127. How Women Actually Heal: Nervous System, Vitality, Hormones & Pleasure with Dr. Sara Gottfried Szal
Plenty with Kate Northrup
Kate Northrup
4.8 • 840 Ratings
🗓️ 23 September 2025
⏱️ 57 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What does it really mean to heal as women—in our bodies, minds, and spirits?
For too long, women have been told to push through exhaustion, overfunction at every turn, and manage "all the things" while our own vitality suffers. But what if true healing isn't about doing more? What if it's about reclaiming nervous system regulation, honoring our hormonal rhythms, embracing pleasure as medicine, and living from authentic wholeness?
In this transformative episode of Plenty, I spent an entire day in deep conversation with Dr. Sara Gottfried, a pioneering women's health physician, hormone expert, and bestselling author. Together, we explored the complex realities of women's health today—from navigating a medical system that often dismisses women's experiences to supporting ourselves through major transitions like perimenopause and menopause.
This conversation touches the core of everything we explore in this community: how nervous system balance, embodied pleasure, and true vitality become the foundation for not just surviving, but thriving as women.
What You'll Discover in This Episode
Women's Health & Medical Advocacy:
- Why women's health faces unique challenges in traditional medicine
- How to reclaim agency over your healing journey
- Strategies for advocating for yourself in medical settings
Hormones, Fertility & Life Transitions:
- Essential preparation during reproductive years for a vibrant menopause
- What every woman should know about hormones and vitality
- Supporting your body through perimenopause and beyond
Nervous System & Embodied Living:
- The crucial role of nervous system regulation in women's health
- How boundaries and pleasure practices support healing
- Why your "whole body yes" is your greatest navigation tool
Money, Safety & Women's Bodies:
- The profound connection between financial security and physical health
- How our relationship with money impacts our sense of safety
- Building true abundance from an embodied place
Dr. Sara's wisdom, combined with her generous spirit and clinical expertise, creates a conversation that feels both deeply personal and universally relevant. Whether you're in your twenties planning ahead, navigating perimenopause, or supporting other women in your life, this episode offers practical insights grounded in both science and intuitive wisdom.
This conversation left me feeling inspired, more grounded in my body, and even more committed to supporting women in living fully resourced, embodied, and abundant lives.
Ready to transform how you think about women's health and healing? Listen now.
“If I’m being dismissed, if I’m being gaslit, and I’m a physician, then there are millions of women that are still being dismissed and gaslit.” –Dr. Sara Gottfried Szal
🎤 Let’s Dive into the Good Stuff on Plenty 🎤
00:30 Dr. Sarah Gottfried's Background and Insights
01:10 Discussion on Hormones and Women's Vitality
03:40 Challenges Faced by Women in Healthcare
06:40 Research Gaps in Women's Health
08:15 Navigating Perimenopause and Menopause
09:42 Heart Rate Variability and Stress Management
12:19 Alcohol's Effects on Health
16:48 The Role of Relationships in Health
22:43 Tracking Hormones and Health
28:38 Supporting Egg Quality and Fertility
31:28 Reframing Symptoms as Initiations
49:20 The Relationship Between Money and Women's Health
Links and Resources:
The Autoimmune Cure, Women, Food, and Hormones
Treated with Dr. Sara
Stan Tatkin
“Age and Happiness: The U-Bend”, from the Economist
Diana Chapman
Connect with Dr. Sara Gottfried Szal:
Website
Instagram
Treated with Dr. Sara
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Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | We experience more trauma at an earlier age, more sexual trauma. We're 14 times more |
| 0:05.9 | likely to be raped than men. And then the third is a little more selfish. Just finding that in my |
| 0:11.9 | own experience, even as a physician, as I've struggled through different stages of life. |
| 0:17.6 | I am so excited for today's episode. It was really, really special because I got |
| 0:25.5 | to spend the entire day in the home of Dr. Sarah Gottfried-Sall, who's the author of the autoimmune |
| 0:34.4 | cure and also women, food, and hormones, and many others. |
| 0:40.0 | She is a groundbreaking women's health doctor who really understands the connection between |
| 0:47.6 | our traumas, our emotions, and our physical health. |
| 0:52.3 | The part right at the beginning of the show made me emotional because I asked her why |
| 0:58.5 | she cares so deeply about healing women's bodies. |
| 1:03.3 | And her answer really surprised me and was actually incredibly personal to me. |
| 1:10.1 | So you'll have to listen in to find out what that was. |
| 1:12.9 | We talked so much about hormones, vitality, fertility, both literally and metaphorically. |
| 1:21.5 | We talked about boundaries, overfunctioning, how to let go of that, |
| 1:27.4 | how to have better sex, more orgasms, how to live a |
| 1:32.8 | juicier life on so many levels. So this episode is a really special one. It was really meaningful |
| 1:42.3 | for me personally from a legacy perspective around women's |
| 1:48.0 | health. And I know you are going to love Dr. Sarah Gottfried Saul. Welcome to Plenty. I'm your host, |
| 1:58.3 | Kate Northrop, and together we are going on a journey to help you |
| 2:02.9 | have an incredible relationship with money, time, and energy, and to have abundance on every possible |
| 2:12.1 | level. Every week, we're going to dive in with experts and insights to help you unlock a life of Plenty. |
| 2:21.2 | Let's go fill our cups. |
... |
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