Natural Remedies & Modern Medicine: Dr. Anna Cabeca’s Menopause Formula

Dr. Anna Cabeca has dedicated over two decades to transforming women’s health, blending modern medicine with time-tested natural remedies to provide comprehensive solutions for menopausal challenges. Serving over 10,000 women in her private practice and reaching millions more through her bestselling books, online videos, and articles. Dr. Anna is a triple-board-certified expert in Gynecology, Integrative Medicine, and also Anti-aging and Regenerative Medicine. With special certifications in Functional Medicine, Sexual Health, and Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy, she offers a unique and effective approach to wellness. Her USA Today bestsellers, including “The Hormone Fix,” “Keto-Green 16,” and “MenuPause,” have garnered widespread acclaim for their practical and empowering guidance. Frequently featured in major media outlets such as Forbes, People, ABC, and most recently on the cover of Woman’s World Magazine, Dr. Anna is also the innovative mind behind products like Mighty Maca® Plus and Julva®. Beyond her professional accolades, she is a single mother of four daughters, finding joy in weekends spent hauling horses to shows. Dr. Anna’s ‘s mission is clear: to provide proven, pragmatic solutions that empower women to lead the vibrant, healthy lives they deserve. I would add something in here about her being named & know as ‘The Girlfriend Doctor’.

Your book “MenuPause” offers dietary solutions for women in midlife. Can you share some insights or favorite recipes from the book that have been particularly well-received?’

My inclusion of flavors from around the world is something that really resonates with people and is exciting to try, especially my Kofta and tabouli recipes made “Keto-Green®” and an international favorite like the Shakhuka. The combination of ingredients that I put together is what I call medicinal menus. Traditional physicians historically prepared the food for the king as in the Ottoman Empire (heal through food).

In MenuPause each of the six plans, pause something different that are common roadblocks to women’s health and midlife weight loss.

Bioidentical hormone replacement therapy is a significant part of your practice. What should women know about this treatment, and how can it improve their quality of life?

It used to be that women going through menopause either were left to “suffer” their symptoms or  were treated with traditional hormone therapy in a standard-fit-all pill form – in some cases it helped, but in many cases it solved one problem and created another. Because they were given arbitrarily without considering all the variables, simply because we are all unique, and while all women go through menopause, we all experience it in a very different way. Some have only a few symptoms, some have several, for some it lasts years, others barely feel anything, for some it happens in their early 40’s, others in their late 50’s. In order for HRT to really work it needs to be done “a la carte”. First you need to do a comprehensive hormone blood panel blood that will show where your imbalance truly lies, is it your estrogen, testosterone? What about your thyroid? And how does your cortisol level fit through all these changes? Based on that your physician can create a treatment plan made for you – that is where bioidentical hormone therapy is different – it’s tailor made, and is often given in form of ointment/cream, sometimes patches and occasionally pills – but it is a treatment form that is adapted to the individual, and when you use cream or ointment, you can control how much or how little you actually take. It is much more efficient in restoring your balance, and much less aggressive to your system. Now that alone is not enough, it needs to be in conjunction with a healthy diet, as the Keto-Green® 16 diet I describe in my book and of course an active lifestyle; but the combination of all makes a world of difference in how women experience menopause.

How has your experience as a single mother influenced your understanding and approach to women’s health and wellness?

I have been a single mom since my youngest daughter was 2.5 years old, and my children now range from age 16 to 36.

Over these years, especially as a women’s health specialist, I developed a keen eye to intricately see the hormonal changes and cyclic changes they were going through, acutely in tune with their transitions in puberty and their monthly menstrual cycles. It made me even more aware of my own transitions between monthly menstrual cycles through menopause.

Being a single mom has been the single, most challenging career I have held and the single most rewarding one, and I honor women for their fortitude and resilience. As a single parent, you just develop a much more acute sense of awareness of what your children go through, as their care on the day to day relies on your shoulders.

I had no idea how the challenges of sole responsibility of raising Children on your own would lead to a whole other perspective. It also made me realize the importance of creating a healthy community around you through friendships, family and a network of like-minded people, and how that can make a true difference in your health and wellness.

Here is the thing, life happens, and we all experience traumas at some point, yet life must go on, especially when you have children who depend on you.

The loss of my son when he was a toddler affected me deeper than anything else I have ever gone through, but I had daughters to raise, and I found my way. I learned to address my trauma, started speaking about it, and accepted it as part of my journey – and getting to that point is critical for your overall well being.

With over 20 years in practice, how have you seen the landscape of menopausal health care evolve, and what changes do you believe are still necessary?

For starters – now we talk about menopause, it has become a regular subject of conversation across all media platforms. There is almost like a “menopause movement” out there, and many celebrities are chiming in and using their status to spread the word and normalize this transition. I can assure you, we didn’t talk about menopause when my Mom went through it. Hot flashes? Fatigue? Brain fog? What are you talking about? There was shame associated with it, somehow a woman became old, non-desirable, asexual…Yet it hits at mid-life – so what are we supposed to do during that second part of our lives? Forget about everything that makes us women? Women in their 50’s, 60’s and 70’s and beyond still have sex – and why shouldn’t they? So in that sense, we have made a lot of progress, and I feel there is a much greater understanding as to how it impacts women, but also, when not supported, how it can impact the entire family dynamic – cause if she suffers in silence, eventually it will trickle down to the rest of the clan. We have a much deeper understanding of how hormones interact with our entire body function, and how nutrition and lifestyle can affect that. We have more comprehensive blood work analysis in place that helps identify with much more accuracy where the imbalance lies, and it has helped us develop treatment plans that are much more personable and adaptable. The stigma of shame is much less than it used to be. I think the biggest change we still need to see is more in the perception of aging…women are under an incredible amount of pressure to stay youthful and fit and attractive, much more than men; and that I am afraid we are a long way from normalizing – the idealization and obsession with youth is probably our biggest challenge – and such a waste of time too, because you can only go forward, there is no going back, and each season of life has its beauty and strength and qualities. Personally I love the woman I am in my mid 50’s, I am such a better version of myself, but it took a lot of self-work to get me to that point – and social media doesn’t help.

You have a background in integrative and functional medicine. How do you approach patient care differently than conventional practices?

For me it is very simple: everything is connected. Think of our hormones as the conduit of information throughout our bodies. And what we put in our bodies will have a direct impact with how we feel and our overall health. It’s like a never ending cycle of cells and hormones that travel through our bodies. Conventional medicine tends to address the symptom -very simply put:  she has a headache – oh then let’s give her a painkiller.. Then you feel better for a while, then the headache comes back and you treat it again – and on and on in those cycles that are left unsolved. Functional medicine on the other hand will consider the symptom and dig deeper to figure out WHY it is happening – so you can heal it at the source and prevent it from coming back. 

Your product, Julva®, has gained popularity for improving feminine health. What feedback have you received from users, and what impact has it had on their lives?

People love it – PERIOD! It is such a fantastic product, even if I say so myself, I am still amazed by it and all my clients who are using it are basically loyal to Julva for life. it is popular because it works – it’s as simple as that. It rejuvenates the vulva, it keeps the vaginal area moist, which certainly helps during intercourse, it improves your libido, improves bladder control and keeps the clitoris healthy…AND it smells good too. 

I created this formulation based on my many years of clinical practice working with compounded hormones, and in sexual health and sexual medicine. As a gynecologist, we know the vagina ages too. We don’t just get wrinkles around the eyes and the lips, it’s happening below, and that causes atrophy of the vaginal walls, atrophy of the urethra causing bladder leakage and incontinence symptoms as well as clitoral atrophy.

Hey, we want none of that. We can optimize our health for longevity and pelvic floor is a critical part of that.  

As someone with a strong presence in both traditional and digital media, how do you ensure your message reaches and resonates with a diverse audience?

I think the key for me is to speak from the heart. We are all women here, we have our own unique genetics and body composition, but deep down, we all go through the same phases in our own way. I think in a sense, that may be one of the reasons why functional medicine was appealing to me, because it is individualized and looks at all the diversities that make us human. Look at me! I am a daughter of an Middle Eastern immigrant – you’re preaching to the choir!

You’ve received numerous awards, including Mindshare Innovator of the Year and the Award for Clinical Excellence in Age Management. What do these recognitions mean to you and your work?

I am honored and humbled by all those recognitions, and I feel blessed that my work has had such an impact on so many women. There is no question that it is very rewarding, and it justifies all those late sleepless nights and countless effort I put into my work. But truly, I get the deepest satisfaction when I help a client one on one, when I get to know their struggle, and when after however many attempts and research, I find a way to help improve her life: be it a woman who struggles with infertility, or with intimacy during menopause…just name it…but when I get the “Thank you so much Dr. Anna, you truly changed my life” – there is nothing more gratifying to me than that .

What role do you believe lifestyle factors such as diet, exercise, and stress management play in managing menopausal symptoms?

As I mentioned earlier – diet and exercise and stress management are an essential part of your overall balance throughout ALL your life-cycles – but certainly come to a boiling point when you hit menopause. You have to look at menopause as a change in your body’s coping mechanisms. When you are in your 20’s you can be up all night and go to work the next day and barely miss a beat. Your body is functioning at a very different pace. When you hit menopause, your body is telling you – hey we need to adjust certain things here – I can’t keep up. And that’s OK!!  You are going through a dramatic change during menopause that in itself can be pretty brutal to the body and mind, so you have to do what you can to support those changes. Following a healthy Keto-Green Diet filled with leafy greens, high quality protein and healthy fats, minimizing sugar intake, exercising regularly and practicing gratitude is crucial- and it will do wonders to your stress levels. If cortisol levels are up, it throws off your sugar levels, which in turn impacts your appetite and cravings and in turn will impact your energy and mood…Again it is ALL connected.

You often talk about the importance of community and support among women. How can women build stronger support networks during their menopausal journey?

I can’t stress enough how important it is to have a community. The menopausal journey can be a really lonely experience – especially within the family setting where husband and kids keep doing what they are doing as usual, and you are the only one going through these changes – just imagine you’re having dinner with your family and out of nowhere your body is having a hot flash, you feel like you’re burning and need to remove as much clothing as you can just to be able to sit though the meal, only to feel cold within the next few minutes. And your people look at you like : “what on earth??” And that is just one example: the brain fog, forgetfulness, tiredness, mood swings… And though today it is much less seen as a “weird experience” it is still a lonely experience that your loved ones cannot share with you. So, when you find other women that are going through a similar situation, not only do you feel understood and supported but you may also learn a few tricks from them on how to improve your symptoms. And, if you feel supported and understood, you will put less pressure on yourself to try to compete with your younger version of yourself, which in turn will help reduce stress, which in turn will help with your symptoms…

We are not made to go through life alone, and contrary to what we may think, our family members are not always the ones who understand what we are going through – they are the ones who love us most and that we love most, but they may be at a loss when it comes to something so individual as menopause. Also, there is such a thing as women power – don’t ever underestimate that – it literally can move mountains, volcanos even!!!