Archives for August 2020

I hadn’t slept through the night without the help of a sleeping aid in 30 years.

For reals. Not one night.

My mom says I didn’t sleep on the way home from the hospital. She says that as a toddler, I couldn’t get to sleep because I couldn’t turn my brain off. As a teenager, I couldn’t stay asleep. As an adult, I know 3am better than I know my husband.

Of course I do – I walk around like a half-crazed zombie every day – putting off (until I get some sleep), all the things I should get done – including having a normal relationship with my family, showing up for anything after 4pm, dishes, laundry, errands, friends – unfortunately when you’re running on empty, there really isn’t any of you available to anyone else.

I’m barely surviving most days, counting the moments until bedtime. Then praying… praying I’ll be able to sleep.

I’ll think to myself… I haven’t slept in 4 nights, maybe tonight I’m tired enough to just take my herbal concoctions instead of something stronger to sleep…

I’ve taken enough Benadryl in my life to be assured of dementia… muscle relaxants, those can’t be good every day… the sleep prescriptions scared me so I never really took them…

People ask how I read two to three health books a week? I don’t watch TV and I know better than to be on a screen with insomnia so what the heck else am I going to do at 3am?

I also have an uncanny knack for assimilating and retaining a whole lot of that information – that’s an interesting part of this story and has the same etiology as why I can’t sleep so stay with me.

Well-meaning friends suggest that I may have anxiety. Ya think? 30 years with no sleep would make anyone anxious.

Well-meaning doctors suggest I should lose some weight, it must be hormones… Cool – yep, I know that every hormone in my body is off and yes I’m overweight… because… have I mentioned, I DON’T SLEEP?

How about a sleep test… the first one when I was in my early 20’s told me I didn’t sleep enough to diagnose my sleep… and my official diagnosis was an excessively sleepy light sleeper… SUPER helpful…

The second one in my 30’s… still didn’t sleep enough to diagnose but he said, “You are overweight so you probably have sleep apnea, here’s a breathing machine”…

Also SUPER helpful… I spent the next two months lying awake while hooked to an uncomfortable breathing machine… If I had waking apnea, that machine may have helped…$4000 sleep machine gifted to my dad.

Well-meaning family members remind me that I better figure this out because my health is at risk… Cool thanks, I had no idea that not sleeping for 30 years could be a problem. I’ll make a note of that.

What about exercise before bed? Now I can’t GET to sleep and when I do, I still wake up a few hours later.

Exercise earlier in the day? Now I’ve used up every tiny bit of myself there was and there is nothing left of me with hours to go until bedtime.

Sleep books… try this herb, go to bed at the same time and wake up at the same time… check – I go to bed at 10 and wake up at the same time every day…. 3am – hmmmm… I’m not feeling any better with this sleep hygiene thing?

How about I sleep in a dark room? Oh wait, I’ve done that since I was born. Turn down the heat. Nice, now I’m frozen while awake at 3am. Weighted blanket. Now I’m sweating and awake at 3am.

You get the picture. I have tried EVERYTHING. Read all the books. Done the yoga. Taken the prescriptions. Fasted. Juiced. Cleansed. Hormones. Carbs. No carbs. CBD. THC. Melatonin. Every herbal sleep blend on the planet. I tried drinking a bottle of wine a night. Quit drinking. Gave up coffee. Six thousand dollar alkaline water filter. Acupuncture. Magnets. Energy work. Massage. Meditation. Hypnosis.

I read at least 2 health books a week. Believe me, I’ve tried it.

Enter some amazing synchronicity.

A client asked me to help her discern what dietary changes she may need for her MTHFR issues with elevated homocysteine.

I just happen to have an interest in MTHFR because learning about that 15 years ago saved my marriage. A story for a different day but I saw the effect firsthand that supplementing and eating properly for a particular genetic variant could have.

In researching for my client, I stumbled upon genetic information that has literally changed the course of my life.

I’d previously not given this any credit because there are some really sketchy companies out there offering genetic testing but honestly, they’ve looked at one study to make their conclusions and they neglect to tell you that 3 other studies contradict the one they’re sighting to give you their recommendation to buy their supplements.

I knew genes mattered (obviously) but I had no idea how much control we really have over the expression of our genes or how much information is now available to us thanks to the human genome project.

And if you have a devour the research and connect the dots brain like I do (thanks to the same gene actually) and enough of a science background to weed through some pretty in-depth Pubmed studies, the answers to all your persistent health problems can actually be found in your genes!

I’d been looking for answers in the symptoms (insomnia, overweight, moodiness, anxiety, hormones). No wonder nothing ever worked long term, I wasn’t addressing it at the genetic (cause) level.

I immediately realized that my infertility, estrogen dominance, and weight issues are all SYMPTOMS of the same gene and what I’d been eating (or maybe I should say, not eating) was actually exacerbating my insomnia through this pathway.

I realized that my insomnia is also related to another gene that doesn’t allow me to turn serotonin into melatonin. AHA! That’s super helpful to know! I’m not crazy, weak, and unable to control my “anxiety”, and I’m never going to “just tell myself to stay asleep”. My sleep hormone fails to turn on!

None of my “symptoms” is the actual problem and chasing symptoms is pretty useless if you don’t know what’s causing the symptom to begin with!

Everything I’d tried was just a bandaid at best. A lot of what I’d tried over the years actually made my particular (fairly serious) gene variants even worse.

I’d been looking for a solution to the symptoms of my problem, not the problem itself.

I’m a health coach, a nutrition expert, I have a degree in nutrition and exercise science, and I’m a complete health information junkie. I eat extremely healthily most of the time (I’m human) and have for years. In fact, I was already eating very similarly to the way experts suggest we all eat to keep our genes as healthy as possible.

It was just that this one gene required me to add in a category of foods to my dinner plate that I’d been convinced were the devil.

It took an inexpensive but very specific genetic test and quite a bit of research beyond my initial resource…

But once I poured over the research and put the pieces of the puzzle together – I determined which trouble gene is causing almost all my most pressing problems, made one quite subtle and counterintuitive shift to my already healthy diet and within days a whole shit ton of my “symptoms” started to disappear.

We’re talking – a whole new Michelle emerged!

And hopefully, I’ve also saved my life by getting to the bottom of my sleep issues and estrogen dominance. I already had thyroid cancer, I certainly don’t want breast cancer too!

Now I know that those of you with insomnia, weight issues, and estrogen dominance are dying to know what I changed. We all want it to be as simple as a diet or a pill.

I’m not going to tell you what I changed though and here’s why.

What I’m eating is what I specifically tweaked for my exact genetic biochemical makeup. Not yours.

Two of my closest friends have the exact same symptoms but a different gene is causing their struggles and my tweak is the exact opposite of what they need to do.

We’ve all tried every single thing that works for those around us and instead, we have to figure out what works for us. What supports our unique genetic code.

If someone’s health greatly improves with a particular diet (including the insanely healthy one I designed) it’s not because that diet is perfect for everyone, it’s because that diet is working with, instead of against their genes.

What appears to balance their system can actually tip into imbalance over time – that’s exactly what happened to me. This is why you can feel amazing on a new plan for a few weeks but ultimately cravings take back over and derail you. That’s often your body’s wisdom trying to get your attention.

Luckily there is a base eating plan that supports all our genes and detox systems and the key is in what you aren’t eating as much as what you are. The biggest tip I can give you is that if it comes in a package, don’t eat it.

From there it’s just tweaking to remove foods you’ve become sensitive to and include those that support your genes.

You have to be empowered to approach it in this way instead of treating it as just another weight loss diet though.

We are all unique and have our own set of genetic variants. There are about 10 of them that are becoming more and more well researched because they are the big guns when it comes to causing really serious health problems in our modern lifestyle if they aren’t taken care of properly.

You might have insomnia, estrogen dominance, and anxiety too but remember those are just symptoms and what matters is changing the way you eat in accordance with your unique genetic makeup (more specifically your particular combination of the big 10) because that is what is causing those symptoms.

Treating the symptoms, even at the hormonal and neurotransmitter level, (although super important and sanity-saving) is still just a bandaid if you don’t understand why you have these imbalances to begin with.

Tweaking your lifestyle to support your own unique genetic makeup is where the magic happens!

I share all about this and more in my free Facebook group. I invite you to join the conversation there!

>>> https://www.facebook.com/groups/wildwomanwellness