Episode 45
Heather Gray:

The Foundations of Healing

In this episode we talk about the foundations of health and discuss tips for improving energy, reducing pain, and supporting gut health. Heather Gray joins us to give us the foundational areas we need to focus on for healing.
First Aired on: Jul 25, 2022
Episode 45
Heather Gray:

The Foundations of Healing

In this episode we talk about the foundations of health and discuss tips for improving energy, reducing pain, and supporting gut health. Heather Gray joins us to give us the foundational areas we need to focus on for healing.
First Aired on: Jul 25, 2022
In this episode:
In today's episode, Heather shares her tips for setting the foundation to heal and optimize health.

Heather shares her health journey that began in early childhood with gut issues, included psychiatric events in adolescence, and undiagnosed Celiac, Lyme, and endometriosis.  This journey led her to question "why" and to become a Functional Diagnostic Nutritionist...first to help herself, and then others.

Wellness is a journey and we need to constantly adjust our routine and up level our self care.

Heather discusses the importance of slowing down and addressing trauma that may be hidden in the nervous system to truly heal.

The foundational areas of wellness are diet, rest, exercise, stress management, and supplementation.

Heather's tips include:
Testing for food sensitvities
Paleo Diet
Getting to bed on time
Staying well hydrated

Become your own advocate.  Don't fall for marketing tricks, read ingredients and know what you are eating.

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Episode Transcript

[Page//00:00:00] Julie Michelson: Welcome back to the inspired living with autoimmunity podcast. I'm your host, Julie Michaelson. And today I'm joined by functional diagnostic nutrition practitioner, Heather Gray, AKA the line boss, Heather considers herself a foundation coach. And in our conversation today, she shares countless tips that will help you increase your energy, reduce your brain [Page//00:01:00] fog and improve your gut health.

[Page//00:01:02] Heather welcome to the podcast.

[Page//00:01:05] Heather Gray: Hey, thanks for having me.

[Page//00:01:07] Julie Michelson: I am really excited that you're here.

[Page//00:01:10] Heather Gray: Yay.

[Page//00:01:11] Julie Michelson: I love starting off with asking about your story, because most of us got into this world through a personal journey. So share with us, how did you become the line boss to, how are you, how did you get into. Functional medicine, functional nutrition.

[Page//00:01:33] Heather Gray: Oh, cool. Yeah. I start off almost every talk with, I was basically born constipated, right. you know, so even at a very young age, I remember my feet falling asleep, you know, sitting on the potty and my mom, you know, dumping thick, nasty oils down my throat to help soften my stool. But even at the time, nobody was trying to figure out why.

[Page//00:01:54] Four year old was so constipated. Around the same time my uncle had killed himself and [Page//00:02:00] it was a pretty dark, traumatic time in my family. And shortly after that, I developed some other like stomach issues behavioral stuff, you know, and then fast forward. You know, when I was 13 and actually got bit by a tick and developed Lyme disease, started getting symptoms from that about two years later with my first dent, psych ward for trying to kill myself.

[Page//00:02:21] And, you know, again, you know, I got pills shoved down my throat, you know, patted on the head was told I was attention seeking you know, and sent on my way. Nobody was digging deeper on why this, you know, 15 year old was trying to take herself out. There was a lot of early childhood trauma. And I also found out that I had undiagnosed celiac disease.

[Page//00:02:40] So you fast forward, even more times to 27 years, you know, go by. 'em like 2013. I finally got diagnosed with Lyme disease, celiac Hashimotos endometriosis. And you know, I was gonna go the traditional route for, for the Lyme disease stuff. Cause I really didn't know any better. And all they were doing was kind [Page//00:03:00] of.

[Page//00:03:01] Killing, you know, throwing napalm at me trying to kill the critters, but they never took into account the host. Right? What shape was the host in? And I was in horrible shape. I hadn't been chronically ill for decades, right. There was no way I could handle that kind of, you know, onslaught war and it's a couple weeks after I started treatment and thought I was gonna die.

[Page//00:03:24] I actually heard the founder of Reed Davis. He's the founder of FDN functional diagnostic nutrition speak on, you know, you have to heal the gut, right? Lower inflammation, open the detox pathways are your, a hormones balanced, you know, all these things that nobody has ever looked into for me. And I thought, oh my God, that makes total sense.

[Page//00:03:44] Yes. Sign me up. And at the time When you go through the program, you can go through the program. Well, back then you had like a choice on whether you could go through it to be a practitioner or, or to go through it, just to look for your own health stuff. And now it is definitely more practitioner [Page//00:04:00] guided or, or, you know, centered.

[Page//00:04:01] But at the time I was a hair stylist for like 15 years and my body was starting to break down. I couldn't even hold a fork to feed myself cuz the pain in my wrist in my hand was so bad. It was kind of like a, a double gift, cuz I knew I've always had a propensity for the natural alternative. You know, I loved studying herbal stuff when I was younger.

[Page//00:04:22] So the, the thought of having a new career and, you know, figuring out what was wrong with me, you know, just seemed amazing. So that is, you know, between that in a nutshell is you know, how I got into the functional world for.

[Page//00:04:35] Julie Michelson: Amazing. And you are well now.

[Page//00:04:38] Heather Gray: Yeah. You know it with chronic Lyme. And you've had mold issues and I've looked deeper into my genetics, you know, and I don't detox properly. You know, there are things in place that I constantly have to do. My self-care is out of this world. Like this morning, I was sweating in my sauna bed, you know, and I, I have to take the time out.

[Page//00:04:59] I think it [Page//00:05:00] was probably one of the gifts of this disease, because a lot of us, especially moms working, you know, entrepreneur, like.

[Page//00:05:07] Julie Michelson: about.

[Page//00:05:12] Heather Gray: And as caregivers, you know, we have a tendency to give, give, give, give, give, and never filling our own cup. And if anything, it's taught me to slow down and to fill my own cup up first because I very easily can go out of remission. And I have a couple times when I've decided to get off my path and I wasn't eating right for my body.

[Page//00:05:32] I, you know, was up too late, was you know, drinking too much alcohol, you know? So yes, and you know, this last stint that I had with the, the Ronna, you know, back in February caused some kind of long haulers type symptoms that I've been dealing with. Massive fatigue in brain fog, again, which sucked because I really had that brain fog kind of, you know, gone.

[Page//00:05:56] So it's really, it's, it's amazing when, when your brain [Page//00:06:00] works normally and then it starts to, you can, you can, you can feel it start to kind of, you know, slip away from you again, it's, it's a scary feeling. But I'm starting to get that under control. I've got a, a new treatment that I just recently started, but it's been kind of, it's been kind of kicking my butt.

[Page//00:06:15] So kind of going through some hers responses again, like yesterday, I felt like that's all I did was. Which it was insane. But feeling so much better today. So it's obviously what my body needed. So to answer your question, like 80% of the time I'm doing so much better. And then there are a few other times I have to, you know, dial in, dial in, dial in and, and keep digging and peeling those layers back.

[Page//00:06:39] Julie Michelson: Yeah. Wow. And thank you for sharing your, your full story with us. And, and it is a journey. It's always a journey. Those of us that have, you know, lived with chronic illness, I think all know, I know what you it's like, you're never there, you know, you can feel great, but you, like you said, it takes you're pro act hates your proactive.

[Page//00:06:59] [Page//00:07:00] You mentioned self-care and filling your cup and To, you know, is that something, is that where you start with clients when you're working with them, or obviously you're very in tune to your body. And so you, what I'm hearing is like you shift, if you know something, you feel something going in a direction you don't like you make a change.

[Page//00:07:23] Heather Gray: Right. No, absolutely. And I, you know, even built into my online course, some traumatic experiencing exercises. So se because that was a huge part of my healing journey over in this. Last year and a half that I figured out, cuz I, I kind of went back off the wagon a couple years ago and was really angry.

[Page//00:07:43] Had gained a bunch of weight, was back being painful, was reactive and had gotten to a fight with my husband. And he kind of looked at me and was like, you know, I'm not gonna be married to an angry person anymore. He's like, I don't know what's going on with you, but you know, let's figure this out. And even back in 2013, when I started the, the [Page//00:08:00] Lyme disease and went through the program, I've always focused on the physical.

[Page//00:08:04] And I've never addressed the hidden trauma that was in my nervous system, hidden trauma from my uncle, killing himself when I was four, the hidden trauma from massive abuse from, you know, alcoholic and drug addicts that I was, you know, raised by trauma from having mold in lime, in my brain for decades, you know?

[Page//00:08:22] So there's all kinds of things that can cause trauma. And so basically for me, you know, the gas was stuck on, there was always a tiger chasing me. And if you can't get that nervous system calm down, right. You don't digest properly. You don't, you can't heal or, you know, have lasting healing. And so that was a, another piece that, yeah, so I, I kind of call myself like the foundation coach because. It, it frustrates me so badly, especially poor all these poor people with lime. And I see 'em on all the groups and they talk, oh, treatment, treatment treatment. What treatment did you get? Treatment treatment treatment treatment. It's like, no, start with the foundations, because even the [Page//00:09:00] best treatment in the whole wide world, if you're gonna eat McDonald's right and inflame your gut and inflame your brain.

[Page//00:09:06] If you're gonna get three hours of sleep at night, if you're gonna drink alcohol, like if your mindset's not correct, if your trauma too much trauma in your nervous system, all the treatment in the world is only gonna get you that far. And if it does get you there, you're gonna end up. You're gonna end up in remission.

[Page//00:09:22] I mean, out of remission. So yeah. Got, yeah. Gotta get those foundations down.

[Page//00:09:29] Julie Michelson: And so let's go there. What are the foundations, although before you jump into that, I, I wanna highlight cuz I love that you brought up this difference between we can feel better. And not be truly healed. And so for lasting healing, we do need to, you know, activate that parasympathetic system and allow our body to truly heal.

[Page//00:09:51] We can eliminate symptoms. Which is a good thing, cuz sometimes, but not some, it's always a process. And so depending on the order, [Page//00:10:00] but you know, when you're talking about foundations, I heard, you know, food sleep, but I don't wanna put words in I in your mouth. I know what I think of you know, what, what are you focusing on?

[Page//00:10:14] Heather Gray: the FDN has a, what they call dress for success model and it's diet, rest, exercise, stress reduction, and supplementation, you know, the supplementation being the last thing, cuz it's just. A lot, like when people focus too much on treatment, supplementation can be great to help calm some of those symptoms down while you're trying to get to the root cause.

[Page//00:10:35] But a lot of folks I've found even in the functional world, sadly will, will just put bandaids on folks with supplements, right? It's more natural than they do the prescriptions, but they've never even digging down deeper of kind of getting why this person needs these to begin with. And so diet is, you know, absolutely key.

[Page//00:10:53] Rest. It's amazing to me, how many people aren't sleeping at night and like when you, it, it, it never [Page//00:11:00] ceases to amaze me when I'm in an intake form and that's not even like a number one main complaint of theirs. Like it'll come out a few days later. Oh. And I don't sleep at night. And I I'm just like, wait, why isn't that one of your main complaints?

[Page//00:11:10] Like that's, ah, sleep is just, I don't function at all anymore if I don't get the right amount of sleep. So I'm just, I'm in awe of folks who weren't sleeping and functioning.

[Page//00:11:21] Julie Michelson: Isn't that a, a common symptom for people with Lyme's disease in the insomnia.

[Page//00:11:27] Heather Gray: Oh, absolutely. I thank God. Never had that as an issue. Mine was the opposite. I, well, I had like extreme adrenal fatigue. So even if I slept 12 hours, I would wake up in the morning in tears cuz it felt like I only slept two hours. But I never had a problem with falling asleep and, and getting to sleep like I'm seriously.

[Page//00:11:46] One of those people that I could sit here in my chair right now, close my eyes and I'd be out in like a minute. So I'm blessed in that way. So exercise, you know, believe it or not like the first thing that I do when I start working with folks [Page//00:12:00] and my runners and my CrossFit people, they are so sad and they get so mad at me because I tell 'em you, you've got to chill out.

[Page//00:12:07] You know a stress on the body, a stress on the body, whether it's good stress or bad stress. And if you've got chronic health issues, right? The whole name of the game is to lower the amount of stress on your body, so it can heal. And so, you know, I tell 'em for like the next three months, while we're working together, you can walk, you can do yoga, you can do light weight training, but that's kind of where I need you to live.

[Page//00:12:28] And it's amazing to me, women who've been trying to lose weight. And so they kick up their exercise even more and more, more, more, more, and it seems so counterproductive. And then I tell 'em to slow down and cut back and then boom, five pounds comes off. Like it never fails. So exercise, stress reduction.

[Page//00:12:43] That's where the sematic experiencing work that I teach some meditation, some breath work. Right, because it was always frustrating to be, he'd go to the doctor and the doctor would say, you need to lower your stress and eat better, but they wouldn't, you know, give you any tools to do that. It's like, you know, you walk out it and you're like, okay, [Page//00:13:00] what does that mean?

[Page//00:13:01] You know? So that's, that's the part of, of coaching that I love is cuz I actually get to, you know, hold somebody's hand and walk with them while they're on this journey. Cuz a lot of us weren't brought up right. To understand what actual real food is like when I was a kid, you know, this is a part of a balanced breakfast.

[Page//00:13:19] You. Yes. That's actually like diabetes in the making is what that was. You know, it was sugary cereal with orange juice and a piece of fruit and a piece of toast like it, you know, so a lot of folks, you know, including myself up until just, you know, very few years ago, you know, I remember giving my kid, you know, Mac and cheese and Kool-Aid and hot dogs for lunch and didn't think anything of it.

[Page//00:13:42] And now I look back at it and go, oh my God, what was I doing? 

[Page//00:13:45] Julie Michelson: And we say we do the best we can with the knowledge we have at the time. Oh.

[Page//00:13:50] Heather Gray: Amen. That's part of the reason why I like doing stuff like this is, you know, if I can plant one little seed for somebody that they can take a look at what they're doing in their life right now and go, oh, [Page//00:14:00] maybe this is contributing to the way I'm feeling or my mental health issues, you know, then, then all my suffering has been, you know, not, not in vein.

[Page//00:14:10] Julie Michelson: It's always one of my favorite things when a, a parent is working with me and they reach that point, they're like, oh, Why am I, when they really get that understanding of food and nutrition and they realize like, why am I feeding my kid terrible things while I eat the healthy, good thing, you know, real food and that click of like, oh, now the whole family can actually eat well.

[Page//00:14:37] And, and that's, that's such a rewarding. Piece of it is I always say the ripple effect. I dunno when people learn, cuz you can't unlearn, like once you realize how, how wrong we were doing it, like you can't go back.

[Page//00:14:54] Heather Gray: No. I, I used to say that quite often, because this world is not set up for a [Page//00:15:00] healthy, mental and physical health. It is it it's not, and it can feel so isolating sometimes. And. I have to constantly think about food prep and, and if I'm out of the house, you know, what am I gonna make? What can I bring with me?

[Page//00:15:13] Where can I get food? Where can I get clean water? You know, it's it can get kind of exhausting sometimes. And I get frustrated and I'm human, you know? And sometimes I wish I could just go. On a whim and yeah, I'm gonna meet you at the restaurant and have, you know, our nerves or, you know, and a drink, you know, but I can't, and, and that's okay.

[Page//00:15:30] Cuz I actually function so much better than, than most people I know, even that don't have a chronic, haven't had a history of chronic disease. So I'm grateful for that. That it's, it is frustrating. It can feel isolating because this world is just not set up for a healthy life.

[Page//00:15:46] Julie Michelson: No. And, and, you know, the hope is this is why we're doing this right. That we will make a contribution to that change and things will correct. I mean, they actually have to, it's just a matter of, you know, whose [Page//00:16:00] lifetime it's gonna be in

[Page//00:16:01] Heather Gray: Hopefully it's ours. I would love to see the happen.

[Page//00:16:04] Julie Michelson: it would be so good. I wanna highlight, because this is, it is such a passion point for me as well.

[Page//00:16:10] And whether it's lime autoimmune often, it's both this idea of over exercising. I, I. Is finding that proper level of, I use the word movement. I don't even use the word exercise, but finding that level. And, and it's true is a process to get people to understand that when they're over exercising and over exercising, depending on where you are for your health, it, it, it may be going for too long of a walk.

[Page//00:16:40] Like it just depends on, you know, if you, if you're exercising and. Your symptoms are getting worse or your, you know, do you feel like

[Page//00:16:51] Heather Gray: afterwards.

[Page//00:16:51] Julie Michelson: that idea? You know, that's another like training we have, right. Of like, oh, you know, I'm hurting from yesterday's workout. It must have been a great [Page//00:17:00] workout. Maybe not so much. And so people don't realize that, you know, I love the saying you can't, first of all, you can't over exercise your way out of a bad diet. But also, you know, that often then I went through it. When I was declining with auto immunity, It it's like, I didn't, it was like, no, it's not gonna take this from me.

[Page//00:17:24] You know, I'm going to keep exercising. And so I think that's a, that plays into it when people are, you know, they may have no energy for anything else, but they're pushing themselves. And, you know, especially where we live, CrossFits huge where, you know, I. Lived in Boulder county for years where they say, you know, everybody in Boulder county is training for something, you know, it's not exercise and they're training.

[Page//00:17:48] So I dunno. So I, I love that you brought that up and I just, I wanted to highlight that for listeners to really consider, like, what is that proper level of exercise for you?

[Page//00:17:59] Heather Gray: [Page//00:18:00] My husband lost 65 pounds and I lost 40. By walking, you know, actually, you know, testing for

[Page//00:18:10] Julie Michelson: Today is . It

[Page//00:18:12] Heather Gray: and getting my hormones balanced. But it wasn't, it, it wasn't by cranking up the time in the gym, you know, as how we lost weight, it was actually the exact opposite. So I know it seems counterproductive, but, but trust us, we know what we're doing.

[Page//00:18:27] Julie Michelson: is so true. So I know one of your big, and that maybe we're just. Going back to what we were already discussing, but you're, you're all about, you know, you have five tips that help people, you know, increase their energy, reduce their brain fog. I think reduce their pain as well. I've gut issues, right?

[Page//00:18:50] Because your story starts with gut issues.

[Page//00:18:54] Heather Gray: Absolutely.

[Page//00:18:55] Julie Michelson: So let's see, I don't know if we'll get through all five, but and maybe [Page//00:19:00] that was, maybe that was them 

[Page//00:19:01] Heather Gray: so I love testing for food. Sensitivities is, is part of it. You know, it, we call it low hanging fruit in the industry because a lot of, like, for me it was pork it was coconut, it was almonds. Right. So I was going on a keto diet. And gaining weight and, and, and getting more angry and inflamed. And I found out that I was reacting to almonds, coconuts olives and pork, and that was like a staple for my keto diet.

[Page//00:19:29] So it was a no wonder. I've seen like people migraines that they've been dealing with daily. I, I, I mean, I've seen so many amazing things happen by just eliminating food sensitivities to start off with. So that would be like number one. Two, make sure you go into bed on time. You know, we say that really optimal, optimal health for sleep is, you know, between 10:00 PM and like 4:00 AM.

[Page//00:19:52] So every time you stay up. Later, past 10:00 PM. I meant your body is actually missing out on [Page//00:20:00] crucial things to detox and functions that only happen when you're asleep. So that's, that's a huge one. Most people, I have some people I have to really start 'em off, slow on that one. It's like, they're up till midnight.

[Page//00:20:10] And I'm like, all right, well, try to go to bed at 1130 this day, this week, right. And the next week try to gets bed at 11, right? Because if you try to take somebody who's normally going to bed at midnight and trying to get them bed at 10, they're gonna lay there. Thinking about how pissed off they are at you. So sleep. So one, two do do, do, do. Making sure that you're hydrated, right? They say you should be drinking half your ounce, half your body weight in ounces of water a day. And I don't, there's so many people who are so chronically dehydrated it's ridiculous. And then also constipated. And so that would be another one is to make sure that you're the three PS, right.

[Page//00:20:44] Pooping, peeing, perspiring Yes, probably more than five now from the total of this talk

[Page//00:20:49] Julie Michelson: yeah. Yeah, for sure. I know I'm always, always talking poop with my clients. It's so important.

[Page//00:20:57] Heather Gray: It's so important.

[Page//00:20:58] Julie Michelson: Yeah. And I love that you brought [Page//00:21:00] up and it's, and this is why these are foundational things. I love that you brought up drinking enough water. It is such a common problem. And often when you go to the doctor, they don't ask you how much water you drink.

[Page//00:21:14] Right. Or if you drink water,

[Page//00:21:16] Heather Gray: What kind of water you're drinking because like our city water is flora, fluorinated, and chlorine, and chlorine is absolutely horrible for your gut bacteria and flora. And chlorine's really horrible for your, your thyroid as well. You know, so anybody who's got issues with their thyroid have been diagnosed with Hashimotos, you know, put a shower, filter on your shower and make sure you're drinking filtered water.

[Page//00:21:40] Cuz that chlorine is, is absolutely horrible for.

[Page//00:21:44] Julie Michelson: and I, I love that you added the shower filter, so it's not just what you're drinking our, you know, our. Absorbs. And so I was so excited when I built the house that I'm in now that we were able to put in a whole house water filter

[Page//00:21:56] Heather Gray: Ah, so

[Page//00:21:57] Julie Michelson: my favorite thing in the world [Page//00:22:00] is just so good. I'm not sure I could live without one a again, ever.

[Page//00:22:06] Like now that I've had one

[Page//00:22:07] Heather Gray: My favorite is gifts from my husband was Valentine's day when he bought me my first Bey, you know, my first water filtration system. I've I've upgraded since then, but I was just like, that's my favorite gift ever. What did work? I am. There was a girl I worked with on the ranch and I gave her, she was outta water and I gave her some of my water and she came back to me the next day and said, what was in that water that you gave me?

[Page//00:22:30] I'm like, why? And she's like, I had more energy and I, I just couldn't believe it. I'm like, well, cuz your cells are hydrated for the first time in their life. It's more like, well what's not in that water with you.

[Page//00:22:41] Julie Michelson: I love that. That's that is amazing. You talk about, I've heard you talk about eating grain free. Do you think everybody should be grain free or.

[Page//00:22:54] Heather Gray: There is a caveat to that. So if you're gonna take, I love Western a price and actually Western a price was my [Page//00:23:00] first like kind of intro into the alternative. You know nutrition world. And he was a dentist back in the 1930s who were traveling the world and, and seeing these indigenous folks of the area and how their, their mouths within one generation were just completely getting trashed with the introduction of like the standard of American diet.

[Page//00:23:21] And, you know, so if you're going to take the time to soak and sprout and prepare your grains properly, absolutely go eat grain. There are some health benefits to it. Fiber. I personally haven't found too many people who wanna take the time to prepare grams properly. So that's why I put them on a paleo diet.

[Page//00:23:41] And even they're finding, even in organic grains, they can still be high in mold. They can still be high in, you know, other things that aren't really great for you. If you think about it, even an organic piece of bread, it's still processed food, right? You have to do things to that. You know, [Page//00:24:00] product to get it, to be this product.

[Page//00:24:02] And I'm, I'm more of a proponent of whole real foods right. In their natural forms. so, yeah, I, I am more of a paleo type diet, but if you are gonna eat grains, the only way that you really should is if you're sprouting and soaking. So that way your body can actually absorb them properly. And they're not leading to leaky.

[Page//00:24:19] Get. Yeah.

[Page//00:24:20] Julie Michelson: I love that. I I always find that. Just does seem that even people that seem to tolerate grains well do better grain free, for sure. And so is that something you, so I know you said you, you do food sensitivity panels right away with your clients your com you're combining it, it sounds like yeah,

[Page//00:24:45] Heather Gray: I put everybody on the payroll diet. Yep. Minus their food sensitivities. And then I teach 'em how to rotate because until their gut is healed, if you're eating the same foods over and over and over again, you're gonna create new food sensitivities. So, yep.

[Page//00:24:59] Julie Michelson: I love that. [Page//00:25:00] I love the I always joke. I, I am. I've gentled, the longer I've been coaching. And so I, I try to like the one, no, no. I say for anybody with autoimmune or Lyme or, you know, toxicity issues without an autoimmune diagnosis or the is, you know, absolutely gluten free across the board.

[Page//00:25:24] Heather Gray: Absolutely. Yeah. Especially if you've been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, like me and gluten are one of the number one contributors to autoimmune disease out there. So yeah, absolutely everybody. Absolutely. I've just, I've been doing a lot of dairy and, and corn and grain zoomers as well.

[Page//00:25:39] And I'm seeing how they all kind of interact and there's some molecular mimicry that goes on with like wheat and dairy and corn. And so all my autoimmune folks there, that's, that's the, the three big beds as we call 'em and I, I take people off of those automatically.

[Page//00:25:54] Julie Michelson: Yeah. I, I, it was always interesting to me. Because we didn't [Page//00:26:00] learn a lot about corn in the various schools I went to. But I found time and time and time and time again. So many people, this was before I was using food sensitivity panels. But even without them, so many people upon reintroduction that corn was such a huge issue that it, it rose that it was I'm same with you.

[Page//00:26:24] It was gluten, dairy and corn because almost every time. And

[Page//00:26:29] Heather Gray: Yeah. I was shocked when I got my corn Z back and I was actually almost reacting to it just as badly as we and the, and the Mexican that's in, you know, part of me was, was deeply, deeply crushed. But, you know, if you think about it, you know, what do we feed corn to typically, you know, we feed it to animals to fat them up faster, you know?

[Page//00:26:49] So it, it's just, there's not a whole lot of, of.

[Page//00:26:52] Julie Michelson: we feed it to animals that shouldn't be eating corn, but that's a whole different episode.

[Page//00:26:56] Heather Gray: Absolutely trust me. I grew up in, in [Page//00:27:00] Greeley, in the agricultural area and I go talking like I talk now back, you know? And it just Dr. They just, their heads explode. I'm like cows four stomachs. None of them were met to break down corn. They are not ghost eat corn.

[Page//00:27:16] Julie Michelson: yeah. Salmon. Isn't supposed to eat corn

[Page//00:27:18] Heather Gray: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I'm not sure. Very, especially, you know, maybe, you know, the, the ancient corn back of our ancestors, you know, might be a completely different story, but we've, we've like everything else we've changed and BAS size it to the, where our bodies are. Like, what the hell is that

[Page//00:27:37] Julie Michelson: Yeah, it's it is so true. So we covered a lot and you already gave a lot of tips. And oftentimes my guests struggle with this question, but we always, I always ask you to pick one. Sometimes people bring in a whole new one. But if listeners. Wanna just start one thing today. [Page//00:28:00] Like what is one step that they could take immediately to start to move the needle on their health?

[Page//00:28:06] Heather Gray: paleo. I, you said you,

[Page//00:28:10] Julie Michelson: step but, okay. Yeah,

[Page//00:28:13] Heather Gray: but it's, but it's free. You don't need a, you know, a person to help with that. Like, that's something you absolutely could IM you know, implement today and you could implement it in, in tiny steps, you know, start say, say this week, you're gonna cut out wheat and then next week you'll cut out dairy.

[Page//00:28:27] And then the next week, you know, there's, there's ways to do it. And within a month or two, you can be completely paleo. But you know, you had talked about you can't exercise your way out of a bad diet. You can. So you can't supplement your way out of a bad diet, like diet is foundation. So absolutely.

[Page//00:28:41] That's like my number one. go paleo.

[Page//00:28:45] Julie Michelson: I love that. That's, you're speaking my language and know for listeners that are like, this is the stuff Julie always talks about. I didn't, this is, Heather's not a plant.

[Page//00:28:57] Heather Gray: Nope. If you put on my website, you I've got [Page//00:29:00] YouTube, you can, I'm ranting about it all the time. I just got done ranting about there's this new shake place in town. And it's supposed to be healthy shakes. Right. I walk in and it's all herbal life. It's soy. Corn grain. And they're touting themselves as fricking healthy.

[Page//00:29:18] And like the word nutrition is up on their sign. And I thought my freaking head was gonna explode. I was so pissed when I left there. I'm like, that is not healthy.

[Page//00:29:28] Julie Michelson: Wow. Well, I'll have to check it out so that my head can explode as well.

[Page//00:29:32] Heather Gray: People have to just sit out there with some picking signs and just saying truth and advertising, right. Truth. And.

[Page//00:29:38] Julie Michelson: seriously. Well, and that's the, this is where we all need to be our own advocate. And it's like using the word healthy are all natural on the front of a label. You know, it's the marketing and you've got to take the time to actually see what's in stuff. So [Page//00:30:00] that's that, that's another, see another tip everybody.

[Page//00:30:04] Heather Gray: now, if you don't recognize it in greet it, look it up. You'll be shocked.

[Page//00:30:08] Julie Michelson: don't be fooled where for people that listen like I do on the go and aren't going to click links in the show notes. Where's the best place to find you. People are like, wow, I have to check out more. Where can they go?

[Page//00:30:23] Heather Gray: I got a lot of great videos on YouTube. So discoveringhealthFDN on YouTube is a great place. Or if you have Lyme disease and are needing support, I've got a, a Lyme boss unraveling the secrets of Lyme disease. I've got a support group for Lyme folks on Facebook. So those would be the two places that I would start.

[Page//00:30:42] Julie Michelson: Wonderful. Heather, thank you so much. You have shared amazing gold and given listeners more than five tips to get started on their health journey.

[Page//00:30:52] Heather Gray: Yay. Thanks for having me again. I'm glad we were able to do this.

[Page//00:30:55] Julie Michelson: Me too, for everyone listening. Remember you can get the show notes and [Page//00:31:00] transcripts by visiting inspired living.show. I hope you had a great time and enjoyed this episode as much as I did. I'll see you next week.

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Heather Gray
Heather Gray is a Functional Diagnostic Nutritionist Practitioner. She found this work after 27 years of undiagnosed Lyme Disease, Celiac Disease, Hashimoto's, and Endometriosis. She was depressed, anxious, and in chronic widespread pain, had bad skin, bloated, constipated, exhausted, weight gain, and had horrible periods to name a few things. She set out on a path to healing. She has now lost over 100bs, her pain has lessened, no more suicidal thoughts, and has all-day energy. She now has a practice where she teaches others how to take care of themselves and get the inflammation off their body and brain. She gives you control over your health journey. She teaches you to destroy brain fog, moodiness, chronic inflammation, and pain.
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