Many women come through the doors of Battle Born Health feeling just generally crappy. They have been struggling with feeling wired and tired and experiencing symptoms like weight gain or trouble losing weight, excess fatigue, no sex drive, and a gut that is a mess no matter what they eat. And the worst part is they have been to every GI doc, taken every supplement, tried multiple diets only to have no results or be misdiagnosed with perimenopause, general stress, thyroid issues, etc.
I see a lot of misdiagnosed women who just feel like crap. They know they do not feel like themselves – they may be irritable, get stressed faster, have little patience or be chronically tired. They feel like they are surviving rather than thriving. Unfortunately, traditional western medicine has to “cross things off” or have patients meet certain parameters to be diagnosed. But these women often meet some of the criteria for thyroid disease, for example, but not all, so they are either diagnosed with nothing and feel like they are a mystery, or they are diagnosed improperly and being treated for a condition that is not the root of the issue.
This frustration and desire to figure out what’s going on so they can feel better is what drives women to try functional medicine. Functional medicine looks at the whole person, not just their symptoms. It is a patient-centered approach to health and chronic disease management that focuses on nutrition, hormones, supplements, exercise and lifestyle changes to repair or eliminate the root cause so that the symptoms, too, are remedied.
Usually, we find the root of their symptoms are hormonal imbalances. For women who are trying to lose weight and not getting results, we find that they are not doing enough rest and recovery. For almost all women, they are functioning on not enough sleep and too much stress – a terrible combination and perfect recipe to feel like crap all the time. We also evaluate things like emotional, loving connections and how to make those a larger priority on your health journey.
There are also many environmental factors that can make you feel like crap. The smoke in our area this summer has wreaked havoc on our air quality and our emotional state of mind. We are still in this pandemic perpetuating an undercurrent of fear and the unknown. And you may be going through big life changes like having a new baby or your baby going off to college. As the saying goes, your body keeps the score and if you are going through lots of environmental stressors, your body may be having a hard time tolerating the stress and change.
To start feeling better and stay well, you have to start by understanding where you are at. If you are stressed, a transformational boot camp is the worst idea for you. When you are in our functional medicine program, we will help you discover the right thing for your body at different times in your journey. This requires constant evaluation, in our program but also beyond. You are never in the same place twice, so what works when you are 42 may be totally different at age 45. You have to listen to your body and your body language so you can understand the signals and adjust from there.
In my functional medicine coaching, I teach women about their bodies so they can continue to reach their health goals, not just in the 16-week program, but throughout their life. When women know about their bodies, they can be advocates for themselves throughout their life and never take a diagnosis or lack of diagnosis blindly again.
