you're above 40 Go get your testosterone checked. Don't be fucking stupid here, go get a check. And if it's low, my answer is you should probably fix it. That's where I start. And then from there, I'm gonna give them medical advice. I'm not telling people how much to take, I think I think all supplements should be taken in response to a need first, therefore you have the need, you've proven that you have low testosterone, you have bloodwork that says it then you're going to take that you need to monitor it with bloodwork. Now once we get to that point, if someone says my doctor wants to stick fucking pellets in me, I said we'll find a different fucking doctor or tell them that you want to do it, like literally the cleanest, healthiest and most affordable way because these pellets are not fucking stupid. It's not that they're not testosterone, and it's not that they won't work, it's that they're just dumb and so much more expensive and so much more complicated than it needs to be. This is actually pretty simple, and they can still run the same blood work. So it's all fine. All they got to do is not give you something that's six to $900. And you can just have something that's 30 bucks, it'll do the exact same thing better and you're not having to go into the doctor all the fucking time. Like you could that's only defending their own pocketbook if they're explaining to you that product over the traditional way. And I'll be honest with you more guys, I know than taking fucking true steroids and testosterone and TR T for a whole lot longer than medical driven TR T has been around. So don't pretend like these bros who've been lifted, been taking steroids for a long time. Like they don't know anything. There's a lot of idiots out there, and they're, they're not the ones you should be turning to for advice. But there is a lot of goddamn information that's out there that your doctors don't even fucking consider it. If they're giving you pellets, they ain't even considering you what's easiest for you or what's best for you. Not at

John Fairbanks 31:01
all. And I think it comes back to that, that product concept where they're, it's just pushing that product. Because there's also you know, the money to

Tyler 31:10
be made John on like one visit some bloodwork every quarter, and they're getting money off of a $25 of you know, my vials are bigger than yours like a 25 $30 a month fucking vial. Like they're just that that's not producing a shit ton of money for them forever. But you can come back in and spend 700 bucks in 90 days. Yep.

John Fairbanks 31:29
And, and I think this is also a piece where it's either you can take it either way. However, you want to view the medical profession, where you view them as negligent and devious in nature, where they're just peddling whatever the product is, or they're completely oblivious. Either way, the end results are the same. But here's the biggest problem that I find. And this is one of the things where if you're not informed, and you are using, you're using your God given American right to have full control over your choice as a consumer, and now you're using these online doctors. Yep, the issue is, is that the online doctor knows what's up, they know the deal, they are just going to check the boxes that are necessary. And to help you get what you're here to get. The problem is obvious. And I'm going to use the example from a conversation I had just recently. But you're right , a dude's neighbor is on ozempic. Right? Taking the shot has had a ton of success. But in the shop for like three, four months, she's lost 50 pounds, right? But she's just talking to this doctor so she can keep getting more shots. What's

Tyler 32:42
current body weight, and although that's important with this lost 50 pounds, but now weighs

John Fairbanks 32:46
Now she weighs 135 pounds. So we're

Tyler 32:49
running out of weights to lose. That's because a 400 pound person is down to 350.

John Fairbanks 32:54
Now this is true. She was a 185 pound person who then lost 50 pounds. And it's now 135. a friend of mine talking with a neighbor says oh, you know, hey, you lose the way I know you're on the shot you doing this, that and the other and and how's that all going? She goes great. I just got off. I actually just had an appointment with my doctor and he reached me for another 12 months of shots. And it's like, he goes, What's your goal? Like you've already lost 50 pounds or 130? He's telling me he's like John, she doesn't have a lot more weight to go. And she's not going to take this shot every single week for another year. And this is the like, now we're getting into the point where it's like, there should be someone that's in this woman's life being like, Hey, this might be predatory. Yeah, now you're being sold. You're being oversold? Well, I I'd be willing to fucking guarantee. Well, we can sell you a month of shots, but it costs this. Yeah. But if you buy 12 months of shots, it lowers the price. Oh, well, I'll just do that. And now we're so transactional. And there's no one, no one's helping this lady. Whereas I don't know if this is good or not.

Tyler 34:13
But I think you're looking at things like Ed pills and shit like that, right? Like your hymns, your blue chew, whatever else is out there, like, at least now we know so much about them. And it's not a long term commitment. It's a thing that you just take sometimes. I don't have a problem with that being commoditized in that way, because we have enough of an understanding about this. I do think with weight loss pills, I'm all about our weight loss drugs like this, like I'm all about that if you don't want to talk to your doctor about it. You know what, listen, the person you're getting to prescribe from as a doctor to you's just gonna call them up and they're gonna do it for you. They know what you're there to do, you're not going to try to trick them. But the issue is, they don't have any incentive to give a shit about you. So you kind of start running into the situation where maybe there's not a better alternative that they should talk you into right? I'm all about, like I said about the TRT, right, someone comes in to tell it's love, I just love for the doctor to be like, but there's a much cheaper, safer, better way. You're scared of needles? Fine, I'll just put big ones in your fucking quarterly. But like, you know if, if that's the thing you want to do, that's the gap. But when it comes to things like ozempic, and these weight loss drugs, the hang up is like, how do we get off of this? And are you going to learn anything about this process? Or are we just forcing you to not be hungry? And so the dilemma is like all things, get into them with the end in mind, begin with the end in mind. And I don't know that that is being discussed. Any clients I have that are taking it like nobody's ever explained to them what happens when they stop?

John Fairbanks 35:42
What happens when they're actually taking it and what why they're losing the weight,

Tyler 35:47
or take the dose way, way, way, way, way down. So then it's kind of manageable, then it 's fine, if we're having an issue where you can take this at a very low dose forever. And that kind of covers your basics, your bases, and then fine, if that's the, but then they should know that. But this is wild when a person, you know, lost essentially 40% of their body weight now. And there's just nothing left. And you get to that point where like, well, now what, you're just gonna take this for another year gonna be 90 pounds, and then what, you've only done it based on the fact that you haven't actually had to win any of the discipline stuff, you haven't had to learn any of this stuff, hopefully, maybe with just enough time of choosing not to eat or being unsatisfied with food that maybe that imprints on you enough, after a year and a half, maybe. But if you never actually learned how to win a day, and you were just forced to, because you're essentially the food equivalent of being locked in a cage and slipped food through the door. You know what I mean? This is all you're gonna be able to handle. Like I just don't know that when these people get off that they have learned anything behaviorally, that's going to help them win once they're off the medical medication, which is fine. If you can be on the medication forever, and it doesn't fuck you up. That's the thing. I don't know. So, but I just think that this changed a lot. And that's again, you guys, take this conversation from it what you will. I do believe you should be talking to your clients about this. And don't be weird about it. Like don't force it on people. First off, I wouldn't be pushing, I wouldn't be pushing any of these things. I don't push TRT, but it's a conversation if you're coaching men that are in their 40s and 50s. It's absolutely a conversation that you should be having, like, how's this look? And you feel the tough get that looked at? I'm not the one to tell you what to do. I'm telling you to go see if there's a problem. I had a client who was suddenly really rundown and stuff like, like really winded, like in a way that didn't make any sense, right? I'm no medical professional. I'm just a big fat dumb guy who fucking trains people, right? I'm just, I just lift weights and don't have hair on my head, right. But I noticed something was wrong. I said, I think you should go to the doctor with this, because we thought he was sick for a couple of weeks, maybe we got a respiratory thing. Turns out, fuck could do that to have an entire new fucking heart or heart valve put in again, he had had an open heart surgery five, six years before the fall, it had failed. And that's how we noticed it. And then it got way, way, way, way, way worse for a bit. But as soon as I, again, I'm not here to give medical advice when I'm coaching somebody, but if there's something I'm like, You need to go get this looked at. I don't know what to tell you. I'm not gonna tell you what it is. I'm not that guy. But some things I think you should go deal with. Testosterone was one of those things. I don't want ozempic conversations to be off the table. When someone's talking to me, I would rather be able to tell them what I actually think about it. Whatever my current level of information is about it, like, here's what I think I don't think it's terrible. But I think you need to be prepared to actually fix your relationship with food throughout this process. You know, where you need to start this with the end in mind. I think a lot of people don't. I think doctors aren't having these real conversations with people. Unfortunately. Maybe they're just busy. John, maybe they're just busy getting on to the next person. I don't know. I also think maybe they're too busy to learn. Let's be real. John, if you were a doctor, he says so you got out of Medicine Medical School in the year 2004. You've been practicing medicine for 20 years. That's a respectable career but you have a long way to go. Do you know how prevalent just things like boner pills, testosterone therapy, like smoking cessation drugs that have came and went over the years, fucking these weight loss drugs, illnesses that come and go vaccinations that come and go. There's all of these products now that have been introduced. And these people aren't doing research. They're just out there working and clients are coming to their office every day. That's pretty much it, patients are in and patients are out. And so at some point, they're just like somebody in their networks on pharmacy medical records, you know, here's this, here's just this will tell you that it's good. And I think that's kind of the level of information most of these doctors are about these things. They get told this is a product that checks this box and they'll administer it because we can make X on it.

John Fairbanks 39:53
It's not habit forming. Tyler : Here's the pain. Here's the pain. You already No, this was so crazy. We know what doctors are gonna do. This is the craziest thing. And we all look back to when we were about four years ago, and two months ago, something crazy happened. Yeah, it was all the doctors all had the exact same opinion minus a couple that we don't talk about. And it's like, but we all agreed that the bad guys were the pharmaceutical guys. And they told those doctors that it was non habit forming. Now there's a new pain scale. And now there's whatever that became a brand new word, a brand new shit, and they had all these doctors out, and everybody got hooked, hook line and sinker got tricked, and we just told that party line. And that's what's crazy is that that's where their information came from. The

Tyler 40:48
opioid crisis, people are whispering in the ears of these people, and they're just taking their word for it on everything still. And I actually know some doctors now have a bit of cynicism now about that system, not finally, they don't just trust whatever they're fucking told from the top down. And thank fucking God. And maybe that's a personality trait that if you go to medical school and you go to call, you have to excel in school, at a young age, you have to be very thorough, you gotta work very hard, you gotta do it for a very long time. I feel like that's a recipe for conformists, which is fine. Those types of people were maybe not the type of people throwing middle fingers to somebody just because they told them what to do. And fucking tell me what to do. I'm 16 years old and I'm in college do not crash my bunker, I don't give a fuck. Those people like me, don't end up going on to spending 10 years in fucking medical 10 years in college to become a doctor. And I get that. But that is a trait that I think is carried with that long length of education and nose to the grindstone stuff is you are doing all of that so that you can kind of be indoctrinated into this system, a lot of information to learn, you don't get to doubt all of the information that's presented in front of you. That's complicated and takes a long time. People like me who doubt every single piece of information that's put in front of them since they were children. I don't trust I never trusted a thing a fucking adult told me my entire goddamn life. Never. Okay, well, I'm not equipped to become a fucking doctor for that reason alone. But I think people that are serial thrusters and do what they're told people just are not equipped. They are absolutely not equipped to question the information that they're told from sources that they have blindly decided to trust. It's a blind trust industry. Very often, I think if you're gonna spend that much fucking time in college, now a lot of them are hip to it now and I think they're being better about it. And I've spoken to doctors who have legitimate regrets about the way that they handled promoting things and talking about things and 2020 2021 2022 as well, let alone the goddamn opiate shit. So it's changing, but you have to advocate for yourself. Don't expect anyone to do it for you guys. We gotta get going. John's got a heart out. Thanks for listening to all the short gym owners podcasts follow John Fairbanks, FL follow me at Tyler F unsewn Tyler eff ironstone we'll see you next week.


























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