Julie Michelson: [00:00:00] Laurie, welcome to the podcast.

Lori Graham: Thank you. This is going to be fun.

Julie Michelson: This is going to be fun. And I, um, I've finally just made myself hit record so that everybody could get the value from you. So I know you call yourself a recovering occupational therapist. Tell us a little bit about, you know, what shifted your, your journey toward functional medicine.

Lori Graham: I always felt like a square peg in a round hole, and I, I felt like my patients were not. Doing anything nourishing in terms of food. Oh, and most of the issues I dealt with were wrapped around hip replacements and maybe some strokes here and there, and some neurological diseases. But the thing that became so palpable was a lot of kids would bring their parents [00:01:00] donuts.

Lori Graham: And muffins from ShopRite and just leave it on the counter. So you really got to see what people were eating. And I had this parallel life where I was honestly plant-based for many times. I went raw, I did lots of different things just to see I was athletic. I really wanted to see what fueled me the best.

Lori Graham: And I always felt like if you just didn't eat like that, you might feel a little better. You think worked with a wonderful Naturepath who went to school with Jeffrey Bland. Ah, how do you like that? I like that. Just had a birthday. And she said to me, and she said to me, you know, you should study functional medicine.

Lori Graham: I said, oh, okay. That sounds like an idea. And ironically there was a program in New York City, so it made it really easily. That's great. Easy for me to do. [00:02:00] And, and my sense was that the doctors there were a breed different than the breed that, well, I didn't really partake in traditional medicine. I had a naturopath.

Lori Graham: I had a homeopath. Okay. You know what I mean? Um, so, but, but the doctors there were dis disenfranchised from traditional medicine. Not so much that they were disenfranchised with pharma when it's needed, but they recognized that food was medicine. Mm-hmm. And they just didn't know how to glue it together.

Lori Graham: Right. And they. And it was, it was, it was awe inspiring. It was. It was, oh, here's a doctor I'll give my health to, you know? Right, right.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. Ah, right. Amazing. Well, thank [00:03:00] your friend for all of us. Yeah, really. It is. It is amazing. And, and, um. There are so many differences. Um, which actually, let's just start there.

Julie Michelson: So you, you wrote a book called Dysfunctional Medicine.

Lori Graham: Yes. And my husband thought of the name and I said, oh my God, that's so good. And I don't want it to across like, um, bashing medicine. I'm not, um, I have a special needs child and honestly. His is a long story, not for now, but maybe another time, you know, over another coffee.

Lori Graham: But, but his was a blend of spiritual healing and also conventional medicine and, and I think medicine shines when there's emergency medicine shines, [00:04:00] but. Medicine changed many years ago when the principles surrounding it, like food, be thy medicine. Mm-hmm. Changed. And pharma got involved with the curriculum and I trace that in my book, but for me, I think that since so many patients worry about.

Lori Graham: What it cost to see a functional medicine practitioner in the non-insurance model. Mm-hmm. That educating patients Yes. On, on what they can do for their own health. Mm-hmm. And also I would say how to leverage what they know when they go to the doctor's office.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. Which is so empowering.

Lori Graham: It's very empowering.

Lori Graham: I jokingly say, you know, back in the [00:05:00] day there was lots of talks, uh, uh, talk about ombudsman. We don't hear it that much in the mainstream, you know, now. But, but that's what I'm doing. I'm, I'm, I'm, they're the ombudsman for themselves because I'm teaching them. But traditional medicine, you know, you know, this, it, it looks to treat symptoms.

Lori Graham: You have a problem, we'll give you a drug. And oh, by the way. We didn't check for contraindications or maybe you're on another medicine. You know, ask your phar. People have to know to ask their pharmacist. Right, and, and traditional medicine shines though. In emergency care. Absolutely. With chronic disease where, where food reigns, where, yeah.

Lori Graham: Where you can take charge of your health through diet and lifestyle. Mm-hmm. Honestly, why should medicine be paying for that? They should just pay for the blood test to follow you to see if [00:06:00] you're outside the norm in some way. So traditional medicine is evidence-based, so is. So is functional medicine, it's evidence-based.

Lori Graham: There are studies we rely on. Mm-hmm. Um, but we don't give meds just to treat symptoms. We look at what the root cause is, and traditional medicine doesn't look at root cause. I would also say that traditional medicine is very male centric in the sense that most of the studies. Speak about men. Sure. And the blood tests that are done are in much wider ranges.

Lori Graham: And I don't even know this for sure, but I'm going to half guess except for female hormones that everything else is I. You, you know,

Julie Michelson: Ty typically, actually. And, and let's talk about the differences in the testing. 'cause [00:07:00] I know you're, yeah. You are also of the test, don't guess. Um, you know, there's certain things we all can be doing to be healthier.

Julie Michelson: And then there's the individualized. You know, and the end

Lori Graham: of one. The end of one. Yeah.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. Um, right. And so I know we're aligned in that individualized approach and optimization. When you're looking at labs, you're looking for optimal for you. Um, I wrote an article a few years ago, uh, about that was in, um.

Julie Michelson: Sistic Life Magazine about lab testing because the, the reason the range is so wide is it's literally a bell curve on the average of everybody from that lab company that's taken the test. So from

Lori Graham: that

Julie Michelson: lab company? From that lab company. So LabCorp's vitamin D range is gonna be different than vibrance vitamin D range.

Julie Michelson: Wow. Especially you see the big difference in [00:08:00] hormones because

Lori Graham: Right.

Julie Michelson: If you're going, you know, insurance based testing, you're gonna have a lot of older people not on hormones.

Lori Graham: Right.

Julie Michelson: If you go functional medicine testing, their ranges are gonna be skewed a little more toward optimal because a lot of people are on hormone replacement.

Julie Michelson: So it, it is fascinating during COVID, the some of the bigger. You know, can go anywhere and get a draw. Lab companies changed their vitamin D ranges

Lori Graham: because we were,

Julie Michelson: during Covid, people finally started taking vitamin D. And so the one of 'em, the range only I think went to like 40 or 60. You know, now it's a hundred.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. Yeah. So, so you're real. And if you look at how unwell. We are who wants to be in the middle of that range.

Lori Graham: Right. Right, right, right. Not me. And so, right. And, and even the [00:09:00] ranges sometimes could be skewed up. The optimal ranges can be screwed. Uh, skewed, not screwed, skewed up or skewed down. They depends.

Lori Graham: They're not just in the middle somewhere. Right, right. And so, you know, there are a couple of companies that have, um. They have algorithms that will actually take your blood test and put them into optimal ranges and then connect the dots, which somebody who's doing more of like, um. Orthomolecular biochemistry.

Lori Graham: Mm-hmm. They really understand it. I'm not, I'm not that person. I need, I need support from like an algorithm. But it's amazing how different that range is.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. It really is. And I think astounding the, the difference in, um, 'cause I, at my, at my sickest was, you know, well your [00:10:00] blood looks, your blood test looks fine.

Julie Michelson: Always looks fine. Um, and that's so common. I hear it all the time. And part of it is that, that the te you know, what they're testing for, again, back to, they're not looking for root causes of anything, so, right. Um. And it's not because they don't want to, that's just not the model. It's not, not the model.

Julie Michelson: They're taught.

Lori Graham: Doctors don't get taught nutrition in medical schools. So there's, there's a gap. Yeah. There, there's tremendous gap, you know, and functional medicine also, they really do honor the individuals. So when I do an assessment with somebody. I'm taking 90 minutes. I'm a little slower than your husband might be.

Lori Graham: I'm a little, but I'm also like, I'm also coaching. You know what I mean? Right. Well, yeah. Asking different types of questions. Mm-hmm. And sometimes when I'm doing a history, I go, [00:11:00] oh my God, Uhhuh. That's it. That's why you see it. Yeah. And traditional medicine. Doesn't necessarily take that time because they're boxed into these.

Lori Graham: First of all, the medical assistant is taking your blood pressure and you know, taking your pulse and they're asking the regular questions that they have to put into the EMR. But if it were the doctor doing it, honestly, they might actually be asking, how are you, Mrs. Smith, anything new? Like, and, and start.

Lori Graham: Things rolling. Right? Yeah. You know, and getting, and getting people open to talking. More patients give you the answers,

Julie Michelson: you know? Oh, yeah. Even if they don't know it, they don't realize, they

Lori Graham: don't recognize that, that they're giving you the answers. Sure. Right. They don't, and I, I literally leave an hour and a half [00:12:00] and I tell patients, leave me that hour and a half with you when I have to come up with a food plan.

Lori Graham: I make sure this is gonna be successful for them.

Julie Michelson: Right, right. Yeah. Well, and even just to touch on the labs again, um, any good practitioner isn't treating the lab results. You're treating the patient. Right. So I, I hear that all the time. Um, the, to me, the best example is hormones, whether you're talking thyroid hormone or sex hormones.

Julie Michelson: You know, how do you feel, right. Because I know for me, where my free T three needs to be to feel well,

Lori Graham: right,

Julie Michelson: right. But I don't know what that number is for you.

Lori Graham: Right. Right. And you know, and that's interesting you say that. 'cause on my journey with my functional medicine practitioner, we were noticing my cholesterol going [00:13:00] up and I eat very plant forward.

Lori Graham: Yeah. I don't eat chicken, I don't eat meat. My choice, it's happened in college. Just the food was really bad in college, but, but I'm, I'm eating, you know, fatty fish now doing my snack. Good. So, so, anyway. My cholesterol's going up. I'm not eating cholesterol to speak up. Yeah. But it's, it's in some of the nuts and the seed, but we now know that eating cholesterol doesn't

Julie Michelson: raise cholesterol.

Julie Michelson: We

Lori Graham: now know. Right. But, and then the other side of it is that it's going up because you're not making much estrogen anymore, lady. Yeah. And my thyroid's struggling, so You're right. So. This is a really great, you know, kind of example. I am gonna have a visit soon after I get to go and get my blood test. But my, I went on t [00:14:00] porcine, NT thyroid, which is from porcine, which apparently doesn't have gluten, but arm thyroid, f

Julie Michelson: np thyroids.

Julie Michelson: Typically the cleaner,

Lori Graham: the cleaner. Yeah, but now we have people talking about not even taking that, but there's a lot and, and, and, and listen, patients get confused by all this too. You and I both know that. Like they, they don't know what to, it

Julie Michelson: goes back to the individual. Like I, so I take thyroid hormone and I have interviewed people that, that feel like, you know, I, I don't wanna, well, I will use the word, like that's a failure.

Julie Michelson: I feel the best I have felt in my life. I'm okay. I don't care. I don't get a prize at the end the road. Right. You

Lori Graham: don't, you don't get a prize for this. No. So, so, and I don't eat, but I take,

Lori Graham: so there's

Julie Michelson: my personal, but, but

Lori Graham: here's something interesting. [00:15:00] My TSH went up, my cholesterol went higher. It's interesting. Everybody's different and that's the thing. So Yeah.

Julie Michelson: But you also did just mention because,

Lori Graham: because I've had some stress recently. Okay. Um, although that blood test was precedes the stress,

Julie Michelson: but we need cholesterol to make our hormones,

Lori Graham: to make our hormones.

Lori Graham: And

Julie Michelson: even when we're at a point where we might not be making so many hormones, our body's still gonna try.

Lori Graham: Try. It's still gonna try. Yeah. So, so we need to look at things like inflammation. We need to look at oxidative stress. We need to look at how buoyant your LDL are. So I have this great scientist I work with who has this circle.

Lori Graham: You can find it on the web. It's just, he happened to introduce it to me. Mm-hmm. And it shows how if you go on a statin, [00:16:00] then you'll get diabetes. You'll take a diabetes med and then you'll get high blood pressure and then you'll take a high blood pressure med and Oh, then by the way, you'll get Alzheimer's.

Lori Graham: And I mean, it's a little Debbie Downer and I don't know that it's a hundred percent truth because there's some genetics that play into this with you. Sure.

Julie Michelson: And also depends. Ons who you're taking a statin and are you taking coping cat with your statin? And how about what are you eating this whole time?

Lori Graham: How about if you're a woman? I'm a woman. Yeah. We know our bones can get weaker 'cause we're not making as much Es estrogen. So I say to my women. Aging and my age. My age, my women are aging with me. Like it's kind of funny that my population is an older population, but I'm, you know, I'm 10 years older than when I started, right.

Lori Graham: Than when I, right. Yeah. But [00:17:00] I say you've got other levers to pull. You can do more resistance training. Right. Yeah, you can more muscle, you can push, you can, you can push, you can wear the weighted vest when you go for a walk or you walk your dog. Yep. There are more things that we can do to pull different levers and then if that doesn't work than maybe you look at a medicine, but always we have to ask why.

Lori Graham: Right.

Julie Michelson: And I love the, the pulling levers. I mean, it's the same as looking at genetics or taking into account genetics, right? We can know predispositions, but let's change what's influencing our genetics, right? And, and so I love that and I, and honestly for me, it's really exciting. The, the longer you're doing this, the older your clients are getting, [00:18:00] here's why.

Julie Michelson: It it because people are learning about functional medicine and there was this kind of false notion that it's too late for me. Right. It like I'm, I'm too old.

Lori Graham: Do you know You wanna know what I did last Saturday? You're gonna love this. What'd you do? I have two grandchildren. One is almost six, the other's almost four.

Lori Graham: And I jumped on a trampoline with both of them. Woo hoo. Now it's not like I haven't jumped on a trampoline, but I haven't jumped on a trampoline since my kids were little. Sure. How many 68-year-old women do you know who jump on a trampoline with their grandchildren?

Julie Michelson: It's amazing. I can like list lymphatic support, fun, joy, all the good neurotransmitters, right?[00:19:00]

Julie Michelson: Um, but that's, but that's why

Lori Graham: we, yeah. You know, and, and so the other thing about. Functional medicine, and your audience might know this, but food is medicine, right? The different colors and like, I'm not as, as extreme as, what's his name? Brian Johnson. Yeah. I'm not extreme like that, but he really says it well.

Lori Graham: This is everything I put in my mouth has a purpose. Now I'm not that bad. But if I want some or that good

Julie Michelson: depending on your,

Lori Graham: or that if I want something really good, you know, my really good is like taking a fig, not a fig a date and pop popping some almond butter in it and two or three, you know, caco chips.

Lori Graham: But listen, and here's the other thing about, about my book Mixed into this. Into this conversation. Yeah. And you are the function medicine coach and you know, I didn't get here overnight. Sure. And [00:20:00] you're not done. And I'm not done, but I used to take my kids' snacks. Like I, I was the shop, the, the smart way.

Lori Graham: So I'd get a big bag of ruffle ruffles and there were only three ingredients back in the days. It was canola oil, which we all, I. Thought was good back then, back then, and I put it in, in Ziploc bags, and then I'd eat the bag when they went to sleep.

Julie Michelson: Well, I say that all the time, like, you know, I wasn't born eating this way for, for me personally, it took me getting very sick to learn.

Julie Michelson: Right. Even what, you know, we joke all the time because like my, my oldest son has celiac and, and. He would be like, you were trying to kill me. I'd be homesick and you'd be giving me saltines. And I'm like, well, that's what my mom did. You know, like when, when, well, guess

Lori Graham: what? If you have diarrhea, you mean part of it is the salt to retain the fluids a little bit.

Lori Graham: Yeah.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. Well, but it was the [00:21:00] gluten is what was making him sick to begin with. I, but he didn't have any GI issues.

Lori Graham: So, and, but he has celiac, but that might have just like. You said he had celiac, right? He does. Yeah. So now you're giving me cause to think my mother had, had we, we called it colitis back in the day.

Lori Graham: Mm-hmm. I don't know if that's what she really had. Right. 'cause 'cause we've probably become more nuanced in Sure. In diag diagnosis. But I, when I did my genetics, there were two genes that govern. Celiac. Mm-hmm. And I'm heterozygous on one of those. So that is a, an Ashkenazi trait. It is

Julie Michelson: an Ashkenazi trait.

Julie Michelson: I knew it when I saw the curly hair.

Lori Graham: Yeah. But, but that just, you know, like, and, and, and, and I work with, I, I work with a lot of patients with GI issues and I don't know really how many women don't [00:22:00] have some form of GI issues with our hormones changing all the time and. Honestly, like I think that's the first place as a functional medicine practitioner that in traditional medicine, nobody ever really asks you.

Lori Graham: But in functional medicine, that's the first place we're gonna ask. We're gonna think, well, food is the first thing that

Julie Michelson: I call it, the low hanging fruit, right? We all,

Lori Graham: it's a low hanging fruit, but it's also. It's a foreign body.

Julie Michelson: It's either driving illness or driving wellness. Yeah. And your gut has to discern, right?

Julie Michelson: Right. Is, is this nutrition or is there, you know, a bacteria I need to get rid of real quick? Yeah.

Lori Graham: Right. And I think, you know, also just on the topic of aging, where this ties in, our immune system is supposed to decline as we get older. But I don't think it has to. I think no. I [00:23:00] think we really just have to keep nourishing the healthy bugs in our Sure.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. And, and some of the, what we, you know, I, I know I've heard you use my favorite word, inflammaging. Um, I. It's, you know, that we normalize so many of these inflammation driven declines and we just call it aging, right? Oh, I'm sore, I'm tired, I'm all the, all the things, my brain's not working as well. They all have reasons, you know, but also for those of us that have been on the earth for a while, well, the earth is a lot dirtier than it was.

Julie Michelson: 30 years ago, we, we deal with, so, you know, of course our immune system needs more support because it's, it's bombarded, it's just dealing with a lot.

Lori Graham: And honestly, like I tell my patients, control what you can. [00:24:00] Yeah. You can't control everything. You're not gonna live in a bubble. Right. You know? You're not, but you can get Yeah.

Lori Graham: And you don't have

Julie Michelson: to,

Lori Graham: to, to, you don't have to, you can get a filter in your home and you can buy organic and you know, or grow your food or grow your food or exercise and sweat it out. And you can think about foods that open up your detoxification and your lymph. And as we're aging, as things are changing, you know, the rules do change.

Lori Graham: Yes. Because the hormones are changing and. One of the things I hear from women, I think this is the perfect place to talk about this, is, you know, they wanna become that perfect body again. And I think that's probably okay up to around 60. Mm-hmm. And I, I've really shifted in this over the years, but honestly, like, you don't wanna be overweight, you wanna build muscle, so.

Lori Graham: Get a [00:25:00] body composition scale and follow your muscle instead of the total amount that you weigh. Follow your, your muscle. That's

Julie Michelson: funny. 'cause you said perfect body and in my, literally the words that popped into my brain were strong. Like the perfect body is strong. Right, right. And, and, and so yeah, we need to, to.

Julie Michelson: Shift our definition of what a perfect body is.

Lori Graham: Right? And how about this? Since there still is a little bit of controversy around taking estrogen past 60, and I don't know if it's not in my world, well hang I, there are some people that. You hear

Julie Michelson: everything

Lori Graham: from, you hear everything. Yep. If you are, if you're sorting through it and really trying to find what your truth is, a little extra fat on your body, guess what?

Lori Graham: [00:26:00] You make estrogen from the fat. Right. And, and so you don't want the visceral fat. You don't wanna be chubby. Yeah.

Julie Michelson: And you don't want too much ster, which tends to be fat derived degen as well.

Lori Graham: I just think we have to, we, we have to be a little more muscle, more muscle focused and you know for sure, you asked me before we got on about how was my day and you know, I did my yoga class and I.

Lori Graham: I did. Yeah, I do Vinyasa. So it's pretty, it's a strenuous, it's, it's a, it's a heated room. It's pretty strenuous and there are a lot of younger people that I aspire be like, but I'm really working on my balance these days. Like standing on. It's so important.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. While it's one of the most, an OT important longevity tools is balanced,

Lori Graham: how do people's lives get ruined?

Lori Graham: Yeah. In their [00:27:00] seventies and eighties if they take a fall. Right. It's not when you wanna have surgery. No,

Julie Michelson: for sure. And that's where that being strong and working on balance and, you know, you don't have to be a supermodel, like a, a body that's functioning well and feels good is the ideal body. Right. Right.

Julie Michelson: So, you know, I, I laugh, I, I really grew up. With an aversion to the word skinny, because I was a very thin child. I was an eater. I was, I did not have an eating disorder. My dad was skinny as a real, he probably had celiac too. Who knows, you know, likely. Um, yeah. And so I have the, that lens of, well, now I look back at that.

Julie Michelson: Body that didn't have any extra body fat on it that most women would like kill for. And I think, well, sure. I wasn't absorbing my nutrients. [00:28:00] Right. Right.

Lori Graham: You were right. Right. They didn't know, they didn't know about medical food for people like that to just get crisis. They didn't, they didn't have.

Julie Michelson: No, and I mean, my dad tried, I, there, I, we went through a phase where he made me, you know, a milkshake every day with a, with an egg in it, you know, like trying.

Julie Michelson: And I'm like, you know, dad, I look just like you. Like it's

Lori Graham: not gonna happen. It's funny you should say that because I am, I am weed avoidant. I am at this point in my life, I am weed avoidant. Um, but. My parents used to have in, in Long Island where I grew up, they had Snyder's pretzels. And they got Yes in a, they got delivered in the can.

Lori Graham: In the can. And I used to get constipated when I had one of those big pretzels, Uhhuh, not constipated, constipated, but like, it was just, but it affected you, the bathroom. Yeah. And you know. [00:29:00] That didn't make sense until I went to college when Snyder's pretzels weren't on the menu and, and the meat was bad.

Lori Graham: And then I started eating like lots of salads and I didn't grow up with lots of salads. It was iceberg. I did,

Julie Michelson: but they were iceberg lettuce and, and a tomato that it, and maybe

Lori Graham: a tomato, right. But honestly, like they had. Lots of diversity of vegetables and different salads, all of, and I went for food service.

Lori Graham: So I read Adele Davis, you know, diet for a Small Planet, and I was sold. So there I was eating lots of vegetables. Going to the bathroom regularly. Right. Always a novel.

Julie Michelson: No Snider pretzels. They were delicious. I, I, it's been decades and decades and my mouth is watering, even though I I, you could, you could give me a whole can right now, and I, I have not willingly, you know, we, in our household, it's.

Julie Michelson: Being [00:30:00] gluten is a verb. It's something that happens to you because I will not, you know, people ask me all the, do you ever cheat? And I'm like, if you had any idea how sick, yeah, I get. You know, and that's the beauty of when you find out for yourself, right? Like I, you make a little

Lori Graham: blueprint, it's your blueprint.

Julie Michelson: There's things I'm sensitive to that I can have sometimes, and they're nutrient dense, and I'll have them on as a treat on occasion.

Lori Graham: Right.

Julie Michelson: You know, and like nightshades,

Lori Graham: you know, um, right. But you can't, you can't have a diet centered around it. And we know where we can push the envelope. And I say that to my patients.

Lori Graham: If I put them through a weight loss plan and I have a really good, effective weight loss plan that changes your awareness around food significantly. But I tell people, you're gonna cheat a little bit. I. You're not gonna let the scale go up five pounds, it'll go up two pounds. Right. And that's [00:31:00] inflammation.

Lori Graham: That's That is right. And it'll come down as soon as you change course. But you're gonna know where you can push the envelope a little bit. And that's you. And then I say, and guess what? And the rules are gonna change every 10 years. 'cause you're a woman. That's funny. And we have to roll with those punches because what they do, they just, they change.

Lori Graham: Yeah. Well,

Julie Michelson: I'm. Still experimenting with, you know, what I have learned in the past two years is I can eat tomatoes from my garden all summer long.

Lori Graham: No problem. No problem. Well, why? Because they're completely organic.

Julie Michelson: I, but if I buy organic tomatoes in the win now, I don't know. And I haven't played with seasonal eating.

Julie Michelson: I try, I. I eat seasonal ish. Um, I don't know if it's a seasonal thing. I don't know if it's, is your

Lori Graham: stomach better at during, during season, like during the growing season since you're eating more from the garden, [00:32:00] would you say you see a change?

Julie Michelson: Uh, my stomach's, I mean, when I'm eating, like my stomach's fine, you know, unless I'm experimenting.

Julie Michelson: Right, right, right. But if you

Lori Graham: implemented from your garden, you would have less problem.

Julie Michelson: It seems to be, I mean, because I thought like, okay, I'm finally, like tomatoes are back in and no they're not, but they're, they are from the garden in the summer. Right. It's, it's kind of wild, you know? So, but that's, back to your

Lori Graham: question, may be organic isn't a hundred percent organic because again, we cannot trust a hundred percent.

Lori Graham: Right. We can't, the labeling and there are certain like pesticides that are allowed, I think when they say it's organic and it could be,

Julie Michelson: yeah, very.

Lori Graham: They're very marginal. But that might be what pushes you over the, it could

Julie Michelson: be, but [00:33:00] to your point of we're always changing. You know, there are things that I don't eat that every few years I'll be like.

Julie Michelson: How about now, you know? Right. Not gluten. For me, that's not a

Lori Graham: Right, that's not an option.

Julie Michelson: Not even worth the experiment, you know? Right. But it goes back to the beginning of the conversation about empowering people. When we teach people to, to really pay attention to the signals that they're getting. Right then.

Julie Michelson: Then we can shift course. Right. We could do a reset. We can, you know,

Lori Graham: and people, you know, by and large people think it's normal to have a foggy head in the morning. Right. Think it's normal to be stiff in the morning. I'm not stiff in the morning. No,

Julie Michelson: I don't have a, it's all inflammation.

Lori Graham: Years ago. Yeah.

Lori Graham: Years ago I did, you know, but mm-hmm. And you, you know. I have a [00:34:00] wonderful husband who's has chronic Lyme, and I'm the person who recognizes when it's happening again. And thankfully I don't go after what he brings into the house for himself. But if he goes too processed food. Mm-hmm. Yeah. All of a sudden he's coughing and then he gets a neck pain.

Lori Graham: Uhhuh. And then I go, oh, this sounds familiar. You need to go to your doctor and get a Lyme test. Yeah. And we're in one of those cycles now. And, you know, like, it's, it's his and, and you know, for anybody who's listening to this, you may not have a partner that buys into what? Sure. And you have to do what's right for you because.

Lori Graham: Yeah, you cannot do what, you cannot eat the way your partner eats just because it's easier.

Julie Michelson: Right? [00:35:00] Yeah. And I love that you're dispo. That's like excuse number one you hear all the time, whether it's the partner or for younger, younger people, it's, oh, my kids won't eat. I'm like, your kids are going to eat what you put on the table.

Julie Michelson: They are, they're not gonna skip very many meals at all. You know, and, and so for me, the fun part about working with, you know, women raising families is changing that cycle of like, let's not, you know, your kids should be. Able to avoid the chronic illness and, and need the big course. Correct. In their forties, fifties, sixties, seventies, you know, if, if they just start right now eating real food, like let's just start there.

Lori Graham: Real food. You weren't, you are so right.

Julie Michelson: You are so right. So it's fun. But he's lucky. He has and, and then sometimes we're blessed and we have a partner [00:36:00] who's dialed into us, you know?

Lori Graham: Well, my husband is very allowing, you know, years ago, yeah, when we got married, I still had kids living in the house and I said to him, I will cook the vegetables, but you will cook your meats because that's fair.

Lori Graham: You don't eat meat Well, because I got to a point where I realized. I wasn't eating enough protein and I was living on protein shakes, and I just said, I don't have the time to make your protein and make a different protein for me. Okay. Yeah. You know, and, and, and, and I think we just, we have to always honor what our body needs.

Lori Graham: Sure. And, and in, you know, just we, we have to, and we have to let our partners do what they 'cause they might not be. As motivated to do what you know you might be doing. If you have a health challenge you have to [00:37:00] take, if you're motivated to take care of it, then take charge and find a functional medicine person.

Julie Michelson: Yeah, absolutely. That's the

Lori Graham: only kind of person who's gonna dig deeply enough.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. Amen. Amazing. And so you do a lot of, I know you do one-on-one as well, but you do a lot of group work. Yes.

Lori Graham: Basically, I have a few different tiers of service when if I have somebody that really needs to make significant changes and they're coming from truly conventional, haven't taken a step in this direction yet.

Lori Graham: Sure. And if they can afford, I will put them in quite tight touch with me so that Uhhuh. They're texting me every day. I wanna know what they're eating. We're changing things around. Mm-hmm. I meet with them every week the first six weeks, and then every other week, and I try to wean them off. Yeah. You know, about three to four months.

Lori Graham: That's kind of my [00:38:00] signature program. Gotcha. Um, I do one-on-one visits. Mm-hmm. Um, with people that are highly motivated to follow through with the. Care plan, and we do follow up visits as needed. And then I run groups. So right now I have like a weight loss group that I'm running, and I'm starting on April 10th, my diabetes program.

Lori Graham: Why I was inspired, and I really mean inspired. A woman, and I can speak about this only because she's all over my Instagram page, 'cause otherwise I don't normally share patient stories. Um, but she was looking to move onto her sailboat in Belize where she is now, and she was on insulin and two oral meds and her blood sugars were flirting in the three to 400 range.

Lori Graham: Right?

Julie Michelson: Yeah.

Lori Graham: And, and honestly. The way it went was I put her on keto. [00:39:00] Mm-hmm. And she came down into the high one hundreds. The doctor took her off the oral meds and one day she's at about one 20 and she said, should I take my insulin, you know, at dinnertime? And I said, no, you need to call your doctor and find out if you need to take less.

Lori Graham: Right. Because you'll be sleeping at night.

Julie Michelson: Yeah.

Lori Graham: She never called him and she took her insulin and in the morning she got up and she was at about 60.

Julie Michelson: Yeah.

Lori Graham: She didn't have any glucose tubes or anything like that. So what she did was she took salt water taffy. She didn't even have an heart corn star.

Lori Graham: Somebody corn syrup bring I have somebody bring me something. No, she said I found, I found salt water taffy fine. Get your blood sugar up a little bit. She never looked back. Yeah. And

Julie Michelson: I, I see it over and over and over again. And, and I [00:40:00] love that, that that wasn't the, the start of the conversation. But it is important to highlight if you are on medication, whether it is, 'cause often they go hand in hand, blood pressure medication, anything for blood sugar, whether you know, from Metformin to insulin to.

Julie Michelson: We do not all of the GLP ones that are out there now, all the things, because I, I see it time and time again and the a if, if it's, if we're talking type two, that's a lifestyle illness and, and all of that is reversible and you don't ever have to look back, but it is so, I love that you, you know, it's so important to be, I like.

Lori Graham: But you know now, now she's, she changed her hemoglobin. A1C went from 7.4 to 6.3, and so she's insulin resistant. She's not really diabetic at [00:41:00] this point in time. She's insulin resistant and she's now walking. Yeah, she's down in Belize. She is working out with a trainer doing weights. It's amazing. And we're gonna use more herbal support now.

Lori Graham: And, and she's on A-A-C-G-M, so I see everything on the street. Sure. Yeah. But, but she like, she loves having someone like me Sure. To say, you need to go out for a walk now I just looked at you partner. Yeah,

Julie Michelson: go for a walk. That's great. I love it. So. Where can, where can listeners find the book Dysfunctional Medicine?

Julie Michelson: The

Lori Graham: book is on Amazon Dysfunctional Medicine. And where's

Julie Michelson: the best place to find you?

Lori Graham: They should reach out to nutrify your life.com and that's all one word, N-U-T-R-I-F-Y-O-U-R. Like all one, not three separate [00:42:00] words. All one.com. And I have a contact me button there. Nice. So if anybody really wants to talk to me, what I do, I do a complimentary 15 to 20 minute is this right for you kind of conversation.

Lori Graham: And then we'll figure out what you need. So take Love it.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. Amazing. Lori, I, so, I'm so excited, uh, that we connected. Oh, I love that you are attracting a mature community. Um, because it just means that we're creating, that the ripple is working right. And we're, we're creating the change. Um, so. Thank you so much for sharing your time and your expertise with us, and we are glad that you are recovering from that OT world and, and joined us over here

Lori Graham: and, you know, you know that saying, um, be the change that you wanna be.[00:43:00]

Julie Michelson: Yes. Amazing, amazing. Oh, and I listeners are probably like, wait, wait. Don't let her go yet. What is one step that listeners can take starting today? Could be. Anything you wanna throw at us to start to improve their health?

Lori Graham: Give up processed food. Yes.

Julie Michelson: Yeah. Amazing.

Lori Graham: That, that, that one, that one thing without any personalization will make a huge change across the board.

Julie Michelson: Yes. Amen. Amen. Thank you so much. Thank you. For everyone listening, remember, you can get the transcripts and show notes by visiting inspired Liven show. I hope you had a great time and enjoyed this episode as much as I did. Go find Lori.