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CNN Larry King Live
Interview with Suzanne Somers
Aired October 14, 2006 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SUZANNE SOMERS: If they see me nude it doesn't matter because I don't know them. And they don't know me. And I don't know who's seeing me. And they don't know who they're seeing. But I know you and you know me. And I know who you'll be seeing. And you know who you'll be seeing. And both of them are me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Tonight, Suzanne Somers more than five years after revealing she had breast cancer on this program.
The beloved "Three's Company" star is cancer-free. How did she do it without conventional medicine?
Suzanne Somers, living proof that 60 is the new 30. Revealing her secrets to staying healthy and being ageless. It's next on "LARRY KING LIVE."
KING: It is always a pleasure, indeed a delight, to have Suzanne Somers as a special guest on this program. The actress, singer, businesswoman and best selling author. In fact, as soon as she appears, number one.
Her new book is "Ageless, the Naked Truth about Bioidentical Hormones." The book includes 16 interviews from cutting-edge doctors on how to slow the aging process for women and men. We've shown you its cover. Interesting. She's sort of in purple. I'm in purple. And so is the book in purple.
(LAUGHTER)
"Ageless," she just turned 60. We taped this right before she was 60. But it's on after she was 60.
Is that a traumatic age?
SUZANNE SOMERS, ACTRESS & AUTHOR OF "AGELESS": I said to my husband, so, you know, what's it like to sleep with a 60-year-old woman, and he said I never done it before.
KING: What's it like to be a 60-year-old woman?
SOMERS: Best I've ever felt. You know, it's so interesting, because I have been programmed, and everybody's programmed, to think that this is -- you're coming down the other side. But if your hormones...
KING: You're not going to live to 120. It's not middle age?
SOMERS: I'm probably going to live to be 100, probably. Probably, so are you.
KING: Because?
SOMERS: Because I'm restoring my hormones to youthful balances. And I've been doing that now for 10 years. And it's -- it's amazing to me that everybody doesn't understand that this is what's missing.
If you look at young people, what's the difference between young people and old people? Young people make a full compliment of hormones. They don't get the diseases we call the diseases of aging, which is heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's.
Old people, older people, get those diseases commiserate with the loss of hormones.
And you and I both had experiences, heart disease, cancer. I wonder if we had understood the hormonal system earlier, could we have not had to experience that.
KING: How do you not lose them?
SOMERS: You start early. See, I think that we are the last generations who are going to die the old fashioned way, which are those three diseases, from 40s on, because our doctors haven't caught up yet. That's the problem.
It's not -- that's why I gathered these doctors in this book. They're Western doctors. I only interviewed Western doctors, who realize that the kind of medicine that we're all practicing today is 50-year-old medicine. That it isn't relevant to today's world. We're living longer. We've got more stress.
In fact, they say that we experience more stress in this country in one day than people in Elizabethan times did in their entire lifetime. Nobody sleeps. Nobody can sleep. And if you can't sleep, your cortisol never goes down.
KING: I want to get into all of this with you. But how did you clue into this?
SOMERS: Kind of by accident, because I started -- I gained weight. Remember when I first came on here. And you told me I was wacky. And was telling you, you should eat the lamb chops with the fat. But, look, I was the first one out there saying don't mix protein and carbohydrate, and avoid sugar. And all of those books followed after that.
So what I found in the science...
KING: How did you fall into that? SOMERS: Because I was gaining weigh and couldn't figure out why. I now know its hormonal weight. But I didn't know that. Eating less, exercising more, still gaining weight, put on about 20 pounds and couldn't stop it. And I didn't want to go on a diet. Tried diets. I'd lose the weight for a gig. And then, as soon as I'd finished the gig, and eat right, normally I'd get fat again.
And so I looked up the science. And it was about insulin. The insulin's connection. And I never knew that insulin was a hormone.
And so, then, I really got fascinated by hormones because there are two layers of hormones. The top layer -- and we all need to understand this so we can understand when we go to the doctors so we're no so helpless.
Imagine a marionette. And the top layer, the arms, are the major hormones, insulin, thyroid, cortisol, adrenals. You've heard of all that. They are like -- they're like Zuben Meda (ph), the whole orchestra plays discordant. Those hormones all talk to the minor hormones of this marionette, moving the legs around of estrogen, progesterone, DHEA, testosterone, pregnetalone (ph). If one of these top layers -- your thyroid's off, or your insulin's off, or cortisol's off, or your adrenals are off, then all of the others ones, you're your sex hormones are off.
KING: In a minute, I want to get to, in a little while, how you balance all of this.
(LAUGHING)
And how it does it.
But first, a couple of current things. You're past the five-year mark since the breast chance.
SOMERS: Yes.
KING: Which was announced on in this program, by the way. I'll never forget that.
SOMERS: Yes. Yes. Right. Me too.
KING: How are you doing?
SOMERS: I'm great. All of my levels come back perfect. And I guess, in a way, now that I have six years to look back on it, it was a strange kind of gift.
Everybody who has had cancer says that, if they survive. And the gift for me was it made me go deeper into this to understand it. And that I chose a nonconventional way to treat my cancer. And that I'm still alive. Meaning I never tell anybody to do what I did, but giving women, in particular, another option rather than the poison theory.
Because what I felt at the time when they said, okay, here's what we're going to do surgery, radiation, chemotherapy, Tamoxifen, which is the after-care drug, which, oh, by the way, that drug is going to make you gain weight. And, oh, by the way, you'll probably be a little depressed for five years.
And I thought, it just doesn't sound like a great option. And I -- then I found that medicine I told you about, Iscador, that builds up your immune system. And I thought, build up or poison? Build up or poison?
So I decided to go this other way, plus keeping my hormones balanced. Because young people, unless it's some kind aberration, don't get cancer.
KING: Weren't you rolling the dice?
SOMERS: I don't think -- yes, I was. But at the same time, I thought chemotherapy was rolling the dice. I still think chemotherapy is rolling the dice.
See chemotherapy kills cancer, absolutely. But it also kills the immune system. And unfortunately, in almost all cases, cancer can grow back faster than your immune system can recover. Without an immune system you've got no defenses.
So knowing that -- because I had written so many books, and maybe that was my advantage that I knew all of this. So it was easier for me than the average woman to say, you know, I appreciate your advice, Doctor, but I don't want to do it.
KING: More in a moment with Suzanne Somers. The new book is "Ageless," published by Crown.
We'll be right back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SOMERS: I chose your show to come on tonight to talk about something very, very hard for me to talk about, that I've never told anyone. In last year, I've been battling and surviving breast cancer. And I was in that clinic. And it all has to do with my breast cancer.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: We're back with Suzanne Somers. The new book is "Ageless."
Now, in that book, you say that we all have cancer. Does she really believe it only activates when people don't take care of their hormonal balance. We all have cancer. You believe that?
SOMERS: I believe we all have cancer in us. In fact, I remember after I was diagnosed, there were some tests that we wanted to know if it had spread throughout my body, that you could drill into the hipbone to find it there was any cancer in the body. And my doctor said that you'll find it because we all have cancer in us. He said, what are you go doing? You don't want to do any conventional kind of therapy. So what are you going to do with it if you have that information? He said why don't you just leave it be?
The theory of these new -- and this is not my theory. This is a theory of cutting-edge doctors who realize that we do all have cancer in us. And we -- when we start losing our hormones, our brain recognizes a reproductive person. So women are born with only so many eggs. We can't buy anymore. We can't make anymore. We can't take anymore. Some women are born with more eggs. Some women are born with less eggs. And when you run out of eggs, that's called menopause. It really should be called egglessness. Egglessness.
(LAUGHTER)
I love doing this. It tells the brain, oh, this woman can no longer make a baby. The same thing with a man. When there's no more testosterone, oh, the guy can no longer make a baby.
When you can no longer make a baby, because biologically speaking, we're only here to reproduce the species. The brain -- the cancer that's in all of us has an opportunity to proliferate.
But if you put the hormones back in a template that the brain recognizes as reproductive, that cancer doesn't bother you. It stays there.
KING: How?
SOMERS: How do you put it back? How do you put the hormones back?
KING: Yes.
SOMERS: You would take a blood test, Larry, find out where your testosterone levels are, where your DHEA levels are, where prenonilevels (ph) are, HGH. Because every hormone has a pause. Andropause is the pause of testosterone. Menopause is the pause of eggs, et cetera.
KING: You take the test and then what?
SOMERS: OK. Then your doctor goes, oh, yes, you're low in testosterone. He gives you exactly the amount of testosterone that you are missing in the aging process. And he puts it back at optimal levels. Optimal meaning not your age. Because you don't want hormones for your age. You're in decline. So am I. You want to put back when you were in your healthiest prime.
And that's why guys on testosterone replacement, not more than they need, not less than they need, have vitality, have energy. They're not grumpy. They don't get belly fat. They can sleep well at night. The very last thing to go are erections.
KING: What's the different between...
(LAUGHING)
The last things to go are...
SOMERS: That's the last thing. When that happens -- see, know why that happens? A woman is -- to make a woman, she's estrogen to testosterone. That's the ratio. Men are testosterone to estrogen. You have estrogen. It's an important part of your ratio. That's what makes you a man.
As you start losing your testosterone, when it gets lower than your estrogen -- now, your estrogen is your dominant hormones, that's when you can no longer can get an erection.
(LAUGHING)
KING: Well, what about Viagra?
SOMERS: Well, that's...
KING: Phonier.
SOMERS: Well, that's a phony erection. And that other one -- I love the one for four hours, saying it lasts longer than four hours. My husband said, get me some of that.
(LAUGHING)
KING: What's the difference between regular hormones that most people talk about and your bioidentical?
SOMERS: OK, what I take is nondrug. They're biologically identical to the human hormone. Bioidentical.
KING: Where do you get them?
SOMERS: From a compounding pharmacist. It has to be prescribed by your doctor.
The hormones that women have been taking, up until now, are synthetic hormones. They're not hormones. They're made from horse's urine. They take away the nastiest effects.
The Women's Health Initiative proved that they are dangerous and even fatal.
And breast cancer is an epidemic. At the turn of the century one in 91 women got breast cancer. Now it's one in eight. They're about it readjust it to one in six. And they say our daughters will be one in five.
Something's wrong. What's wrong?
KING: When you're on this therapy -- and that's a good word for it.
SOMERS: Yes, hormone therapy. KING: In addition to feeling good inside, do you look better outside?
SOMERS: I ask you. Do I look better outside?
KING: But you could have had work done. And I wouldn't know that.
SOMERS: No, this is a real face. This is a hormone face.
KING: You have not had plastic surgery?
SOMERS: I've had some fillers. I -- I...
KING: What do you mean, Botox?
SOMERS: Yes. Yes. Everybody does that. I...
KING: Not me. But go ahead.
SOMERS: You don't? It hurts.
KING: I wouldn't go near it.
SOMERS: I go twice a year. It hurts like crazy. I like my face. I don't like the look of overdone faces. I don't have anything against it. I just don't like that look.
I have a thing called a Face Master, which I have been using for 14 years. I hate to be self-serving. But I sell it on suzannesommers.com. But it's a microcurrent face-lift machine that -- you know when you use a free weight and pump up the muscle under the skin, it's not the skin that's lifting, it's the mussing under it.
And there's no way to exercise your facial muscles. So you use this little facial machine on your face. And it pumps up the muscles under the skin, in essence, keeps the support up so the skin doesn't sag.
And I think it's had a dramatic effect on the aging process on my face.
And I think the hormones have had an incredible effect. Hormones smooth out your skin.
A lot of women, as they get older, their breasts start to droop a little bit. When you put the hormones back in the right template, everything perks up again.
KING: Sex better after this kind of living, this kind of therapy? Is the sex better?
SOMMERS: Well, first of all, the kids are grown. You don't have to lock the door.
KING: Yes, but that doesn't mean the sex is better. SOMERS: And you're in the mood.
KING: More?
SOMERS: You're in the mood. And you better hope that your partner's on hormone replacement, too. It's your healthiest prime, except that you've got wisdom and you're not all messed up in your head. You just feel like it.
KING: Is this, therefore, a good idea for both people in the marriage or relationship together?
SOMERS: Yes, yes. And start early. Like, I wonder, when I think about my cancer -- see I didn't get cancer in menopause. Not when I was 50. I got it in perimenopause -- and I write about this. Perimenopause is dismissed by doctors as, oh, nothing serious.
It's the most dangerous passage a woman goes through. Why? Because one day your estrogen's surging. One day her progesterone is plummeting. And she's all over the place. And she's moody, and gets depressed and starts gaining weight and starts losing her sexual interest. Because without sex hormones, there's no sex drive.
So in those surges, in those spaces, when the hormones are all over the place -- remember the brain, only here to reproduce, says, oh, this woman's winding down, can't make a baby. So that's when the cancer in that woman has an opportunity to grow a new self, except that new self has no intelligence. So it does in the breast. She...
KING: Do you dislike Western medicine?
SOMERS: I don't. Nobody, nobody, does better surgery than American medicine and American doctors. If I needed surgery, I'd fly from anyplace in the world to have it done in this country.
Western pharmaceuticals, for pain, infection, mental illness, hands-down, nobody even comes close.
But for all of these conditions that people have -- women my age have my fibromyalgia. Women my age have autoimmune disease as Lupus. All these crazy things are happening.
Most women my age are on sleeping pills, synthetic hormones, and antidepressants.
When you're -- when you have your hormones put back like I do, my body sings inside. That's the only way I can describe it. The -- the -- you just get to feel so incredible. You -- it -- I guess that's why I scream it from the rooftop. I've written 16 books so that I can tell people, this is -- this is great.
What I -- here's how I feel about Western medicine. Our doctors have to catch up. They didn't learn it in medical school.
KING: I want to take a break.
SOMERS: OK. All right.
KING: And then we'll talk about medical school.
We'll be right back with Suzanne Somers. The book is "Ageless."
Don't go away.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: We're back with Suzanne Somers, the actress, businesswoman, best selling author. She appeared on this program quite often, and always, always presents very interesting, unique concepts. Her new book is "Ageless."
The problem with the way doctors are educated is?
SOMERS: In our medical schools today, there's a required 12 weeks of Endocrinology, four hours -- four hours of which are devoted to prescribing hormones. So how is a doctor know about bioidentical hormones unless he decides to go outside of the box and learn about it?
That's why I gathered these doctors in this book. Every one of these -- they're from Yale, Harvard. These are the top, brightest doctors. It was like getting my PhD the last two years writing this book.
Each one of them can tell you the most amazing things about thyroid, how to restore the thyroid to balance without drugs.
Drugs are killing us.
And so, these doctors are understanding that, for the conditions, that we have other ways of treating -- even the statins. Pharmaceutical companies are gong to be furious with me. But read -- a doctor...
KING: You don't like statins?
SOMERS: I don't. I know you're on a statin.
I'll tell you why. I'll tell you why. Because the moment -- the movement your cholesterol goes up, your doctor wants to give you a statin. And a statin does inhibit your body's ability to manufacture cholesterol. That's a good thing.
It doesn't reverse arterial plaque. But it keeps any new plaque from forming. That's a good thing. But the plaque you already have is the plaque you already have.
Over the counter niacin -- and you can look it up on Google. And you can read about it my doctors' interview -- actually reverses arterial plaque. It's been shown to reverse it. Not the time release niacin, because that gives people flushes, but regular over- the-counter niacin.
I said to this one doctor we interviewed, so why don't we all know about that? He said because it's not patentable.
KING: What is bad about the statins, since -- they're discovering things about statins every day?
SOMERS: Statin's are great for inflammation. But if you kept your hormones balanced, inflammation wouldn't be the kind of problem that it is today. Everybody's got inflammation.
And there's an amazing test called CRP, C-reactive proteins. Your C-reactive protein is supposed to be at .5. If it's at 3.0 -- any man who has a CRP and it's at 3.0, his inflammation means that he's likely, within the next six years, to have a heart attack or stroke. And for women, it's even more severe.
I sent a girlfriend of mine, who has constantly had stomach problems -- she's always clearing her throat. And she's -- she -- everything she was allergic to.
I said why don't you go and have a CRP test. She came back and her CRP -- this was a young woman -- was 15. I said you're going to die. You have to -- you have to get that down. How do you get it down? You get your hormones balanced. There are things like fish oil, and niacin, and things like that. But sleep, sleep, sleep. Nobody can sleep.
That's why -- that's why romance novels are so popular because women all over America are reading one a night because they can't sleep.
KING: Is there such a specialty as anti-aging? Are there doctors who specialize in anti-aging?
SOMERS: Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. And this is a whole new faction of doctors. They're all doctors -- it's funny. Most of the doctors I interviewed here are anti-aging doctors. It's interesting. I'd say half of them were ER doctors where...
KING: Emergency room?
SOMERS: Yes. If they had to -- they're not cardiac surgeons, but if they had to open somebody's chest and reach in there and start the heart again, they did it.
But they all said the stress was intense. And they wanted to do the type of medicine that would de-stress them. Every one of these doctors are saying it's the most rewarding medicine I've ever done.
Instead of people coming in complaining, their patients come in, going, oh, Doctor, I feel so great. Oh, my God, everybody is so great. That's what I do with my doctors.
KING: How much longer under this concept, if we follow the Suzanne Somers method, do you believe someone could live?
SOMERS: I believe we could live to 90 and 100 years old. There's a new thing out there that I'm looking into now, Nanotechnology that they say, longer than that.
I don't care about living longer... I don't care how long I live. I just don't want to be sick.
And women can expect, in this country -- expect eight year of disability before they die. That means either tubes up the noses, wheelchairs, Alzheimer's, cancer, heart disease.
Women at middle age get fat. It makes them very unhappy yet...
KING: When you talk to women about anti-aging, do you -- don't you believe the first thing they think of is how do I look?
SOMERS: Yes.
KING: They don't think about internal. They think about external.
SOMERS: You're right. But my concept is keep your insides young, trick your brain into thinking you are young internally, it manifests on the outside.
I think what is youthful about me, if I can say it without sounding egotistical, is my energy. I don't have the energy of what you think a 60-year-old woman has. I have young energy. I have energy.
The other day I was doing a back bend in yoga, a complete back bend by myself. And I thought, who would have thought at 60 that my bones would be in such good shape?
That's another thing. When you restore your hormones to perfect balance -- when I first started taking hormones, I did a bone density test. I had lost bone. I have no bone loss. My replacing with bioidentical hormones has actually reversed my bone loss. I have no bone loss. So that's why I can do a back bend. That's why I can stand on my head and lift myself off the floor with my wrists and my forearms. My arms are strong. My bones are strong.
KING: Do you get sick?
SOMERS: I hadn't been sick since I had cancer.
KING: You don't the flu? You don't get colds?
SOMERS: I think that that's Iscador. It builds up your immune system so strong that nothing can invade or attack...
KING: You still take it.
SOMERS: I do. I think I'm going to take it for life.
KING: Where do you get it?
SOMERS: You can now -- because of me, because of you, because of this show, because of my cancer being announced on this show, it became available in this country as a result of you and me. It's not FDA approved but your doctor can prescribe it.
KING: How does that work?
SOMERS: Well, it's call anthroproscopic medicine. So anthroproscopic means not FDA approved but you can get it by prescription legally by your doctor.
I feel strong. I feel incredible. You know the other thing that -- my last book, I got so many letters from women saying, OK, but what about me? I've had a hysterectomy. I think hysterectomies, A, there are too many done and, B, they're not right.
KING: We'll get a break and we'll come back with more. Suzanne Somers. The book is "Ageless."
SOMERS: Na-na-na.
KING: Na-na-na-na-na-na. Don't go away.
(LAUGHING)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN TV SHOW CLIP)
SOMERS: So, this is what goes on under my nose, behind my back?
JOHN RITTER, ACTOR: Glad you're here. Come over here.
SOMERS: What?
RITTER: Come over here and join us.
SOMERS: That is disgusting! You're -- you're deprived!
(END TV SHOW CLIP)
KING: We're with Suzanne Somers. The book is "Ageless."
I got to tell you, she just said to me, ask me about the prostate. All right, women, tune out.
SOMERS: OK, you're going to find this interesting, because you have one.
KING: You don't.
SOMERS: I don't.
The prostate is the equivalent to a woman's breasts, OK? In the prostate there are ducts and in the ducts is where your testosterone makes food for the sperm. As you lose testosterone, that's when you start getting an enlarged prostate. Pretty soon your PSA test goes up.
Immediately everybody panics, they take out the prostate, they put men on a Lupron, which is a -- you know I don't know if you know anybody on Lupron but it's a nasty drug.
What you're really missing is testosterone. You know, I'm a layperson. But sometimes I think about the kind of medicine we're practicing today like why don't you put two and two together, it's common sense. If the reason this prostate is enlarging is because you're losing testosterone, hey, what about putting it back in to, put everything back to normal again?
It's all about feeling normal and not about -- see, I don't know about your parents, but my parents didn't have medicine cabinet full of drugs. My --
KING: No, but they served you the wrong foods and you died.
SOMERS: Yes, but they ate real food. They ate real food. Think about what your mom served you, like it or not. I don't know if your mom was a good cook.
KING: Well, she was a Jewish cook.
SOMERS: See my mother-in-law I could eat -- crepe lach (ph) -- kugel knishes --
KING: Crepe lach (ph). You can eat that. There's a restaurant in New York, called Sammy's Hungarian, a famous Jewish restaurant, not plugging them, because you can't get in.
You go to Sammy's Hungarian, you eat a meal, right?
SOMERS: Uh-huh.
KING: Get in the car, or the cab, drive to Mount Sinai, take a number, and wait. Take a number because your heart is due imminently.
(LAUGHTER)
SOMERS: See, I don't but think it's from the Jewish food. I think it's from stress, I think it's from eating too much of the Jewish food, you know. Too much of anything is not good. Everything is about moderation. By the way you look great.
KING: Thank you. So do you. HGH, the human growth hormone?
SOMERS: I inject that.
KING: You can get that -- you inject it. You can get it in pills?
SOMERS: No. No.
KING: Yes, you can, I've seen it.
SOMERS: Then it's not real HDH because they haven't made it yet. But you can replicate it --
KING: There's a big movement against it, athletes -- SOMERS: They're over taking it.
KING: They can't pick it up in a test.
SOMERS: When they take the pill? If they have a pill, they can't pick up that athletes are taking, then it's some kind of black market.
What's for sale right now, you can replicate HDH by just loading up with amino acids. There's a cocktail of amino acids that make up -- but
KING: But what does it do for you?
SOMERS: By the time we're 20 we make the max amount of HGH. From then on it's just all downhill. By the time your 60, you are out. So you never replace a hormone that is not low or missing, I'm out. I have none.
So what is HDH do? It just makes you feel stronger, not high, not stoned just strong. It -- it builds muscle. It dissolves fats. So the combination of all of these hormone -- remember when you were young and didn't gain weight, and you ate, and you had bad lifestyle but it didn't matter? That's because hormones were pouring in.
So what I'm doing is putting them all back. People say to me, well, is that natural? And I say, is hip replacement natural? Is heart replacement, you know, or bypass -- is any of that natural? We're living longer. It's an incredible time. Technology will keep always live until we're 90, and 100 years old. We can look in our bodies now, MRIs, CAT Scans, thing with initials.
KING: Do you ever feel like that -- that woman of "Three's Company"?
(BEGIN TV SHOW CLIP)
SOMERS: I'll get it.
RITTER: Chrissie. Do you have to use that hand to hole the phone?
SOMERS: Jack, if I use my other hand I'll be listening with my wrong ear.
(END TV SHOW CLIP)
KING: You look at her when it comes on and say, that -- that's me, but it ain't me?
SOMERS: Oh, that so me. She's so me. Her heart and her soul is me. She was the child I didn't get to be. I love Chrissie Snow. I watch it -- there was a 48-hour marathon last weekend. My husband said, could we go now? I would just like sitting there watching. I'm fascinated by watching me young like that. I'm fascinated by watching the progression because when I started that show I said to everybody, I just have to tell you, I was going to be a chef. So I don't know how I got here. I don't know how to act. I've never taken a drama class. And I don't know if that was a good thing to say or not.
KING: You told us you were sorry you didn't get to say good-bye to John Ritter.
SOMERS: Yeah, yeah.
KING: That you had some difficulties with that.
SOMERS: Yeah. Well, you know, now -- last weekend when I was watching that marathon, I had a moment where I thought, I now know why he was so mad at me. He lost a great partner. Jack and Chrissie were great together. Great. Great. He zigzagged.
I watched him the first year. I really didn't know what I was doing the first year, if you watch it in progression the first year. I always hate when they show clips from the first year because I'm like -- you know I don't know what I'm doing.
But then I remember one day the bell went off in my head where it was almost like, oh, it's musical, comedy is musical. And then Jack and I -- John and I -- started this incredible thing. He was great. We were going to do a project together. And I'm really, really sorry that we didn't get to see him evolve into what he might have --
KING: What a talent.
SOMERS: He's other Dick Van Dyke.
KING: Major comedic talent.
SOMERS: Major.
KING: What's the story, why don't you Joyce Dewitt, the other girl, don't get on? You don't talk?
SOMERS: I don't know. I don't know.
KING: It's not you?
SOMERS: It's not me. I don't have a problem. Honest to god. When I see her --
KING: If she calls you, you talk to her?
SOMERS: Yes, of course. I see her say things and I think, I don't know what you're mad at. It's been 30 years.
KING: You have any idea?
SOMERS: Do you?
KING: No, I don't.
SOMERS: I don't. I don't. I can figure it out. But I wish her well. Call me. You know.
KING: Of course, it a puzzlement.
SOMERS: It is.
KING: How do you explain --
SOMERS: It is. Maybe, you know, women are cats.
KING: How do you explain your long, loving marriage?
SOMERS: Oh, I love my husband. He's Jewish.
(LAUGHTER)
KING: You are never apart?
SOMERS: We're never -- 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
KING: How do you do that, though? That's hard.
SOMERS: It's not.
KING: Being with one person.
SOMERS: I know. I don't know. I don't even get it. I -- I -- I met him when I was 19 years old. He was the host of the "Anniversary Game". I remember I was sitting there feeding my baby watching this dumb guy on this stupid game show.
KING: This was your first marriage?
SOMERS: My first marriage, when I was 17.
Watching this dumb guy on this stupid game show called "Wedding Party." And I thought, what an ass. And about a year later I get hired as a prize model on another show called the "Anniversary Game". I walk in and it's him, the ass.
KING: Like him right away?
SOMERS: Love at -- like boing. In fact, I said to my therapist, I was in deep therapy at that time and I said, I met who I'm going to marry. She said tell me about him. She said he is not going to be ready to marry you for at least 10 years. Ten years later we got married. I waited. Call me dumb.
KING: Why does it work?
SOMERS: I -- I find him sexy and smart and we're great business team. We've, you know, we've got a great business together. I just really like him. I don't know.
KING: You're an empire at Home Shopping.
SOMERS: I am. I am.
KING: You sell the clothing. Is this your --
SOMERS: This is. Next week, probably something like $60. It's a dress. Wish I could show you. It's really cute.
KING: Do you supervise everything sold?
SOMERS: My daughter, Leslie Hamill designs the clothes. We do a 42-pierce collection every month. But the clothing line is called "Hip, Sexy, but not desperate." It's for women my age, that we want to look great, we want to look sexy, but we don't want to look like we're wearing our daughter's clothes.
KING: Back more with Suzanne Somers. The book is "Ageless." Don't go away.
(BEGIN TV SHOW CLIP )
SOMERS: He thought I was a -- a h-h-o
JOYCE DEWITT, ACTRESS: A hooker?
SOMERS: Hooker!
RITTER: Honey, what going on in there?
DEWITT: Nothing!
SOMERS: Nothing!
Don't tell Jack. I'll just die.
DEWITT: No.
RITTER: Everything all right?
SOMERS: I was just laughing.
RITTER: Chrissie, where did you go tonight?
DEWITT: The Funky Fox.
RITTER: You shouldn't go there. People will think you're a hooker.
(END TV SHOW CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: You didn't finish, I don't think, on hysterectomy.
SOMERS: Right.
KING: You're against them, right?
SOMERS: I'm not against them. It's just that there are a million hysterectomies done in this country every year. I don't know if a million women really need to lose their organs.
And I was talking to a 40-year-old woman the other day and she said that she just had a hysterectomy. I said what did they take? She said they took everything. I you're your uterus, your cervix, and your ovaries? Right.
I said, when you're being wheeled in did your doctor say you, by the way, you have to know this, you're going to go into instant surgical menopause. You're going to have huge mood swings.
You're going to completely, completely, lose your sex drive. I don't mean not in the mood sometimes. I mean, you can't feel anything without sex hormones. You can't feel anything. You're going to gain weight. Generally you're not going to be as happy as you were before you walked into this operating room.
If women were really informed would they do it? I think you -- you better really know why you're having a hysterectomy. I would never, ever let anyone take my ovaries, or my cervix, unless I had cancer in them. Then you have to.
KING: Your previous book was "The Sexy Years"?
SOMERS: Yes.
KING: You going to do one called "The Sexier Years"?
(LAUGHTER)
SOMERS: My next book is all about men, men and their hormones. The sexier years? These are. These are because -- because I -- there's something I got back. Something that I lost, that I got back. And that's what most people feel as they are aging that once they lose it, they're never going to get it back again.
That's why I keep writing these books. And that's why I want doctors to catch up. You know, learn it. I think the pharmaceutical companies, I -- you know, the pharmaceutical companies have a problem with me right now because when "The Sexy Years" came out the $2 billion a year synthetic hormone business dropped by 72 percent. It's not my ego talking, it's just that in the complaint they filed against the Compounding Pharmacists of America, I was named in that complaint, as one of the key reasons for the decline.
So they're trying to get Compounding Pharmacists to not be allowed to make. So I thought, well then why don't you, pharmaceutical companies make bio-identical hormones in individualize doses so women can get exactly what they want. Because the one pill --
KING: Suzanne?
SOMERS: Yeah? KING: What's a compounding pharmacist?
SOMERS: That's where you go -- you know, the pharmacy in Beverly Hills that's where you go -- remember when you're a kid, you'd go with your prescription, they mix it up for you. And make the caps -- they still do all over America. That's the only way to get hormones is through compounding pharmacies.
They do it in cream because -- that's the other thing I talk about in here is the environment. Our livers are so full of sludge from the environment. We unknowingly take in 8 to 10 pounds of pounds chemicals every year. We're decomposing -- it takes longer for our bodies to decompose now because of chemicals.
KING: Why does your life span increase all the time?
SOMERS: Because of technology. Because they can sew us back together. Because of our amazing surgery, because of MRIs, because of CAT scans, because they can look in -- because we've got drugs that are keeping alive but are we feeling well?
Look at -- young people jump and leap and do, and the differences, old people are out of gas. Old people are tired. You don't have to be tired. The goal is it live as long as you're genetically programmed to live, but die healthy. Your parents -- your grandparents died healthy. They died in their sleep. Old people used to die in their sleep. Now they die in nursing homes and in hospitals and --
KING: They're older, but not happier.
SOMERS: None of them are happier. And that's why I keep going "Ageless". It's not about the number, it's about your energy.
KING: Right back with more of Suzanne Somers after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: Back with Suzanne Somers. The new book is "Ageless."
You already have your own line of healthy foods. You have the Thigh Master, other products. You sell them all on Home Shopping. You bringing them altogether, is that it?
SOMERS: I'm -- if anybody's interested go to suzanne.com. Because I thought I've got over a thousand products. I don't have enough time on HSN to sell all of these products.
I've got these women who are these incredible women that -- more of a fan base than I ever had on "Three's Company." And put together a party business like Tupperware or Mary Kay or Avon, where there will be parties all over the United States selling Suzanne products.
KING: What do you want to be?
SOMERS: I'm just having fun. KING: What do you want to me, an industry? You want to be Avon calling with the bell and Mary Kay -- you want to be that?
SOMERS: Yeah, yeah.
KING: Suzanne Somers parties, with salespeople, and they get commissions?
SOMERS: Absolutely. It's in the process right now. We just opened it up for signups and over 3,000 women signed up in this last couple of weeks.
KING: How big are the chocolates doing?
SOMERS: Chocolates are incredible, sugarless chocolates. I make things that people want. I make food that tastes great. I make clothes that are hip and sexy, and not desperate. I make fitness equipment that's not a drudge. It's like a way of life.
KING: Are dark chocolates better?
SOMERS: Men like dark chocolate. You don't know why women like white chocolate. You don't like white chocolate do you? No man likes white chocolate. Why?
KING: Dark chocolate I've acquired a taste -- I think dark chocolates are healthier. I know they are.
SOMERS: It is. It is; 70 percent dark chocolates a great way to lower your serotonin. The reason women -- a week before their periods -- are coming through the cabinet, they'll eat baking chocolate, is because their serotonin levels drop. So I a little bit of 70 percent dark chocolate in the afternoon will boost that, and that's why they do it.
KING: You still eat bacon and that stuff? You still eat that?
SOMERS: I eat bacon. Don't you wish you could?
KING: You eat a lot of crap.
SOMERS: I eat no crap. I eat real food. I eat bacon without nitrates. I cannot have nitrates in it. I have bacon and eggs for breakfast.
KING: You go into the store and ask for bacon without nitrates?
SOMERS: Yes, yes. The one here in Beverly Hills, the Whole Foods, they have bacon without nitrates.
KING: Does it taste as good?
SOMERS: Absolutely. It doesn't last as long. Scary. Scary.
KING: It won't stay in the refrigerate. SOMERS: Right. It molds pretty fast. Like you buy it, use it up in a couple of days because it done have all the nitrates, which nitrates are like, you know that's what -- that's why our bodies are taking longer to decompose when we die now.
KING: Do you buy at health food stores?
SOMERS: I do. I put in a one acre organic garden at my house. I'm a farmer. I think that we should eat the highest quality food that we can afford. If you can afford organic food, eat it. We are what we eat.
KING: You still act?
SOMERS: I did on Broadway last summer.
KING: They killed you.
SOMERS: They killed me.
KING: Why did they do that to you?
SOMERS: I'm not them, I guess. It was -- you know, they say Broadway will break your heart. It broke my heart for a while. Now, when I think back on it greatest, greatest experience of my entire professional life. I had one month of every show spontaneous stand ovations two, three, four curtain calls. I remember on closing night I'm standing there with the drummer and he said I don't get. I said I don't either.
He said, I've been playing Broadway a long time. You don't get standing ovations like that. And out in front, they'd wait for me, and very emotional. I don't know -- but, you know, Kenna Mitzi Welsh (ph)?
KING: Sure.
SOMERS: They wrote my Broadway show. They're the last of their kind. They're so incredible. And my friend, Barry Manilow, said to me before I went, they're going to kill you. I said, why? I haven't hurt anybody.
They -- they sent me a review of -- they said this will make you feel better. If you look up on Broadway review.com, or whatever it is, it goes through 2005-06 season. Suzanne Somers show written by Stan Davidson or Jacobson -- I think it's Davidson.
It was a review that I dreamed of. It was does she know what she has going against her? Did she know what we think? He wrote this thing about, "You should come see this show." So?
KING: We'll be back with our remaining moments right after this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SOMERS: I love you. I love you. I love you up there. I love you. I love you. I love you way up there. I love you. I love you, band.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CAROL LIN, CNN NEWS ANCHOR: Coming up in just six minutes, Miss Manners cover your ears. Diplomats sounding off. Sanctions against North Korea, but will they work? We'll ask your opinion.
And he went from down in the dumps to straight and narrow. What you can learn about life and ambition from this former crack addict. Yeah, he's on a bike. All coming up at the top of the hour right here in "The Newsroom."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: Our remaining moments are here, with Suzanne Somers. Her book is "Ageless." Going back to Vegas?
SOMERS: I am.
KING: When?
SOMERS: I am, November 9th. My first time back in 15 years, I guess.
KING: What hotel?
SOMERS: New Orleans. I can't wait. I can't wait. See my career's interesting. I can -- I can do nightclubs. I have a lecture business. The Home Shopping business. The party business. I write the books. And this is when it's all supposed to be going down hill. I wake up every morning. I don't mean to sound Pollyanna, but happy, really happy. Life is good. Life is really good.
KING: Don't you -- with all of the things you do, don't you miss performing? When you're not performing?
SOMERS: I do.
KING: Don't you like -- wouldn't you like to be on stage tonight?
SOMERS: I loved it. I -- if the right thing comes up I'll do it again. If the right television series comes up, I'll do it again.
KING: You would go back?
SOMERS: Yes, yes, I would. Absolutely. If I can fit it in. I was just offered something -- I don't want to say, because now they've offered it to somebody else. Oh, I would have loved to have done this series. I had to turn it down because it was right now. And I had this book coming out.
And I said to this person -- who you know -- I said, if I take this show you're going end up hating me because I have to ask you for this week off, we're launching the new party business, we're launching another business over here. I said I'm going to have to miss the first two months. I said it's impossible.
The timing wasn't right. When it is -- right now I just want to teach women how their bodies work how they can -- how they can go to the doctor and not feel so helpless because if they read everything in that book, they will be able to go in -- even with a doctor who doesn't know anything -- and say I want this test, that test, this test. I want to know what optimal levels are.
KING: Do you ever think -- it's probably ridiculous -- of retiring.
SOMERS: No.
KING: Go to Arizona? Scottsdale.
SOMERS: Only --
(LAUGHTER)
KING: Go with Alan, go to Scottsdale, sit on a park bench, watch pigeons, eat grapes?
SOMERS: You know we have two seagulls who come every morning. I woke up this morning --
KING: Two Jewish guys?
(LAUGHTER)
SOMERS: Right, George.
(LAUGHTER)
I woke up this morning. I roll over in bed -- we live at the ocean. I roll over and there's this seagull going -- staring at me from outside. And he waits out there -- not for me, for Alan. He has a thing with animals. They wait for Alan every morning, these two seagulls. And he goes out there in his underpants and feeds them bread. And that's our life.
KING: And don't forget to look for Suzanne's next book, "Why Seagulls Will Help You Live Longer." -- "Life With a Seagull." Thank you, doll.
SOMERS: You, too, thanks.
KING: One of my favorite people, Suzanne Somers, the book is "Ageless." the Publisher is Crown, with 16 interviews from cutting edge doctors on how to slow the aging process for woman and men.
That's tonight's edition of LARRY KING LIVE. Stay tuned for more news, around the clock, on your most trusted name in news, CNN. Good night.
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