Original Recording - Ep.58
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Christa: [00:00:00] ultimately through the process, my end goal is for my patients to feel empowered and to trust their [00:00:08] body and to have an understanding about what hurts and heals their particular body. And when they know those things, [00:00:16] then you don't need me forever. Like, I don't want you to need me to the degree that you need me when you walk in the door.
And that's what I strive for from the very [00:00:24] beginning.
Welcome to the wild and well, a collective podcast where we believe empowered [00:00:32] health is your superpower. We have combined our expertise in medicine and nutrition to bring you the latest research, expert insights and success stories of [00:00:40] people on a mission to live a big life. So buckle up and get ready to learn how to live wildly [00:00:48] well.
Sheree: Welcome back to another episode of the Wild and Wild Collective podcast. Today we're doing a [00:00:56] solo episode with Krista and I'm really excited to give you guys a behind the scenes sneak peek into like interview [00:01:04] style process where I'm going to talk to Krista exactly how she takes care of her patients.
I think a lot of the times when we're. Interviewing [00:01:12] or doing research on a practitioner or someone we want to work with, we want to know exactly how they're going to be different. And Christian, I both [00:01:20] have a very unique approach to health and wellness. We bring in the functional health. We bring any holistic health.
And so, Krista, I'm [00:01:28] excited to dive in today. Can you share with us? I guess if someone's coming to you going, Oh my gosh, I have been to, which is normally our patients, right? [00:01:36] So many other practitioners, or I'm just feeling like I'm banging my head against a wall. Where do I start and how is it going to be different working with you?
[00:01:44] Because I feel like I've tried everything.
Christa: Yeah. So I think, in a world where there's a million taco stands, like I use [00:01:52] that analogy all the time in Texas, like, how is it that practitioners can also stand out and what makes each of us unique? And I think it's [00:02:00] us as human beings are all unique.
So there's that how we interact with others is all unique. And then most practitioners, we have our own sort of [00:02:08] Specific special sauce or system. And I think that just comes with time of seeing what works, what doesn't work. And I really do [00:02:16] go through a system when I work with people.
I work with people one on one for a variety of times. It just depends [00:02:24] on how much work they need, but no matter how long the, let's say health program is that I'm working with someone, I always stick to [00:02:32] the same process, the same system, the same. three pillars, because I find that if we don't follow that, it can be really [00:02:40] overwhelming not only to the body, but also to the mind of like too many things all at one time.
And I also find that if we go in a [00:02:48] systematic approach, oftentimes the body will heal itself along the way. So that requires less [00:02:56] intervention, less supplements. Less interventions overall, right? If we're really healing our body in a systematic [00:03:04] approach. So the first pillar that I always go through with patients, regardless of what's going on, is [00:03:12] digestion and detoxification.
And those really go hand in hand because digestion is not only, for nutrient absorption, but it's also for excretion, which [00:03:20] is part of the So, I always start there and those are really foundational. It's like the bottom of a bathtub, like [00:03:28] you've got to make sure that plug is unplugged so that what's the toxins that are filling into the bathtub have a way out.
So, focusing on how well [00:03:36] they're hydrating and what kind of nutrients they're eating is important. I find the beginning stages is a lot of just [00:03:44] removing. Getting out of our own way, like interviewing the patient to really understand what they're drinking. Are they drinking alcohol? What [00:03:52] they're eating?
What kind of environment are they in? And oftentimes there's just, we're blind to like, our own things that aren't serving us. [00:04:00] Right? And so, having this interview process with a patient kind of serves a lot of purpose. Seeing things from an unemotional or fresh eyes [00:04:08] perspective can be helpful for the patient to say, Oh yeah, I didn't realize that this, how I'm eating or my daily snacks or how much alcohol I'm drinking through the week [00:04:16] is affecting me or if I'm smoking or whatever.
Everyone has their own story of how they, their own systematic daily routines, right? [00:04:24] So getting out of the way, and then also adding supplements to support Those systems so the gut microbiome, we've had lots of conversations [00:04:32] around but a lot of times we just need to re inoculate that.
So, getting a good probiotic is foundational supporting [00:04:40] detoxification with maybe N. A. C. is a really great over the counter supplement that you can do. So those are just some basics. That I start with in pillar [00:04:48] one.
Sheree: I think the key thing to take away from this is someone might hear, okay, well, I do the similar process with everyone, but it is [00:04:56] still, it's not a cookie cutter approach.
And I think we can see now and people are fed up with a cookie cutter approach when it comes to health. It's not just let's follow this [00:05:04] meal plan. And I love that you didn't even bring. Those words into it. It's like, we haven't even started talking about food specifically. It's looking [00:05:12] at your system and looking at the foundations of your system and looking at the person in front of you.
Because like you said, the person in front of you could be smoking, [00:05:20] drinking. , what are they eating? Are they eating well? What is their childhood history? Has there been a whole lot of antibiotic use? Like it's looking at, yes. Okay. This [00:05:28] is the beginning, the detoxification and the digestion of the person sitting in front of me.
What have they got going on? [00:05:36] So we start there. We look at, okay, what do we need to remove? What maybe supplements do we add in? What is the next phase? That you [00:05:44] take someone through once you get their detoxification pathways working a bit better, you're optimizing their digestion. Where do they go from there?
Christa: Yeah. So [00:05:52] from there I focus on hormones and hormones. Often we think of just being estrogen, testosterone, progesterone. But we're [00:06:00] actually looking at cortisol and thyroid hormone and insulin hormone, right? So there's many hormones in our body and they [00:06:08] all work like a beautiful symphony or not. Right.
So If 1 is thrown off, it can affect other things. And if your digestion and [00:06:16] detoxification pathways have really been struggling, then it most likely is affecting your sex hormone detoxification and production [00:06:24] as well as cortisol, insulin, thyroid. Right? So once we've worked on pillar 1, we now can focus on pillar 2 and [00:06:32] see where are our levels now.
Are is insulin better is insulin sensitivity better because the past couple of months we've really been honing [00:06:40] in on eating more appropriately for insulin regulation and blood glucose stabilization. Oftentimes, when we regulate that, our [00:06:48] thyroid actually improves because we are better nutrients in our body and we're nourishing those plants.
So. At that [00:06:56] point, it's where, okay, sometimes, I really take more of an integrative approach because if people are struggling with energy, they're struggling with processes in [00:07:04] their body. Sometimes we do need to be on a thyroid medication for a period of time in our life of high stress, let's say, until we get those things under [00:07:12] control better.
And then. And oftentimes we can taper down on those when we've healed more of the processes, right? But intermittently and depending where you're [00:07:20] at in are you still having periods? Are you putting out enough progesterone? So this is our opportunity now to say, okay, our detox pathways are really [00:07:28] supported.
And so it's safer than to do bioidentical hormone replacement, because I just find, If [00:07:36] people don't, if practitioners aren't paying attention to both of those situations, like if you're just throwing people on hormone replacement and you're not [00:07:44] identifying any kind of glitches in detoxification or digestion, you're really putting the woman and the man at risk by flooding the body with [00:07:52] hormones that maybe they can't process appropriately.
Sheree: Interesting point.
Christa: Yeah, no, I think you've got to do step one before you do step two and a lot of things [00:08:00] and I think patients are really antsy to feel better and I get that. So I always want to give my patients quick wins to feel that energy, [00:08:08] but there is a process to things because I don't want to overload the body with more than it can handle.
If, you're coming from a background of poor [00:08:16] diet, inactivity, smoking, high alcohol, et cetera, , your body's going to respond better to, hormone [00:08:24] replacement if we've dialed that in. Energy wise to cortisol is a stress hormone. And so if you are having a lot of fatigue and you're [00:08:32] just exposing your body to a lot of oxidative stress via smoking or environmental stressors.
That can affect cortisol as well. So [00:08:40] that's the next phase. So we want to dial in first phase. Second phase is where we can really hone in on, okay, do we still need support hormonally? And once we [00:08:48] can get that balanced, a lot of times the third phase is really easy. And that's cellular health and cellular health.
We can test [00:08:56] directly with organic acids. We can see organic acid testing is done with a urine sample. First morning urine. It gives [00:09:04] us a lot of information as far as metabolites. of what's going on in the body. So we can actually look and see how well your body's taking in [00:09:12] fats and carbohydrates for fuel, which is pretty cool.
Like taking in food, converting it into energy. We can look at your toxic burden. We can [00:09:20] look at your detox pathways. We can see a lot of information with something like organic acids but cellular health. really [00:09:28] is the study of how well you're able to take in nutrients and create energy. And that is reflected in energy levels.
We [00:09:36] don't always have to have a test. You can just tell me how you feel, how well are you able to perform in the gym? How is brain fog? How well are you sleeping? How do you feel when you [00:09:44] wake up in the morning? So phase three is a lot more subjective, I would say versus objective. Although we can look at blood [00:09:52] work at the beginning of work together.
And then summarizing our 4 months or 6 months or 9 months together. I like to look at blood work about every 3 [00:10:00] months, though, to see progress. It's about how it takes to really see a shift a really, big shift in most of the time and [00:10:08] to see from the beginning to the end, how well your body is responding, what's the shift in lab values?
And so, [00:10:16] yeah, so that final phase is just really, well are the cells? How healthy are they? How the building blocks of you, your body? How well are you functioning as a whole? [00:10:24]
Sheree: Thank you. Brought up something really interesting and I Want to drive this home as well, is that it's really a process, if [00:10:32] people are coming in, it's generally because they've tried a lot of things in the past, right.
And they are fed up. And like you said, this could be a four, a six [00:10:40] month, a nine month journey. Sometimes it's even longer than that. And when you're coming at it from an integrative, holistic, functional, whatever you want to call it, [00:10:48] approach, it's wrapping your head around the fact that there is no magic pill.
There is no quick fix, and you've probably done some [00:10:56] damage in the past, and that's not us sitting here pointing the finger, it's just going, okay, you did the best you knew how to do at the time, and now we're going [00:11:04] to reset, we're going to support the body with a detoxification with a digestion, then we're going to look at things hormonally, and then we're going to look at the [00:11:12] cellular health picture, and so you mentioned a The obviously it's a longer game, but you also mentioned some quick wins.
So when people [00:11:20] start working with you, especially at the beginning, what do they tend to notice? Like, what are some of these quick wins that you can actually, even though it's a longer [00:11:28] process to make sure that their body is optimally healthy, which is what we're always striving for. What do people start to notice right away when you do get these [00:11:36] sorts of systems in place, things optimized and processes working.
Christa: Yeah, the quick wins are going to depend on who it is and [00:11:44] what they're struggling with to begin with, but whatever the main concern is, I think that's, if it's fatigue, how well are we sleeping through the [00:11:52] night, are you waking up with more energy or is your afternoon slump less impactful for hormones, There is no quick [00:12:00] fix especially in the women's cycle.
We typically have to wait about three months to really see that. That's just the dynamic of how our body works. [00:12:08] But I would like to see pretty quickly less mood swings, around different things. phases of the cycle. I would say the biggest things that people come to me [00:12:16] for are going to be digestive issues and fatigue and hormone imbalance and so if we can shift that in a positive [00:12:24] direction those are the quick wins that we're looking for.
And ultimately through the process, my end goal is [00:12:32] for my patients to feel better. empowered and to trust their body and to have an understanding about [00:12:40] what hurts and heals their particular body. And when they know those things, then you don't need me forever. Like, I don't [00:12:48] want you to need me to the degree that you need me when you walk in the door.
So, my goal is always to, along the way, Have my patients [00:12:56] feel better, and part of that is just having, because they're walking through their day to day, trusting their body more, and feeling more confident in the fact that their body can heal, their [00:13:04] body is not broken, and and they're feeling more like themselves again.
Pretty quickly. And that's what I strive for from the very [00:13:12] beginning.
Sheree: Yeah. And it like you said, it comes back to that empowered health and a huge part of something that I know we both do is the educational component. If a client [00:13:20] comes in and they've got poor digestion, they've got poor detoxification, it's educating them.
Okay. This is what's been going on in your body. And this is why we're doing it in this [00:13:28] approach. We do need to unclog the drain first, and we do need to then layer in looking at your hormones, and then we can look at the cellular [00:13:36] health. And like you say, the goal is for them not to need you as much because they feel empowered in their body, because they feel like they can trust themselves again.
And I'm [00:13:44] sure, like, As much as hormonal cycles can take three months to regulate, you do see your mood pick up. Energy is probably one of the quickest things we [00:13:52] see shift, right? Digestion is something that you can see shift pretty quickly if someone's come to you with bowel movements because it might be putting in the [00:14:00] right supplement, it might be putting in or taking out the food that's causing the issue.
And it is really looking at the feedback that you get from the person, from [00:14:08] the body, from you. Like becoming more intuitive with yourself and teaching them how to do that. So I'd love to know, when we think [00:14:16] about how clients could take away, maybe three things of if they're going, Oh my gosh, where do I even start?
Maybe I'm not even ready to start [00:14:24] working with a practitioner just yet. I want to see if I can do some things on my own. What would be like maybe one to three things that you could suggest?
Christa: Well, number one, [00:14:32] address the unsexy foundations. So You've got to look at things like how well are you, are you drinking clean, filtered water all day long?
90 [00:14:40] ounces of water a day. Are you eating appropriate food? Are you cutting processed food as much as possible? Eating real things? That means not eating out as much. Are [00:14:48] you sleeping? Are you allowing your body six to eight hours of consistent, solid, comfortable sleep every night? Are you managing stress?
[00:14:56] Like starting to become aware of how much do I, what's my level of perceived stress on the daily basis? And then am I moving my body enough? Am [00:15:04] I, just even walking daily is super important. Sitting all day is super unhealthy. So addressing the foundations, those six kind of [00:15:12] foundational things that are unsexy, they don't cost any money either.
It really is just about becoming aware of where you're at there. The second thing is I would start to [00:15:20] supplement with what the most common things that people need. Which I would say would be a lot. A lot of people need some level of vitamin D [00:15:28] supplementation, magnesium, a good solid probiotic NAC, like I said, is a supplement that you can get.
It really helps support [00:15:36] detoxification pathways and then B vitamins, which, I prefer methylated B vitamins. However, some people have some DNA [00:15:44] problems there, but for the most part, most people do well with an already bioavailable form of a B complex, not just one B vitamin, but a B complex.
So having some of that foundational [00:15:52] supplements, something to look into of course, always reach out to your own practitioner before starting anything that you're, I'm not sure how your body [00:16:00] will respond to, but having good foundational supplements to fill in the nutritional gaps can be really, really helpful.
And then I think setting [00:16:08] up accountability with somebody on your new health adventure, because it's difficult for us to make changes [00:16:16] that are brand new to us. Right. So sharing that with a family member or a friend or coworker, what have you to stick to these [00:16:24] new new awareness, I would say of.
health habits. So foundations, some supplements and some accountability is like a [00:16:32] great way to start to, on your journey of awareness of how can I start to support my body in a system, in a systematic [00:16:40] way to regain my energy and to feel better. Like yourself again.
Sheree: Love that. Well, thank you for sharing your process.
And I know [00:16:48] if anyone is listening to this and it's like, okay, that's exactly what I need. And I'm sure there's many of you that are then don't hesitate to reach out. I know Krista offers [00:16:56] a good kind of, what did you call it? A health strategy call. So we'll pop that in the show notes. If you want to just have a chat, like there's never any obligation.
It's more just, [00:17:04] okay, how can we support, like we are here to help first and foremost. So thanks for sharing your process. Yeah. Excited to do so.
[00:17:12] If you love this episode, be sure to leave us a review, download and subscribe. If you know someone that could also benefit from this conversation, please [00:17:20] share. That's how we spread empowered health. We'll see you again for another episode of the Wild and Well [00:17:28] Collective.
