Episode 69
Table of Contents:
In this episode:
Dr. Anna Esparham, MD , founder of Health Is PowHer and Pain Free Life Academy, Is a nationally-recognized physician who healed herself from multiple chronic conditions from near death shock to issues with chronic pain and autoimmune disease.
She is now a coach helping women learn how to heal themselves for good. Health Is PowHer's Podcast serves women who want to learn about how to overcome all the Issues that come with life.
Anna first became sick with Polyglandular Autoimmune Syndrome in her first year of medical school following vaccinations and Mono, but didn't realize the vaccines were a trigger until later. She was fortunate to find help with an integrative medicine approach by addressing her eating, dietary supplements, getting nutrient IV's, Meyer's, and Vitamin C IV's.
A year later, after getting another flu vaccine, Anna had excruciating pelvic pain, worse than any pain she had ever experienced. She was dealing with Bladder Pain Syndrome and Interstitial Cystitis. Again, she improved...until she got the next flu vaccine the next year.
That third time almost killed her, and left her with (among other challenges) severe Fibromyalgia.
Traditional, Integrative, and Functional Medicine, combined, helped her improve 30-40%.
Spiritual healing accounted for the rest and took her to 100%
Pain is a messenger, giving us information.
Fibromyalgia
Is a diagnosis and a disease process.
It effects multiple systems, including immune system, nervous system and endocrine system.
Autoimmunity
The Journal of Clinical Investigation published a study where antibodies from Fibromyalgia patients were injected into healthy mice, and the mice developed Fibromyalgia.
Fibro causes neurogenic inflammation, in the dorsal root ganglia. NSAIDS don't help because they don't reach those nerves.
Inflammatory cytokine IL-8 is involved, as well as increased oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction.
It effects neurotransmitters, suppressing serotonin and norepinephrine which help stop pain sensation.
It is an endocrine disruptor, causing the cortisol curve to be blunted in a stress response, dis-regulating the HPA Axis.
And, Fibro patients produce less growth hormone at night.
EMOTIONS AND PAIN SHARE THE SAME BIOLOGICAL PATHWAY.
We can modulate our pain response by changing our thoughts and beliefs.
The Biology of Belief - Bruce Lipton
NLP
Hypnosis
Using visualizations can be instrumental in healing.
Our thoughts change our physiology!
Using your imagination can help you heal!
Spirituality doesn't have to be religious. Believing in a higher power is essential for healing (even if it is your higher self).
Anna's 1 Thing:
Morning visualization ritual.
Every day, first thing in the morning, visualize your perfect day...
perhaps pain free, energized, happy, joyous, etc.
See yourself move through your day happy and whole.
This may only take a couple of minutes.
Your life will change!!
Other Resources:
Connect with Anna Esparham
Episode Transcript
Julie Michelson: [Page//00:00:00] Welcome back to The Inspired Living with Autoimmunity podcast. I'm your host, Julie Michaelson, and today we're joined by Dr. Anna Esparham. Founder of Health is powHer and Pain-Free Life Academy, and the host of the Health is powHer podcast, which is amazing. Anna is a nationally recognized physician who healed herself from multiple chronic conditions, including [Page//00:01:00] autoimmunity and chronic pain, and she now helps others do the same.
Today we're talking about all things fibromyalgia. Anna shares her expertise and understanding of this complex illness, as well as her effective treatment approach that incorporates scientifically founded use of spirituality to heal. This episode is for everyone, whether you have fibromyalgia or not.
Anna, welcome to the podcast.
Anna Esparham: I am so excited to be here. Julie, thank you for having me on the show.
Julie Michelson: Thank you so so much for joining us. We probably could have recorded two episodes already, with the conversation that we've been having before I hit record. So I am, I already know what goodness the listeners are in for. You, you have an incredible. Story, an incredible journey. And I would love to have you, you know, introduce yourself to listeners via your [Page//00:02:00] journey.
And then we'll dig into the rest of the conversation.
Anna Esparham: Yeah. So yeah, I love the origin story and I love hearing everyone's stories too. I do that on my podcast as well. It's so interesting how we. Out to where we are today. So well I am a medical doctor and so conventional trained. But I really got into more of the integrative and functional and spiritual side because I got so sick.
Especially the first year of medical school. I. I had to repeat a whole bunch of immunizations cuz I never had chickenpox when I was a kid. And, and then I got mono all at the same time. And then something crazy happened where I was so incredibly sick and bedridden that What happened was I developed this severe autoimmune poly glandular autoimmune disease, and then everything snowballed from there where I developed all these chronic pain syndromes as well, and I [Page//00:03:00] was in so much pain, so sick.
I was bedridden trying to get through med school, trying to get through residency, and, you know, the conventional medicines, even though steroids, you know, they helped me get by. I mean, I could at least not get on disability. go through, you know?
Julie Michelson: of function.
Anna Esparham: Sort of, sort of function and well, that's what led me to, I was like, no way.
I need to have quality of life. I need to get through, you know, med school and residency. And so that's what led me to Dr. Jeanie Driscoll, who was the head of integrative medicine. She actually, not a lot of people know about her. She's a integrative medicine physician that has really led the way.
And led the field along with all these other people at, at the Institute of Functional Medicine and Integrative Medicine where she created the Integrative Medicine fellowship. I mean, she's done a ton for the world on integrative cancer therapies and she got me better through nutritional changes, dietary supplements, IV vitamin C or IV Myers [Page//00:04:00] cocktails cuz I had. So she created this integrative medicine fellowship. She really created, you know, the way for integrative cancer therapies across the. And integrative cancer care. And anyway, she started me on, you know, nutritional changes dietary supplements, IV vitamin C because my adrenal glands were completely destroyed. I went into menopause, you know, at age like 23 or 24. And so then I started feeling better, but I wasn't completely a lot better.
You know, there was so much pain going on. You know, the conventional system just wasn't helpful at all. And there was a point in the time where I was at an academic medical center where we did have to start getting mandated, you know, [Page//00:05:00] immunizations and. And that was fine. And, and I got the first flu vaccine, but then I doubled over and experienced severe pelvic pain where I was puking on the toilet.
I mean, I, it was crushing, it was excruciating. It was like, I, I am, have so much of a pain threshold. I went through peritonitis and I was just fine like at age 14 and which is like an infection of the belly and the pelvis and cuz my appendix burst and I was like living with it for three months and I was like, totally.
Like, not ha you know, I was, I was not complaining, and that's just me. I just don't complain about pain. And anyway, I didn't know what was going on and I got treated for this chronic pelvic pain, bladder pain syndrome, interstitial cystitis, and. and for a year, you know, I started getting better, I was better, got the second, you know, immunization and then all of a sudden I started getting some whole body pain, started getting some anaphylaxis type symptoms.
Not shock yet, but and I didn't still know, but then my doctor was still kind of like, well, there might [Page//00:06:00] be an association there and let's just keep checking you out. So anyway, I was dealing a lot of myalgias that year. Then the third time, I almost died. I went into anaphylactic shock. I developed severe pain throughout my entire body.
Obviously it, you know, developed into severe fibromyalgia. It maybe even having a small fiber neuropathy, who knows? But So that's what kind of led me down this chronic pain path. As a, as I'm also a headache and pain doc too. So it's like as I'm a integrative headache and pain doc I'm dealing with, you know, this fibromyalgia, pain, and and it's, it's funny cuz even with all my knowledge, it was like, how do I get through this?
I had so much muscle weakness, fatigue, brain fog, you know, sleep issue. It was so difficult and and so that's kind of what led me to where I am really focusing a lot [Page//00:07:00] on chronic pain and fibromyalgia for women especially. just because I feel like a lot more women do get chronic pain and fibromyalgia more so than men. There's a lot of hormonal issues related to it, but but it's a big passion of mine and that's why I'm also going back to residency in.
Julie Michelson: Incredible. Honestly, incredible.
Anna Esparham: Go back. I'm so scared. I'm like, oh, what am I doing? I'm gonna go back to residency in osteopathic neuro musculoskeletal medicine. Because it is so important in treating the whole body, the myo fascia, the nerves, the joints, the tissues, the muscles, the bones. Everything to help both chronic pain and fibromyalgia.
And so I, I got to, I got accepted into this program, so I'm super excited. But yeah, it's just strange how this kind of led me to help people with chronic pain and, and even though there's this medicine side All the while. The biggest thing that truly heat me, I just, I [Page//00:08:00] believe in medicine and I think medicine is wonderful.
I think both conventional medicine and integrative medicine and functional medicine, all of it is just incredible. I just think I only got 30 to 40% better with that. And the biggest thing that truly helped me, Was the spiritual side that intuitive side. Really connecting with my spirit, my higher self, connecting with God and, and you know, with my faith, Jesus Christ.
And, and working on that spiritual healing cuz that was the only way that I truly healed, you know, a hundred percent. So yeah. So that's my story. That's my story.
Julie Michelson: Which is so incredible and, and you are healed a hundred percent, so you're pain free.
Anna Esparham: Well, so we're not ever completely pain free. We're always gonna experience pain, and so anytime. I am overly stressed, or if I ride in a car and I'm, my biomechanics are a little bit off or my posture is bad, I will [Page//00:09:00] experience like some shoulder pain or like maybe some thoracic pain, some hip pain, but it's never that type of pain that is just chronic continu.
Constant, I mean, excruciating. And so there pain is a good thing. It's very protective for us. It's a, it's more of a, a message to us, which we'll probably get into. But yeah, so it, it was amazing to me how the spiritual side, even though I'm very scientifically based as a, you know, board certified, well triple board certified physician, maybe I'll be quadruple board certified after this residency.
Julie Michelson: gosh,
Anna Esparham: But but it, it real, I just believe in the spiritual that's the foundation for healing.
Julie Michelson: And I wanna throw in there for listeners, because we, we often talk about self, we could do a whole nother podcast on what is going on at medical school. I mean, yours was different, a little different because, and I've interviewed so many docs who, [Page//00:10:00] you know, their autoimmune journey either started or really became unbearable in medical school.
And I'm like, I really think we need to revamp medical school. And yours, I know was, was more, you know, vaccine inoculation related, but. I do wanna throw out there because we got to talk before I hit record. You know, we talk all the time about this, like, overachieving, go, go, go. Not taking care of yourself, running yourself down.
So I want to for the listeners that aren't familiar with you. You know, you listen to your body, you take good care of yourself, you know what you need, and yes, you might be what I would. Not, might be you are what I would call a high achiever. But you do it in a way that's healthy for you so that you can continue to contribute to your patients and clients.
And so I just, I wanted to like add that qualifier because I'm sure listeners are thinking like, wait, , you know,[Page//00:11:00]
Anna Esparham: How on Earth
Julie Michelson: Yeah. Yeah. And, and for those of you that are, are listening and not watching, like, you know, talk about a, a vibrant human
Anna Esparham: Oh,
Julie Michelson: Yeah.
Anna Esparham: so much. Yeah, no, I, I do think there is a, because I am also a pain doc and this is what I do a lot with pediatric patients, you know, as well, and. We always talk about, yeah, perfectionism and high achievers and people pleasing, and that's actually been studied that those are the qualities that actually lead to chronic pain.
And what's interesting, there are some times when I was telling you, yeah, I'll get little pain episodes here and there. And when I do my meditation and connection to God and I ask for the message, I say, okay, what's this message, this pain, what is it trying to tell me? and what comes up sometimes is like, Anna, you're trying to impress these people.
And I'm like, okay, let's, let's like forgive myself. Let's reel back and let's [Page//00:12:00] readjust here. And so we just have to tune in. It's just all about tuning in and listening to that message.
Julie Michelson: which I love because, you know, we talk about, you know, pain is a symptom. It's information, it's your body trying to tell you something. And I, I was going to ask you to circle back and go there. So it's not just, You know, riding in the car, or, you know, it, it's not necessarily a physical thing. It can be a physical expression of, Hey, you're off path here.
Which is it is such a, an amazing gift when you are tuned into that level, right? You're, oh, just listening to your body and, and like you said, tapping into your spirituality to, to say like, oh, figure it out. Like, okay. What, what does this mean? What's my body telling me? What's.
Anna Esparham: Yeah, and just like what you said about, I was just kind of getting off the path. Just recently I really, I was getting the message that I needed to [Page//00:13:00] leave this, you know, major academic medical center I was working at, I was director. I was kind of at the top of my, you know, I was associate professor. I was getting all these awards and, and I, I just, I, it took me a while to finally, Listen to that message, but I was having little headaches, you know, I was getting these, this kind of headache pain and I was wondering what was going on there.
And I spent a whole week cuz the headache and I had some depression symptoms too for an entire week. And I was like really dug deep, connected to God. I meditated with God for, oh, for several hours a day. It took me that long and I finally, literally at the end of that week, I finally got that message and it was like I had to leave and I was like, oh, I don't.
I'm getting paid. Well, I'm I'm doing so well. No. And then of course, you know, this is my path now and I'm going back and here I am. I'm going back to residencies. This is apparently what I'm supposed to be doing.
Julie Michelson: And do your [Page//00:14:00] symptoms. Once you made the decision to leave, what happened?
Anna Esparham: So it just re It just releases. Yeah, it just
Julie Michelson: and I just got goosebumps
Anna Esparham: yeah. Yeah. And it.
Julie Michelson: so amazing.
Anna Esparham: it's beautiful because just like we were talking about before we started the recording, is a lot of times when you're diagnosed with a chronic illness or a chronic pain disorders, like, hey, you're gonna accept, which is good.
You, you accept it. Yes, we accept the problem for sure, but we don't have to live with it forever. You, you can truly heal yourself. There are the tools that I learned, you know, you don't necessarily have to learn the tools that I learned. There are so many different tools. To heal from chronic pain or from chronic autoimmune disease.
But I, I healed. I don't have to take my steroids, you know? So I, I don't have to have excruciating pain and muscle weakness every single day. And, but I do have to tune in. To what I feel is very healing for me is that spiritual connection [Page//00:15:00] to my Holy Spirit, to God, and to allow those messages to be understood and to be learned so that I can take that lesson and move on from the pain.
Julie Michelson: So amazing and so beautiful. I have 800 questions I wanna ask you. But I am really excited to bring listeners a, another piece of the conversation because I, I just, it, it's just people need to learn. So you are on the Inspired Living with Autoimmunity podcast and we are talking about fibromyalgia.
I want you to connect those dots for us because I feel like this is new news for a lot of people.
Anna Esparham: Yeah. So, so many people know about fibromyalgia. I'm gonna get really kind of like sciencey here, but
Julie Michelson: go for it.
Anna Esparham: So fibromyalgia I, it's a diagnosis it's a disease process, but much like other diseases that [Page//00:16:00] really are just kind of vague and you can't see them like migraines or a D H D, there is underlying Pathophysiology, immunology, endocrinology going on in the body that is thrown off.
And so then we start experiencing, especially women, women get this a lot more than men. As we said, it's a lot of hormone balances, hormone differences. And our brain is a little bit different too. Our nervous system works a little bit differently, but we get this widespread muscle pain, joint pain, stiffness.
We get fatigue. We get this cognitive, you know, dysfunction, kind of brain fog type symptoms. It's a lot of emotional kind of dysregulation. Some anxiety, some depression, a lot of sleep. We don't sleep as well as other people. We get GI issues like irritable bowel syndrome, headaches, migraines, et cetera.
And. And so what they found more recently, everyone was like, okay, fibromyalgia. There's no inflammation, which is not true. There is inflammation, there is nervous system inflammation, and there is [Page//00:17:00] immune system inflammation going on. And so recently a study done, I think it was by, it was a, in the uk it's in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, and they took antibodies from people with fibromyalgia and put them into mice that didn't.
you know, any pain symptoms or fibromyalgia, and the mice got fibromyalgia and so they found that those antibody, they took those antibodies from people who had fibromyalgia. They're like, oh, so this must be an autoimmune disease because
Julie Michelson: we just haven't identified.
Anna Esparham: no, we haven't. We there, there is fi 50% of fibromyalgia typically.
You could have a small fiber neuropathy and or there could be neuropathy going on for most of all people who have fibromyalgia and that actually could be caused by an autoimmune disease. So some people hanging around with just the diagnosis of fibromyalgia and not neuropathy. [Page//00:18:00] 50% of them are going without the di that diagnosis.
And so that's like, that body's destruction of small nerve fibers that produce pain or different temperature sensation. For us with fibromyalgia, we have a decreased cold threshold. So we don't like cold on our bodies. That's why a lot of us do better with warmth. But there's more so that that's not just it with the immune system, there's, there's a whole lot more.
And so one of the other things that happens is, , and this is also probably in the last few years, been more recently studied. There's neurogenic inflammation, meaning inflammation in the nervous system. They're in the dorsal root ganglia, and that is those spinal nerves that come out of our spinal cord.
On our back in between our vertebra, there's these dorsal root ganglia that actually are producing a lot of inflammatory substances along those nerve pathways that actually from the central. Go to the central nervous system, to our brain and to our spinal cord, and also go into our periphery, [Page//00:19:00] all in our skin, our muscles, our tissues, even our organs.
And so, even though I say inflammation, our, the fibromyalgia is not well treated with the anti-inflammatories like ibuprofen or an NaPro. . So it doesn't typically help the pain. But there still is inflammation going on, and, but it's more in a place where those meds can't typically reach. And so like our the spinal cord, the brain also has many different.
Inflammatory substances being produced more so than a healthy individual. And that is, most often it's interleukin eight. And that is, you know, a really inflammatory cytokine that is caused by our nerve immune cells called the glial cells. And those are involved in the dorsal root ganglia That's.
Spinal cord, the brain. And so it is kind of involving a lot of mast cells, monocytes, neutrophils, all these different inflammatory factors. So it's like this big soup, [Page//00:20:00] inflammatory soup and fibromyalgia that is not treated with normal anti-inflammatories and. , that's not just it. There's also a lot of oxidative stress, which comes from reactive oxygen species and and perhaps a little mitochondrial dysfunction as well that can result in the progression of fibromyalgia.
So that's a lot of what the immune system dysregulation and that autoimmunity is. So there's no like main antibody, particularly in fibromyalgia that we're really testing. So it's hard to treat as an autoimmune disease. However, we still have to take care of that inflammation and regulate the immune system to our normal state.
But they're, but that's not just it. This is part of that's just part of fibromyalgia is the immune system. The other aspects are our nervous system and our [Page//00:21:00] endocrine system. And so we've got all these neurotransmitters involved that we may not have enough of and that we may have too much of in fibromyalgia.
And a lot of us have heard about serotonin and or epinephrine. Well, us with fibromyalgia. We don't have as much serotonin and norepinephrine, which are those feel good chemicals, but they're also they actually inhibit pain. Those are the neurotransmitters in our spinal cord that actually activate the descending pain pathways that stop the pain.
So you've got two pain pathways, one that makes you feel the pain that's ascending toward your spinal cord and brain, and the one that's descending. Stops the pain and that's where serotonin and norepinephrine are real big in and can stop that pain. So that's why we give a lot of SNRIs or serotonin and or epinephrine reuptake inhibitors to give you a little bit more of that serotonin, norepinephrine hanging around in your spinal cord to activate those descending inhibitory pain pathways.[Page//00:22:00]
And then there's also some other inflamm inflammatory neuro peptides like glutamate and substance P that are involved. And so sometimes people do like a low glutamine or low glutamate diet to help decrease some of that excitatory painful neurotransmitter. In brain scans of people with fibromyalgia.
Our pain pathways are way overactive. Our reptilian brain, that limbic system that's like that fight or flight, the emotional, you know, fear type pathway, that's like super active in people with fibromyalgia versus like healthy people. And then, . People with fibromyalgia also have a endocrine disruption where our cortisol that's helps us with energy.
PR provides us with resilience against stress, keeps us from having shock when we get sick. Well, we have a blunt in that cortisol curve, so we don't have as good of a cortisol response to stress. So our endocrine hypothalamic pituitary [Page//00:23:00] adrenal access is dysregulated and thrown off. . And not only that, but also we don't have as much growth hormone secretion at night.
And so that also affects multiple factors in our body in terms of regeneration. So it's, it's just multiple factors going on in fibromyalgia that really is just often, you know, being treated either. Is not necessarily right either, but opioids duloxetine or venlafaxine like SNRIs SSRIs, it's all, you know, great.
But we're still not
Julie Michelson: you're still treating a symptom or a piece of the pathway.
Anna Esparham: Yes.
Julie Michelson: Wow. I feel like, okay, you know, I'm done , I learned so much listeners, you are welcome, . You can play that back. But it makes it, what I, I am so excited about is when [Page//00:24:00] I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, oh gosh, don't know, 15 years ago was.
Again, and I had said this before we recorded I felt like it was like, oh, you have pain. We don't, you know, you have pain that doesn't fall under your rheumatoid arthritis pain. And so I feel like back then any especially woman who had fibromyalgia symptoms either was made to feel like they're crazy or it's all in their head.
You know, or it was like, we don't, we don't know, you know, we're just gonna stick fibro on you. And beyond the, the SNRIs, the SSRIs, that, that was all they did back then. If, then, actually it was probably before they were u you know, it may have been five, five years later, you know? So I'm like, well, wow, there's so much more to the puzzle.
You know and again, all of those disruptions [Page//00:25:00] and, and dysregulation that you just shared, like they're not the ac the cause,
Anna Esparham: No,
Julie Michelson: So when we talk about functional medicine being root cause medicine, or you know, it's going after each of those pieces separately, it isn't actually gonna heal.
Anna Esparham: True. It's, and, and that's where you have to listen to the patient's story and, and often time our story. Thank God I had a great, you know, medical team for mine. I got so lucky probably cuz I prayed so much But You really have to listen to each patient's story and understand where that pain is coming from.
Take a look at the diet, the nutrition, their environment, any toxic relationships, tra trauma and, and P T S D just like we talked about previously, is a huge part. The emotions actually, there is some evidence where emotions can create some [Page//00:26:00] autoimmunity in and of itself, and also we already know it. The emotional pathways are along the same anatomical pathways as pain,
Julie Michelson: can you please say that one more?
Anna Esparham: so the emotional pathways, so our emotions, those pathways are along the same anatomical pathways as the pain. So they are really combined. You can't separate emotions and. You just can't. So pain can cause emotional pain. Emotional pain can cause pain. And that's why there are a lot of actually really good studies on pain reprocessing therapy or other types of more positive intention hypnosis, creative visualization to where we can modulate.
Our pain and treat our own pain through the power of our mind, our heart, our spirit. And, and there's actually evidence to that in emotional [Page//00:27:00] modulation or what they call super spinal self-regulation of our pain. And that's where those mind body therapies come in. . And so I use, I mean, I, I use a lot of self hypnosis.
I use a lot of medical intuition to help my own pain and also the women that I coach. But in traditional medicine we do a lot more like cognitive behavioral therapy and then clinical hypnosis. So it's a little bit different in terms of which, you know, kind of medical system you're.
Julie Michelson: Wow. And this, I told you, I, I literally do think I physically jumped up and down when, when we talked about, you know, that we're going to, to talk about this. I, I wanna back all the way up though and ask, I'm gonna throw you under the bus here. But I'm pretty sure you can handle it. We talk about spirituality and for you and your journey.
That's, you know, [Page//00:28:00] faith, God. Jesus. What if somebody who's listening is not particularly religious? Can they still, you know, I, I, I wanna just touch on. You know, I, and because I, I can't remember if you said it here. I know you used the word universe when we were talking earlier. I, to me there's always a workaround.
And so, but I, I wanna just share that with listeners for, you know, it's okay. , you know, you know it. What, what is somebody who says, well, you know, I don't know cuz I'm not religious, so I guess I can't heal. No
Anna Esparham: Yeah. So, so it's interesting. Well, okay, so my background is a little interesting. So my, my dad is actually Muslim and my mom is atheist and I am somehow, you know, believe in God and Jesus Christ. Only be, probably cuz I see them. I don't know how. But anyway hopefully that's not a hallucination, but But for, I, we. [Page//00:29:00] in my coaching programs, I also work with people of all different kinds of faith and or people who aren't religious at all and, and even people who are agnostic or atheist. And what's interesting is that in my intuitive healing sessions that I usually do, that's like kind of the meat of my coaching program is the intuitive healing sessions, because the truth is, You can be healed and however, it's typically using a higher power and whatever that is to you, your higher self, a universe source an energy that's just, you can't quite call it a name.
Then that is your connection and that's your healing source. As long as it feels good to you, it feels healthy. It feels right. It feels divine, it feels sacred, then that is perfect. , and, and, and that's how you use it. And it's really that higher power when you connect to that higher power, it's something greater than you because that power is so limitless and we are just [Page//00:30:00] like, we're in this like limited field.
And so in order to access that healing energy and that healing power, we do have to. Truly ask to be healed through that intuitive healing connection. And, and it's, and then we're like, oh my gosh, I can't believe we just did that. Like, I can't believe I can heal myself. And just through the power of belief, through the power of visualization.
And studies have shown this, and we talked about this a little bit earlier, but you know, Dr. Bruce Lipton. Talked about the biology of belief and how just by believing and thinking that we're healed actually changes our cells and our tissues and the receptors on our bodies, and the communication that goes on with all those neurotransmitters and hormones in immune system, that we can actually positively change our body for the better.
And much like all the other mind body therapies like hyp. Et cetera, guided imagery, you name it, does the same thing as [Page//00:31:00] long as we truly intently believe that we can heal
Julie Michelson: So it's not the power of pos Well, it is the power of positive thinking, but it, it's not wishful thinking. That was the what I, you know, it's not, but when you get to that, that place where, You can shift the beliefs, the belief system, it changes the biology.
Anna Esparham: Yeah, there's a way to do it. It's, there is actually several ways to do it because you still wanna believe, but you have to really. Believe and change your limiting beliefs to a thing that you can believe in. And so it's these subtle changes that you can get to that really gets to this next big belief.
So it's pretty fun. I had, I actually had a coach help me with that. I was like, they did neurolinguistic programming is how I kind of changed some of my beliefs. So yeah,
Julie Michelson: And do you practice n l.
Anna Esparham: I do, I learned from them. So what's her name? She wrote a book Oh, it's not Martha Beck. It's Byron
Julie Michelson: I like her[Page//00:32:00]
Anna Esparham: I do mar, I like Martha and she does similar.
Byron Katie, do you know Byron Katie?
Julie Michelson: I do not.
Anna Esparham: Oh yeah. So anyway, she wrote a lot of healing books and so, you know, we're kind of took her methods and used that to access our limiting beliefs, become aware of our limiting beliefs, like I am not worthy, and then switch it to be like, is that true? Well, no, because, oh my gosh, I've done.
You know, amazing things in my life. And so then what is true then? Well, yeah. I mean, I am good at learning. I am good at making friends. I am nice. I'm kind. I mean, and so you start getting some evidence to where you can actually start believing the positive.
Julie Michelson: I love that. That's amazing. And I know you mentioned also the power of visualization.
Anna Esparham: Yes, the, the visualization piece is really key. This, so this is where hypnosis comes in. And hypnosis is really about using your imagination with a [Page//00:33:00] goal or intention in mind. And so you'll see a lot of athletes use this in the Olympics, for example, and they'll like play out their gymnastic, you know, event and then actually win the event because they believed it, they visualized it in their head and
Julie Michelson: I've already run this race. Yeah.
Anna Esparham: exactly. And they've performed it perfectly. And so actually that's what we use. Actually do a ton of hypnosis actually in conventional medicine clinics. And it is amazing and the evidence is amazing for chronic pain actually. And so we actually have a whole pain foundation for kids with chronic pain.
It's actually at Stanford Medical Center that we actually teach quite a bit of hypnosis, using our visualization with a goal, like say if we want to release headache pain, We just go into a safe space in our mind. Could be the beach, the mountains an imaginary. Look at what that fiery head pain looks like.
It could be red fiery, maybe black sticky substance. Have this a power, this powerful healing hands. [Page//00:34:00] Grab it. Take it outta your head, put it into this treasure chest, bury it deep in the ocean, you know, chuck it across the universe, blow it up. And somehow that visualization, using the power of our imagination, actually changes the pain pathway.
Julie Michelson: It's so incredible and I know all of this, and I still, it's so incredible.
Anna Esparham: I know.
Julie Michelson: It's so amazing.
Anna Esparham: it's amazing. And, and I didn't know a lot of, you know, adults do it, but I didn't know kids would do it. And kids
Julie Michelson: They're probably better at
Anna Esparham: they're better at it. They're so much better at it. They're better at it cuz of imagination. They can
Julie Michelson: Yeah. Yeah. It hasn't been, you know, totally taken away from them yet and buried, so that is, that's amazing. Wow. Incredible. Incredible. So, a and what a, and these are things people can. [Page//00:35:00] Learn to do themselves so they can use the tools because as we talked about, like you said, you know, I'm never, none of us are ever completely pain free, right?
Like, whether we've had a chronic pain condition or not. It's just part of and I always say, you know, why we're, I'm, we're constantly changing, healing, growing. Shifting, you know? And, and so I, I just think it's incredible to, to, once you get those tools, like you were saying, like you check in, right?
And, and sometimes I'm sure it's a quicker hit, sometimes it takes hours and hours and hours of,
Anna Esparham: Yeah, definitely it. And it
Julie Michelson: but they're skills.
Anna Esparham: It is, it's a skill to learn, but you can learn it. It's not like something you have to go, like the, the great thing about this, especially with chronic pain or fibromyalgia, the, the thing about chronic pain and fibromyalgia is that you can so easily do it just with the power of your mind.
Or your heart, your spirit, whatever you wanna call it. [Page//00:36:00] Because there are so many great studies out there showing that just a lot of the, some of the techniques and therapies that we talked about, whether it be hypnosis, whether it be just, you know, believing and positive thinking, you know, Reprogramming, you're limiting beliefs, making sure you're not catastrophizing and you're really, you know, intently visualizing a beautiful day without any pain.
You can move your muscles, you can exercise without any problems. You have a lot of energy. Then somehow every day you just get a little bit more of that and a little bit more of that and, and it's so amazing how we have that. . And it goes we don't talk a lot about it in the conventional medical system,
Julie Michelson: I was saying earlier you know, the, all the, the things that I used to think were so woowoo are so science-based and true and real. And, and this is why we're having these conversations right to, to change. I [Page//00:37:00] don't know that it'll be in my lifetime, but I really look forward to the day when that, when medicine really is all encompass.
Anna Esparham: I, I, I think it will be and, and I have hope for it. As long as industry is not as involved in moneymaking, then I think we have a chance. So we'll see which wins.
Julie Michelson: Yes. Well, and look at you. I mean, going back and and going, you know, back to residency again. And, and so I, I expressed gratitude off air. I'll, I'll say it again. I'm grateful. For, you know, Michael is always to bring, get the word out to people, but also you know that, that you're practicing, right? That you're, you're there changing the system.
So thank you for that.
Anna Esparham: Yeah. We'll see. I hope to keep going. Thank you so much. I love being on the show today. Julie
Julie Michelson: It's so amazing. So what is one step that listeners can take starting [Page//00:38:00] today to start to improve their.
Anna Esparham: So this is a morning ritual that I usually start with in my coaching programs for women with chronic pain or fibromyalgia. And the very first thing when you wake up in the morning cuz intent, that biology of belief that's setting yourself up for the day is actually going to. That reality, that energy that you have is going to create that reality and that energy is your thought process and that belief process.
And so whenever you wake up in the morning, just how that would look like to you. It just takes, it'll probably just be two minutes in your energy. You don't get tired after. You've, you're just happy calls to that [Page//00:39:00] reality in your day. And I don't know, you know, it's crazy how it works, but it works.
Julie Michelson: Give us the one thing again. It, it
Anna Esparham: Oh, shoot. Oh, oh, bummer. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
Julie Michelson: start with the one thing again.
Anna Esparham: Okay. Start with the one thing. Okay. All right, so the one thing is my favorite morning ritual is starting off with your ideal vis visualization of the day. Because setting up your intention sets up your energy and that reality for the day because your how you.
Are thinking how you are believing, how you are visualizing is going to call that energy to you for that day. And it's actually a consistent habit because the more you do it, experience an amazing energetic, typically do it. It. On your pain, you [Page//00:40:00] could just imagine you are experiencing exercise without any exacerbations of a pain flare. You are able to have enough energy to make your own meals, nutritious meals, you don't have that afternoon slump. You're after, you know, you eat lunch, you don't have to rely on a whole bunch of caffeine throughout the day.
You're happy, you're joyful, and so it's just. Actual visualization, just thinking, imagination, believing that's going to happen for you, that somehow it actually does.
Julie Michelson: I love that. That's, that's so cuz I know how powerful it is. One of my absolute favorite sayings is where attention goes, energy flows. And, and this is, this sets you up for that. It, it really does. And I, if, if you're listening to this conversation and this is all new. I understand you're [Page//00:41:00] thinking no way.
Yes way. And it's, it doesn't, there's no special ability required. We all have the, this ability. So do the one thing, start with your morning visualization. And, and I'm gonna add from who I work with and what I do. If you don't have fibro. and you know, you're lucky enough with your autoimmunity to not have crime.
I mean, honestly, even the healthiest people should be doing this because this is how we, this is how we manifest. It's, it's why, you know, manifestation works. And so I, I say there's nobody that won't benefit from adding this to your morning practice, so, oh
Anna Esparham: agree
Julie Michelson: gosh. Thank you so much.
Anna Esparham: You.
Julie Michelson: for people that are listening on the go and aren't gonna check out the show notes, which will have all your links, where's the best place for them to find you?
Anna Esparham: The best pace is my website right now and it's [Page//00:42:00] healthispowher.com and that's P O W H E R cuz I do a lot with women. It's just because. Women are often, you know, this, are often underrepresented in the health care field. So, so yeah, so healthispowher.com. We also, you can just find the podcast on there.
You can contact me there. There's my programs there, so I'm always happy to chat
Julie Michelson: Have to check out her podcast. And again, the links will be in there too, but health is pow her it, it's awesome.
Anna Esparham: Julie's gonna be on, so you gotta listen to that.
Julie Michelson: can't wait. can't wait. Anna, thank you so, so much. You shared amazing gold with us today. I seriously, if, if listeners just start doing that morning practice, they're gonna experience.
Shifts, it's gonna be incredible. So I'm telling you guys, please do it
Anna Esparham: Yeah. Thanks Julie. Thanks everyone for having.
Julie Michelson: for everyone listening. [Page//00:43:00] Remember, you can get the show notes and transcripts by visiting Inspired Living Show. I hope you had a great time and enjoyed this conversation as much as I did. I'll see you next week.
Today we're talking about all things fibromyalgia. Anna shares her expertise and understanding of this complex illness, as well as her effective treatment approach that incorporates scientifically founded use of spirituality to heal. This episode is for everyone, whether you have fibromyalgia or not.
Anna, welcome to the podcast.
Anna Esparham: I am so excited to be here. Julie, thank you for having me on the show.
Julie Michelson: Thank you so so much for joining us. We probably could have recorded two episodes already, with the conversation that we've been having before I hit record. So I am, I already know what goodness the listeners are in for. You, you have an incredible. Story, an incredible journey. And I would love to have you, you know, introduce yourself to listeners via your [Page//00:02:00] journey.
And then we'll dig into the rest of the conversation.
Anna Esparham: Yeah. So yeah, I love the origin story and I love hearing everyone's stories too. I do that on my podcast as well. It's so interesting how we. Out to where we are today. So well I am a medical doctor and so conventional trained. But I really got into more of the integrative and functional and spiritual side because I got so sick.
Especially the first year of medical school. I. I had to repeat a whole bunch of immunizations cuz I never had chickenpox when I was a kid. And, and then I got mono all at the same time. And then something crazy happened where I was so incredibly sick and bedridden that What happened was I developed this severe autoimmune poly glandular autoimmune disease, and then everything snowballed from there where I developed all these chronic pain syndromes as well, and I [Page//00:03:00] was in so much pain, so sick.
I was bedridden trying to get through med school, trying to get through residency, and, you know, the conventional medicines, even though steroids, you know, they helped me get by. I mean, I could at least not get on disability. go through, you know?
Julie Michelson: of function.
Anna Esparham: Sort of, sort of function and well, that's what led me to, I was like, no way.
I need to have quality of life. I need to get through, you know, med school and residency. And so that's what led me to Dr. Jeanie Driscoll, who was the head of integrative medicine. She actually, not a lot of people know about her. She's a integrative medicine physician that has really led the way.
And led the field along with all these other people at, at the Institute of Functional Medicine and Integrative Medicine where she created the Integrative Medicine fellowship. I mean, she's done a ton for the world on integrative cancer therapies and she got me better through nutritional changes, dietary supplements, IV vitamin C or IV Myers [Page//00:04:00] cocktails cuz I had. So she created this integrative medicine fellowship. She really created, you know, the way for integrative cancer therapies across the. And integrative cancer care. And anyway, she started me on, you know, nutritional changes dietary supplements, IV vitamin C because my adrenal glands were completely destroyed. I went into menopause, you know, at age like 23 or 24. And so then I started feeling better, but I wasn't completely a lot better.
You know, there was so much pain going on. You know, the conventional system just wasn't helpful at all. And there was a point in the time where I was at an academic medical center where we did have to start getting mandated, you know, [Page//00:05:00] immunizations and. And that was fine. And, and I got the first flu vaccine, but then I doubled over and experienced severe pelvic pain where I was puking on the toilet.
I mean, I, it was crushing, it was excruciating. It was like, I, I am, have so much of a pain threshold. I went through peritonitis and I was just fine like at age 14 and which is like an infection of the belly and the pelvis and cuz my appendix burst and I was like living with it for three months and I was like, totally.
Like, not ha you know, I was, I was not complaining, and that's just me. I just don't complain about pain. And anyway, I didn't know what was going on and I got treated for this chronic pelvic pain, bladder pain syndrome, interstitial cystitis, and. and for a year, you know, I started getting better, I was better, got the second, you know, immunization and then all of a sudden I started getting some whole body pain, started getting some anaphylaxis type symptoms.
Not shock yet, but and I didn't still know, but then my doctor was still kind of like, well, there might [Page//00:06:00] be an association there and let's just keep checking you out. So anyway, I was dealing a lot of myalgias that year. Then the third time, I almost died. I went into anaphylactic shock. I developed severe pain throughout my entire body.
Obviously it, you know, developed into severe fibromyalgia. It maybe even having a small fiber neuropathy, who knows? But So that's what kind of led me down this chronic pain path. As a, as I'm also a headache and pain doc too. So it's like as I'm a integrative headache and pain doc I'm dealing with, you know, this fibromyalgia, pain, and and it's, it's funny cuz even with all my knowledge, it was like, how do I get through this?
I had so much muscle weakness, fatigue, brain fog, you know, sleep issue. It was so difficult and and so that's kind of what led me to where I am really focusing a lot [Page//00:07:00] on chronic pain and fibromyalgia for women especially. just because I feel like a lot more women do get chronic pain and fibromyalgia more so than men. There's a lot of hormonal issues related to it, but but it's a big passion of mine and that's why I'm also going back to residency in.
Julie Michelson: Incredible. Honestly, incredible.
Anna Esparham: Go back. I'm so scared. I'm like, oh, what am I doing? I'm gonna go back to residency in osteopathic neuro musculoskeletal medicine. Because it is so important in treating the whole body, the myo fascia, the nerves, the joints, the tissues, the muscles, the bones. Everything to help both chronic pain and fibromyalgia.
And so I, I got to, I got accepted into this program, so I'm super excited. But yeah, it's just strange how this kind of led me to help people with chronic pain and, and even though there's this medicine side All the while. The biggest thing that truly heat me, I just, I [Page//00:08:00] believe in medicine and I think medicine is wonderful.
I think both conventional medicine and integrative medicine and functional medicine, all of it is just incredible. I just think I only got 30 to 40% better with that. And the biggest thing that truly helped me, Was the spiritual side that intuitive side. Really connecting with my spirit, my higher self, connecting with God and, and you know, with my faith, Jesus Christ.
And, and working on that spiritual healing cuz that was the only way that I truly healed, you know, a hundred percent. So yeah. So that's my story. That's my story.
Julie Michelson: Which is so incredible and, and you are healed a hundred percent, so you're pain free.
Anna Esparham: Well, so we're not ever completely pain free. We're always gonna experience pain, and so anytime. I am overly stressed, or if I ride in a car and I'm, my biomechanics are a little bit off or my posture is bad, I will [Page//00:09:00] experience like some shoulder pain or like maybe some thoracic pain, some hip pain, but it's never that type of pain that is just chronic continu.
Constant, I mean, excruciating. And so there pain is a good thing. It's very protective for us. It's a, it's more of a, a message to us, which we'll probably get into. But yeah, so it, it was amazing to me how the spiritual side, even though I'm very scientifically based as a, you know, board certified, well triple board certified physician, maybe I'll be quadruple board certified after this residency.
Julie Michelson: gosh,
Anna Esparham: But but it, it real, I just believe in the spiritual that's the foundation for healing.
Julie Michelson: And I wanna throw in there for listeners, because we, we often talk about self, we could do a whole nother podcast on what is going on at medical school. I mean, yours was different, a little different because, and I've interviewed so many docs who, [Page//00:10:00] you know, their autoimmune journey either started or really became unbearable in medical school.
And I'm like, I really think we need to revamp medical school. And yours, I know was, was more, you know, vaccine inoculation related, but. I do wanna throw out there because we got to talk before I hit record. You know, we talk all the time about this, like, overachieving, go, go, go. Not taking care of yourself, running yourself down.
So I want to for the listeners that aren't familiar with you. You know, you listen to your body, you take good care of yourself, you know what you need, and yes, you might be what I would. Not, might be you are what I would call a high achiever. But you do it in a way that's healthy for you so that you can continue to contribute to your patients and clients.
And so I just, I wanted to like add that qualifier because I'm sure listeners are thinking like, wait, , you know,[Page//00:11:00]
Anna Esparham: How on Earth
Julie Michelson: Yeah. Yeah. And, and for those of you that are, are listening and not watching, like, you know, talk about a, a vibrant human
Anna Esparham: Oh,
Julie Michelson: Yeah.
Anna Esparham: so much. Yeah, no, I, I do think there is a, because I am also a pain doc and this is what I do a lot with pediatric patients, you know, as well, and. We always talk about, yeah, perfectionism and high achievers and people pleasing, and that's actually been studied that those are the qualities that actually lead to chronic pain.
And what's interesting, there are some times when I was telling you, yeah, I'll get little pain episodes here and there. And when I do my meditation and connection to God and I ask for the message, I say, okay, what's this message, this pain, what is it trying to tell me? and what comes up sometimes is like, Anna, you're trying to impress these people.
And I'm like, okay, let's, let's like forgive myself. Let's reel back and let's [Page//00:12:00] readjust here. And so we just have to tune in. It's just all about tuning in and listening to that message.
Julie Michelson: which I love because, you know, we talk about, you know, pain is a symptom. It's information, it's your body trying to tell you something. And I, I was going to ask you to circle back and go there. So it's not just, You know, riding in the car, or, you know, it, it's not necessarily a physical thing. It can be a physical expression of, Hey, you're off path here.
Which is it is such a, an amazing gift when you are tuned into that level, right? You're, oh, just listening to your body and, and like you said, tapping into your spirituality to, to say like, oh, figure it out. Like, okay. What, what does this mean? What's my body telling me? What's.
Anna Esparham: Yeah, and just like what you said about, I was just kind of getting off the path. Just recently I really, I was getting the message that I needed to [Page//00:13:00] leave this, you know, major academic medical center I was working at, I was director. I was kind of at the top of my, you know, I was associate professor. I was getting all these awards and, and I, I just, I, it took me a while to finally, Listen to that message, but I was having little headaches, you know, I was getting these, this kind of headache pain and I was wondering what was going on there.
And I spent a whole week cuz the headache and I had some depression symptoms too for an entire week. And I was like really dug deep, connected to God. I meditated with God for, oh, for several hours a day. It took me that long and I finally, literally at the end of that week, I finally got that message and it was like I had to leave and I was like, oh, I don't.
I'm getting paid. Well, I'm I'm doing so well. No. And then of course, you know, this is my path now and I'm going back and here I am. I'm going back to residencies. This is apparently what I'm supposed to be doing.
Julie Michelson: And do your [Page//00:14:00] symptoms. Once you made the decision to leave, what happened?
Anna Esparham: So it just re It just releases. Yeah, it just
Julie Michelson: and I just got goosebumps
Anna Esparham: yeah. Yeah. And it.
Julie Michelson: so amazing.
Anna Esparham: it's beautiful because just like we were talking about before we started the recording, is a lot of times when you're diagnosed with a chronic illness or a chronic pain disorders, like, hey, you're gonna accept, which is good.
You, you accept it. Yes, we accept the problem for sure, but we don't have to live with it forever. You, you can truly heal yourself. There are the tools that I learned, you know, you don't necessarily have to learn the tools that I learned. There are so many different tools. To heal from chronic pain or from chronic autoimmune disease.
But I, I healed. I don't have to take my steroids, you know? So I, I don't have to have excruciating pain and muscle weakness every single day. And, but I do have to tune in. To what I feel is very healing for me is that spiritual connection [Page//00:15:00] to my Holy Spirit, to God, and to allow those messages to be understood and to be learned so that I can take that lesson and move on from the pain.
Julie Michelson: So amazing and so beautiful. I have 800 questions I wanna ask you. But I am really excited to bring listeners a, another piece of the conversation because I, I just, it, it's just people need to learn. So you are on the Inspired Living with Autoimmunity podcast and we are talking about fibromyalgia.
I want you to connect those dots for us because I feel like this is new news for a lot of people.
Anna Esparham: Yeah. So, so many people know about fibromyalgia. I'm gonna get really kind of like sciencey here, but
Julie Michelson: go for it.
Anna Esparham: So fibromyalgia I, it's a diagnosis it's a disease process, but much like other diseases that [Page//00:16:00] really are just kind of vague and you can't see them like migraines or a D H D, there is underlying Pathophysiology, immunology, endocrinology going on in the body that is thrown off.
And so then we start experiencing, especially women, women get this a lot more than men. As we said, it's a lot of hormone balances, hormone differences. And our brain is a little bit different too. Our nervous system works a little bit differently, but we get this widespread muscle pain, joint pain, stiffness.
We get fatigue. We get this cognitive, you know, dysfunction, kind of brain fog type symptoms. It's a lot of emotional kind of dysregulation. Some anxiety, some depression, a lot of sleep. We don't sleep as well as other people. We get GI issues like irritable bowel syndrome, headaches, migraines, et cetera.
And. And so what they found more recently, everyone was like, okay, fibromyalgia. There's no inflammation, which is not true. There is inflammation, there is nervous system inflammation, and there is [Page//00:17:00] immune system inflammation going on. And so recently a study done, I think it was by, it was a, in the uk it's in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, and they took antibodies from people with fibromyalgia and put them into mice that didn't.
you know, any pain symptoms or fibromyalgia, and the mice got fibromyalgia and so they found that those antibody, they took those antibodies from people who had fibromyalgia. They're like, oh, so this must be an autoimmune disease because
Julie Michelson: we just haven't identified.
Anna Esparham: no, we haven't. We there, there is fi 50% of fibromyalgia typically.
You could have a small fiber neuropathy and or there could be neuropathy going on for most of all people who have fibromyalgia and that actually could be caused by an autoimmune disease. So some people hanging around with just the diagnosis of fibromyalgia and not neuropathy. [Page//00:18:00] 50% of them are going without the di that diagnosis.
And so that's like, that body's destruction of small nerve fibers that produce pain or different temperature sensation. For us with fibromyalgia, we have a decreased cold threshold. So we don't like cold on our bodies. That's why a lot of us do better with warmth. But there's more so that that's not just it with the immune system, there's, there's a whole lot more.
And so one of the other things that happens is, , and this is also probably in the last few years, been more recently studied. There's neurogenic inflammation, meaning inflammation in the nervous system. They're in the dorsal root ganglia, and that is those spinal nerves that come out of our spinal cord.
On our back in between our vertebra, there's these dorsal root ganglia that actually are producing a lot of inflammatory substances along those nerve pathways that actually from the central. Go to the central nervous system, to our brain and to our spinal cord, and also go into our periphery, [Page//00:19:00] all in our skin, our muscles, our tissues, even our organs.
And so, even though I say inflammation, our, the fibromyalgia is not well treated with the anti-inflammatories like ibuprofen or an NaPro. . So it doesn't typically help the pain. But there still is inflammation going on, and, but it's more in a place where those meds can't typically reach. And so like our the spinal cord, the brain also has many different.
Inflammatory substances being produced more so than a healthy individual. And that is, most often it's interleukin eight. And that is, you know, a really inflammatory cytokine that is caused by our nerve immune cells called the glial cells. And those are involved in the dorsal root ganglia That's.
Spinal cord, the brain. And so it is kind of involving a lot of mast cells, monocytes, neutrophils, all these different inflammatory factors. So it's like this big soup, [Page//00:20:00] inflammatory soup and fibromyalgia that is not treated with normal anti-inflammatories and. , that's not just it. There's also a lot of oxidative stress, which comes from reactive oxygen species and and perhaps a little mitochondrial dysfunction as well that can result in the progression of fibromyalgia.
So that's a lot of what the immune system dysregulation and that autoimmunity is. So there's no like main antibody, particularly in fibromyalgia that we're really testing. So it's hard to treat as an autoimmune disease. However, we still have to take care of that inflammation and regulate the immune system to our normal state.
But they're, but that's not just it. This is part of that's just part of fibromyalgia is the immune system. The other aspects are our nervous system and our [Page//00:21:00] endocrine system. And so we've got all these neurotransmitters involved that we may not have enough of and that we may have too much of in fibromyalgia.
And a lot of us have heard about serotonin and or epinephrine. Well, us with fibromyalgia. We don't have as much serotonin and norepinephrine, which are those feel good chemicals, but they're also they actually inhibit pain. Those are the neurotransmitters in our spinal cord that actually activate the descending pain pathways that stop the pain.
So you've got two pain pathways, one that makes you feel the pain that's ascending toward your spinal cord and brain, and the one that's descending. Stops the pain and that's where serotonin and norepinephrine are real big in and can stop that pain. So that's why we give a lot of SNRIs or serotonin and or epinephrine reuptake inhibitors to give you a little bit more of that serotonin, norepinephrine hanging around in your spinal cord to activate those descending inhibitory pain pathways.[Page//00:22:00]
And then there's also some other inflamm inflammatory neuro peptides like glutamate and substance P that are involved. And so sometimes people do like a low glutamine or low glutamate diet to help decrease some of that excitatory painful neurotransmitter. In brain scans of people with fibromyalgia.
Our pain pathways are way overactive. Our reptilian brain, that limbic system that's like that fight or flight, the emotional, you know, fear type pathway, that's like super active in people with fibromyalgia versus like healthy people. And then, . People with fibromyalgia also have a endocrine disruption where our cortisol that's helps us with energy.
PR provides us with resilience against stress, keeps us from having shock when we get sick. Well, we have a blunt in that cortisol curve, so we don't have as good of a cortisol response to stress. So our endocrine hypothalamic pituitary [Page//00:23:00] adrenal access is dysregulated and thrown off. . And not only that, but also we don't have as much growth hormone secretion at night.
And so that also affects multiple factors in our body in terms of regeneration. So it's, it's just multiple factors going on in fibromyalgia that really is just often, you know, being treated either. Is not necessarily right either, but opioids duloxetine or venlafaxine like SNRIs SSRIs, it's all, you know, great.
But we're still not
Julie Michelson: you're still treating a symptom or a piece of the pathway.
Anna Esparham: Yes.
Julie Michelson: Wow. I feel like, okay, you know, I'm done , I learned so much listeners, you are welcome, . You can play that back. But it makes it, what I, I am so excited about is when [Page//00:24:00] I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, oh gosh, don't know, 15 years ago was.
Again, and I had said this before we recorded I felt like it was like, oh, you have pain. We don't, you know, you have pain that doesn't fall under your rheumatoid arthritis pain. And so I feel like back then any especially woman who had fibromyalgia symptoms either was made to feel like they're crazy or it's all in their head.
You know, or it was like, we don't, we don't know, you know, we're just gonna stick fibro on you. And beyond the, the SNRIs, the SSRIs, that, that was all they did back then. If, then, actually it was probably before they were u you know, it may have been five, five years later, you know? So I'm like, well, wow, there's so much more to the puzzle.
You know and again, all of those disruptions [Page//00:25:00] and, and dysregulation that you just shared, like they're not the ac the cause,
Anna Esparham: No,
Julie Michelson: So when we talk about functional medicine being root cause medicine, or you know, it's going after each of those pieces separately, it isn't actually gonna heal.
Anna Esparham: True. It's, and, and that's where you have to listen to the patient's story and, and often time our story. Thank God I had a great, you know, medical team for mine. I got so lucky probably cuz I prayed so much But You really have to listen to each patient's story and understand where that pain is coming from.
Take a look at the diet, the nutrition, their environment, any toxic relationships, tra trauma and, and P T S D just like we talked about previously, is a huge part. The emotions actually, there is some evidence where emotions can create some [Page//00:26:00] autoimmunity in and of itself, and also we already know it. The emotional pathways are along the same anatomical pathways as pain,
Julie Michelson: can you please say that one more?
Anna Esparham: so the emotional pathways, so our emotions, those pathways are along the same anatomical pathways as the pain. So they are really combined. You can't separate emotions and. You just can't. So pain can cause emotional pain. Emotional pain can cause pain. And that's why there are a lot of actually really good studies on pain reprocessing therapy or other types of more positive intention hypnosis, creative visualization to where we can modulate.
Our pain and treat our own pain through the power of our mind, our heart, our spirit. And, and there's actually evidence to that in emotional [Page//00:27:00] modulation or what they call super spinal self-regulation of our pain. And that's where those mind body therapies come in. . And so I use, I mean, I, I use a lot of self hypnosis.
I use a lot of medical intuition to help my own pain and also the women that I coach. But in traditional medicine we do a lot more like cognitive behavioral therapy and then clinical hypnosis. So it's a little bit different in terms of which, you know, kind of medical system you're.
Julie Michelson: Wow. And this, I told you, I, I literally do think I physically jumped up and down when, when we talked about, you know, that we're going to, to talk about this. I, I wanna back all the way up though and ask, I'm gonna throw you under the bus here. But I'm pretty sure you can handle it. We talk about spirituality and for you and your journey.
That's, you know, [Page//00:28:00] faith, God. Jesus. What if somebody who's listening is not particularly religious? Can they still, you know, I, I, I wanna just touch on. You know, I, and because I, I can't remember if you said it here. I know you used the word universe when we were talking earlier. I, to me there's always a workaround.
And so, but I, I wanna just share that with listeners for, you know, it's okay. , you know, you know it. What, what is somebody who says, well, you know, I don't know cuz I'm not religious, so I guess I can't heal. No
Anna Esparham: Yeah. So, so it's interesting. Well, okay, so my background is a little interesting. So my, my dad is actually Muslim and my mom is atheist and I am somehow, you know, believe in God and Jesus Christ. Only be, probably cuz I see them. I don't know how. But anyway hopefully that's not a hallucination, but But for, I, we. [Page//00:29:00] in my coaching programs, I also work with people of all different kinds of faith and or people who aren't religious at all and, and even people who are agnostic or atheist. And what's interesting is that in my intuitive healing sessions that I usually do, that's like kind of the meat of my coaching program is the intuitive healing sessions, because the truth is, You can be healed and however, it's typically using a higher power and whatever that is to you, your higher self, a universe source an energy that's just, you can't quite call it a name.
Then that is your connection and that's your healing source. As long as it feels good to you, it feels healthy. It feels right. It feels divine, it feels sacred, then that is perfect. , and, and, and that's how you use it. And it's really that higher power when you connect to that higher power, it's something greater than you because that power is so limitless and we are just [Page//00:30:00] like, we're in this like limited field.
And so in order to access that healing energy and that healing power, we do have to. Truly ask to be healed through that intuitive healing connection. And, and it's, and then we're like, oh my gosh, I can't believe we just did that. Like, I can't believe I can heal myself. And just through the power of belief, through the power of visualization.
And studies have shown this, and we talked about this a little bit earlier, but you know, Dr. Bruce Lipton. Talked about the biology of belief and how just by believing and thinking that we're healed actually changes our cells and our tissues and the receptors on our bodies, and the communication that goes on with all those neurotransmitters and hormones in immune system, that we can actually positively change our body for the better.
And much like all the other mind body therapies like hyp. Et cetera, guided imagery, you name it, does the same thing as [Page//00:31:00] long as we truly intently believe that we can heal
Julie Michelson: So it's not the power of pos Well, it is the power of positive thinking, but it, it's not wishful thinking. That was the what I, you know, it's not, but when you get to that, that place where, You can shift the beliefs, the belief system, it changes the biology.
Anna Esparham: Yeah, there's a way to do it. It's, there is actually several ways to do it because you still wanna believe, but you have to really. Believe and change your limiting beliefs to a thing that you can believe in. And so it's these subtle changes that you can get to that really gets to this next big belief.
So it's pretty fun. I had, I actually had a coach help me with that. I was like, they did neurolinguistic programming is how I kind of changed some of my beliefs. So yeah,
Julie Michelson: And do you practice n l.
Anna Esparham: I do, I learned from them. So what's her name? She wrote a book Oh, it's not Martha Beck. It's Byron
Julie Michelson: I like her[Page//00:32:00]
Anna Esparham: I do mar, I like Martha and she does similar.
Byron Katie, do you know Byron Katie?
Julie Michelson: I do not.
Anna Esparham: Oh yeah. So anyway, she wrote a lot of healing books and so, you know, we're kind of took her methods and used that to access our limiting beliefs, become aware of our limiting beliefs, like I am not worthy, and then switch it to be like, is that true? Well, no, because, oh my gosh, I've done.
You know, amazing things in my life. And so then what is true then? Well, yeah. I mean, I am good at learning. I am good at making friends. I am nice. I'm kind. I mean, and so you start getting some evidence to where you can actually start believing the positive.
Julie Michelson: I love that. That's amazing. And I know you mentioned also the power of visualization.
Anna Esparham: Yes, the, the visualization piece is really key. This, so this is where hypnosis comes in. And hypnosis is really about using your imagination with a [Page//00:33:00] goal or intention in mind. And so you'll see a lot of athletes use this in the Olympics, for example, and they'll like play out their gymnastic, you know, event and then actually win the event because they believed it, they visualized it in their head and
Julie Michelson: I've already run this race. Yeah.
Anna Esparham: exactly. And they've performed it perfectly. And so actually that's what we use. Actually do a ton of hypnosis actually in conventional medicine clinics. And it is amazing and the evidence is amazing for chronic pain actually. And so we actually have a whole pain foundation for kids with chronic pain.
It's actually at Stanford Medical Center that we actually teach quite a bit of hypnosis, using our visualization with a goal, like say if we want to release headache pain, We just go into a safe space in our mind. Could be the beach, the mountains an imaginary. Look at what that fiery head pain looks like.
It could be red fiery, maybe black sticky substance. Have this a power, this powerful healing hands. [Page//00:34:00] Grab it. Take it outta your head, put it into this treasure chest, bury it deep in the ocean, you know, chuck it across the universe, blow it up. And somehow that visualization, using the power of our imagination, actually changes the pain pathway.
Julie Michelson: It's so incredible and I know all of this, and I still, it's so incredible.
Anna Esparham: I know.
Julie Michelson: It's so amazing.
Anna Esparham: it's amazing. And, and I didn't know a lot of, you know, adults do it, but I didn't know kids would do it. And kids
Julie Michelson: They're probably better at
Anna Esparham: they're better at it. They're so much better at it. They're better at it cuz of imagination. They can
Julie Michelson: Yeah. Yeah. It hasn't been, you know, totally taken away from them yet and buried, so that is, that's amazing. Wow. Incredible. Incredible. So, a and what a, and these are things people can. [Page//00:35:00] Learn to do themselves so they can use the tools because as we talked about, like you said, you know, I'm never, none of us are ever completely pain free, right?
Like, whether we've had a chronic pain condition or not. It's just part of and I always say, you know, why we're, I'm, we're constantly changing, healing, growing. Shifting, you know? And, and so I, I just think it's incredible to, to, once you get those tools, like you were saying, like you check in, right?
And, and sometimes I'm sure it's a quicker hit, sometimes it takes hours and hours and hours of,
Anna Esparham: Yeah, definitely it. And it
Julie Michelson: but they're skills.
Anna Esparham: It is, it's a skill to learn, but you can learn it. It's not like something you have to go, like the, the great thing about this, especially with chronic pain or fibromyalgia, the, the thing about chronic pain and fibromyalgia is that you can so easily do it just with the power of your mind.
Or your heart, your spirit, whatever you wanna call it. [Page//00:36:00] Because there are so many great studies out there showing that just a lot of the, some of the techniques and therapies that we talked about, whether it be hypnosis, whether it be just, you know, believing and positive thinking, you know, Reprogramming, you're limiting beliefs, making sure you're not catastrophizing and you're really, you know, intently visualizing a beautiful day without any pain.
You can move your muscles, you can exercise without any problems. You have a lot of energy. Then somehow every day you just get a little bit more of that and a little bit more of that and, and it's so amazing how we have that. . And it goes we don't talk a lot about it in the conventional medical system,
Julie Michelson: I was saying earlier you know, the, all the, the things that I used to think were so woowoo are so science-based and true and real. And, and this is why we're having these conversations right to, to change. I [Page//00:37:00] don't know that it'll be in my lifetime, but I really look forward to the day when that, when medicine really is all encompass.
Anna Esparham: I, I, I think it will be and, and I have hope for it. As long as industry is not as involved in moneymaking, then I think we have a chance. So we'll see which wins.
Julie Michelson: Yes. Well, and look at you. I mean, going back and and going, you know, back to residency again. And, and so I, I expressed gratitude off air. I'll, I'll say it again. I'm grateful. For, you know, Michael is always to bring, get the word out to people, but also you know that, that you're practicing, right? That you're, you're there changing the system.
So thank you for that.
Anna Esparham: Yeah. We'll see. I hope to keep going. Thank you so much. I love being on the show today. Julie
Julie Michelson: It's so amazing. So what is one step that listeners can take starting [Page//00:38:00] today to start to improve their.
Anna Esparham: So this is a morning ritual that I usually start with in my coaching programs for women with chronic pain or fibromyalgia. And the very first thing when you wake up in the morning cuz intent, that biology of belief that's setting yourself up for the day is actually going to. That reality, that energy that you have is going to create that reality and that energy is your thought process and that belief process.
And so whenever you wake up in the morning, just how that would look like to you. It just takes, it'll probably just be two minutes in your energy. You don't get tired after. You've, you're just happy calls to that [Page//00:39:00] reality in your day. And I don't know, you know, it's crazy how it works, but it works.
Julie Michelson: Give us the one thing again. It, it
Anna Esparham: Oh, shoot. Oh, oh, bummer. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
Julie Michelson: start with the one thing again.
Anna Esparham: Okay. Start with the one thing. Okay. All right, so the one thing is my favorite morning ritual is starting off with your ideal vis visualization of the day. Because setting up your intention sets up your energy and that reality for the day because your how you.
Are thinking how you are believing, how you are visualizing is going to call that energy to you for that day. And it's actually a consistent habit because the more you do it, experience an amazing energetic, typically do it. It. On your pain, you [Page//00:40:00] could just imagine you are experiencing exercise without any exacerbations of a pain flare. You are able to have enough energy to make your own meals, nutritious meals, you don't have that afternoon slump. You're after, you know, you eat lunch, you don't have to rely on a whole bunch of caffeine throughout the day.
You're happy, you're joyful, and so it's just. Actual visualization, just thinking, imagination, believing that's going to happen for you, that somehow it actually does.
Julie Michelson: I love that. That's, that's so cuz I know how powerful it is. One of my absolute favorite sayings is where attention goes, energy flows. And, and this is, this sets you up for that. It, it really does. And I, if, if you're listening to this conversation and this is all new. I understand you're [Page//00:41:00] thinking no way.
Yes way. And it's, it doesn't, there's no special ability required. We all have the, this ability. So do the one thing, start with your morning visualization. And, and I'm gonna add from who I work with and what I do. If you don't have fibro. and you know, you're lucky enough with your autoimmunity to not have crime.
I mean, honestly, even the healthiest people should be doing this because this is how we, this is how we manifest. It's, it's why, you know, manifestation works. And so I, I say there's nobody that won't benefit from adding this to your morning practice, so, oh
Anna Esparham: agree
Julie Michelson: gosh. Thank you so much.
Anna Esparham: You.
Julie Michelson: for people that are listening on the go and aren't gonna check out the show notes, which will have all your links, where's the best place for them to find you?
Anna Esparham: The best pace is my website right now and it's [Page//00:42:00] healthispowher.com and that's P O W H E R cuz I do a lot with women. It's just because. Women are often, you know, this, are often underrepresented in the health care field. So, so yeah, so healthispowher.com. We also, you can just find the podcast on there.
You can contact me there. There's my programs there, so I'm always happy to chat
Julie Michelson: Have to check out her podcast. And again, the links will be in there too, but health is pow her it, it's awesome.
Anna Esparham: Julie's gonna be on, so you gotta listen to that.
Julie Michelson: can't wait. can't wait. Anna, thank you so, so much. You shared amazing gold with us today. I seriously, if, if listeners just start doing that morning practice, they're gonna experience.
Shifts, it's gonna be incredible. So I'm telling you guys, please do it
Anna Esparham: Yeah. Thanks Julie. Thanks everyone for having.
Julie Michelson: for everyone listening. [Page//00:43:00] Remember, you can get the show notes and transcripts by visiting Inspired Living Show. I hope you had a great time and enjoyed this conversation as much as I did. I'll see you next week.
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My Guest For This Episode
Connect with Anna Esparham
Anna Esparham
Dr. Anna Esparham, MD , founder of Health Is PowHer and Pain Free Life Academy, Is a nationally-recognized physician who healed herself from
multiple chronic conditions from near death shock to issues
with chronic pain and autoimmune disease. She is now a
coach helping women learn how to heal themselves for
good. Health Is PowHer's Podcast serves women who want
to learn about how to overcome all the Issues that come
with life. She has conducted several research studies and
Is published In several peer-reviewed medical journals.
She has been featured In the New York Times, Shape
Magazine, Healthy Children, and More!
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