October 13, 2025 • 47 mins
If you’ve ever been told “it’s normal” when you knew it wasn’t—this episode is for you. I’m joined by Dr. Deb Muth—naturopathic doctor, functional medicine expert, and founder of Serenity Health Care Center—to talk about being seen at last: how to advocate for yourself, ask better questions, and get to root causes instead of living on prescriptions that never explain the “why.”
We dig into:
- Why women are diagnosed 4–5 years later than men for many conditions—and what to do about it in real time.
- The difference between normal vs. optimal labs (think vitamin D and thyroid) and how ranges can hide what you’re feeling.
- Practical advocacy: what to ask when a provider orders “a full workup,” which tests that usually aren’t included, and how to prepare.
- Hormones 101: broken sleep, irritability, brain fog—how progesterone, thyroid, and nutrient levels actually play together.
- Everyday detox & environment: simple ways to lower exposures (fresh air, air purifiers, lemon water, NAC, vitamin C) and why new homes can make you feel worse before better.
- When to get a second (and third) opinion—and why you should go outside the same hospital system.
- Dr. Deb’s personal story reversing a scary MS diagnosis by uncovering infections, mold, and toxins—and the hope that offers.
If you’re navigating symptoms that don’t add up—or you’ve stopped going to the doctor because you’re tired of being dismissed—this conversation offers language, next steps, and a reminder: you are the expert on your body.
Links
- Dr. Deb Muth: serenityhealthcarecenter.com | FB group “She Knows” | Book: Seen at Last
If this helped, share it with a friend who needs a little light, follow the show, and leave a quick review so more people can find these stories.
Thank you for listening to Hope Comes to Visit. If this conversation helps, follow the show, share it with someone who needs hope today, and leave a review - it helps others find their way to these conversations.
New episodes drop every Monday, so you can begin your week with a little light and a lot of hope.
For more stories, reflections, and ways to connect, visit www.DanielleElliottSmith.com or follow along on Instagram @daniellesmithtv and @HopeComestoVisit
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
He said, Well, I hate to say this to you, but you
have fibromyalgia.
Here's a prescription fornarcotics.
Here's a prescription for someantidepressants.
And go home and prepare to bedisabled in four years.
And my youngest son had justbeen born, maybe a year before
that.
And I was like, I wasflabbergasted.
I was like, are you kidding me?
(00:20):
Like, that's all you have tooffer me.
And I went out to the car,bawling my eyes out, calling my
husband, and he's like, thisisn't gonna be you.
SPEAKER_01 (00:36):
Hi there, friends.
I'm Danielle Elliott Smith, andthis is Hope Comes to Visit.
Let's take a deep breath, sharesome truth, and look for light
together.
Today we're talking aboutwomen's health.
It isn't niche, but it'snecessary.
If you've ever felt dismissed ina doctor's office, if you've
ever heard it's normal when youabsolutely know that it's not,
(00:59):
today's conversation is for you.
When you leave today, you'regoing to feel seen and heard in
a way that you likely haven't inquite some time.
I'm really excited to dive inwith my guest today, Dr.
Deborah Muth.
Deborah Muth is a naturopathicdoctor, functional medicine
expert, and the founder ofSerenity Healthcare Center.
Dr.
Deb, do you like prefer Dr.
(01:20):
Deb, Dr.
Deborah, or Dr.
Muth?
Everybody calls me Dr.
Deb.
That's what I thought.
Okay, so I'm gonna go with Dr.
Deb.
Dr.
Deb, thank you so much forjoining me.
I am so excited to have thisconversation.
You have a new book out.
Um, but your the way youpractice, the way that you see
women, especially from head totoe as a whole being is
(01:45):
extraordinary.
I felt like I felt like we werefriends almost just reading
through your book.
SPEAKER_00 (01:51):
Thank you for that.
That that was what I was hopingthat people would get the sense
and the feel that um their storyis not uh always unique.
It's unique to them, butunfortunately, the number of
women that are affected thesedays with stories like mine and
everybody else's, there's asisterhood that comes together
(02:13):
with us.
And I think a lot of times wefeel very alone.
And I was hoping that peoplewould feel like they're not
alone, but there's a group of usout there that can be sisters
together and we can share.
And it doesn't mean we wallow inour stories.
It's that we mean we empowereach other.
We don't have to give up and wedon't have to just say, yeah, I
got this label and this is mylife.
(02:33):
It doesn't have to be that way.
So that's what I was reallyhoping to present with the book.
So I'm glad you felt that way.
SPEAKER_01 (02:39):
Well, what's beautiful about what you're
saying there, and I think thisis sort of the universal
experience that I hope to createwith the podcast, is that
ability for people to feel seenand heard and known.
And the book is called Seen atLast, right?
So it's in my world, in thishope comes to visit world, I
(02:59):
want people to hear otherpeople's story and for it to
feel like they're hearing theirown story coming out of
someone's mouth.
And that was the experience Ihad reading the book.
Uh, and the beauty of thispodcast for me is that I get to
have these experiences withpeople and that that hope visits
me each and every time.
So I hope that it that itresonates with the audience as
(03:21):
well.
But um, so we haven't had achance to speak about
experience.
So I want I want you to share alittle bit about your experience
and then we we can chat back andforth.
But this isn't just somethingthat you do as a doctor.
This was this comes frompersonal and lived experience as
well.
So let's talk a little bit aboutyour history and and how this
(03:41):
all came to be.
SPEAKER_00 (03:42):
Yeah, absolutely.
So um, this is truly my storyand the story of so many women
that I hear every single day.
And and I've been blessed to bein the integrative slash
functional medicines uh spacefor over 25 years.
I started out as a traditionalwomen's health nurse
practitioner and learned veryquickly exactly what traditional
(04:05):
medicine was like.
And that's what led me to becomea naturopath because I knew
there was more out there thanwhat conventional medicine could
offer.
Um, when I was 28 years old, Ihad some symptoms that I didn't
like that I knew didn't fit.
Um, I had this weird numbnessand tingling and burning and
pain.
And that was in the 90s whenfibromyalgia hit the stage and
(04:27):
every woman got diagnosed withfibromyalgia.
And I remember going in to seemy doctor, and I knew I told my
husband, I'm coming out with oneof two diagnoses.
I said, it's either going to befibromyalgia or they're gonna
tell me I have MS.
And um it, I remember this day,like it was yesterday.
It was a beautiful summer day.
It was 100 degrees outside.
(04:48):
I had on a fleece jacket, a longsleeve shirt, going into the
doctor.
I get there, they're taking mytemperature, and the the MA is
like, let me go get a differentthermometer.
Something doesn't seem rightwith this one.
And we did that four times.
And finally I said, Do you wantto tell me what my temperature
was?
He's like, it can't be right.
It's 95.4.
There's no way that's possible.
And I looked at him and I said,I have on a fleece jacket and a
(05:12):
long sleeve shirt, and I'mreally comfortable.
So maybe there is an issue.
And they completely dismissedit.
And the doctor came in, spentabout 10 minutes with me, and uh
turned and looked at me, neveraddressed the body temperature
at all, just assumed it was abroken thing.
I couldn't have been brokenthere, somebody else, the
(05:32):
machine, right?
And uh he said, Well, I hate tosay this to you, but you have
fibromyalgia.
Here's a prescription fornarcotics, here's a prescription
for some antidepressants, and gohome and prepare to be disabled
in four years.
And my youngest son had justbeen born, maybe a year before
that.
And I was like, I wasflabbergasted.
(05:54):
I was like, Are you kidding me?
Like, that's all you have tooffer me.
And I went out to the car,bawling my eyes up, calling my
husband, and he's like, Thisisn't gonna be you.
And he's always been my rockbehind that.
Um and luckily I had mywitchcrafty friends back in the
day, 25 years ago.
That's what we callednaturopathic people in the
(06:14):
quacks, and I'm one of them now,which is okay.
And uh I called them and I said,You guys know someone that can
help me?
And they were like, Absolutely,come with us.
And they introduced me to thisamazing world of integrated
medicine and nutrition andlifestyle changes that today we
know so much more freely than weever did then.
And um, they looked at me andsaid, You've got some thyroid
(06:37):
issues, you've got someovergrowth of yeast issues going
on.
Here's a diet, here's somesupplements.
Literally three weeks later, allmy symptoms were gone.
SPEAKER_01 (06:46):
See, that's amazing.
So it interestingly enough, see,we haven't had a chance to talk
about this.
I was diagnosed withfibromyalgia at 18.
So before it hit mainstream.
And the doctor at the time, Iwas 18 for 18 on all the
pressure points.
My mom was diagnosed first,leading rheumatologist in Los
Angeles.
(07:07):
And she came home and said, Ohmy gosh, Danielle, we've been
trying because I'd been going todoctors for years trying to
figure out what was wrong.
And so the fibromyalgia at thetime was a, oh my gosh, we
finally know what's wrong withyou.
Yeah.
However, I did have a similarexperience in terms of here's a
muscle relaxant, here's apainkiller.
(07:28):
Um, good luck.
He said to me, because I said,What does this mean?
And he said, So it means thatyou're going to never be able to
do anything that's high impact.
You can't wait tables, you can'ttake any high exercise, and
you're going to be taking thismedication.
And so I instantly went and tooka STEP class and got a job
(07:49):
waiting tables.
And but I reached a point whereI could take Vicodin the way I
took Tylenol within a couple ofyears.
And I thought, well, thisdoesn't feel right.
And I had no knowledge ofaddiction to medications at the
time, but I did just stop takingthe medications because I
thought at some point I'm goingto need this medication.
(08:09):
So I probably shouldn't be ableto take it this way.
So I just stopped.
But because I had been takingtoo much, I'm now allergic to
Vicadin.
Wow.
So I but I knew it wasn't right.
It was interesting to me,though, reading your book, how
you were talking about how somany of the symptoms, the
(08:30):
symptomology of fibromyalgia istypically indicative of
something else because we're notpaying attention to all of the
external and environmental andeverything else.
But part of the challenge with afibromyalgia diagnosis is
everything else gets lumpedunderneath it.
And anytime I've ever hadanything else go wrong, it's
(08:54):
been, oh, it's the fibro.
If it's my stomach, if it's myhead, if it's my heart,
anything, it's the fibro.
And so I've ultimately stoppedgoing to doctors.
And so I would like you to sharewith the audience because one of
the things that was so I hate touse the word staggering, it's so
(09:17):
overused in in this type ofenvironment.
But I was blown away by thestatistics in terms of how
misdiagnosed women are, how longit takes them versus our male
counterpoints to get theappropriate diagnosis in terms
of Alzheimer's, in terms of howhow frequently we're diagnosed
(09:39):
with MS when that's incorrect.
Um, if you'll share a little bitof that, because I I kept
turning to my fiance and saying,look at this, look at this, look
at this as I was reading.
SPEAKER_00 (09:51):
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, it is it's staggering tothink that women of today are
diagnosed later than men withthe same conditions.
I mean, it takes us 4.6 yearslonger typically to get
diagnosed for anything.
Uh, autoimmune diseases, thyroiddiseases.
(10:12):
We're often dismissed and we'retold it's anxiety, it's
depression, um, you're juststressed, you're raising kids.
And part of that, it's ourmedical system, right?
I mean, I understand why in thebeginning, when we were when we
started researching drugs, a lotof women were left out of the
research because of ourmenstrual cycles and our
(10:33):
possibility of pregnancy and allof that.
But what's ended up happening istoday, women are just thought of
as smaller versions of men.
And that couldn't be furtherfrom the truth.
We are so much different thanmen.
Our biochemistry is different,our makeup is different, our
genetics are different, ourhormones make us different,
good, bad, or indifferent.
(10:55):
It makes us different.
And so when we think that womencan respond to the same things,
it's it's not the case.
I mean, we know that many womenthat have been diagnosed with
cardiovascular diseases, they gointo the ER with a heart attack,
they'll be sent home anddismissed almost 50% more than a
male will.
A male will be taken uh veryseriously that this could be a
(11:17):
cardiac issue, but oftentimeswomen are dismissed and sent
home because they presentdifferently.
Their symptoms are different.
We don't present with crushingchest pain.
We present with headaches andneck pain and joint pain and jaw
pain.
And so, unless the doctor isreally knowledgeable about that,
which most ER doctors are, butthere are still doctors out
(11:38):
there that will still dismiss itand just say, honey, it's okay.
It's just anxiety.
And honestly, after 25 years ofdoing this, you would think I'd
have heard everything that awoman could tell me a doctor has
told her.
And every day I'm floored bywhat a male doctor or female, it
doesn't matter.
The women tend to be just asmean, um, say to these women
(12:00):
that are suffering from chronicillnesses or because they have
multiple system issues going on,you know, their neck hurts,
their head hurts, their periodsare bad.
We call that a multi-systemissue.
If they come in and complainwith more than three things,
they're automatically taughtthat it's depression and anxiety
and they should be dismissed.
And we see that over and overagain.
(12:22):
And it's not getting any better.
I would have hoped it wouldhave, but it's not.
It's getting worse, in myopinion, at least from what I
see with my clients.
And other people may seesomething different, but my
clients, it's definitely adisservice to women, as far as
I'm concerned.
SPEAKER_01 (12:36):
Well, and our healthcare system is is so
fundamentally broken anyway,right?
And it's expensive.
And I found uh that it wasinteresting that you talked
about the the tests and thepanels that get done, how much
they leave out.
Yeah.
Because I figure that if thedoctor says, okay, we're gonna
(12:56):
run some tests, I having next tono knowledge, not a doctor, uh,
don't even play one on TV, don'tknow everything they're not
including.
And if I'm to say, Are youincluding everything?
And they say yes, I have to takethem at their word unless I've
(13:17):
done a whole world of research.
And sometimes I don't even knowwhat I should be asking.
So in order to give our audiencethe best bet at getting started,
because I I imagine that it'soverwhelming, right?
You you mentioned in your bookthat that you have women who
(13:38):
come in with binders full ofinformation.
Let's walk people through thebest way to advocate for
themselves.
Because if I've got someonewho's listening right now and
they're thinking, this is me,I've been dismissed.
I'm one of those people whodoesn't go anymore, right?
Unless I absolutely have to.
(13:58):
I'm not going.
SPEAKER_00 (14:00):
Where do I start?
Absolutely.
I think that's a great question.
Because once we empower people,they have control over not just
their life, but their health.
And our system is broken.
And so unfortunately, you haveto be your own advocate.
Um, I had to become the medicaldetective for the women that I
see.
And so I'll teach you what Iteach them.
(14:22):
So, first and foremost, I alwaystell people go in loaded with as
many questions as you possiblycan.
And sometimes that takes alittle research, but AI has been
really helpful for us thesedays.
You can chat GPT a lot ofdifferent questions, but the
biggest questions you want toknow is what are the test
results going to show you?
Because in traditional medicine,we're very limited,
(14:44):
unfortunately, because ofinsurance models and the
regulations of what can beordered and what can be covered
under your insurance.
And if the insurance isn't goingto reimburse for the test, the
doctor's not going to order itbecause his organization is then
going to have to pay for it andthey don't want to lose money.
That's just the reality of thegame these days.
So oftentimes just evenadvocating for a simple vitamin
(15:04):
D test can be a challengebecause unless the doctor can
prove that they think or alreadyknow that you have a vitamin D
deficiency, they're not going toorder it.
And vitamin D is one of thebiggest things that we need to
know is at its height.
Um, I see women every day whoseendocrinologists will tell them
that the vitamin D level isokay, being at 30, which is the
(15:25):
low end of normal.
But until it's at an optimallevel of about 60 to 80, it's
not protecting you with yourimmune system, which is what it
needs to do.
And it's not a vitamin, it's ahormone.
So it is essential for everyhormone production we have in
our body.
And so knowing just a few ofthose things can be extremely
helpful, but nobody tells usthat.
SPEAKER_01 (15:48):
I'm gonna bring you back for a second because I this
may sound like the most simple,basic, um ignorant question.
You said vitamin D is not avitamin, it's a hormone.
Correct.
SPEAKER_00 (16:03):
So why do we call it vitamin D?
SPEAKER_01 (16:07):
Wow.
Okay, so I was 52 and a halfyears old when I learned that
vitamin D was not a vitamin,it's a hormone.
SPEAKER_00 (16:15):
Right?
It is, and it is essential,literally essential for
everything in our body.
And it's only been actuallytested maybe about 20 years ago,
it started to get tested.
It didn't get covered byinsurance until 10 to 12 years
ago.
Insurance wouldn't even cover itto be looked at.
(16:35):
And yet we know all these thingsabout how great vitamin D is.
It's good for the immune system,it protects us against cancer,
it helps us make all of ourother hormones, it gives us
energy, it gives us focus andconcentration.
And yet it's one of those thingsthat we only test if we know
you're deficient.
Well, how do we know you'redeficient if we never looked at
it?
That becomes a problem.
(16:56):
And again, it's part of ourbroken system.
And so I always tell patientswhen a doctor says they're gonna
do some tests for you, askspecifically what test they're
going to do and then ask themwhat they are hoping to find by
that.
So when they typically say we'regonna do the full workup on you,
it usually means a completeblood count.
So they can look at your whiteblood cell count, your red blood
(17:17):
cell count, and the sizes.
They're gonna look at ametabolic panel.
So they want to see your bloodglucose, your liver function,
your kidney function.
And they might do a lipid panel,look at your cholesterol level.
To them, that's a full workup.
But that isn't even a windowinto what's going on with your
body.
It is the bare minimum, as faras I'm concerned.
(17:41):
If we want to know more, like asa 50-year-old woman, I want to
know what your hormones looklike.
Yes, if you're postmenopausal,they're going to be on the lower
side, but some may still behigh, some might be low.
And when you present and yousay, I'm not sleeping well, I'm
having broken sleep a couple oftimes a night, I'm more
irritable, I can't think, Ican't remember where I put my
(18:03):
car keys.
That is not normal.
That it's not normal aging forus to go through that process.
Yet that's what we tell people.
That's just part of aging.
It's just normal.
It doesn't have to be, norshould it be.
So your hormones control all ofthose things.
When your progesterone levelfalls, starting about age 35,
we're going to start to see thatbroken sleep, waking between
(18:25):
like two and four in themorning, that tossing and
turning throughout the wholenight.
We're a little bit moreirritable than we used to be.
We find all the stupid people inthe world, right?
They all get under our skin.
That is a hormonal imbalance.
That's not just us going throughsomething.
It's our hormones starting toshift.
And when we have the properbalance, we'll feel better.
(18:46):
Do doctors do that test?
No, not normally.
Only if you have irregularbleeding or you have pelvic pain
of some kind, will they do atest for hormones?
And what they'll say is, well,you can't regularly test
hormones.
They fluctuate a lot.
And that is correct.
They do.
They fluctuate moment to moment,day to day.
But we can get a snapshot ofwhere you are in your cycle and
(19:08):
we know where it's supposed tobe at each phase of where you
are in your cycle.
And so we can correlate that tosee if they're imbalanced and if
one's lower than the other orhigher than the other.
And we can prevent disease byknowing that.
But yet we don't do that test ona regular basis for that.
SPEAKER_01 (19:25):
So I'm going in armed with as much information
as I can.
I'm coming with the questions: what do I need to know about me? (19:29):
undefined
SPEAKER_00 (19:36):
That is a great question.
Know as much about you as youpossibly can.
Um, many times when people don'tfeel well, we start to
disconnect from our bodiesbecause we don't want to feel
the pain.
So we do all kinds of things notto feel the pain.
We work so that if our brainsare busy working, we're not
worried about what our body'sdoing or feeling.
(19:58):
Um keep a journal.
I tell people, the moreinformation you can give us, the
better.
Traditional doctors don't likethat.
It takes time, but that is whereall the meat and potatoes are in
somebody helping you to getdiagnosed with something.
For instance, if every time youeat dairy, you get nasal
congestion and postnasal dripdown your throat, and it lasts
(20:22):
for a couple of hours after youhave dairy, dairy's probably not
a good thing for you.
But will you know that unlessyou pay attention?
You you won't.
So I always tell people, asyou're preparing to go in, write
down everything you're feelingand then try to keep track of it
at least for a week or twobefore you go into the doctor,
of what has made your symptomsbetter or worse.
(20:44):
It's worse when I eat dairy,it's worse when I eat gluten,
it's better if I take a hotshower, it's better if I take a
walk, um, I'm not sleeping.
And this is the time frame thatI'm waking up in because that
tells us a lot too.
If you wake between one andthree in the morning, it's a
liver issue.
If you wake between two andfour, it's a serotonin
(21:05):
deficiency.
So those little pearls, justknowing those things, can really
direct you to what's going on,can make a significant
difference.
SPEAKER_01 (21:15):
So, as a functional medicine doctor who integrates
Western medicine, those littlepearls, is that something you
know, or is that somethingeverybody knows?
SPEAKER_00 (21:27):
That is something a functional medicine doctor will
know.
A traditional doctor won'tnecessarily know that.
But even seeing a traditionaldoctor, having all of that
information helps them to figureout a little bit more about
what's going on too.
It is really important for them.
Um, if you feel a particular wayduring your menstrual cycle,
great thing to tell them.
(21:47):
I feel this way during myperiod, I feel this way just
before I get my period.
Um, those things can make a hugedifference.
You know, I get a headache, theheadache starts here, it's gone
there.
If you've got stomach issues,this food makes it worse, this
food makes it better.
It's better if I don't eat, it'sbetter if I eat this.
(22:07):
Those kinds of things can make ahuge difference.
Even with traditional medicinedoctors, they will be able to
put some of the pieces togetherfor you.
SPEAKER_01 (22:15):
One of the things I had prior to reading your book,
one of the things I had startedto realize in my in my age is
how disconnected each doctor isfrom the other.
So if I talk to a hematologist,they aren't necessarily talking
to the nephrologist, right?
(22:36):
Um, and if one gives memedicine, they're not
necessarily clearing it with theother.
So that had started to bother mea little bit.
But then in reading your book, Ithink the the overarching view
that I received from your bookgave me more of a magical look
(22:58):
at how fantastic our system isand how amazing it is, that it
all works so well together.
And how do I optimize that?
And how can I work with my ownindividual system to figure out
what works best for me?
(23:19):
How can I pay attention toenvironmental issues and what's
going on?
There was one particular casestudy you you mentioned in your
book about a woman who had beengoing through uh renovating her
house and started to feel veryfatigued and sore, and lots of
pieces of her body were hurting,only to find out that her body
(23:40):
was reacting to the lead in thepaint and the plastics in the
home.
And it's not even something thatwould have occurred to me.
Is that something that manypeople are hypersensitive to, or
is that something that hergenetics plus?
SPEAKER_00 (24:02):
Great question.
Many people are sensitive to allof these environmental things,
they just don't realize that'swhat's causing it.
Our bodies have adapted to avery toxic environment.
You know, we have over 85,000chemicals that are known to us
today that are in ourenvironment that we're exposed
to on a regular basis.
(24:22):
And these things didn't exist 20years ago.
Um, and unfortunately, if you'reof Mediterranean descent, which
I believe now they figure isabout 45 to 50 percent of the
population in the US, they carrya genetic defect called the
MTHFR gene.
Many people will call it themother trucker gene, because
that's how they remember it.
(24:43):
But that gene, if you're mutatedon that gene, it doesn't allow
your body to detox well.
So you can't eliminate all ofthese toxic chemicals that
you're being exposed to.
And oftentimes, again, we don'tput two and two together, so
that's where the symptoms arereally important to know what's
going on.
If every time I'm at work withinfour hours, I'm getting a
(25:05):
headache.
Okay, it might be the stress atwork.
It might be Susie that sits nextto you, but it may also be the
environment that you're in, thatthere's something in that
environment that's botheringyou.
The first thing we would thinkof would be, oh, there's an
allergen in here of some kind.
There's dust or there's somesomething like that.
Right.
And it could be just thatsimple, but it could be even
(25:27):
bigger than that.
Um, unfortunately, everything wehave off-gasses.
So all of our new furniture, allof our new flooring and
carpeting and paint, they allhave chemicals that off-gas.
And that off-gassing takes 10years, seven to 10 years for it
to go through its off-gassingperiod.
So when we think there's no wayI can be sick, I have a brand
(25:49):
new house.
You probably are really sickfrom the brand new house because
the brand new house has allbrand new things in it and it's
releasing all these chemicals.
And you haven't been exposed tothem for a long time.
SPEAKER_01 (26:01):
How do we protect ourselves?
How do we do the best we can tosort of living in a bubble?
SPEAKER_00 (26:10):
And yeah, we can't do that.
SPEAKER_01 (26:12):
Yeah, uh, which, yeah, I'm pretty sure we can't,
but how do we do the best we canto take care of ourselves?
SPEAKER_00 (26:20):
Yeah, so I think it's important always to start
with nutrition.
We have to eat a solid, good,healthy diet.
Whole foods, lots of colors, youknow, your fruits, your
vegetables, your proteins, andtry not to eliminate any one
food category.
But when you look at the foodpyramid, the major food category
at the bottom is incorrect.
(26:41):
It's an inverted food uh pyramidthat we should be looking at.
Fruits and vegetables first,proteins, carbohydrates, and
things with gluten last.
Gluten's very inflammatory forus.
So it acts like morphine in thebrain for a lot of people and
overstimulates them.
So we, if you're inflamed orhave any neurological condition,
you want to avoid gluten rightaway.
(27:02):
Um, that's first and foremost.
And then secondarily, very easythings that you can do in the
home, especially a brand newhome, is leave a window cracked
open.
It doesn't have to be high, leanlike maybe a half an inch to an
inch open just to get some freshcirculating air in the building
is really helpful because it'llhelp remove those off-gassings.
In some of our older homes,they're built very tight.
They don't breathe.
(27:23):
And so we need to keep thatcirculation.
Run an air purifier in yourhouse is really great.
And then I really think it'simportant for all of us to detox
on a regular basis because we'reexposed to so many things.
Using really simple things likevitamin C as a detoxifier.
Um, N acetylcysteine, we call itNAC for short.
(27:43):
That's a great uh detoxifier.
Milk thistle is another one.
If you like tea, you can do milkthistle tea.
But I will warn you if you havea ragweed allergy, don't do it
because you'll have some allergysymptoms.
But just basic things like thatcan really be done.
Starting your day off with awarm glass of lemon water is one
of the best things you can dofor detoxing your body.
And it only has to be the sizeof a coffee cup.
(28:05):
Um, put a little quarter sliceof lemon in there, drink that
down, start that body moving itstoxins and the liver doing what
it's supposed to, and it'sextremely helpful.
SPEAKER_01 (28:16):
I love this.
I it's funny, there was a periodof time in my life where I
couldn't be bothered with any ofthis.
And I truly have been fascinatedreading through everything that
you had to say.
Do you find with the women whocome in to see you, the patients
(28:36):
that you come in, is there overthe course of the last couple of
years, is there something thathas surprised you?
Is there a commonality that thatwas that you that you didn't
expect?
SPEAKER_00 (28:48):
Over the last couple of years, what's really
surprised me, you know, we cameout of a pandemic.
Um, and what that virus has doneto women has been horrible.
I did not expect that.
Um, you know, the coronavirushas been around a long time.
It it's a common cold virus.
It should not have done what itdid, but I am seeing very high
(29:12):
levels of neurological diseasesthat I didn't see before.
We're seeing a lot of peoplewith decreased immune systems uh
for no reason.
Um, we're seeing cardiovascularthings in people who shouldn't
have them.
They're young, they're healthyoverall, a lot of fatigue, a lot
of fibromyalgia symptoms, a lotof um, I have several patients
who've had triggered MS afterthey were sick with the virus.
(29:36):
Um, those kinds of things Ididn't expect.
And it's become harder for us totreat them than it was before
the pandemic.
Before we could treat them, allthe things we used were great.
It worked.
Now it's much more effort on thepatient side and on our side,
and things that used to workbefore don't work as well as
they did.
SPEAKER_01 (29:56):
Do you find that more and more people are moving
towards functional medicine?
SPEAKER_00 (30:00):
Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_01 (30:03):
What is the pivot in that shift?
SPEAKER_00 (30:06):
I think it's multifaceted, especially with
people who are chronically ill.
They're tired of beingdismissed.
They're tired of being toldthere's nothing wrong with them.
They're tired of just having adrug thrown at them with no real
understanding of what's causingtheir symptoms.
They want root medicine.
They want to know what's causingtheir symptoms.
And they're looking for answersoutside of our traditional
(30:29):
system.
I think the traditional systemis great.
If I have a heart attack, if Ibreak my arm, I want a
traditional medicine doctor tofix me.
I'm not coming to see someonelike me.
I want an orthopedic to set myarm.
I want a cardiologist to fix myheart.
But unfortunately, where we arenot good in traditional medicine
is with the chronically ill,with the people who have all
(30:51):
these symptoms that don't seemto make sense.
We don't do a good job in ourtraditional medicine system with
taking care of those people.
We don't have a lot of optionsfor them.
And that's where people willturn to functional medicine.
The other place is theanti-aging people, the people
who want to live life longer,healthier.
They want to be 80 years old andlook and feel like they're 60.
(31:12):
And it's not from a vanityissue.
They want to truly live life andbe vibrant.
Those are the other people thatare turning to functional
medicine because there are toolsin our toolbox that the
traditional medicine peoplecan't give them.
People with Alzheimer's diseaseare turning to functional
medicine.
They don't have a lot of goodanswers for them.
(31:32):
They have no way of figuring outwhat triggered it.
They're coming to people like meto help them figure that out.
SPEAKER_01 (31:39):
That's where I am in the anti-aging category, if you
will.
Not from a vanity standpoint,but truly from a how can I live
the best, healthiest, longest,fullest existence through my
kids having kids and being outand about.
(32:01):
I don't want to be or feeldebilitated.
I don't want to be in a placewhere I feel lost and confused
and unable to move.
And I I also in your book reallyappreciated what you were just
(32:25):
saying the the combination ofthe two, the the traditional
Western medicine and thefunctional, because I think that
there is a place for both.
(32:47):
And if I do break a boat or ifI'm in uh if I'm in a car
accident, I would like to beable to go to the hospital.
Um so I think but I do love howyou are helping, most
specifically in this category,women to feel seen rather than
dismissed, because there are somany who just have to keep
(33:11):
saying, but I swear there issomething wrong.
But I swear you are missingsomething.
For the individual, becausefunctional medicine does not
fall under the health insurancecategory.
Correct.
For the individual who doesn'thave the ability to currently
(33:32):
private pay for functionalmedicine, where do they start?
Because I can see that this isdefinitely something that is
appealing, but if they don'thave the ability to private pay,
but want to pursue in some way,where do they begin?
SPEAKER_00 (33:51):
That's a great question.
So you can begin with a healthcoach or a nutritionist.
That is the easiest place tostart, especially if you're
eating a traditional Americandiet.
If your diet is pristine, that'sa different say uh scenario.
But starting with nutrition iskey, and starting with those
people are great.
Um, soon there will be aplatform that I'm creating for
(34:15):
women and men that if they wantto pursue this and they they
really they don't have access toa functional medicine
practitioner for whateverreason.
It's locally they don't haveaccess or they can't afford it.
There will be an affordableoption for them to receive
functional medicine via an appthat we're creating.
And all the knowledge that I'vehad and all the luxury that I've
(34:36):
had of treating 13,000 patientsover 25 years will be built into
this app.
And so you will have access tothat functional medicine.
You will have access to my brain24-7.
And you can ask questions insidethe app, and my brain will tell
you all the answers that Ishared today and even more
pearls that we have.
Um, and that that will changefunctional medicine as we know
(34:58):
it for sure.
That is fantastic.
SPEAKER_01 (35:01):
I love the accessibility because I think
that this is one of the piecesthat is missing, right?
Um, I had a doctor a number ofyears ago who left traditional
medicine because I've beentested for that mutated gene.
As soon as you said that,because she left traditional
medicine to move into thefunctional space.
(35:22):
And she was going to join agroup that was it was a private,
it was like a subscriptionalmost.
Yeah.
And it was, I want to say two orthree hundred dollars a month to
join their group and have accessto them at all times.
And it it was never somethingthat was even vaguely possible
(35:43):
for me at that time.
And this was easily 15 plusyears ago.
So at the time, it wascompletely out of reach.
So I really appreciate theopportunity for the level of
accessibility that you'reworking to offer.
And for our audience's purposes,when you have that app, we'll
(36:08):
make sure that we can update theshow notes and let people know
that that you have thatavailable.
So, in addition to diet, whatwould you say would be the next
step?
SPEAKER_00 (36:17):
I think the next step would be getting an
evaluation of your hormones andnutrient levels.
If you can get not a traditionalblood test for nutrients,
because we do have a way oftesting vitamin B and magnesium
and vitamin C, those kinds ofthings.
Um, but they're not looking atreally good levels.
Um, there is an uh a platformcalled Rupa Health that you can
(36:40):
go on and you can order testsfor yourself.
You don't have to have a doctorto order them.
And you could do just a verysimple basic mineral vitamin
test and see what you'redeficient in.
By that, you can interpret ityourself.
You can look at it and it'lltell you like you're low in
vitamin D, you're low in vitaminB, you're too high in this.
(37:00):
And it'll tell you in that testresult exactly what supplements
to take and how much.
And that is a really great placeto start because sometimes we're
just guessing at what we thinkyou need.
But if you know what you needalready and you're supplementing
and optimizing that, those aresome very basic things that you
can do on your own.
Hormones are a little bit moredifficult to figure out by
(37:21):
yourself, but once you havehormone tests, you could go to
someone like myself and say,please interpret this for me and
tell me what I need.
And it reduces the time that youhave to be with a practitioner
like myself, which then is goingto significantly reduce the cost
for you as well.
SPEAKER_01 (37:36):
That's fantastic.
And one of the things you saidabout earlier about the testing
is a lot of times it'sinterpreted not based on
optimal, but based on range.
And will you reiterate that foreveryone so that people can
understand what that means?
Because I know a lot of timespeople get back like you're
you're you're fine, everything'snormal.
And it isn't necessarily normal,it's that you're running really,
(37:58):
really close to low or reallyclose to high.
But as long as you're stillwithin the range, you're being
told you're fine.
SPEAKER_00 (38:04):
Absolutely.
So our healthcare lab system isset up to catch 90% of the
people.
So if you look at ranges,sometimes they're very wide.
It could be anywhere from 10 to100 is the normal range on a
particular lab test.
Vitamin D is a good example ofthat.
Normal range goes from 30 to100.
So if you're at 29, they'regonna say you're okay.
(38:27):
But if you're at 101, they'regonna say it's too high.
Optimal range in for vitamin Dis right in the middle, around
60 to 80.
Another really good example yourlisteners will probably want to
know is is thyroid function.
Your TSH stands for thyroidstimulating hormone.
It's what everybody measures tosee if you have a thyroid
disorder.
Um, that range it goes from,depending on the lab, about 0.5
(38:50):
up to four and a half.
But I've seen doctors interpretthe lab and say, well, if it's
not 10 or higher, I'm not gonnatreat you.
Okay, but the the normal rangeis four and a half on the high
end.
Why are you saying you're gonnawait until 10 to treat you?
And so in that particular case,too, with thyroid, it's opposite
of what makes sense to ourbrain.
(39:12):
So in our brain, we would think,well, I want as much thyroid
hormone as I can have becausethen I have better energy and
better metabolism, but that'sjust the opposite.
You want that TSH level to be alot lower.
All the TSH tells us is is yourbrain communicating with the
thyroid?
And if so, how well is it doingthat?
And the more it needs it, themore it's gonna kick the
(39:32):
thyroid, the higher the TSHlevel becomes because it needs
more thyroid hormone and itshouldn't be doing that.
So an optimal range for TSHlevel should really be about one
to two.
So if you're at three and a halfand you're not feeling well,
most doctors are gonna say it'stotally fine, but a functional
medicine doctor is gonna saythat's too high.
And we need to look at otherthyroid labs, other thyroid
(39:55):
function tests, and thetraditional doctors aren't going
to do that.
SPEAKER_01 (39:59):
Do you see a specific functional medicine
doctor or do you heal yourself?
SPEAKER_00 (40:03):
I do both.
Um, so I know a lot aboutmyself, but it's not good to
treat just yourself.
So when I got my diagnosis of MSuh three years ago, I started
researching my own things and Istarted working on myself quite
a bit, but I did pull in someexperts for myself and I said,
okay, I need some people withbetter brains than I do or
(40:24):
bigger brains and differentissues and specialties that I
don't have.
And so I have a doc that I seefrom New Zealand.
I have another doc in uhCalifornia that I see.
Um, and I I got the best ofeverything from everybody that I
knew and put put it alltogether.
I had to fix myself because Ididn't have time to go see
(40:45):
people, but um, I always am myown best guinea pig.
So I never do anything for mypatients that I don't try on
myself first.
Um, so 18 months after mydiagnosis of the MS, I finally
decided to see the neurologistbecause I wasn't going to see
the neurologist, because in myworld, MS is something else
until proven otherwise.
There's a reason your body'screating white matter.
(41:07):
And um, so I finally said to myhusband, I really want to see
the neurologist.
I said, I know I don't have MS,but I need to hear it from them.
And I saw the traditionalneurologist and gave her my
whole story of everything that Ihad done over 18 months.
And she looked at me and shesaid, You don't have MS.
Um, and so she she gave me a newlabel and said, I think you have
(41:28):
post-COVID peripheralneuropathy.
And I'm like, oh brother, herewe go.
And and I already knew it wasn'tthat either.
It was all the other things.
I had Lyme disease, I had moldmycotoxin illness, I had viral
illness.
I mean, I had a lot of toxinsthat I wasn't cleaning out and I
wasn't clearing.
And once all of those thingscame out, all of my symptoms
(41:49):
were gone.
And what they said wasimpossible that you can't
reverse white matter disease waspossible.
I don't have white matterdisease in my brain anymore.
And traditional medicine tellsus all the time we can't do
that, but functional medicinesays we can, and it is true, and
I'm living proof that we can doit.
SPEAKER_01 (42:06):
That's amazing.
SPEAKER_00 (42:07):
How are you feeling now?
I feel amazing.
I really do.
I don't really have any symptomsthat I had before when I
started.
Um, and it's interesting, myorthopedic doctor who diagnosed
me with MS, I just hired abusiness development person and
she knows him, and he diagnosedher with MS 15 years ago as
well, and she doesn't have it.
(42:28):
So I was like, oh, that'sinteresting.
There's got to be somethingemotional for him around this MS
and women.
Because now this is like thefourth person I've heard that he
had diagnosed with MS off of abrain scan.
SPEAKER_01 (42:40):
Um, but he So, how many women, I mean, if if you
know four people, how many otherwomen are out there that have
been diagnosed by this man andare just taking medications and
doing doing treatment that theyshouldn't be doing?
Yeah.
Doesn't that do more harm thangood?
SPEAKER_00 (43:00):
It certainly does.
And I think it's easy for us todo that.
You know, we're scared, we don'task the right questions.
The doctors are afraid of beingsued if they don't provide
something for you.
And I think there's a lot ofwomen out there that are taking
immune-suppressing drugs thatthey don't need to be taking,
that are opening them up forother problems down the road by
(43:21):
suppressing their immune systemthat they don't have to be
doing.
And there and there arecertainly people who truly do
have MS and they need certainmedications.
But I also think that thosepeople should be looking at what
triggered it in the first place.
Because our body doesn't juststart attacking itself for no
reason.
There's a reason why it'sattacking itself, and we need to
(43:41):
figure out what that is andeliminate it so the body can
actually heal.
SPEAKER_01 (43:45):
So if you are given a scary diagnosis, would your
recommendation be to either geta second opinion and or go deep
in terms of really digging intois this accurate and what can I
(44:06):
do to potentially combat thesymptoms?
SPEAKER_00 (44:10):
Most definitely, I would say get a second and a
third opinion and don't do it inthe same hospital system.
So if I'm seeing the localhospital system and I'm seeing a
neurologist there, and I want asecond opinion from another
neurologist, and they're in thatsame facility, they're not going
to give you a different opinion.
They have to give you the sameopinion of the previous doctor.
(44:34):
So you want to go outside ofthat system if you can for a
second opinion.
Ideally, outside of the town iseven better because all the
doctors know each other andthey're not going to tell a
patient that something isdifferent than another doctor
has said.
So I definitely think that'simportant.
And then I would say if it's aserious condition, then do a
(44:56):
functional medicine evaluation.
At least do a consult withsomebody to say these are the
potential other things thatcould be causing your issues,
and then do a deep dive and juststart really checking out every
piece of it to know is thistruly the right diagnosis or
not?
Um, it doesn't take long usuallyto figure out what's going on.
And you can open up somedifferent testing that can tell
(45:20):
us pretty fast exactly what'sgoing on.
SPEAKER_01 (45:23):
This is fantastic.
Dr.
Deb, I have so enjoyed havingthis conversation with you.
Where can everyone find you?
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (45:30):
So you can find me on my social page, uh Deb Muth.
I have a women's group that wejust started called She Knows
Functional.
Uh sorry, she knows, and it's atFacebook.
So it's a free group.
You can join us.
We have these conversations allthe time.
Everybody's supporting eachother there.
And you can also find me atSerenity Healthcare Center.com.
SPEAKER_01 (45:51):
Fantastic.
Is there anything I didn't askyou that you that you would like
to offer?
SPEAKER_00 (45:57):
I would love to say this to people trust your gut.
Women's intuition is amazing,and we need to trust our guts.
And when you get diagnosed withsomething, it isn't the time to
retreat.
It's the time to find the rebelinside of you that rises above.
Be that mama bear that you wouldbe for your children.
(46:18):
You have to be it for yourself,too.
SPEAKER_01 (46:21):
I love that.
I have one final question foryou.
Yeah, how do you define hope?
SPEAKER_00 (46:25):
How?
Um, hope is never giving up, isnever accepting a wrong answer.
Just always being in likecurious and understanding that
today we may not have the answerfor something, but that doesn't
mean that tomorrow or a weekfrom now we won't have the
answer.
Things are constantly changing.
So always be curious, always belooking for the answers.
(46:48):
You are fantastic.
SPEAKER_01 (46:50):
Thank you so much for being here.
I really encourage people to goout and grab your book.
Seen it last.
I uh I enjoyed every single pageand I read it very quickly.
Uh, and I personally felt veryseen.
So thank you for being here andthank you for the book.
So thank you so much for havingme.
Appreciate it.
(47:10):
My pleasure.
And friends, thank you forjoining us as always.
I hope we made you feel seenduring this conversation.
Please do turn around and shareit with anyone who you feel
needs to hear this conversationas well.
Review if you are up for it, anduntil we get to see you next
time, please do take very goodcare of yourself.
He said, Well, I hate to say this to you, but you
have fibromyalgia.
Here's a prescription fornarcotics.
Here's a prescription for someantidepressants.
And go home and prepare to bedisabled in four years.
And my youngest son had justbeen born, maybe a year before
that.
And I was like, I wasflabbergasted.
I was like, are you kidding me?
(00:20):
Like, that's all you have tooffer me.
And I went out to the car,bawling my eyes out, calling my
husband, and he's like, thisisn't gonna be you.
SPEAKER_01 (00:36):
Hi there, friends.
I'm Danielle Elliott Smith, andthis is Hope Comes to Visit.
Let's take a deep breath, sharesome truth, and look for light
together.
Today we're talking aboutwomen's health.
It isn't niche, but it'snecessary.
If you've ever felt dismissed ina doctor's office, if you've
ever heard it's normal when youabsolutely know that it's not,
(00:59):
today's conversation is for you.
When you leave today, you'regoing to feel seen and heard in
a way that you likely haven't inquite some time.
I'm really excited to dive inwith my guest today, Dr.
Deborah Muth.
Deborah Muth is a naturopathicdoctor, functional medicine
expert, and the founder ofSerenity Healthcare Center.
Dr.
Deb, do you like prefer Dr.
(01:20):
Deb, Dr.
Deborah, or Dr.
Muth?
Everybody calls me Dr.
Deb.
That's what I thought.
Okay, so I'm gonna go with Dr.
Deb.
Dr.
Deb, thank you so much forjoining me.
I am so excited to have thisconversation.
You have a new book out.
Um, but your the way youpractice, the way that you see
women, especially from head totoe as a whole being is
(01:45):
extraordinary.
I felt like I felt like we werefriends almost just reading
through your book.
SPEAKER_00 (01:51):
Thank you for that.
That that was what I was hopingthat people would get the sense
and the feel that um their storyis not uh always unique.
It's unique to them, butunfortunately, the number of
women that are affected thesedays with stories like mine and
everybody else's, there's asisterhood that comes together
(02:13):
with us.
And I think a lot of times wefeel very alone.
And I was hoping that peoplewould feel like they're not
alone, but there's a group of usout there that can be sisters
together and we can share.
And it doesn't mean we wallow inour stories.
It's that we mean we empowereach other.
We don't have to give up and wedon't have to just say, yeah, I
got this label and this is mylife.
(02:33):
It doesn't have to be that way.
So that's what I was reallyhoping to present with the book.
So I'm glad you felt that way.
SPEAKER_01 (02:39):
Well, what's beautiful about what you're
saying there, and I think thisis sort of the universal
experience that I hope to createwith the podcast, is that
ability for people to feel seenand heard and known.
And the book is called Seen atLast, right?
So it's in my world, in thishope comes to visit world, I
(02:59):
want people to hear otherpeople's story and for it to
feel like they're hearing theirown story coming out of
someone's mouth.
And that was the experience Ihad reading the book.
Uh, and the beauty of thispodcast for me is that I get to
have these experiences withpeople and that that hope visits
me each and every time.
So I hope that it that itresonates with the audience as
(03:21):
well.
But um, so we haven't had achance to speak about
experience.
So I want I want you to share alittle bit about your experience
and then we we can chat back andforth.
But this isn't just somethingthat you do as a doctor.
This was this comes frompersonal and lived experience as
well.
So let's talk a little bit aboutyour history and and how this
(03:41):
all came to be.
SPEAKER_00 (03:42):
Yeah, absolutely.
So um, this is truly my storyand the story of so many women
that I hear every single day.
And and I've been blessed to bein the integrative slash
functional medicines uh spacefor over 25 years.
I started out as a traditionalwomen's health nurse
practitioner and learned veryquickly exactly what traditional
(04:05):
medicine was like.
And that's what led me to becomea naturopath because I knew
there was more out there thanwhat conventional medicine could
offer.
Um, when I was 28 years old, Ihad some symptoms that I didn't
like that I knew didn't fit.
Um, I had this weird numbnessand tingling and burning and
pain.
And that was in the 90s whenfibromyalgia hit the stage and
(04:27):
every woman got diagnosed withfibromyalgia.
And I remember going in to seemy doctor, and I knew I told my
husband, I'm coming out with oneof two diagnoses.
I said, it's either going to befibromyalgia or they're gonna
tell me I have MS.
And um it, I remember this day,like it was yesterday.
It was a beautiful summer day.
It was 100 degrees outside.
(04:48):
I had on a fleece jacket, a longsleeve shirt, going into the
doctor.
I get there, they're taking mytemperature, and the the MA is
like, let me go get a differentthermometer.
Something doesn't seem rightwith this one.
And we did that four times.
And finally I said, Do you wantto tell me what my temperature
was?
He's like, it can't be right.
It's 95.4.
There's no way that's possible.
And I looked at him and I said,I have on a fleece jacket and a
(05:12):
long sleeve shirt, and I'mreally comfortable.
So maybe there is an issue.
And they completely dismissedit.
And the doctor came in, spentabout 10 minutes with me, and uh
turned and looked at me, neveraddressed the body temperature
at all, just assumed it was abroken thing.
I couldn't have been brokenthere, somebody else, the
(05:32):
machine, right?
And uh he said, Well, I hate tosay this to you, but you have
fibromyalgia.
Here's a prescription fornarcotics, here's a prescription
for some antidepressants, and gohome and prepare to be disabled
in four years.
And my youngest son had justbeen born, maybe a year before
that.
And I was like, I wasflabbergasted.
(05:54):
I was like, Are you kidding me?
Like, that's all you have tooffer me.
And I went out to the car,bawling my eyes up, calling my
husband, and he's like, Thisisn't gonna be you.
And he's always been my rockbehind that.
Um and luckily I had mywitchcrafty friends back in the
day, 25 years ago.
That's what we callednaturopathic people in the
(06:14):
quacks, and I'm one of them now,which is okay.
And uh I called them and I said,You guys know someone that can
help me?
And they were like, Absolutely,come with us.
And they introduced me to thisamazing world of integrated
medicine and nutrition andlifestyle changes that today we
know so much more freely than weever did then.
And um, they looked at me andsaid, You've got some thyroid
(06:37):
issues, you've got someovergrowth of yeast issues going
on.
Here's a diet, here's somesupplements.
Literally three weeks later, allmy symptoms were gone.
SPEAKER_01 (06:46):
See, that's amazing.
So it interestingly enough, see,we haven't had a chance to talk
about this.
I was diagnosed withfibromyalgia at 18.
So before it hit mainstream.
And the doctor at the time, Iwas 18 for 18 on all the
pressure points.
My mom was diagnosed first,leading rheumatologist in Los
Angeles.
(07:07):
And she came home and said, Ohmy gosh, Danielle, we've been
trying because I'd been going todoctors for years trying to
figure out what was wrong.
And so the fibromyalgia at thetime was a, oh my gosh, we
finally know what's wrong withyou.
Yeah.
However, I did have a similarexperience in terms of here's a
muscle relaxant, here's apainkiller.
(07:28):
Um, good luck.
He said to me, because I said,What does this mean?
And he said, So it means thatyou're going to never be able to
do anything that's high impact.
You can't wait tables, you can'ttake any high exercise, and
you're going to be taking thismedication.
And so I instantly went and tooka STEP class and got a job
(07:49):
waiting tables.
And but I reached a point whereI could take Vicodin the way I
took Tylenol within a couple ofyears.
And I thought, well, thisdoesn't feel right.
And I had no knowledge ofaddiction to medications at the
time, but I did just stop takingthe medications because I
thought at some point I'm goingto need this medication.
(08:09):
So I probably shouldn't be ableto take it this way.
So I just stopped.
But because I had been takingtoo much, I'm now allergic to
Vicadin.
Wow.
So I but I knew it wasn't right.
It was interesting to me,though, reading your book, how
you were talking about how somany of the symptoms, the
(08:30):
symptomology of fibromyalgia istypically indicative of
something else because we're notpaying attention to all of the
external and environmental andeverything else.
But part of the challenge with afibromyalgia diagnosis is
everything else gets lumpedunderneath it.
And anytime I've ever hadanything else go wrong, it's
(08:54):
been, oh, it's the fibro.
If it's my stomach, if it's myhead, if it's my heart,
anything, it's the fibro.
And so I've ultimately stoppedgoing to doctors.
And so I would like you to sharewith the audience because one of
the things that was so I hate touse the word staggering, it's so
(09:17):
overused in in this type ofenvironment.
But I was blown away by thestatistics in terms of how
misdiagnosed women are, how longit takes them versus our male
counterpoints to get theappropriate diagnosis in terms
of Alzheimer's, in terms of howhow frequently we're diagnosed
(09:39):
with MS when that's incorrect.
Um, if you'll share a little bitof that, because I I kept
turning to my fiance and saying,look at this, look at this, look
at this as I was reading.
SPEAKER_00 (09:51):
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, it is it's staggering tothink that women of today are
diagnosed later than men withthe same conditions.
I mean, it takes us 4.6 yearslonger typically to get
diagnosed for anything.
Uh, autoimmune diseases, thyroiddiseases.
(10:12):
We're often dismissed and we'retold it's anxiety, it's
depression, um, you're juststressed, you're raising kids.
And part of that, it's ourmedical system, right?
I mean, I understand why in thebeginning, when we were when we
started researching drugs, a lotof women were left out of the
research because of ourmenstrual cycles and our
(10:33):
possibility of pregnancy and allof that.
But what's ended up happening istoday, women are just thought of
as smaller versions of men.
And that couldn't be furtherfrom the truth.
We are so much different thanmen.
Our biochemistry is different,our makeup is different, our
genetics are different, ourhormones make us different,
good, bad, or indifferent.
(10:55):
It makes us different.
And so when we think that womencan respond to the same things,
it's it's not the case.
I mean, we know that many womenthat have been diagnosed with
cardiovascular diseases, they gointo the ER with a heart attack,
they'll be sent home anddismissed almost 50% more than a
male will.
A male will be taken uh veryseriously that this could be a
(11:17):
cardiac issue, but oftentimeswomen are dismissed and sent
home because they presentdifferently.
Their symptoms are different.
We don't present with crushingchest pain.
We present with headaches andneck pain and joint pain and jaw
pain.
And so, unless the doctor isreally knowledgeable about that,
which most ER doctors are, butthere are still doctors out
(11:38):
there that will still dismiss itand just say, honey, it's okay.
It's just anxiety.
And honestly, after 25 years ofdoing this, you would think I'd
have heard everything that awoman could tell me a doctor has
told her.
And every day I'm floored bywhat a male doctor or female, it
doesn't matter.
The women tend to be just asmean, um, say to these women
(12:00):
that are suffering from chronicillnesses or because they have
multiple system issues going on,you know, their neck hurts,
their head hurts, their periodsare bad.
We call that a multi-systemissue.
If they come in and complainwith more than three things,
they're automatically taughtthat it's depression and anxiety
and they should be dismissed.
And we see that over and overagain.
(12:22):
And it's not getting any better.
I would have hoped it wouldhave, but it's not.
It's getting worse, in myopinion, at least from what I
see with my clients.
And other people may seesomething different, but my
clients, it's definitely adisservice to women, as far as
I'm concerned.
SPEAKER_01 (12:36):
Well, and our healthcare system is is so
fundamentally broken anyway,right?
And it's expensive.
And I found uh that it wasinteresting that you talked
about the the tests and thepanels that get done, how much
they leave out.
Yeah.
Because I figure that if thedoctor says, okay, we're gonna
(12:56):
run some tests, I having next tono knowledge, not a doctor, uh,
don't even play one on TV, don'tknow everything they're not
including.
And if I'm to say, Are youincluding everything?
And they say yes, I have to takethem at their word unless I've
(13:17):
done a whole world of research.
And sometimes I don't even knowwhat I should be asking.
So in order to give our audiencethe best bet at getting started,
because I I imagine that it'soverwhelming, right?
You you mentioned in your bookthat that you have women who
(13:38):
come in with binders full ofinformation.
Let's walk people through thebest way to advocate for
themselves.
Because if I've got someonewho's listening right now and
they're thinking, this is me,I've been dismissed.
I'm one of those people whodoesn't go anymore, right?
Unless I absolutely have to.
(13:58):
I'm not going.
SPEAKER_00 (14:00):
Where do I start?
Absolutely.
I think that's a great question.
Because once we empower people,they have control over not just
their life, but their health.
And our system is broken.
And so unfortunately, you haveto be your own advocate.
Um, I had to become the medicaldetective for the women that I
see.
And so I'll teach you what Iteach them.
(14:22):
So, first and foremost, I alwaystell people go in loaded with as
many questions as you possiblycan.
And sometimes that takes alittle research, but AI has been
really helpful for us thesedays.
You can chat GPT a lot ofdifferent questions, but the
biggest questions you want toknow is what are the test
results going to show you?
Because in traditional medicine,we're very limited,
(14:44):
unfortunately, because ofinsurance models and the
regulations of what can beordered and what can be covered
under your insurance.
And if the insurance isn't goingto reimburse for the test, the
doctor's not going to order itbecause his organization is then
going to have to pay for it andthey don't want to lose money.
That's just the reality of thegame these days.
So oftentimes just evenadvocating for a simple vitamin
(15:04):
D test can be a challengebecause unless the doctor can
prove that they think or alreadyknow that you have a vitamin D
deficiency, they're not going toorder it.
And vitamin D is one of thebiggest things that we need to
know is at its height.
Um, I see women every day whoseendocrinologists will tell them
that the vitamin D level isokay, being at 30, which is the
(15:25):
low end of normal.
But until it's at an optimallevel of about 60 to 80, it's
not protecting you with yourimmune system, which is what it
needs to do.
And it's not a vitamin, it's ahormone.
So it is essential for everyhormone production we have in
our body.
And so knowing just a few ofthose things can be extremely
helpful, but nobody tells usthat.
SPEAKER_01 (15:48):
I'm gonna bring you back for a second because I this
may sound like the most simple,basic, um ignorant question.
You said vitamin D is not avitamin, it's a hormone.
Correct.
SPEAKER_00 (16:03):
So why do we call it vitamin D?
SPEAKER_01 (16:07):
Wow.
Okay, so I was 52 and a halfyears old when I learned that
vitamin D was not a vitamin,it's a hormone.
SPEAKER_00 (16:15):
Right?
It is, and it is essential,literally essential for
everything in our body.
And it's only been actuallytested maybe about 20 years ago,
it started to get tested.
It didn't get covered byinsurance until 10 to 12 years
ago.
Insurance wouldn't even cover itto be looked at.
(16:35):
And yet we know all these thingsabout how great vitamin D is.
It's good for the immune system,it protects us against cancer,
it helps us make all of ourother hormones, it gives us
energy, it gives us focus andconcentration.
And yet it's one of those thingsthat we only test if we know
you're deficient.
Well, how do we know you'redeficient if we never looked at
it?
That becomes a problem.
(16:56):
And again, it's part of ourbroken system.
And so I always tell patientswhen a doctor says they're gonna
do some tests for you, askspecifically what test they're
going to do and then ask themwhat they are hoping to find by
that.
So when they typically say we'regonna do the full workup on you,
it usually means a completeblood count.
So they can look at your whiteblood cell count, your red blood
(17:17):
cell count, and the sizes.
They're gonna look at ametabolic panel.
So they want to see your bloodglucose, your liver function,
your kidney function.
And they might do a lipid panel,look at your cholesterol level.
To them, that's a full workup.
But that isn't even a windowinto what's going on with your
body.
It is the bare minimum, as faras I'm concerned.
(17:41):
If we want to know more, like asa 50-year-old woman, I want to
know what your hormones looklike.
Yes, if you're postmenopausal,they're going to be on the lower
side, but some may still behigh, some might be low.
And when you present and yousay, I'm not sleeping well, I'm
having broken sleep a couple oftimes a night, I'm more
irritable, I can't think, Ican't remember where I put my
(18:03):
car keys.
That is not normal.
That it's not normal aging forus to go through that process.
Yet that's what we tell people.
That's just part of aging.
It's just normal.
It doesn't have to be, norshould it be.
So your hormones control all ofthose things.
When your progesterone levelfalls, starting about age 35,
we're going to start to see thatbroken sleep, waking between
(18:25):
like two and four in themorning, that tossing and
turning throughout the wholenight.
We're a little bit moreirritable than we used to be.
We find all the stupid people inthe world, right?
They all get under our skin.
That is a hormonal imbalance.
That's not just us going throughsomething.
It's our hormones starting toshift.
And when we have the properbalance, we'll feel better.
(18:46):
Do doctors do that test?
No, not normally.
Only if you have irregularbleeding or you have pelvic pain
of some kind, will they do atest for hormones?
And what they'll say is, well,you can't regularly test
hormones.
They fluctuate a lot.
And that is correct.
They do.
They fluctuate moment to moment,day to day.
But we can get a snapshot ofwhere you are in your cycle and
(19:08):
we know where it's supposed tobe at each phase of where you
are in your cycle.
And so we can correlate that tosee if they're imbalanced and if
one's lower than the other orhigher than the other.
And we can prevent disease byknowing that.
But yet we don't do that test ona regular basis for that.
SPEAKER_01 (19:25):
So I'm going in armed with as much information
as I can.
I'm coming with the questions: what do I need to know about me? (19:29):
undefined
SPEAKER_00 (19:36):
That is a great question.
Know as much about you as youpossibly can.
Um, many times when people don'tfeel well, we start to
disconnect from our bodiesbecause we don't want to feel
the pain.
So we do all kinds of things notto feel the pain.
We work so that if our brainsare busy working, we're not
worried about what our body'sdoing or feeling.
(19:58):
Um keep a journal.
I tell people, the moreinformation you can give us, the
better.
Traditional doctors don't likethat.
It takes time, but that is whereall the meat and potatoes are in
somebody helping you to getdiagnosed with something.
For instance, if every time youeat dairy, you get nasal
congestion and postnasal dripdown your throat, and it lasts
(20:22):
for a couple of hours after youhave dairy, dairy's probably not
a good thing for you.
But will you know that unlessyou pay attention?
You you won't.
So I always tell people, asyou're preparing to go in, write
down everything you're feelingand then try to keep track of it
at least for a week or twobefore you go into the doctor,
of what has made your symptomsbetter or worse.
(20:44):
It's worse when I eat dairy,it's worse when I eat gluten,
it's better if I take a hotshower, it's better if I take a
walk, um, I'm not sleeping.
And this is the time frame thatI'm waking up in because that
tells us a lot too.
If you wake between one andthree in the morning, it's a
liver issue.
If you wake between two andfour, it's a serotonin
(21:05):
deficiency.
So those little pearls, justknowing those things, can really
direct you to what's going on,can make a significant
difference.
SPEAKER_01 (21:15):
So, as a functional medicine doctor who integrates
Western medicine, those littlepearls, is that something you
know, or is that somethingeverybody knows?
SPEAKER_00 (21:27):
That is something a functional medicine doctor will
know.
A traditional doctor won'tnecessarily know that.
But even seeing a traditionaldoctor, having all of that
information helps them to figureout a little bit more about
what's going on too.
It is really important for them.
Um, if you feel a particular wayduring your menstrual cycle,
great thing to tell them.
(21:47):
I feel this way during myperiod, I feel this way just
before I get my period.
Um, those things can make a hugedifference.
You know, I get a headache, theheadache starts here, it's gone
there.
If you've got stomach issues,this food makes it worse, this
food makes it better.
It's better if I don't eat, it'sbetter if I eat this.
(22:07):
Those kinds of things can make ahuge difference.
Even with traditional medicinedoctors, they will be able to
put some of the pieces togetherfor you.
SPEAKER_01 (22:15):
One of the things I had prior to reading your book,
one of the things I had startedto realize in my in my age is
how disconnected each doctor isfrom the other.
So if I talk to a hematologist,they aren't necessarily talking
to the nephrologist, right?
(22:36):
Um, and if one gives memedicine, they're not
necessarily clearing it with theother.
So that had started to bother mea little bit.
But then in reading your book, Ithink the the overarching view
that I received from your bookgave me more of a magical look
(22:58):
at how fantastic our system isand how amazing it is, that it
all works so well together.
And how do I optimize that?
And how can I work with my ownindividual system to figure out
what works best for me?
(23:19):
How can I pay attention toenvironmental issues and what's
going on?
There was one particular casestudy you you mentioned in your
book about a woman who had beengoing through uh renovating her
house and started to feel veryfatigued and sore, and lots of
pieces of her body were hurting,only to find out that her body
(23:40):
was reacting to the lead in thepaint and the plastics in the
home.
And it's not even something thatwould have occurred to me.
Is that something that manypeople are hypersensitive to, or
is that something that hergenetics plus?
SPEAKER_00 (24:02):
Great question.
Many people are sensitive to allof these environmental things,
they just don't realize that'swhat's causing it.
Our bodies have adapted to avery toxic environment.
You know, we have over 85,000chemicals that are known to us
today that are in ourenvironment that we're exposed
to on a regular basis.
(24:22):
And these things didn't exist 20years ago.
Um, and unfortunately, if you'reof Mediterranean descent, which
I believe now they figure isabout 45 to 50 percent of the
population in the US, they carrya genetic defect called the
MTHFR gene.
Many people will call it themother trucker gene, because
that's how they remember it.
(24:43):
But that gene, if you're mutatedon that gene, it doesn't allow
your body to detox well.
So you can't eliminate all ofthese toxic chemicals that
you're being exposed to.
And oftentimes, again, we don'tput two and two together, so
that's where the symptoms arereally important to know what's
going on.
If every time I'm at work withinfour hours, I'm getting a
(25:05):
headache.
Okay, it might be the stress atwork.
It might be Susie that sits nextto you, but it may also be the
environment that you're in, thatthere's something in that
environment that's botheringyou.
The first thing we would thinkof would be, oh, there's an
allergen in here of some kind.
There's dust or there's somesomething like that.
Right.
And it could be just thatsimple, but it could be even
(25:27):
bigger than that.
Um, unfortunately, everything wehave off-gasses.
So all of our new furniture, allof our new flooring and
carpeting and paint, they allhave chemicals that off-gas.
And that off-gassing takes 10years, seven to 10 years for it
to go through its off-gassingperiod.
So when we think there's no wayI can be sick, I have a brand
(25:49):
new house.
You probably are really sickfrom the brand new house because
the brand new house has allbrand new things in it and it's
releasing all these chemicals.
And you haven't been exposed tothem for a long time.
SPEAKER_01 (26:01):
How do we protect ourselves?
How do we do the best we can tosort of living in a bubble?
SPEAKER_00 (26:10):
And yeah, we can't do that.
SPEAKER_01 (26:12):
Yeah, uh, which, yeah, I'm pretty sure we can't,
but how do we do the best we canto take care of ourselves?
SPEAKER_00 (26:20):
Yeah, so I think it's important always to start
with nutrition.
We have to eat a solid, good,healthy diet.
Whole foods, lots of colors, youknow, your fruits, your
vegetables, your proteins, andtry not to eliminate any one
food category.
But when you look at the foodpyramid, the major food category
at the bottom is incorrect.
(26:41):
It's an inverted food uh pyramidthat we should be looking at.
Fruits and vegetables first,proteins, carbohydrates, and
things with gluten last.
Gluten's very inflammatory forus.
So it acts like morphine in thebrain for a lot of people and
overstimulates them.
So we, if you're inflamed orhave any neurological condition,
you want to avoid gluten rightaway.
(27:02):
Um, that's first and foremost.
And then secondarily, very easythings that you can do in the
home, especially a brand newhome, is leave a window cracked
open.
It doesn't have to be high, leanlike maybe a half an inch to an
inch open just to get some freshcirculating air in the building
is really helpful because it'llhelp remove those off-gassings.
In some of our older homes,they're built very tight.
They don't breathe.
(27:23):
And so we need to keep thatcirculation.
Run an air purifier in yourhouse is really great.
And then I really think it'simportant for all of us to detox
on a regular basis because we'reexposed to so many things.
Using really simple things likevitamin C as a detoxifier.
Um, N acetylcysteine, we call itNAC for short.
(27:43):
That's a great uh detoxifier.
Milk thistle is another one.
If you like tea, you can do milkthistle tea.
But I will warn you if you havea ragweed allergy, don't do it
because you'll have some allergysymptoms.
But just basic things like thatcan really be done.
Starting your day off with awarm glass of lemon water is one
of the best things you can dofor detoxing your body.
And it only has to be the sizeof a coffee cup.
(28:05):
Um, put a little quarter sliceof lemon in there, drink that
down, start that body moving itstoxins and the liver doing what
it's supposed to, and it'sextremely helpful.
SPEAKER_01 (28:16):
I love this.
I it's funny, there was a periodof time in my life where I
couldn't be bothered with any ofthis.
And I truly have been fascinatedreading through everything that
you had to say.
Do you find with the women whocome in to see you, the patients
(28:36):
that you come in, is there overthe course of the last couple of
years, is there something thathas surprised you?
Is there a commonality that thatwas that you that you didn't
expect?
SPEAKER_00 (28:48):
Over the last couple of years, what's really
surprised me, you know, we cameout of a pandemic.
Um, and what that virus has doneto women has been horrible.
I did not expect that.
Um, you know, the coronavirushas been around a long time.
It it's a common cold virus.
It should not have done what itdid, but I am seeing very high
(29:12):
levels of neurological diseasesthat I didn't see before.
We're seeing a lot of peoplewith decreased immune systems uh
for no reason.
Um, we're seeing cardiovascularthings in people who shouldn't
have them.
They're young, they're healthyoverall, a lot of fatigue, a lot
of fibromyalgia symptoms, a lotof um, I have several patients
who've had triggered MS afterthey were sick with the virus.
(29:36):
Um, those kinds of things Ididn't expect.
And it's become harder for us totreat them than it was before
the pandemic.
Before we could treat them, allthe things we used were great.
It worked.
Now it's much more effort on thepatient side and on our side,
and things that used to workbefore don't work as well as
they did.
SPEAKER_01 (29:56):
Do you find that more and more people are moving
towards functional medicine?
SPEAKER_00 (30:00):
Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_01 (30:03):
What is the pivot in that shift?
SPEAKER_00 (30:06):
I think it's multifaceted, especially with
people who are chronically ill.
They're tired of beingdismissed.
They're tired of being toldthere's nothing wrong with them.
They're tired of just having adrug thrown at them with no real
understanding of what's causingtheir symptoms.
They want root medicine.
They want to know what's causingtheir symptoms.
And they're looking for answersoutside of our traditional
(30:29):
system.
I think the traditional systemis great.
If I have a heart attack, if Ibreak my arm, I want a
traditional medicine doctor tofix me.
I'm not coming to see someonelike me.
I want an orthopedic to set myarm.
I want a cardiologist to fix myheart.
But unfortunately, where we arenot good in traditional medicine
is with the chronically ill,with the people who have all
(30:51):
these symptoms that don't seemto make sense.
We don't do a good job in ourtraditional medicine system with
taking care of those people.
We don't have a lot of optionsfor them.
And that's where people willturn to functional medicine.
The other place is theanti-aging people, the people
who want to live life longer,healthier.
They want to be 80 years old andlook and feel like they're 60.
(31:12):
And it's not from a vanityissue.
They want to truly live life andbe vibrant.
Those are the other people thatare turning to functional
medicine because there are toolsin our toolbox that the
traditional medicine peoplecan't give them.
People with Alzheimer's diseaseare turning to functional
medicine.
They don't have a lot of goodanswers for them.
(31:32):
They have no way of figuring outwhat triggered it.
They're coming to people like meto help them figure that out.
SPEAKER_01 (31:39):
That's where I am in the anti-aging category, if you
will.
Not from a vanity standpoint,but truly from a how can I live
the best, healthiest, longest,fullest existence through my
kids having kids and being outand about.
(32:01):
I don't want to be or feeldebilitated.
I don't want to be in a placewhere I feel lost and confused
and unable to move.
And I I also in your book reallyappreciated what you were just
(32:25):
saying the the combination ofthe two, the the traditional
Western medicine and thefunctional, because I think that
there is a place for both.
(32:47):
And if I do break a boat or ifI'm in uh if I'm in a car
accident, I would like to beable to go to the hospital.
Um so I think but I do love howyou are helping, most
specifically in this category,women to feel seen rather than
dismissed, because there are somany who just have to keep
(33:11):
saying, but I swear there issomething wrong.
But I swear you are missingsomething.
For the individual, becausefunctional medicine does not
fall under the health insurancecategory.
Correct.
For the individual who doesn'thave the ability to currently
(33:32):
private pay for functionalmedicine, where do they start?
Because I can see that this isdefinitely something that is
appealing, but if they don'thave the ability to private pay,
but want to pursue in some way,where do they begin?
SPEAKER_00 (33:51):
That's a great question.
So you can begin with a healthcoach or a nutritionist.
That is the easiest place tostart, especially if you're
eating a traditional Americandiet.
If your diet is pristine, that'sa different say uh scenario.
But starting with nutrition iskey, and starting with those
people are great.
Um, soon there will be aplatform that I'm creating for
(34:15):
women and men that if they wantto pursue this and they they
really they don't have access toa functional medicine
practitioner for whateverreason.
It's locally they don't haveaccess or they can't afford it.
There will be an affordableoption for them to receive
functional medicine via an appthat we're creating.
And all the knowledge that I'vehad and all the luxury that I've
(34:36):
had of treating 13,000 patientsover 25 years will be built into
this app.
And so you will have access tothat functional medicine.
You will have access to my brain24-7.
And you can ask questions insidethe app, and my brain will tell
you all the answers that Ishared today and even more
pearls that we have.
Um, and that that will changefunctional medicine as we know
(34:58):
it for sure.
That is fantastic.
SPEAKER_01 (35:01):
I love the accessibility because I think
that this is one of the piecesthat is missing, right?
Um, I had a doctor a number ofyears ago who left traditional
medicine because I've beentested for that mutated gene.
As soon as you said that,because she left traditional
medicine to move into thefunctional space.
(35:22):
And she was going to join agroup that was it was a private,
it was like a subscriptionalmost.
Yeah.
And it was, I want to say two orthree hundred dollars a month to
join their group and have accessto them at all times.
And it it was never somethingthat was even vaguely possible
(35:43):
for me at that time.
And this was easily 15 plusyears ago.
So at the time, it wascompletely out of reach.
So I really appreciate theopportunity for the level of
accessibility that you'reworking to offer.
And for our audience's purposes,when you have that app, we'll
(36:08):
make sure that we can update theshow notes and let people know
that that you have thatavailable.
So, in addition to diet, whatwould you say would be the next
step?
SPEAKER_00 (36:17):
I think the next step would be getting an
evaluation of your hormones andnutrient levels.
If you can get not a traditionalblood test for nutrients,
because we do have a way oftesting vitamin B and magnesium
and vitamin C, those kinds ofthings.
Um, but they're not looking atreally good levels.
Um, there is an uh a platformcalled Rupa Health that you can
(36:40):
go on and you can order testsfor yourself.
You don't have to have a doctorto order them.
And you could do just a verysimple basic mineral vitamin
test and see what you'redeficient in.
By that, you can interpret ityourself.
You can look at it and it'lltell you like you're low in
vitamin D, you're low in vitaminB, you're too high in this.
(37:00):
And it'll tell you in that testresult exactly what supplements
to take and how much.
And that is a really great placeto start because sometimes we're
just guessing at what we thinkyou need.
But if you know what you needalready and you're supplementing
and optimizing that, those aresome very basic things that you
can do on your own.
Hormones are a little bit moredifficult to figure out by
(37:21):
yourself, but once you havehormone tests, you could go to
someone like myself and say,please interpret this for me and
tell me what I need.
And it reduces the time that youhave to be with a practitioner
like myself, which then is goingto significantly reduce the cost
for you as well.
SPEAKER_01 (37:36):
That's fantastic.
And one of the things you saidabout earlier about the testing
is a lot of times it'sinterpreted not based on
optimal, but based on range.
And will you reiterate that foreveryone so that people can
understand what that means?
Because I know a lot of timespeople get back like you're
you're you're fine, everything'snormal.
And it isn't necessarily normal,it's that you're running really,
(37:58):
really close to low or reallyclose to high.
But as long as you're stillwithin the range, you're being
told you're fine.
SPEAKER_00 (38:04):
Absolutely.
So our healthcare lab system isset up to catch 90% of the
people.
So if you look at ranges,sometimes they're very wide.
It could be anywhere from 10 to100 is the normal range on a
particular lab test.
Vitamin D is a good example ofthat.
Normal range goes from 30 to100.
So if you're at 29, they'regonna say you're okay.
(38:27):
But if you're at 101, they'regonna say it's too high.
Optimal range in for vitamin Dis right in the middle, around
60 to 80.
Another really good example yourlisteners will probably want to
know is is thyroid function.
Your TSH stands for thyroidstimulating hormone.
It's what everybody measures tosee if you have a thyroid
disorder.
Um, that range it goes from,depending on the lab, about 0.5
(38:50):
up to four and a half.
But I've seen doctors interpretthe lab and say, well, if it's
not 10 or higher, I'm not gonnatreat you.
Okay, but the the normal rangeis four and a half on the high
end.
Why are you saying you're gonnawait until 10 to treat you?
And so in that particular case,too, with thyroid, it's opposite
of what makes sense to ourbrain.
(39:12):
So in our brain, we would think,well, I want as much thyroid
hormone as I can have becausethen I have better energy and
better metabolism, but that'sjust the opposite.
You want that TSH level to be alot lower.
All the TSH tells us is is yourbrain communicating with the
thyroid?
And if so, how well is it doingthat?
And the more it needs it, themore it's gonna kick the
(39:32):
thyroid, the higher the TSHlevel becomes because it needs
more thyroid hormone and itshouldn't be doing that.
So an optimal range for TSHlevel should really be about one
to two.
So if you're at three and a halfand you're not feeling well,
most doctors are gonna say it'stotally fine, but a functional
medicine doctor is gonna saythat's too high.
And we need to look at otherthyroid labs, other thyroid
(39:55):
function tests, and thetraditional doctors aren't going
to do that.
SPEAKER_01 (39:59):
Do you see a specific functional medicine
doctor or do you heal yourself?
SPEAKER_00 (40:03):
I do both.
Um, so I know a lot aboutmyself, but it's not good to
treat just yourself.
So when I got my diagnosis of MSuh three years ago, I started
researching my own things and Istarted working on myself quite
a bit, but I did pull in someexperts for myself and I said,
okay, I need some people withbetter brains than I do or
(40:24):
bigger brains and differentissues and specialties that I
don't have.
And so I have a doc that I seefrom New Zealand.
I have another doc in uhCalifornia that I see.
Um, and I I got the best ofeverything from everybody that I
knew and put put it alltogether.
I had to fix myself because Ididn't have time to go see
(40:45):
people, but um, I always am myown best guinea pig.
So I never do anything for mypatients that I don't try on
myself first.
Um, so 18 months after mydiagnosis of the MS, I finally
decided to see the neurologistbecause I wasn't going to see
the neurologist, because in myworld, MS is something else
until proven otherwise.
There's a reason your body'screating white matter.
(41:07):
And um, so I finally said to myhusband, I really want to see
the neurologist.
I said, I know I don't have MS,but I need to hear it from them.
And I saw the traditionalneurologist and gave her my
whole story of everything that Ihad done over 18 months.
And she looked at me and shesaid, You don't have MS.
Um, and so she she gave me a newlabel and said, I think you have
(41:28):
post-COVID peripheralneuropathy.
And I'm like, oh brother, herewe go.
And and I already knew it wasn'tthat either.
It was all the other things.
I had Lyme disease, I had moldmycotoxin illness, I had viral
illness.
I mean, I had a lot of toxinsthat I wasn't cleaning out and I
wasn't clearing.
And once all of those thingscame out, all of my symptoms
(41:49):
were gone.
And what they said wasimpossible that you can't
reverse white matter disease waspossible.
I don't have white matterdisease in my brain anymore.
And traditional medicine tellsus all the time we can't do
that, but functional medicinesays we can, and it is true, and
I'm living proof that we can doit.
SPEAKER_01 (42:06):
That's amazing.
SPEAKER_00 (42:07):
How are you feeling now?
I feel amazing.
I really do.
I don't really have any symptomsthat I had before when I
started.
Um, and it's interesting, myorthopedic doctor who diagnosed
me with MS, I just hired abusiness development person and
she knows him, and he diagnosedher with MS 15 years ago as
well, and she doesn't have it.
(42:28):
So I was like, oh, that'sinteresting.
There's got to be somethingemotional for him around this MS
and women.
Because now this is like thefourth person I've heard that he
had diagnosed with MS off of abrain scan.
SPEAKER_01 (42:40):
Um, but he So, how many women, I mean, if if you
know four people, how many otherwomen are out there that have
been diagnosed by this man andare just taking medications and
doing doing treatment that theyshouldn't be doing?
Yeah.
Doesn't that do more harm thangood?
SPEAKER_00 (43:00):
It certainly does.
And I think it's easy for us todo that.
You know, we're scared, we don'task the right questions.
The doctors are afraid of beingsued if they don't provide
something for you.
And I think there's a lot ofwomen out there that are taking
immune-suppressing drugs thatthey don't need to be taking,
that are opening them up forother problems down the road by
(43:21):
suppressing their immune systemthat they don't have to be
doing.
And there and there arecertainly people who truly do
have MS and they need certainmedications.
But I also think that thosepeople should be looking at what
triggered it in the first place.
Because our body doesn't juststart attacking itself for no
reason.
There's a reason why it'sattacking itself, and we need to
(43:41):
figure out what that is andeliminate it so the body can
actually heal.
SPEAKER_01 (43:45):
So if you are given a scary diagnosis, would your
recommendation be to either geta second opinion and or go deep
in terms of really digging intois this accurate and what can I
(44:06):
do to potentially combat thesymptoms?
SPEAKER_00 (44:10):
Most definitely, I would say get a second and a
third opinion and don't do it inthe same hospital system.
So if I'm seeing the localhospital system and I'm seeing a
neurologist there, and I want asecond opinion from another
neurologist, and they're in thatsame facility, they're not going
to give you a different opinion.
They have to give you the sameopinion of the previous doctor.
(44:34):
So you want to go outside ofthat system if you can for a
second opinion.
Ideally, outside of the town iseven better because all the
doctors know each other andthey're not going to tell a
patient that something isdifferent than another doctor
has said.
So I definitely think that'simportant.
And then I would say if it's aserious condition, then do a
(44:56):
functional medicine evaluation.
At least do a consult withsomebody to say these are the
potential other things thatcould be causing your issues,
and then do a deep dive and juststart really checking out every
piece of it to know is thistruly the right diagnosis or
not?
Um, it doesn't take long usuallyto figure out what's going on.
And you can open up somedifferent testing that can tell
(45:20):
us pretty fast exactly what'sgoing on.
SPEAKER_01 (45:23):
This is fantastic.
Dr.
Deb, I have so enjoyed havingthis conversation with you.
Where can everyone find you?
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (45:30):
So you can find me on my social page, uh Deb Muth.
I have a women's group that wejust started called She Knows
Functional.
Uh sorry, she knows, and it's atFacebook.
So it's a free group.
You can join us.
We have these conversations allthe time.
Everybody's supporting eachother there.
And you can also find me atSerenity Healthcare Center.com.
SPEAKER_01 (45:51):
Fantastic.
Is there anything I didn't askyou that you that you would like
to offer?
SPEAKER_00 (45:57):
I would love to say this to people trust your gut.
Women's intuition is amazing,and we need to trust our guts.
And when you get diagnosed withsomething, it isn't the time to
retreat.
It's the time to find the rebelinside of you that rises above.
Be that mama bear that you wouldbe for your children.
(46:18):
You have to be it for yourself,too.
SPEAKER_01 (46:21):
I love that.
I have one final question foryou.
Yeah, how do you define hope?
SPEAKER_00 (46:25):
How?
Um, hope is never giving up, isnever accepting a wrong answer.
Just always being in likecurious and understanding that
today we may not have the answerfor something, but that doesn't
mean that tomorrow or a weekfrom now we won't have the
answer.
Things are constantly changing.
So always be curious, always belooking for the answers.
(46:48):
You are fantastic.
SPEAKER_01 (46:50):
Thank you so much for being here.
I really encourage people to goout and grab your book.
Seen it last.
I uh I enjoyed every single pageand I read it very quickly.
Uh, and I personally felt veryseen.
So thank you for being here andthank you for the book.
So thank you so much for havingme.
Appreciate it.
(47:10):
My pleasure.
And friends, thank you forjoining us as always.
I hope we made you feel seenduring this conversation.
Please do turn around and shareit with anyone who you feel
needs to hear this conversationas well.
Review if you are up for it, anduntil we get to see you next
time, please do take very goodcare of yourself.
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