Brian (1s):
Coming up on the GET, LEAN, Eat, Clean, Podcast
Rachel (3s):
Focusing on the nutrition stuff. It's like, yeah, it's helpful 'cause it's a quick win. But people get so focused on it, like so focused on the food, so focused on like the lab results. And I'm over here like, no, let's focus on your body. Like how can we reduce your stress? How can we start to regulate your nervous system as fast as possible? Because that's gonna actually make you feel a lot better, right? If you feel more regulated in your body and you're not going to be responding the same way to all the stuff, all the overwhelm that's going on in your life. Like once we can get a regulated nervous system, the body can heal faster.
Brian (40s):
This week, I interviewed certified Functional Diagnostic, Nutrition, Practitioner Rachel. Smith She helps people with autoimmune diseases, mold illness, hormonal imbalances, and gut issues. She uncovers the root cause of health issues with functional medicine lab testing and then uses customized nutrition and lifestyle coaching to help people thrive. again. We discussed Rachel's health journey. Overcoming Autoimmunity, Gut, Health, the Importance of Minerals, Rachel's elimination diet and her one tip to get your body back to what it once was. Really enjoyed my interview with Rachel. I know you will too. Thanks so much for listening and enjoy the show. All, right Welcome to the Get Lean Eat Clean podcast.
Brian (1m 21s):
My name is Brian Gryn and I have Rachel Smith on Welcome to the show. Thanks
Rachel (1m 25s):
For having me on. Brian.
Brian (1m 27s):
Yeah, thanks for coming on. I found Rachel, she's a FDN practitioner, like myself and listen to her on, on another podcast, I guess. God, I'd love to get her on and talk about all things FDN and autoimmunity. I know that's an area that you've sort of focused on. And just to let the audience know what sort of, what was your journey into FDN and becoming a practitioner and then helping others? Yeah, you could give the short versions though. It's okay.
Rachel (1m 54s):
I always, every podcast, I think, how can I make this shorter and shorter? No, you know, I wanna give the, the real version. So I was always sick, like my whole life, even straight outta the womb pretty quickly as an infant I had was hospitalized with pneumonia, so had lots of lung issues growing up, wound up then having a lot of digestive issues, stomach always hurt, just little things like that. Always was in and out of doctor's offices and to me it became normal to be doing that stuff. And then in my, I was like in my teenage years was getting into bodybuilding, weightlifting, sports, things like that. Started to kind of learn about like protein powders and diet changes and things.
Rachel (2m 37s):
And I remember at a certain point I took dairy outta my diet and my so-called Athlete's Asthma went away and my stomach started to feel better. So that was the first time I really started to make a connection between diet and lifestyle and how I was feeling and realizing that I could possibly feel a lot better than I was. And then as I was approaching my late teens getting into my twenties, my health was just a complete tra tra train wreck, like heart palpitations, hair falling out. I lost my period for three years at one point, panic attacks, anxiety, all the things started to come on. And again, I found myself in and out of doctor's offices, in and out of hospitals.
Rachel (3m 19s):
And everyone kept telling me like, your blood work is normal. There's nothing wrong with you. Maybe you just have some anxiety, you know, all the things that they say. And one night I wound up getting admitted to the hospital for my heart palpitations and the doctor said, we have to do exploratory heart surgery on you. And I was so scared I said, okay, I don't know what's happening. Maybe there really is something wrong with my heart. Come out of the surgery. Absolutely nothing's wrong. So I was, that was the tipping point for me. I was super upset that I had just been going through this vicious cycle and I found a Hashimoto's and thyroid specialist who was a functional practitioner in Florida where I was living at the time because through my own research, I thought it was thyroid related, went to this functional practitioner.
Rachel (4m 9s):
He did all these different lab tests, food sensitivity tests, gut testing, all these things I'd never seen before. And, what do you know? It turns out I had Hashimoto's, which is an autoimmune disease of the thyroid. So I immediately started changing my diet, started changing my lifestyle. He had me on all these supplements, all these different things. I got really curious. I then hired an acupuncturist, I started hiring other holistic practitioners. And very quickly as I was changing my diet more and more those symptoms started going away. And after that, I mean my whole life changed. I, the more work that I did, the better my body healed, the better I felt. And I felt so inspired by this that I wound up leaving my job in corporate America and going back to school to study.
Rachel (4m 55s):
Actually I went a pre-med track into medical school, but then wound up switching to become an FDN as I was in medical school. And so happy that I did it because Now I have worked with hundreds of people with autoimmunity, chronic illnesses, mold illness, Lyme disease, all sorts of different, very challenging illnesses that conventional medicine often tells us that there's no solutions for. And we're able to get people to a place where their autoimmunity is in remission or they're just, you know, able to get their life back and feel healthy and vibrant again. Yeah,
Brian (5m 29s):
What a journey, huh. And I know I And now you're, you're practicing out of Austin, Texas, right?
Rachel (5m 36s):
I'm online, so yeah,
Brian (5m 37s):
Anywhere I
Rachel (5m 38s):
Work with, I work with people. I mean I'm living in Austin now, yes. Yeah. But I've worked with people in Europe actually, and a, a few people in Canada, but mostly people spread across the United States.
Brian (5m 48s):
And is your, I mean, we talk about autoimmunity, which I think is like this blanket term that gets thrown around that is almost like, you can't, it's like uncurable sort of thing. Yeah. People are just like stuck with it. What, what would you say as far as autoimmunity and obviously you've helped a lot of people overcome that. Can most of autoimmunity be overcome?
Rachel (6m 8s):
I believe so. I believe that most diseases, unless you are born with something, if you're getting something later on in life, most of this stuff can be, I don't wanna use the word cured, but Right. Your symptoms can be alleviated, right? we can get your body to a totally different place. Whether that's getting rid of all of your symptoms or getting rid of 75% of them and just making you be able to live your life again, it's totally possible. It's just so many different components, right? It's figuring out why did you get sick in the first place? Working on some of those internal factors, maybe there's pathogens that are involved, maybe there's environmental toxins and then there's all the lifestyle stuff that has to come along with that.
Brian (6m 49s):
And with the like environmental toxins, like what type of testing do you do with your clients to help sort of, you know, find out, you know, what, what's sort of causing the issue?
Rachel (6m 58s):
Yeah, I like to do a GI map. Testing is not necessarily for environmental toxins, but that's looking at Gut Health, which is very, very important with autoimmunity because anybody who has autoimmune issues is usually going to have leaky gut and different pathogens going on or dysbiosis in their microbiome. I like to do organic acids testing, which is looking at, it's like 76 or so different markers that are looking at neurotransmitters and mold and yeast in the gut. Which, you know, part of that can be environmental antioxidants, vitamins, mitochondrial health. I like to look at the HTMA, which is a hair tissue mineral analysis. This is looking at three months worth of data of heavy metals that can definitely be environmental as well as minerals.
Rachel (7m 44s):
Not for everybody, but for a lot of people, just because I tend to get these clients in the door are is mycotoxin testing to look at the mold toxins that could be coming from somebody's home or work or car. And let's see, what else? I mean we do general like blood testing as well.
Brian (8m 2s):
Okay. So pretty much start for the most part for most clients you'll start with like the gut and then work from there. Yeah,
Rachel (8m 8s):
Yeah. Pretty much all of those that I, I listed except the mycotoxin testing is, is on an as needed basis
Brian (8m 15s):
Maybe. Sure. Like a client testimonial or someone that you've helped with recently that maybe has had some autoimmune issues and, and you helped sort of get them back to maybe what they were.
Rachel (8m 25s):
Yeah, person that's coming to my head first is, let's call her Jessica, that's not her name, let's call her Jessica. And I've actually, I'm still working with her. We've been working together for like a year, over a year now, which that's not typical. Usually with my clients we work together for six months and they're like, I'm feeling awesome, I'm good to go. But this person had been dealing with what was called lupus. I'm putting in quotations right now what's called lupus and Hashimoto's for decades, like since she was a teenager, I believe she was diagnosed with these things and was just like, yep, I have these horrible flareups. My face gets inflamed, I feel really fatigued.
Rachel (9m 6s):
I feel super crappy, but still helping her husband run a business and has kids and is doing all these amazing things with her life. But then struggling with these symptoms. And when she came to me, we initially started off with a lot of those tests that I told you about and we did find that there was mold So, we were working on that and her symptoms started to improve drastically. Energy started coming back, she stopped getting her lupus flares. So again, for decades she was getting like the butterfly rash on her face, stopped getting her lupus flares, she was getting chronic headaches, very common symptom of mold illness is just like chronic sinus and headaches and neurological issues.
Rachel (9m 50s):
But then something still was a little off, you know, we're like, there's something that's missing here. So, we wound up doing a full tick-borne illness panel and found out that she has Lyme disease as well and also other co-infections. So just different tick-borne illnesses. and we have been working on that. So that one does take a little bit longer to get rid of, but at this point she has all of her inflammation down. She's lost weight for the first time in decades. Again, she's not having these lupus flares. She has energy, she's working out again, she's able to like take care of her kids differently and show up at work differently. So she has had a total turnaround and we're still doing a little bit of of work on that. But yeah, and I, I, I put the quotations in like the lupus and stuff because again, these are just symptoms that we are classifying as a disease.
Rachel (10m 39s):
When in reality what was triggering that for her it was tickborne infections and environmental toxins. Yeah.
Brian (10m 46s):
And as far as like supplements, do you utilize supplements quite a bit with your clients And, and if so, like what, what are some of your go-tos as far
Rachel (10m 54s):
As, sure. So I believe that the lifestyle stuff is so important, right? Sometimes that can get somebody feeling 50% better just with dietary changes and lifestyle changes. And if somebody has any sort of chronic infections like Lyme, pylori, parasites, maybe they have mold, that stuff does need supplements pretty much no matter what. So that will really push that person from feeling 50% better to 80, 90% better and so on. As far as types of supplements go, I do not use any type of the cookie cutter packages is what I like to call them. I'm not gonna call any brands or anything, but there's, you know, oh follow this protocol, steps one through nine and you're gonna feel great.
Rachel (11m 39s):
I think that's not looking at someone's bioindividuality. So I go through full script, which is an online supplement dispensary where you know, we can give clients a discount on there to help them out. And I will pick and choose the things that I think are gonna be most beneficial for them based upon maybe if they have allergy sensitivities, their lab results, And what of course what do they need to help them get better.
Brian (12m 5s):
Hmm, I see. Yeah. And I know you mentioned with testing like minerals, how, what's the Importance of Minerals when it comes to perhaps Overcoming? Autoimmunity?
Rachel (12m 13s):
There's the common saying, minerals are the spark plugs of our cells. So, we, we, we need them to live, right? Where we can't live without minerals in our bodies. We're completely made up of minerals along with bacteria and different things. And some things that I see commonly with people with autoimmune issues with minerals would be one really low potassium. This seems to be very, very common. I think people are starting to understand that salt is not bad. So sodium levels might not, might not be terrible, but I think potassium is really not spoken about enough. And a lot of our minerals, calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, when our body is under a lot of stress, whether that be mental emotional stress or the stress from the internal pathogens or the environmental toxins, our body's gonna perceive all of that stuff as stress along with people get stressed about being sick too, right?
Rachel (13m 5s):
It's like this vicious cycle. So that stress will induce a enhanced or an elevated release of these minerals or like we're burning through the calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium a lot quicker. And those are so vital to our bodies. So a lot of people will be super low in minerals, they'll be burning through them 'cause they're super stressed. Again, looking like a pattern of having low potassium or low magnesium for example. We need certain minerals for certain organs. So potassium is really important for our energy, it's really important for our thyroid as well. I see a lot of people with like Hashimoto's and thyroid issues having very low potassium levels.
Rachel (13m 46s):
Also calcium is another one that we'll see issues with where people will have what's called like a calcium shell. And are you familiar with, do you use HGMA testing?
Brian (13m 58s):
I haven't yet, no.
Rachel (13m 59s):
Okay. Yeah. So calcium, the
Brian (14m 1s):
The hair mineral. The hair mineral, yeah, yeah, yeah. I've done a here mineral test through, this is before FDN And, now I'm drawing a blank on the name of the company, but I've done it once before. Anyways, go ahead, I'm sorry.
Rachel (14m 12s):
Yeah, no you're good. I see calcium shells a lot with people who usually their symptoms will be like low thyroid like symptoms as well. A lot of fatigue and apathy and some even some like aches and pains in the body, low energy levels. And this calcium kind of gets built up in the nervous system. And this can be from a lot of past trauma, a lot of stress. It could be from things like hard water or taking supplements and properly like taking boatloads of vitamin D without K two or taking boatloads of calcium and not needing it. So those are some common patterns. Obviously we could talk like all day about minerals, but, okay.
Rachel (14m 52s):
I'll pause there for a second.
Brian (14m 54s):
And, what about any dietary approaches that you sort of go to? I mean nowadays it's like everyone's inundated with like different diets and different ways of eating from carnivore to vegetarian to this pro metabolic sort of, if I just had Kate daring on the show, which actually sort of is something that I think is, I think it's a good balance, the pro metabolic sort of way of eating. But you know, some people find other ways that they enjoy. But I'm curious your, your thoughts on any dietary approaches. you know,
Rachel (15m 25s):
So I, since my clients are coming to me with autoimmune diseases specifically, or they're presenting with a lot of symptoms that are similar to what one might look like, I like to use an a IP diet if possible with people for at least three months Autoimmune protocol. Yeah, the autoimmune protocol, right. Okay. And take them through that. I provide them with lots of recipes and handouts and all of that stuff. I know it can be very confusing and stressful for people, but I really try to help them add in more produce and organic veggies and talking about adding in more clean meats, And, you know, animal proteins. And so they'll do that for a few months and then after that we'll do a very slow introduction process where we're testing out specific foods with their body to see how they're reacting to them.
Rachel (16m 15s):
Are they having a reaction if they eat tomatoes again or if they eat eggs or rice or something like that. Which are some of the things that we've taken out. And many people, almost everybody finds at that point that they're so much more in tune with their body and they're able to kind of find their own eating plan after that. Right? So some people might never be able to eat eggs again and they've been sensitive their whole life, but many people can heal a lot of those food sensitivities because we've worked on healing the gut during that time of taking some of those foods out. And so my goal for people is to get them eating a more diverse diet where it's including animal proteins.
Rachel (16m 55s):
A lot of produce. I don't eat grains and legumes specifically. I might have them every once in a while if I'm going out to eat with somebody and there's not a lot of options or I wanna have some sort of treat that has it in it. But I kind of leave that to people to figure out themselves because I want them to feel autonomous and like, okay, I know what my body likes to consume.
Brian (17m 17s):
Yeah. And just so people know, the autoimmune protocol, is that pretty much just taking out like the largest offenders? Like things that could possibly call it cause inflammation?
Rachel (17m 27s):
Yeah, there's a lot of different reasons for different ones, but you're taking out legumes, grains, nuts and seeds as well. Night night shades, which is like a lot of spices and tomatoes and eggplants you're taking out. Technically chocolate is in the legume category and coffee too. But a lot of people forget about those. I got a Sam, we take out eggs too. So essentially it's like, and dairy, essentially it's meat and produce. Hmm, right. It's like super simple. You could do a lot of coconut products for some of your fats or like avocado products for some of your fats and healthy fatty meats, but you have everything you need there. You just have to learn how do you get in enough carbohydrates and fats and proteins to feel satiated?
Brian (18m 12s):
Yeah. Well I, I feel like for most people if they went just on that just, it had like protein meats and vegetables and what's your thoughts around like are fruits allowed or those, those brought in maybe later?
Rachel (18m 27s):
Fruits are totally allowed fruit's. Okay. The only problem with fruit is if somebody was eating, like a lot of dried fruit can be super high in sugar. And I would say most people I see have a candida overgrowth. So candida overgrowth is a, we all have this fungus in our body, this yeast candida, it's fine, it's lives symbiotically with us, but when it overgrows it causes a lot of different symptoms. And so in order to reduce that, there's a lot of things to deal with heavy metals and supplements to kill the candida and many other things involved in that. But we wanna reduce sugar a little bit because yeast likes to eat sugar. So if somebody is trying to get rid of their candida, we will do lower.
Rachel (19m 9s):
Like, okay, let's not do the dried fruits right now. Let's not eat a bunch of bananas every day that's super high in sugar. But maybe instead let's do green apples, berries, kiwis, some things that are, you can still have your sugar, you know, you can still have your fruit, but let's keep it on the lower end for a a few months.
Brian (19m 28s):
And, what, what percentage of your clients come in with perhaps like parasites and some of you know And, what type of protocols would you do for someone like that?
Rachel (19m 37s):
I think a lot of people have parasites. I, I think, I don't even know if it's possible to really get rid of all the parasites in our bodies like all the time, right? It's like how can we actually do that? We're exposed to so much constantly, but there can be parasites that can trigger symptoms in people, right? So, we will do the GI map testing, which will look for parasites. However, I don't find any testing is really accurate for parasites because they're just hard to find in the stool. It's a culture in the stool and they might be somewhere else in the body as well. We're not just, we're not gonna see them on the gut test. So I will look at that. If something pops up, awesome, we know exactly what we wanna target if something doesn't pop up.
Rachel (20m 18s):
But they're still, they have things like anal itching and teeth clenching and bloating and other di digestive issues. And maybe they've never treated for paras or taken anything for parasites before. Maybe they've traveled a lot. Like, okay, let's give you something for a month or a few months for parasites while we're doing your other gut protocol to help get rid of that potential bug in there that could be bothering you. So it's gonna look different depending upon the symptoms that are coming up and if we're seeing something on a gut test.
Brian (20m 51s):
Got it. Got it. And I noticed on your website you have a four day reboot plan. Is that, is that what's, maybe give the audience a tidbit of what that's
Rachel (20m 60s):
If if they want a little freebie? Yeah, I have a few different things out there, but I have that, that's a four day plan that has, there's some other holistic health and lifestyle tips in there. And then there's also the four day of recipes. So those recipes are autoimmune friendly, paleo friendly, you know, for dairy free people, gluten-free people, all of those people, they can have all of those meals on there. And it's really just meant to help you see what it feels like to reduce that inflammation. And usually that can increase energy. And so giving you a little bit of a taste of what the nutrition plus some lifestyle changes can do for you.
Brian (21m 38s):
Well, yeah, and we'll put Links in the show notes for that. Another good question I like to ask, I I think it's a good question is what's, what's like one thing you've changed your mind on over the past, let's say, you know, five to 10 years?
Rachel (21m 50s):
One thing I've changed my mind on food sensitivity testing, I used to do food sensitivity testing. And
Brian (21m 55s):
Is that the Mr T? Is that the MRT? I've
Rachel (21m 57s):
Done a lot of different ones. I've done other random ones on myself. I've done the mr I used to do the MRT on people when I first started doing FDNI tried some other tests on people as well. And yeah, I find that my approach of just doing the simple, like here's the straightforward plan for you to follow, instead of me analyzing like, oh my gosh, you also can't eat like apples right now and broccoli and this and this. And they're like, but wait, but I don't feel bad when I eat that food. So I don't think they're always accurate. And since we can heal a lot of food sensitivities, instead of making someone fear some of the healthier foods, I just focus on taking out, like you called it before, those big offenders.
Rachel (22m 40s):
And then also tuning into their body. Like, hey, if you do eat broccoli and it makes you super bloated right now, let's not have the broccoli for a couple months and see how you respond later on.
Brian (22m 50s):
Okay, so you've got that you've changed your mind on food sensitivity testing and just go on to sort of a, a basic protocol to eliminate the big offenders and see how they react from that.
Rachel (23m 1s):
Yeah.
Brian (23m 2s):
Nice. Anything else?
Rachel (23m 3s):
I'm sure that there's gonna be things that will pop up in my head. I'm trying to think. I'm sure there's so many things I'm starting to change my mind. I'm actually starting to change my mind right now about something which is doing more, like how do we start to incorporate more of the, 'cause I teach people nervous system regulation stuff, but it's like they need it now. They don't need it later. I, I find I'm finding that focusing on the nutrition stuff, it's like, yeah, it's helpful 'cause it's a quick win, but people get so focused on it, like so focused on the food, so focused on like the lab results and I'm over here like, no, let's focus on your body.
Rachel (23m 47s):
Like how can we reduce your stress? How can we start to regulate your nervous system as fast as possible? Because that's gonna actually make you feel a lot better, right? If you feel more regulated in your body and you're not going to be responding the same way to all the stuff, all the overwhelm that's going on in your life. Like once we can get a regulated nervous system, the body can heal faster.
Brian (24m 14s):
And is is as far as like regulating the nervous system, is this something that you've taken on recently or you've added into your practices just like a must have for your clients?
Rachel (24m 24s):
So I've been doing nervous system and stress management stuff on I think a little bit of a deeper level than maybe what FDN teaches for a while, for a few years because I went out and did extra certifications and just like educated myself on stuff. And so I've been doing that stuff recently. I became a certified somatic breathwork practitioner as well very recently, like a month ago, month and a half ago. So now that's being integrated into my programs too. And I'm just like super hungry to keep learning more and more about this stuff and figure out like, okay, how can we make this easier and better for people?
Brian (25m 3s):
Yeah, I think that's so necessary because like you can get stressed out about all this stuff, what to eat, like when to eat and like what's your protocol? It's like if what you're do, how should I say this? If what you're trying to do is meant to heal you, but you're stressed off, stressed out about actually trying to do that, right? Yeah, yeah. You're probably just gonna run in circles.
Rachel (25m 26s):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. I teach everybody about the, the polyvagal theory and I have like a nice little chart that I show them and explaining like, okay, if your nervous system is here, this is what's happening to your digestion and your immunity and this and that. And like, okay, if you're here, if you're in freeze, this is what's happening. And so first educating them and, and then the light bulb goes off like, oh my gosh, I've been living in fight or flight every day, or I've been living in freeze and fight or flight on and off, like every day I need to change that. And that's usually a good starting point for, for people to just like tune in and learn and then start to take some small steps to get themselves out of that.
Brian (26m 6s):
And those steps would be just learning how to like breathe correctly, maybe do some type of meditation or those things that you
Rachel (26m 12s):
Not always. Okay. It depends. It depends where you're at. If you're in, if you're in freeze, you're not gonna, when
Brian (26m 19s):
You say freeze, you
Rachel (26m 20s):
Meditate. Yeah. So if you're a freeze state, think of like a deer in a headlights that is the free state. It is nature intended, or God intended us to have that, to do a couple different things. One is to numb ourselves out. Like if an animal was actually about to attack another animal and he froze, it shuts everything down in the body to a point where they're gonna literally be more numbed out and they won't feel what's happening to them as much. Also, it's playing dead in a sense, right? There's like the fawn and freeze area. So an animal can freeze and kind of play dead as a protective mechanism and maybe that other animal won't eat them. So as a human being, we can also go into freeze And.
Rachel (27m 3s):
what happens is everything shuts down, our blood pressure goes down, our circulation goes down, our heart rate goes down. So, we have like no blood going to our extremities and, and we're just, we feel toast. And usually people will feel like depressed and hopeless and just really like, I can't do anything. I'm, I'm frozen in this state. Nobody's gonna meditate and feel better. Like, you're not just gonna go sit down and be like, oh yeah, I'm gonna go zen out. No, you're already so zen out that you're too zen. You're just like, you know, you're kind of a ragdoll and so you wanna do some gentle things to wake your body back up. And that could be, there's a lot of different stuff out there. you know, people can look up like somatic workouts and somatic regulation techniques for freeze.
Rachel (27m 48s):
But sometimes it's as simple as like taking your shoes off and being barefoot. And if you can go outside and do this, this is even better. And, and some grass or just being in your house and first just like feeling your feet, the bottom of your feet on the ground. And then maybe we can like bend our knees a little bit and then can we squeeze our body, start to squeeze our extremities and go put pressure on our head and on our neck and on all of our limbs and our body and start to bring some aliveness back into it. Put a hand on the heart, feel your heart beating, like, okay, I'm here. I'm safe, I'm alive. Taking some deep breaths, bringing your vision to your peripheral area because when our vision is just straight focused, we're in that freeze or fight or flight.
Rachel (28m 32s):
So when we open up our vision and we have like a good peripheral view, it's signaling safety to the body. And then you can kind of start to do more movement, right? Like starting to move the wrist, starting to shake the wrists and the arms a little bit. And eventually if you can get yourself to a nice like bounce or a shake, you're gonna start to feel a lot better. But that's like for the freeze people, right? And if we're in a, a fight or flight, our body is anxious, we're worried, we're freaking out, we're, you know, we're kind of in like this, ah, when I don't know what I should do right now, state and here shaking actually is really good. There are other things that like tapping, EFT, emotional freedom technique, those are a couple things that that can be helpful for, for those states.
Brian (29m 19s):
Got it. Okay. Yeah, I like asking guests about like their routine. Like what do you have a morning? Yeah. Do you have a morning and evening routine that you like to share? Yeah,
Rachel (29m 28s):
I wish I could give you like a cool, cool routine. I used to have a really good one, but as my body healed And, now I'm in flow. So some mornings, some things that are consistent for me is like, I'll wake up in the morning and I will go hydrate with a certain blend of supplements. So I'll do creatine, keon amino acids, I'll put some electrolytes in there like adrenal cocktail and some other minerals and an acetol. And that's like my, what
Brian (29m 58s):
Was the, what was the last thing?
Rachel (29m 60s):
Myo and acetol.
Brian (30m 1s):
Okay.
Rachel (30m 2s):
Yeah. For, you know, hormones, for blood sugar regulation, all that. So I'll have my little blend, I'll drink that. A lot of times I'll go drink it outside, like go to my backyard in the grass, barefoot in the grass, have the sun on my face, get that sunshine exposure. And then I'll either like go on a walk or sometimes I'll go on a run, like this morning I went on a run, kind of depends upon where I'm at with my cycle. 'cause hormones, you know, they dictate women's lives. So I'll do that. And then in the evening time, I will do something that's like winding down. So once the sun sets, I'll turn on my red lights.
Rachel (30m 44s):
I have the bond charge blue light blocking bulbs. So I'll turn some of those lamps on. And then I have like some Himalayan salt lamps, so I'll turn on so that I'm not blasting myself with artificial light. I have a Thera sauna, which I love. So I'll do that a few times per week. And if I'm doing that, I'll do like a Joe Dispenza meditation in the Thera. So I'll like really zen out in there and sweat for a while. The nights that I'm not doing that, I might read a book or I might just like, go with the flow and do whatever feels good.
Brian (31m 16s):
Nice. And as far as resistance, do you do like any re do you just run or do you do resistance training as well or
Rachel (31m 22s):
Resistance training? Yeah, I,
Brian (31m 24s):
And you're Muay Thai? I I, I used to, I mean, I've done my Muay Thai on and off for years now.
Rachel (31m 29s):
Yeah. I am a big weightlifter. I'm actually not a runner, but I'm trying to become a runner. So I'm, I'm a little slow right now, but I'm about to join. I wanna try and join some run clubs in Austin and see how that goes. I did competitive weightlifting in high school, Florida offered that for people in high school. I know not all states offer that, but that is where I developed my love for weightlifting and just became obsessed with it. So like, weight training is always a thing for me a few times per week minimum. Yeah. I used to do Muay Thai too when I was in high school for years. And then at one point I taught these, what was it called? Strike Fit. I taught strike fit classes, which was a blend of like Kav maga Mm.
Rachel (32m 12s):
But I was also allowed to combine my Muay Hai skills in it plus like HIIT workouts. Oh, that's cool. So I did that for a little bit actually while I was in the FDN program and I was doing my certification. Yeah,
Brian (32m 24s):
I've, I've never been a big runner. So like Muay Hai was like my way of, I guess cardio, if you wanna say, but self-protection and Yeah. Yeah, I love doing it. I don't do it as much anymore. I'm not like 25, you know, you're young, but I'm not, I'm not my twenties anymore.
Rachel (32m 39s):
Well, I don't do it anymore either, even though I think it's so cool and I love it. It's just, I'm scared of being hurt, to be honest, in a lot of these places, they don't have the best regulation. They're not like watching you spar with a man and like making sure that the man's not gonna hit you in the face, which they will. It's, it's not good. So my thing is dance, I, oh, cool. I love West Coast swing dancing. I love all sorts of different dancing styles, and that is also cardio to me. So it's a fun way to get to movement in,
Brian (33m 11s):
And I'll ask you this question. What, what one tip would you give an individual that's maybe looking to get their body back to what it once was 10, 15 years ago? What one tip would you give that individual? I
Rachel (33m 21s):
Would say don't label yourself with your disease. Like, if you keep focusing on it and, and thinking like, yeah, I have Hashimoto's and or Lupus or whatever, and like, I can't do all these things. Usually that's gonna keep you in that mindset of associating yourself with that disease versus like having the hope and knowing that you can actually heal and get better. So one, it's just kind of a little bit of a mindset shift. And two is keep looking for the right person to help you because there are so many people out there. And if you can't afford that, then definitely listen to all of these podcasts and, and get all the free resources you can.
Rachel (34m 1s):
It's gonna take a little bit, maybe take a little bit longer of a journey, but use those resources, do all the lifestyle stuff first, and then if you're still needing support, find a really good functional practitioner and they will be able to guide you to the, to the finish line
Brian (34m 16s):
Promised land to the promised land.
Rachel (34m 18s):
Yeah. Yeah. And it's all, and it's, and the last thing, it's like, it's, it is a lifestyle though. It, there isn't actually, there isn't like a finish line, right? I don't know if there is a promised land. It's like we're all doing, the people who started doing healthy things for themselves because they got sick, we're, we're still doing them to keep ourselves from being sick. And because we've learned that we, we have to enjoy these things. Like you have to enjoy the process of like getting in the sauna and meditating or eating healthy foods because there isn't gonna be a day where you just wake up and like, oh, everything's gone and I can go back to eating unhealthy foods again and like, eat McDonald's. Like, that's just not how it works.
Rachel (34m 58s):
So just learning to accept the, the journey and the lifestyle changes along with that.
Brian (35m 3s):
Yeah. No, I agree. I mean, making it a lifestyle change is important. And that's why, like you said, having a coach to like get you on track. 'cause a lot of times people will start something and then stop it and then keep going back and forth. But if you have someone to hold you accountable, then at least you can get you on track for not a week or two weeks. But like you said, like at least six months. Yeah. Yeah. To start seeing. Yeah. Great. You gotta build momentum. Right? Well this was great Rachel. Best place for people to find you.
Rachel (35m 32s):
Natural health rising everywhere. So natural health rising.com. Natural Health Rising on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube. I have a podcast at the Natural Health Rising Podcast. Oh yeah. I respond to my messages on Instagram. If anybody ever needs to reach out to me or has any questions, and you can always book a free health consult with me as well. If you're curious, if you're in a place where you feel like you're still trying to heal your body and you wanna know if it's a good fit to possibly work together, we can talk about that and you can find that link on all of those pages that I just talked about. Awesome.
Brian (36m 11s):
What's the name of your podcast?
Rachel (36m 12s):
The Natural Health Rising Podcast,
Brian (36m 14s):
Wouldn't you say? Awesome. Well, I will, I will put Links in the show notes for that. And yeah, Rachel, it's, I'm great. I'm grateful to connect with you and, and get you on the show, so thank you.
Rachel (36m 25s):
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. Brian. Gryn, welcome. This is great.
Brian (36m 28s):
Thanks for listening to the Get Lean Eat Clean Podcast. I understand there are millions of other podcasts out there, and you've chosen to listen to mine and I appreciate that. Check out the show notes@briangrin.com for everything that was mentioned in this episode. Feel free to subscribe to the podcast and share it with a friend or family member that's looking to get their body back to what it once was. Thanks again and have a great day.
