GLP-1s Are Tools, Not Magic

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I love GLP1 medications. I think they're one of the greatest tools we've seen this century for helping people achieve weight loss results. And America is really struggling with that. Obesity is one of the biggest problems for early mortality and many, many of the diseases that cause early mortality. So this is a wonderful medication, but I believe that it's being misused by a lot of people. And a lot of people have gained like very unrealistic expectations for how it should work. They think they're just going to inject themselves, lose the weight, and that's that. And there's so much more to it. And the more I've learned about the medication, and I've taken the medication myself and absolutely love it, but there needs to be other components, which is nutrition and mind work, so that you can have long-term results and not be taking this medication for the rest of your life.

Welcome And Guest Introduction

SPEAKER_01 0:56

Welcome to Hormone Heroes, where I share testimonials from real people who have experienced bio-identical hormone therapy. Men and women share the symptoms they have experienced and the difference proper hormone replacement has made. Please consult with your physician or practitioner for medical advice. Let's get started with today's guest. We have such an interesting guest today. Her name is Lena Viner. She was born in the Ukraine, and then by way of Indiana, she has made it all the way to Miami, Florida. She's been married for 21 years and has two daughters, ages 20 and 16. And if they look anything like their mother, they're going to be beautiful. And uh but Lena is an eight-figure founder, a neuroscience-based health entrepreneur, and creator of the Rewire Method, which is a framework designed to help people transform the subconscious beliefs and behavioral patterns influencing their health, habits, and overall fulfillment. And after spending 17 years building Garage Startup into an internationally recognized fashion company, Lena shifted her focus towards neuroscience, nervous system regulation, mindset, and sustainable behavior change. Today she leads Dream Life Academy and serves as co-founder of Telezin MD, where she combines physician-guided GLP therapy, nutrition education, and mindset support through her Lose It for Life program. So after that very long introduction, very impressive introduction, uh welcome, Lena. Thank you for being on the show today. Thank you so much. I'm really excited to be here.

Ukraine To Indiana To Miami

SPEAKER_01 2:57

So we have so much to talk about, and you're such a busy female uh entrepreneur, but just walk us through being born in the Ukraine, how you made it to the state.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

So I was born in the Ukraine in the 80s, and that was a communist country at that time. So let that sink in because it was very different. Um my parents decided that they wanted a better life, and some of their friends were moving to Indiana of all places. We were all places. Uh I'm from Kiev, which was the capital, and it's like the equivalent of New York City. So when we got to Indianapolis when I was 10 years old, and there were llama farms and cornfields everywhere, it was like a huge, huge transition. But actually, the Midwest gave me a really wonderful start in life. And I would say, like very American pie, very wholesome, very good place to grow up with good values and morals.

SPEAKER_01 3:54

Yes. And you're exactly right, good values. So I bet that was a maybe a nice change for you guys, for your family.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

Yeah. My family really, really loved living in Indiana, and I actually got all my education in Indiana. I attended Indiana University, finished Kelly School of Business, and only after that did I move to Florida. And then my family followed me. Of course they did. So did you meet your husband in college? No, no. So I had this dream when I was a junior in college that I should move to Miami. And I called my dad at the time and I said, Listen, I think I'm just gonna like maybe move to Miami when I graduate. And he said, Are you out of your mind? You've never been to Miami. What are you thinking? And I said, I just feel like I need to go there. And then lo and behold, I moved here, and two months later I met my husband. And been together ever since. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:56

That was fantastic. And you started your career in real

Real Estate Boom Then Crash

SPEAKER_01 5:00

estate.

SPEAKER_00 5:00

I did. So real estate when I was, you know, first when I had first moved here was really hot. Do you remember that real estate bubble that was happening? And Miami had built up all this condo inventory, and everyone was selling pre-constructions left and right. So I got my real estate license, and I I actually really loved doing real estate because it's extremely flexible. I was working part-time and making six figures because it was just an easy sell at the time. Everyone wanted to buy real estate. So yeah, that's what I did first. And then the crash came.

SPEAKER_01 5:34

Big time. Yeah. In what, 2008?

SPEAKER_00 5:37

Was that when the big crash was? I think it was more like 2005, 2006, because it was right around the time I was pregnant and having my daughter, my first daughter, Mia. Okay. Um, and I remember thinking, oh my gosh, what am I gonna do for work after I have the baby? Because this is such a depressing area to be in. People lost their entire net worth, and I don't really feel like being part of such a depressing environment. So that's when I kind of started thinking maybe I'm not gonna go back.

Starting Mia Belle Girls From Scratch

SPEAKER_01 6:07

Yeah. Well, and so from there you started a a children's clothing line, is that right?

SPEAKER_00 6:13

Yeah. So that was kind of out of left field because I didn't have any formal training on how to do fashion design. I didn't have any formal training on how to manufacture, do sourcing, any of that. So I just kind of up and decided when my daughter was a baby that I really loved baby girls' clothing and I was shopping around everywhere. And people at the time, there was no online shopping yet. So we would be going to these boutiques, and I'm like, oh, I wish I had this and I wish they had that. And then I thought maybe it would be fun to start something. And I just said, okay, let me do it. My family has a lot of entrepreneurs in it, and so we have a lot of entrepreneurial spirit, and we're not afraid to start and fail and try new things. So that's exactly what I did.

SPEAKER_01 6:58

So just out of curiosity, you would have these design ideas, and did you just find some some little seamstress somewhere to put it together for you? Is that was it that simple?

SPEAKER_00 7:11

No, it was it was actually more interesting than that. So we had brought a live-in nanny from Ukraine, and she was living with us, and sh I started telling her, Oh, I like this, I like that. And she was like, you know, I used to be a seamstress. So we went to Joanne Fabrics, we bought a sewing machine, and we bought fabrics, and we just got to work and started like sewing my ideas.

SPEAKER_01 7:37

That's so incredible. As an entrepreneur, the startup stories are so inspiring. So you would go around to a couple of wholesale market type situations?

SPEAKER_00 7:51

Is that so in the beginning, because online wasn't really a thing yet, I guess. Social networks just started, Facebook just started, Instagram wasn't even happening yet. So it was basically just Facebook. I said, okay, well, the traditional way to run a business like this is to create a collection and go to a trade show and then have buyers buy from you for their stores. And that's how the industry essentially worked at that time. So I went and present, I found reps that would rep me at these shows, and then I created a collection and made a ton of mistakes with manufacturing samples. I mean, that was a whole disaster to begin with. But then I showed up to the show, the first show, and I saw these buyers, and they were like housewives who had no idea about business, no idea about what the customer actually wanted. And I thought, this is not how I want to run this business. I don't want other buyers to be responsible for whether my stuff does well or not. So that's when I made a key decision that I wasn't going to do it, do it the traditional way that everyone was doing it. And I really saw an opportunity in social media and and the surfacing online space. So I decided I would fully shift directions to that.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

Oh my goodness. And the timing of that is so serendipitous for you because it it was before, you know, now everything's online, but back then it was new and people were just getting Facebook accounts and Instagram accounts, and you know, and then to be able to purchase, so probably then they had to go you go to your website to purchase it, you know?

SPEAKER_00 9:34

Even different than that, you're not gonna believe this. So at the time, I don't know if you remember this or not, but when Facebook first started, they had auction sales. So we I would post a picture, like an album of pictures, and then people would have to comment sold and the size, and there was a back-end system that connected them to like kind of like get invoiced automatically. I would put my inventory into the system and it would invoice them. And after they paid it, my system would like notify me that it needed to be shipped. So it wasn't even a real online store. Wow. And that's how I got my initial following on Facebook because I started doing this and it grew in popularity. And also we worked with, I don't rem know if you remember, there was this big site called Zulily, and they specialized it. So we started, I started at the same time as Zulilly started, and I was one of their first brands to go on there, and we did amazing with them. So we worked with them for many years.

SPEAKER_01 10:38

And I I I like the comment your husband made of I really need you to do this business for real or make this an actual business or whatever he said to me.

SPEAKER_00 10:48

God bless him. Yeah, I was hobbying it for the first like three years, and then at some point he was like, babe, I love you, but it's either a hobby or a business, and you've already got enough hobbies, so maybe you should maybe you should make this a real business. And it kind of like I'm a very competitive person, and that kind of put like a fire, uh-huh, lit lit a fire on me, and I said, you know what, I think it's time, and and I did.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

Yeah, and it and you grew it to be enormous, and it's it's still available today. Mia am I Bell Girls, yeah. Mia Bell Girls, and it's is it Mia Bellgirls.com? Is that yeah? Okay, so and it you can still see beautiful pictures of Lena. There's a lot of mother-daughter options there, and she serves as a model there as well, but it's gorgeous, gorgeous stuff. Thank you. Makes me wish I had a little girl to to buy for.

SPEAKER_00 11:47

Me too.

SPEAKER_01 11:48

Maybe one of these days I'll have a grandbaby. So, okay. So you conquered, you know, you had a clothing empire. Tell us what happened towards the end of that business for you. It's still in existence, but you stepped away.

The Hidden Cost Of Big Success

SPEAKER_00 12:05

Yes. So at the height of the business where, you know, everybody was like, oh my gosh, we had all these famous collaborations, we were on target, we we hit the Inc. 5000 list. Uh, it was just a big deal. And everything on the outside looked like, wow, you know, she's living her dream life. And and that I really tried to keep up appearances, but there were a lot of cracks in the foundation. And they started to crumble little by little because it was a really tremendous load to carry. And I found myself in a place where I was never present, I was never enjoying my accomplishments, but I was always like efforting and striving and pushing for the next, the next, the next, the next accomplishment and just carrying such a heavy load that my nervous system just completely started to combust. And on top of that, I had a lot of differences with my partner in that business, which also began to affect my day-to-day life. So altogether, you know, the cracks and the foundation started to be undeniable as much as I tried to bury my head in the sand and avoid these feelings, avoid the where things were heading. I just came to a place where I couldn't ignore it anymore.

SPEAKER_01 13:27

Yeah. And as a female entrepreneur, sometimes I find it hard to just have masculine energy about decisions all the time. You know, we are female, we are a little softer sometimes. And it it does take it out of you to have to always stay in that masculine mindset of, you know, running the business and thinking about the business. So I I really understand. And that's sort of what led you into your dream life academy.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

Well, yeah, it kind of put me on a journey of personal development, just so to speak, where I said, okay, I have on the outside everything I ever dreamed of. I have an immensely successful business. I have beautiful, healthy kids, I have an adoring husband. Everything on the outside seems great, but why am I feeling so bad on the inside? And that personal development story kind of got me digging. And I started doing a lot of retreats, a lot of therapy, a lot of reading, a lot of just whatever you name it, I tried it kind of situation. And in the end, I learned so much about myself and just the patterns that continued repeating in my life. Started listening to my excitement, which was one of the biggest things that I learned is that your excitement and your energy is always guiding you. And it's information from your intuition and your higher self giving you the road to take. And I started feeling like, oh my gosh, I feel so much less excited about this business and the journey I'm on here. It was almost like that chapter was like concluding, and I knew there was something else, but I was too scared to admit it to myself, too scared and too nervous to just jump off that cliff. But I guess I like to tell this story about Oprah. I went to an Oprah conference and she talked about how life is gonna give you little droplets of rain. It always starts with little droplets, and that her suggestion is you need to listen to these little droplets and not ignore them, or else the rain gets harder and harder and harder. And if you continue to ignore the rain, it's gonna turn into a full-on hurricane. Makes sense. Yeah. At that point, you're not gonna have any choice but to listen, but you're gonna get to a really hard place where you could have listened earlier. And so I did get to that hurricane and the hard place, and eventually had no choice but to listen. And my husband and I made a choice to walk away from that business, and we didn't have a backup plan. We absolutely had no idea what we were gonna do with ourselves next.

SPEAKER_01 16:12

Yes, but thank goodness you did because the the the Lena Viner Dream Life Academy is something so cool. And I encourage everyone, and everything will be in the show notes as well, but it's lina vinor.com, l-i-n-a-v-in-e-r.com. And you know, it it says success without sacrifice, let's build your dream life. And and that's when you created the rewire method. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Rewire Method For Lasting Change

SPEAKER_00 16:44

Yeah, so one of my biggest like aha moments that I got on hitting this really big high in business and then hitting the really big low and leaving is that we have a system of beliefs that we develop over the first eight to ten years of our life while our brain is very moldable in theta brainwave state. And so we accept those beliefs as truth without ever questioning them. And those beliefs come mostly from our environment, our religion, the people we're around, our parents, and our community. And so we don't really have any control over that information that we're absorbing. But those beliefs are like your blueprint, your system of operating your entire life. And they sit in your subconscious mind. And so we're living 90, 95% of our life using our subconscious mind and that operating system, but we're not really consciously aware of it. We think we make all these decisions, but that's only 5% of our brain. The rest is knee-jerk reactions to our belief system. And so then I had this realization that, you know, your beliefs, they create your thoughts. And your thoughts create your emotions. And your emotions create action or lack of action in your life. And every repeating pattern that you experience that you like or you that you do not like stems back to that belief system. And so the only way we can truly change our reality is by changing that blueprint of those beliefs. And believe it or not, we have like 30 to 50,000 of them sitting in our subconscious mind about everything. Those beliefs include like, who am I? Who who are the people around me? What do I expect out of my life? How, how do I feel about myself? Do I do I have confidence in myself? Do I believe in myself? Do I like my body? Like everything, everything in your life is a belief.

SPEAKER_01 18:45

That's that's so true. And so you through the lena viner.com website and through your the dream life, the mentorship, the membership, the different things that that you have available through that website, you can walk people through that dream.

SPEAKER_00 19:01

So essentially, like everything stems from the rewire method. That is a method I created that allows you to learn how to change your belief system. And so the the way that I came up with the system is through all my trial and errors and all that personal development stuff that I tested. And so I took all the things that I found the most effective from many different modalities and put it into one method that even like a third grader can learn how to do. And so I teach a lot of things. I even teach people inside the rewire method how to test their own beliefs and their subconscious. So you do muscle testing using several different methods where you can actually communicate with your subconscious mind and see where your blocks are, which is very cool. Very, very cool. And so so that's so yeah. I have the rewire method course itself, which is kind of like an intro course where people learn the method, and then we use the the actual method and technique to give them like 300 plus new installations into their belief system that are like fundamental, I believe, for every single person.

SPEAKER_01 20:16

And it's a six-week method, and it's all done online. Yes, digital. Okay, okay, great. And then what is the mentorship?

SPEAKER_00 20:25

The mentorship is really like a more upfront program where I'm very hands-on in taking someone on and really helping mold, you know, evaluate their entire situation one-on-one and giving them um complete system for how to change their entire life.

SPEAKER_01 20:49

Wow. So you are available in some limited capacity.

SPEAKER_00 20:54

I'm sure in a very limited capacity, yes.

SPEAKER_01 20:57

Very selecting. To help those that really want the hands-on experience from you personally.

SPEAKER_00 21:04

Wow. And of course, I'm really busy with my husband and I have TELAZNMD, which is our medical platform through which we have a lot of longevity therapies, the weight loss program, and lots of ways to help people that are 40 and beyond age well and be healthy and have energy and feel great.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

Yes, that was that was my next bridge over. Because if you if you work with a lot of people try weight loss and for one reason or another, their brains aren't fixed. And you know, you sabotage yourself and things things like that. But you do have the telezinmd.com. It's T E L E Z E N M. And you guys offer weight loss, uh, hormone therapy. You tell us a little bit about just give us kind of an overview of Telezin in general.

TelezinMD Weight Loss Beyond The Shot

SPEAKER_00 21:59

Yeah, so it's a Telehealth clinic, which means we service all 50 states. Everything is done virtually, but when you go on our site, you can explore different types of programs that we have. I'll just use weight loss as an example. So, with weight loss, when somebody comes on the site and wants to join our weight loss program, they click get started and then they would fill out like a quick questionnaire. Our medical team would then evaluate their health history and everything that they offer and issue a prescription. And then our pharmacy ships direct to their home the medication every single month, or depending on the package that they choose.

SPEAKER_01 22:39

That is, you know, and it's so helpful that things can be done like this online now. Is there testing that you guys do? Do you do any labs or things like that?

SPEAKER_00 22:50

We are adding an entire lab framework to our business in the next couple months where people can test all different kinds of things. They're going to get kits in the mail that will allow them to test right there from home and really integrate the blood work. Right now, the GLP1 program and all of our other programs, they don't uh require testing. So, but it's definitely something I believe in very strongly and we want to incorporate it. But for now, with the weight loss program specifically, I've worked really hard to build our digital programs for all of our patients in order to be able to really support them beyond the medication. I love GLP1 medications. I think they're one of the greatest tools we've seen this century. Yes, yes. For helping people achieve weight loss results. And America is really struggling with that. Obesity is one of the biggest problems for early mortality and many, many of the diseases that cause early mortality. So this is a wonderful medication, but I believe that it's being misused by a lot of people. And a lot of people have gained like very unrealistic expectations for how it should work. They think they're just going to inject themselves, lose the weight, and that's that. And there's so much more to it. And the more I've learned about the medication, and I've taken the medication myself and absolutely love it, but there needs to be other components, which is nutrition and mind work so that you can have long-term results and not be taking this medication for the rest of your life.

SPEAKER_01 24:30

Yes. And that that is such a key uh part of all this because, you know, we we do GLP1 uh medications in our clinics and things like that. But if you don't work with someone's mind, and I I see here that some of your key components are it's a physician-guided care at every dose, it's a neuroscience-based behavioral program, so you will have lasting results. I think that's a big fear for people is if once I go off of it, am I just going to gain everything back? And if you don't change your brain and change your habits, you know, it it is likely that you will gain it back, just like anything else. You have a nutrition protocol, you have a concierge support team where they're real humans. You know, the shipping is discreet. You can actually use your FSA and your HSA. So that's great. And your medications come from 503A compounding pharmacies, which are excellent pharmacies. And so you you also do some peptide work.

Peptides And Hormone Optimization

SPEAKER_00 25:38

Right now, there's, I don't know if you've heard or not, but there's uh a lot going on in the government and the FDA in terms of peptides. It's been a hot topic on the news. So last last month, the FDA had a meeting and their panel recommended to allow seven different peptides for 503 pharmacy compounding, uh, which right now they have been off since 2023. Legitimate businesses like ours have not been able to sell peptides or most peptides. The only peptides we can sell are GLP1s and Sermomelin right now, which is a growth hormone booster. But all these other wonderful peptides that I know, have tried, tested, and love, uh, we're waiting for FDA to make a final decision. And we're really hopeful that in the next couple months, at least that first batch that the panel recommended six out of seven will get approved.

SPEAKER_01 26:36

Yes. Thank goodness they're getting on the bandwagon. Some orlin is interesting. It's it's a growth hormone precursor. And growth hormone is is we liken it to the next stage in anti-aging. If we do a lot of hormone replacement therapy in our clinics, and sort of the next level is to, as an adult, we don't make much growth hormone anymore, and that helps increase muscle mass, and which of course is going to make you able to be leaner if you encourage muscle growth and things like that. So and it helps with skin and oh my goodness, it's just such a good thing. And sleep better. Yes, yes. And uh what do you guys do for women's hormones?

SPEAKER_00 27:22

So right now we have different combinations and different modalities of estrogen and progesterone. And I also firmly believe in testosterone for women. I myself take testosterone. Oh, we don't carry it yet, but once we get the blood work active on our platform, we'll be able to allow testosterone for hormone optimization for women because I feel that it's also a huge missing link for women that are going through perimenopause and menopause.

SPEAKER_01 27:53

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 27:54

It it speaks to their vitality, their strength, their energy level, their look, their, you know, sex drive, even all those things really matter. You want to remain, you know, feeling like you did when you were younger. And I think that that will help a lot.

SPEAKER_01 28:09

Yes. It I think it's so great because more and more women are starting to have their own stories. So I everybody's always had a hormone story, but at least now some of the stories are where they're getting it corrected and getting to use the bioidentical hormones and just through estrogen, estradiol, progesterone, and testosterone. And I've I've done, I started doing progesterone. Let's see. Well, I'm gonna age myself here. Twenty years ago, I started testosterone probably 15 years ago, and now I added estrogen three years ago. So now I do all three, but that was sort of my progression personally going through all those stages.

SPEAKER_00 28:57

I started six months ago for perimenopause, and it has transformed how I feel. I was in such a bad place. My husband was like, I'm over you right now. Please don't talk to me. I was so moody. I was waking up sweating in the middle of the night. It was just, I wasn't feeling like myself at all. And within a week of starting hormone therapy, I was back to feeling like myself. Isn't that amazing?

SPEAKER_01 29:24

So you are a hormone hero for a lot of reasons. Yeah. But you're also just an inspiration for in any entrepreneur, female or male. Uh an eight-figure entrepreneur is a is a big deal. And, you know, what less than 0.1% of people in the United or in the world conquer that. So that that's just amazing. You're an amazing human. So I just want to remind everyone that to enjoy the benefits of what Lena and her husband have to offer, uh, telezinmd.com. And once again, all these links will be in the show notes. But that is their uh their GLP1 business and hormone business. And just the fact that you are offering some counseling and the neuroscience behind weight loss, I think that that that's really does set you guys apart. And then the Lena Viner's Dream Life Academy at Lena Viner.com, L-I-N-A-V-I-N-E-R.com is also where you can find Lena. And Mia Bell Girls is if you want to just get a look at at what she built into you know a gazillion dollar business, you can take a look at that too. And still purchase beautiful clothing for for women and girls. So well, Lena, as as a hormone hero, is there anything else you would like to tell our listeners? Yes.

Health And Mindset Final Takeaways

SPEAKER_00 31:00

I just want to conclude with as we age, I think a lot of our priorities change. We become wiser and we start looking at our life through a different lens than we do when we're younger. And that's kind of where my journey has been in realizing what what is my definition out of a 10 out of 10 life and the two pillars that I really like to focus on. And I realized you really can't build that version of your dream life unless you put a focus on them, and that's your health, which is physical, and your mental health, which comes from your mind. And ignoring either one of them will keep you in a loop that's stuck. You only get one body, you don't get any replacements, you get to live in it for the rest of your life. You got to take really good care of it and make sure it lasts you and it and it gives you energy and you can live your life and enjoy your loved ones and enjoy your children. And there's so many longevity therapies available today that can absolutely give you the opportunity to live with full vitality into you know your later years and feel just as good as you did in your 20s and 30s, and also your mindset. Your you have to constantly challenge your belief system. And most of the blocks and ceilings in your life come from that belief system. And the only way to change it is to challenge, keep challenging. Why do I believe this? Why do I believe this to be true? And eventually you'll get down to the nitty-gritty of that is a it's a limiting belief. And so that's kind of what I want to say.

SPEAKER_01 32:35

Yeah, that's incredible. Thank you so much, Lena. You're an incredible person, and I appreciate your time today. Thank you. It's been wonderful. I really enjoyed it. Uh-huh.

Subscribe, Review, And Share Your Story

SPEAKER_01 32:48

Thanks for listening to Hormone Heroes. Take a moment to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts so you don't miss the next episode. While you're there, help us spread the word by leaving a rating and a review. If you would like to share your bioidentical hormone story or need help finding a physician in your area, please email us at drkelly at hormoneheroes.org. That's D-R-K-E-L-L-I at H O R M O N E. H E R O E S dot org. We want you to be a hormone hero.