Latest / Limitless Living with Fredricka Davis / 082: Will I Ever Feel Like Myself Again? Hope After Illness, Injury, or Chronic Symptoms

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082: Will I Ever Feel Like Myself Again? Hope After Illness, Injury, or Chronic Symptoms · Limitless Living with Fredricka Davis

• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome back to the Limitless Living Podcast.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Frederica Davis, your host.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Today is Wellness Reset Thursday.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: This is where we get to look at your health and your life as connected, because what is happening in one area almost always is affecting the other areas.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: So, question: Have you ever looked at your life and just wondered, am I ever going to feel like myself again?
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: And when I say life, that's going to be body, mindset, heart, soul, all of that.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: If you're not feeling like yourself, are you sitting there thinking, when in the world will I ever feel like me again?
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: Is it even possible?
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're recovering from an illness or you've had an injury that kind of set you back a little bit.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you are healing from a surgery, or you had an even bigger, more difficult diagnosis.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe honestly, it's just a period in your life where your body simply is not cooperating anymore.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: I can relate, I have been there, I know that I still will have days where I can have that feeling occasionally, living with chronic disease like I do.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: So I understand.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, maybe you're still doing all the things that you need to be doing, whether that's working or taking care of your family or just showing up for your appointments and getting through the day.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's all you can do.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: And that is a lot if you're doing that and you're living with chronic illness or you're just not feeling like yourself.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: Underneath all that, though, are you wondering whether that energetic side of you and that active, clear-thinking woman is ever going to return?
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: I happen to know how the answer to this question sometimes can feel so discouraging.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I've asked it of myself more than once.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up with a lot of allergies and asthma.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Now, lots of people have allergies.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: I had it to the point that I was in a hospital every single week and sometimes more than once during the week and wound up on four years of homeboying because I was more sick than I was actually able to be in school.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: And we didn't have homeschooling like we, you know, have, but nowadays, we didn't have any of that back then.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I was active.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I had lots of broken bones, not in my youth, surprisingly enough, but as an adult, because apparently I think I'm a whole lot more graceful than I am.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: But skiing accidents, horse accidents, motorcycle accidents, trip and fall, slip and fall.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I've had a lot of things: broken bones, sprains, tears, surgeries, pneumonia that landed me in the hospital, even a mysterious infection that was in my jaw that put me in the hospital.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I've had a lot of things.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: When I speak from this, I promise you, I am speaking both with knowledge, but from serious personal experience too.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: So I really do get it when you are in these moments.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: And many of those things were temporary, but when you are in the middle of them, they feel like they are just insurmountable and they just can feel like they are forever and so long-lasting.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: And it can really be discouraging and overwhelming.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: So I get that.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: And even when someone tells you, oh, you're going to feel so much better after you heal and you get to the other side of this, it doesn't matter.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: You can still have this private internal moment, or many of them, quite frankly, when you think, My God, how am I going to come back from this?
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: Will I ever be myself?
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: Will I ever be active?
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: Will I ever be able to do the things I like to do?
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: Will I ever be able to work the way I used to work?
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: Will I have the energy I need for the people I love?
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: Will I be able to get up and down off the ground for my grandkids, whatever the case may be?
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: Then there are the things that do not simply go away.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: So for me, this now includes active psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I was the woman, if you can relate to any of this, that was taking care of everybody else first, putting myself last, and just dealing with the stress, pushing through, getting through.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I have an entire career built around serving others.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I've been teaching nutrition and wellness and mindset and all sorts of things.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm somebody who can really rein myself in and kind of keep going.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: On one hand, that can be good in moments when you need that.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: When you're doing it too much and you're not pausing long enough, then it starts to take a toll.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: So my system was already in need of a little extra loving care because I'd pushed too hard too long doing that.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: And then along came COVID.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: And COVID, what it tended to do was trigger things inside people that they already had.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: So it took what was already inside me going on and turned it up.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: It was like, you know, tenfold, a hundredfold, a thousandfold, and then throw in some hormonal changes with menopause.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: So perfect storm.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: And boom, pain, immense pain, inflammation, me walking around on a cane for almost two years, off and on, mostly on, and fatigue and sleep problems and brain fog problems.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: And everything just became much more difficult.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: Things that would kind of come and go, and then I would kind of address, and then they'd be fine for a little bit.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: They came and they stayed and then they amplified.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: So through all of this, though, I was still running my businesses.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: I was still helping my clients, and I was still being mom and wife and the person people expected me to be, and the person people expected me to be.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that person that everyone else needs and grounds everybody else and is there to help them with their own problems and so on, right?
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: You probably can relate to this.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: Most women have gone through some of this, especially as we get to our 40s and 50s, you know?
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: But I really was not feeling like myself more and more and more and more, especially as I was walking around on a cane.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: And everything I was doing would help a little bit, but not enough.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now I was still running my businesses, helping clients, being mom and wife and the person that I needed to be and everybody expected me to be, but I really just did not feel like myself.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: And if I'm being honest, I felt like, how in the world can I know all these things and be this broken down?
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: What in the hell is happening to me?
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: I am doing so many of these right things.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Why aren't they working?
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: And it was very discouraging.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: It was very overwhelming place to be, even though I had all of this knowledge, all this experience, and I was teaching wellness, nutrition, and healing and things like that.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: And what I want to say to you is if you are there right now, I want you to know that I understand so much the fear that you feel when you are in this place, the fear that's underneath all of this.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's not only a fear about the symptoms that you might be experiencing, it's actually a fear that your body has changed so much that it's changing the course of your life.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a fear that you might not be able to get yourself back, or you might not know where to begin, or there might not even be a possibility of getting yourself back.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, when we get to these ages, you know, 40, 50, 60, 70, whatever, the fear is there.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's real of whether or not we're going to remain independent.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: And this whole predicament that I was in, that's what I'll call it, a predicament today, is exactly how I wound up creating the whole woman reset.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: Because I had to take everything I knew that normally would work but was no longer working for me, reevaluate that, re-research deeper, look at the changes, look at what was happening, and come up with a new way if I had any kind of hope.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: And that's how that happened.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: I created it all to address what was going on in me first.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: Now, before we go any further, none of what I'm sharing replaces appropriate health care.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not anti-doctor, I'm not anti-Western medicine at all.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't ever want to give that impression because I've had moments where I needed surgery and the pain meds, I said yes to the pain meds because it was an appropriate and logical thing to do.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I was happy they were there.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I was happy my surgeon had all the knowledge that he had to have in order to do the surgery.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: That said, I really do believe that so often we turn to Western medicine for quick fixes.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: And Western medicine is limited, it does not typically look at the whole person and the root causes or the triggers that are in someone's daily life.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: And in my opinion, if we had a medical system where we had the wonderful knowledge that Western medicine has and we combined it with this whole self-approach, this whole functional approach, which is more functional medicine and more functional lifestyle coaching and things like that, that would be the perfect marriage.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: I wish we had it.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: We simply do not with the bulk of our medical professionals.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not blaming them, it's just the system that we have.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: So when I talk about the things that I talk about, I do come at things from a more functional viewpoint, more holistic viewpoint, but they don't replace diagnosis or physical therapy or any of the recommendations that you might need from your professional.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: So this is all very individual, very based on your medical history.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: There is a place, though, to be looking at what you're doing to help or hurt what you already have going on.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: So, of course, if you have anything that's new or severe or worsening or any of those things, you absolutely should go see somebody.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: Now, there is something else I want to say clearly, and that is taking responsibility for the choices available to you is not the same thing as blaming yourself for becoming ill in the first place.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, we can contribute to certain things, but it is what it is.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: You are here now, and it will serve no one for you to get stuck in that.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: You didn't choose your genetics, you didn't choose every single infection that you got over the lifetime that you've been on this planet.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: You didn't choose to get injured.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I will say there have been a few times in my lifetime I chose to put myself in dangerous situations and then wound up injured.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: That was my choice.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: But there's a difference.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: Getting stuck in blaming yourself for the actual everything is far different than saying, okay, I wish I would have made that choice a little bit different, but okay, I didn't ask for this.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: This is new.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: Let's keep going.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: You didn't choose every infection you ever had, you didn't choose every injury you ever had, or hormonal shift, or environmental exposure, or even traumas.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: You did not choose traumatic experiences you've had or stressful circumstances, perhaps that have affected your body.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I do believe that our choices sometimes lead us to things like this.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: But what I'm saying is I certainly did not choose to have an autoimmune condition.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: I also did not choose to have COVID.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: I had it before we even knew exactly what it was.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: And then again, and those are things that you cannot control.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: If you did some things, had made some choices that yes, you chose something that put you into a situation where you wound up injured, fine, own it and move on.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: Don't get stuck in blame.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: Don't get stuck in living in the guilt.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you played a role in how you got here or not, whether things happened by chance or not, the most important part here is to be willing to be honest about the ways that you contributed to whatever happened next.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: As I mentioned earlier, I spent years pushing hard, running multiple businesses, taking care of everybody else, being a single mom, helping my aging mother, making my own needs, the thing that I would get to later, always last on the list.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I was doing a lot of healthy things, really, truly mainly healthy things.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: I had all this training in nutrition and personal training and movement and supplements and healthy foods and mindset and stress management, but knowing individual healthy things did not mean I was caring for myself the way I needed to be cared for as a whole woman.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: So I was still overriding exhaustion.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: That was my really biggest thing.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: I was treating sleep like something I could negotiate with.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: I was still carrying too much stress for too long.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I was trying to solve problems one at a time as they would pop up, which is so typically what we all do, at the same time as the rest of my life was becoming more and more imbalanced and pulling from my body.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: Now, did that cause everything I am living with now?
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely not.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I will not tell you that your lifestyle choices have caused what you're living with either.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's more complex than that.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: Might I tell you that, hey, yeah, you did this and you did this and you did this.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's no surprise you have that.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I might.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: I absolutely might.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: But your genes are going to play a role in this, your circumstances are going to play a role in this, your financial state is going to play a role in this.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of things that play a role in our health.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: And for me, my choices were part of the environment that I was putting my body in.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: I was asking my body to function at its best, at its peak, pushing it hard in an environment where it was sleep-deprived, where it was overstressed and nervous system dysregulated.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: And when I changed that environment, I began to see some meaningful changes.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: And then, of course, it wasn't just that.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: There was more to it than that, but that was where I started.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: Now, through creating, living, and practicing the whole woman reset that I now teach, my pain has decreased by about 80%.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: That is enormous.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: My brain fog, I'm no longer on a cane.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: My brain fog and fatigue have improved by about 90%.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to say that again.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: My brain fog and my fatigue have improved by about 90%.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: I can say that.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: I run circles around 20-year-olds.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: And my active psoriasis lesions have even decreased by about 30%.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: Now, is that 80 or 90?
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: No, but 30% is significant enough for me to have less pins and needles, less itching, less hot, fiery, swollen red skin, and less active spots of the lesions.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_00: My sleep has improved and I've lost 42 pounds without another restrictive diet.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: I have become more active, clearer, and far more able to participate in my own life.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: Now, these are meaningful results.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, these are my results.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: They are not a promise of what your body will do if you begin to do the same things because we are all different.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I do still have psoriasis.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: I still have psoriatic arthritis.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: I still have chronic Lyme.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: I have a long list of my own things I still have.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: If I don't sleep enough or I push too hard for too long, or I get sick, get a virus, or even get a bug bite, my immune system still might remind me very quickly that everything is still inside me because it will hyper-react and attack me instead of what's going on.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: But living with something like IHAB or something that's chronic or ongoing is not the same as having no influence over how you live with it.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this was a really big shift for me.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_00: I stopped asking only how do I make this symptom disappear?
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: What the heck is this coming from?
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: I started asking, okay, what is my whole body and life asking me to pay attention to?
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: What is this symptom telling me?
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: I looked at sleep, I looked at nourishment, movement, stress, pain, relationships, uh responsibilities, environment, my thinking, mindset, nervous system.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I looked at all of these things, spiritual health, all of it, as a connected whole.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I stopped assuming that the most intense plan would create the best result.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, let's go fast and hard, let's cast, let's go keto, let's go this, let's go that.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: I stopped doing those types of things.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, there's good things to each one of those things.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not downing any of those.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: However, that's not what my body needed.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: My body needed a different approach.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I've, and from what I've seen with my clients, this seems to be pretty across the board with a lot of women who are 40, 50, 60, and up because we have accumulated a lot of long-term stress, a lot of nervous system dysregulation, a lot of pushing.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: By this point, we've experienced so many things that have perhaps manifested within the body or contributed to something that's already in the body going on.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: So what I want to say is it didn't necessarily mean I rejected conventional health care.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I will clarify that for me personally, I have thus far rejected all the immunosuppressants and the steroids, which are what I would be on for all of my diagnoses because I don't want the side effects, I don't want long-term.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: And my goal is to see how far I can regress, improve, and manage, and how long I can do that before I address with those medicines.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's a personal decision to me.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I've had clients go through the whole woman wellness reset who are on different medications.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they're on, you know, diabetic medication or arthritic conditions or chronic Lyme or fibromyalgia.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: There's just a whole host of things we've experienced here.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: I've had people on the GLP ones.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: If you're taking medicines, I'm not suggesting that you don't go that route.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: What I'm suggesting is that there are other things you have control over that you can do to make a difference in your body, with or without that.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: And becoming more willing to look at those and figure out what kind of appropriate support your body, your mind, your heart, your soul, your head, everything needs can be the key to either helping those medicines do even better, sometimes even getting you off of the medicines, or maybe keeping you from being on them.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: It just depends.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: So this is really individualized, depending on the person, the condition.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_00: You might need medical care or nutrition or physical therapy matched with chiropractic, matched with massage or tai chi or yoga or counseling, coaching, time outside in nature, spiritual practices, time with friends, laughter.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot that can go into this.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: And so many of these are evidence-informed and culturally rooted approaches, and they work.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_00: Not every approach is appropriate for every person.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I will say natural does not automatically mean safe.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: You still need to consider things like your condition, your medications, your history, all the different things.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: But your choices are not limited to this one narrow path, this one little box that they fit in, as we are so often presented when we go see the doctor.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: Usually we are presented with options that are surgery, a 10-second lifestyle mention, if you're lucky, uh, in changes, and drugs.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_00: Those are what we get when we go to the doctors 90% of the time.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: I wish it wasn't that way.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: It just is.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: While those things have a place, there is this whole other area that you have more control over than you probably realize.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you realize it and you're doing some of it, it's just not clicking.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you know that you can, but it's just too overwhelming, you don't know where to start.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: And then that's when you need guidance.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: You just simply likely need somebody who can help you one step at a time simply to do that.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: So, where do you begin?
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: If you're listening to me right now and you're feeling like, okay, my health has become one more enormous problem, and I just don't know where to start.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know where I don't have the energy to solve this.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know where to start.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to do this or I want to do that, and I'm not sure how to do that, and so on.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you have all the questions and it starts to get overwhelmed, and then you just don't do anything.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: Begin by noticing what reliably is making you feel worse?
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: What is it that consistently is taking place that makes you feel worse?
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: Not so you become afraid of everything.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: You're looking for patterns here.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: What happens after several nights of poor sleep, or even maybe one?
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: What happened?
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: Because I know for me it happened, it starts to happen after one now.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: What happens when you skip meals?
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you eat something that was more convenient than good for you?
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Do you get tired?
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: Do you get a little bit more brain fog?
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: I do.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: That's how I feel.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: What happens after an over-scheduled week, where it was just a really, really busy scheduled week?
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: I can tell you for me, I want to slow down.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: I need some time to collapse.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: I need some time to veg.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: And if I don't get that and I keep pushing through, which is what most of us do and what I would have done in the past, then it just keeps going and it it causes flares for me.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: So I want you to be looking for things.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like this, I'm just giving you some examples here.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: Does complete inactivity affect you?
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: I will again say for me and a lot of my clients, sitting too long is right up there is the number one enemy, I swear, some days, if I sit too long because it makes me stiffer.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Do you feel like that?
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: Does too much activity create a flare?
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_00: These are patterns you're looking for.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: And somewhere within there is going to be your kind of your magic number of act, you know, your magic amount of activity and your magic amount of rest and inactivity.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: So does being around a particular situation keep your body tense even after you've left the situation?
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: So this can be, you know, we're coming up into the holidays.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: This can be family situations.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: This can be work situations.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: If you are feeling like hours later you're still on edge because of a situation you were in, that's something to notice.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_00: You are just gathering information and you're gathering it about your own body, about how you operate and about how things around you are affecting you.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: You're not putting yourself on trial here.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: Next, what I want you to do is notice what helps you, even slightly helps you.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: We tend to dismiss a 10% improvement because we want the pain gone or the energy back or the weight off and the problem to be 100% solved, period.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: Right away.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's why we turned pills as quick fixes often, as well as extreme diets or extreme exercise plans when maybe that's not what our body needs at that moment.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I understand that.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: I get it.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_00: But an emptier schedule, maybe a clearer afternoon, that can matter.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: Sleeping an hour longer matters.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: Having slightly less pain when you stand up, that matters.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: Feeling calm enough to make dinner instead of ordering out matters.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: Doing something that will help you feel good, even if it's only 10% better, it matters.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: So small improvements, they're not failure.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: We've just kind of been conditioned to be in this no pain, no gain mentality.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: And that we need to go to all these extremes when really, when really, if we just practice small, simple, sustainable shifts consistently, that would have a much bigger effect on us.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: And that was a hard thing for my brain to wrap around.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know, but I'm a doer.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: I like to do it, and I'm the kind of person who starts something, I'll keep going until it's done, even though I need to take a pause or I need to take a rest because I'm doing it.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'm getting it done.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_00: And when you're in that kind of mentality, you tend to do things bigger.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: So thinking about doing small little shifts that, oh yeah, it made me feel a little bit better, but it wasn't that big of a deal.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: You discount it when really we should be acknowledging it and cheering it on because it's information.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: And if you keep doing that, it becomes a greater change within you.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: It tells you that there's something here that's worth repeating.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: Then choose one stabilizing action.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I do not mean 12 supplements, a rigid meal plan, a new exercise program, or maybe a completely new morning routine and a promise that you'll never become stressed again.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_00: These don't work.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: Choose one thing that's gonna help create a little bit more steadiness, a little bit more balance and go with that first and make it consistent.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you choose to protect your bedtime just three nights this week.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you know you should be eating more protein.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: So you're gonna choose to eat protein earlier in the day and get a head start on that.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_00: Same thing with water.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: We all know we need to drink more water and you're not drinking enough water.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, maybe you're gonna grab one of those tips I've given in a previous episode and say, I'm gonna front load my water and I am gonna drink 20 ounces before I have my coffee or my breakfast, and I'm gonna get a head start on that in the morning.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: Or you're gonna decide to take just a gentle 10-minute walk if you've been doing nothing.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe it's that you will schedule the appointment that you've been putting off.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: For me, it's that damn colonoscopy.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: I've been putting that off, and that is one I just scheduled.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're gonna ask for help on something you've been carrying far too long alone.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: Or give yourself permission to have 10 quiet minutes without television, phone, audiobook, or anybody asking you for something.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: Choose something small enough to do in the life that you actually have.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: Now I'm all for big goals.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: I will tell you, when I do goal setting, classes, and workshops, we set our big goals.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: But it is painfully obvious that while those are important and there is a place for that, when it comes to making lifestyle changes, the small, consistent goals that you learn to integrate every day repeatedly have a much larger impact over time because today's small goal that becomes integrated isn't tomorrow's small goal because it's already part of what you do.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: Then you pick another small goal and they just keep layering and they keep going.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_00: You get the picture.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_00: And as we're talking about all this, please don't use a difficult day as proof that nothing is working.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: Recovery is rarely a perfect straight line.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: A flare does not erase every choice that helped you.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: A hard week does not return you to the beginning.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes progress is that you simply recognize what is happening sooner than you used to.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: And you know how to support yourself before things become worse or long term.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: And in all honesty, you may not return to the exact woman you were before your body changed.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: We're different women.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: We're older, we have more things, whatever's going on as you listen to this in you is there.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: Now, here's the reality: some of you may actually be able to return to the woman you were before with the right effort.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: But for many of you, I know for me, I am not likely to turn, I am not likely to return to the exact woman I was before my autoimmune system kicked in the way that it has.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm okay with that because I have acknowledged that.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_00: Now, that does not mean that the woman I'm going to be moving forward is any more diminished.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: It does not mean the woman you have ahead of you, the woman you are now and ahead of you, is diminished in any way from who you were.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_00: The difference here is that you may need to just pause long enough to understand yourself better.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: And you may need to recognize your limits sooner.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: You may need to care for yourself with just a little bit more wisdom, a little bit more kindness and patience, much like you would if you were caring for your friend.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: If we all cared for ourselves the way that we care for our friends, we would be a lot better off.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: And it might mean that you finally stop measuring your strength by how much discomfort you can handle.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I want you to remember, you're not starting from nothing.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: I know it feels like it some days, but you're really not.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: You're starting from everything that you've lived, everything you've learned and survived, and everything you've discovered about yourself.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the next whole woman reset, it begins September 30th.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: The enrollment will close September 28th, or when it's full, I like to keep these intentionally small.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: That way everybody gets their individual attention that they need.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I created this program from the whole person approach that helped me to begin feeling like myself again.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a cure, a diagnosis, or a replacement for any of the care that you may already need.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: It is an eight-week guided experience that helps you look at all the connected parts of your whole self and your whole life.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: So you can begin to make the realistic changes without turning your wellness into this completely new, overwhelming process and making it feel like it's a whole nother job.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to learn more about it, visit my website, fredericadavis.com.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: If you're interested but uncertain, you can certainly request a brief reset clarity call with me.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_00: And you can begin with my free assessment there too.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: Five signs it may be time for a reset.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_00: You can get that for free.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: And whether or not you join me, I want you to leave today with this.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_00: Your diagnosis, your injury, your symptoms, your difficult, whatever it is that you're going through.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: It may have genuinely changed you.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: But whatever it is does not get to write the rest of your life.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_00: It is not the entire rest of your story.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: You get to write that.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: Start to notice one pattern, recognize one thing that helps.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: Choose one stabilizing action, then give that action enough time and consistency to teach you something.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: There is a difference between pretending everything will be fine and having grounded hope.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_00: Grounded hope says, I don't have to control everything.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's okay.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: I know I can't control everything, but I am not powerless.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_00: I can learn.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: I can ask for help.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_00: I can make a choice today that will support the woman that I am becoming.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for joining me today.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_00: If you know a woman who's been wondering whether or not she'll ever feel like herself again, share this episode with her.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe she needs to hear it and know that she is not alone and that there may still be more possibility ahead of her than she can see right now.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, be rooted, be resilient, and be limitless.