Why Your Gut Issues Won’t Go Away | Rachel Scheer, BS, FM

In this episode, we sit down with Rachel Scheer to unpack her journey from competitive athlete to being told she needed her large intestine removed and how that moment changed everything.

We dive into:

• Why IBS is often a “catch-all” diagnosis
• The real root causes behind SIBO and gut dysfunction
• Why gut issues keep coming back
• The role of stress and the nervous system in healing
• How to actually fix the root cause (not just symptoms)

If you’ve struggled with bloating, IBS, SIBO or unexplained health issues, this conversation will change how you think about healing.

🔗 Dr. Alex Carrasco, MD

https://nourishmedicine.com/

https://www.instagram.com/dralexcarrasco/

🔗 Rachel Scheer, BS, FM

https://rachelscheer.com/

https://www.instagram.com/rachelscheer/

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Transcript

0:00

Was just told I have IBS, and I was put on prescriptions. I was put on lenses, prescription for constipation. I was at the time on birth control, already on an antidepressant because of the depression. And I just found myself on all these medications but not getting any better. they really didn't figure out what was the root cause of all my health issues. I was actually then sent to a colorectal surgeon soon after because I couldn't even use the restroom anymore without doing a daily enema. And that was when they actually suggested the removal of my large intestine my mom was actually the one who was like, just think about this. You know, maybe you don't want to do this. So, so quickly. I just left, and I became obsessed with learning all about the gut and the gut microbiome and the bacteria. Welcome back to the Vibrant Wellness Podcast. I'm your host, Doctor Alex Carrasco. Today's conversation is when I've been looking forward to. We're diving into why so many practitioners and patients feel stuck, even when they're doing everything right. I'm joined by Rachel Shear, a leader in functional medicine whose work bridges gut health hormones, metabolism, and nervous system regulation. Rachel is a certified functional medicine nutritionist who received her degree from Baylor University in nutrition science and Dietetics. Today, we're unpacking what true healing actually requires and why getting the sequence right changes everything. it's so nice to be here with you for joining us. Of course. It's so great to be here. I'm really excited to learn about you and your journey, because I think all of us in this space typically have a. We decided to kind of go off the beaten path and, you know, dive deep into, you know, all of the different things that are involved. And so, yeah, you tell me what that story. Yeah. I always had a passion for health and fitness. I grew up as a gymnast, and then I was a dancer. And then when I went to Baylor, I actually wanted to be a doctor like you. But I remember looking at the curriculum and just thinking, wow, one. Yeah, a lot of years and I just, I didn't think I was smart enough even to be a doctor. And so I think, yeah, I asked my counselor, I was like, what's the next best thing from being a doctor? And she shared with me about dietetics. And so I ended up going the dietetics route with my passion. More on the athletic performance side. I actually competed in bodybuilding for many years, three years consecutively, through college and then after. Yeah. So it's a big part of my focus on the side. I was I was doing some clinical nutrition. I was actually working at Cook Children's Hospital. But it was through competing that, of course, I started to end up with a lot of my own health issues. And at the time, I had a very naive understanding of health. It was really focused on esthetics. And how much do you weigh in body fat percentage and even in dietetics, you know, they really don't teach you the physiology side and how everything is interconnected. Nowhere near as what we learn in functional medicine. And so three years into competing, I'm maintaining around 10% body fat as a female. And I started to struggle with severe gut issues. And this wasn't the type of gut issues where it was like, all right, I have a stomach ache or I'm a little bit bloated. I struggled with severe constipation. I had severe depression and anxiety. An interesting thing was it felt like there was an immediate switch one day off during one of my competitions, I had actually just won, and I remember waking up, the next morning and just something felt super off in my body. And as we were all taught, as we shared to, I went to the doctor, to try to figure out what was going on. I just knew something was really wrong in my body, and that turned into over a year long journey of going to all these different specialist. You going to gastroenterologist, to gastroenterologist. I did every scan you can imagine CT scan, MRI, colonoscopy, endoscopy. You know, the whole spiel. Yeah. Was just told I have IBS, irritable bowel syndrome, and I was put on prescriptions. I was put on lenses, prescription for constipation. I was at the time on birth control, already on an antidepressant because of the depression. And I just found myself on all these medications but not getting any better. And so I eventually even went to the Mayo Clinic, and they were still really not at the time, talking a whole lot about the microbiome. So this was also far before the microbiome was a sexy topic online and on Instagram. And so they did all these weird procedures. One thing where they put like a balloon in my but I don't remember what it was called. But same thing. They, they really didn't figure out what was the root cause of all my health issues. They did find out that I had some of the genetics for others down syndrome. So that was interesting. But then in Dallas, I was actually then sent to a colorectal surgeon soon after because I couldn't even use the restroom anymore without doing a daily enema. And that was when they actually suggested the removal of my large intestine as the solution. And so what started as, you know, all right, something feels off in my body after competing to now being told I need to have my large intestine removed. And a lot of us have like that rock bottom moment. And, you know, for me, when I share that story, a lot of people think like, that's insane. I've I've shared it many times before, speaking on different stages. But the point that I actually tell people with this moment that I was in, I was very ready to get that surgery. Yeah, I was very desperate. Exactly. Yeah. I just wanted a solution. And so, you know, here's this physician offering me this solution of, hey, you can probably use the restroom again, relatively normal. I mean, as normal as you can without having a large intestine, but that seemed far better than not being able to use the restroom at all. And I was trying to get this surgery scheduled, and my mom was actually the one who was like, just think about this. You know, maybe you don't want to do this. So, so quickly. And it was that conversation that I had that I just left, and I became obsessed with learning all about the gut and the gut microbiome and the bacteria. And I actually started working for a, physician's private practice, and he did stool testing, actually ran the vibrant gut zoomer at the very, like first version. Then got super, but it blew my mind at what was happening in my gut. And the bacteria, and I kind of, I think, yeah, I actually kind of self-diagnosed me with Sibo after I dove into the research, you know, and as the story continues, it wasn't an easy journey. Once I realized I had Sibo and I had a ton of gut dysbiosis, because I really had to not just do all these different protocols and now my practice, you know, we specialize in Sibo. We take a gut centric approach to really everything. I believe it's the core driver of all disease. And for me, it wasn't just get on these herbals or do these antibiotics, I did that. I relapsed continuously, and it wasn't until that I really started to address the root cause of my Sibo. And so a big philosophy that we carry out my practice is SIBO not the root cause. It's part of the symptom. And so no bodybuilder at that time, you know, I read all of it right. And thyroid wasn't working very well. Yeah. Hormones were tanking. So that all crystallizes and then made it so that you could develop that. So you get it. But then nobody was was putting that together. Right. It was just these standard conventional tests. No one was talking about the microbiome or seed, but everyone was looking at things structurally given medication, diagnosis of IBS, which now I call a trash can diagnosis. Yeah, most women have IBS, and my brain. So here's like a bunch of medicines and you can on them for forever. Yeah. So unfortunate approach. That's not the solution. Yeah. It's not it's really sad you know. And now that I have my practice and we've worked with thousands of people you know when I share my story people can think that I'm very anti conventional medicine. But I say no I'm not, I'm just pro root cause of course there is always a time and a place for conventional. I mean you're a physician and so you understand emergency medicine probably better than anybody. But it doesn't get to the root cause. And so yeah, I, it was it's been interesting because I love my conventional medicine training. I still stand on it. I prescribe I believe in it. But I love my creative approach to this. I feel like it's a bridge. Yeah, I feel like I'm a bridge between these two worlds, and I don't think that we have to be exclusive. We can use all the tools I agree. You know, honestly it's kind of to your point of medicine like good medicine asks more questions. We don't ask no questions in front of us. And probably because the system is broken, you know, you get five minutes, you get some of those patients, we don't have the time to ask those questions. And then I think also there's lapses in education as well because doctors are typically taught nutrition. I mean, nutrition is even really, like the depth of nutrition. Yeah. I do think that it's going to change in the next decade. But, it's really frustrating if you're a patient. Yeah. I really think if somebody had just taken the time to really get to know me, I mean, it's pretty obvious. I mean, you're and you hit the nail on the head, you know, here's this girl who's 10% body fat, who has a ton of metabolic stress. And, you know, everything slows down when the body is conservation mode between the thyroid, between the hormones, between motility in the gut, which sets the perfect train for a bacteria to overgrow. And so, yeah. Yeah. And we just get stuck in this vicious cycle and said this is where to the relapse rate of Sibo is so high. People now are talking about Sibo and getting this diagnosis. But even the typical treatment of vaccin and niacin, I think it's at least 50%, if not 60% relapse with so many people. And I think a big part of that is because we're not addressing what led to the Sibo in the first place. Looking at motility, looking at the nervous system, looking at digestive insufficiency medications that they're taking. I had a woman who came into my practice. He literally had I don't even know these existed, but these like at home breath tests. Have you seen those? I didn't know they existed. Like. Yeah, like she would every single day. Do a breath test to to monitor. Okay. And that monitors hydrogen and methane levels. So yeah. So she was monitoring on a daily basis. And you know I had to have a conversation with them. Like it's kind of like weighing yourself every single day. You start to just develop a lot of anxiety around it. That she had relapsed with Sibo so many times just over and over again, she had gone to all of the top physicians, you know, Sibo experts per se. And she came into my practice. And a big part of our approach is really getting to know the person and their history. And this could be, you know, different medical procedures that they've had surgeries. This is getting to know their nutrition, getting to know not only what their nutrition looks like today, but what it previously looked like, their stress levels, you know, all of the different lifestyle things. And she had had five surgeries on her abdomen. She had had three, three C-sections, a tummy tuck. Can't remember what the last one was. But immediately when I read that, yeah, I thought adhesions. And it turns out she actually ended up getting a scan and she had a ton of adhesions. She also ended up having more toxicities and that was playing a big role, some digestive insufficiency. But you know, once you're able to take this functional approach, and actually get to know her, look at her history, I mean, it same thing was pretty obvious, but I was blown away that no one had considered the reasons for for Sibo. Yeah, it's tricky. And then on top of that, probably with, well, maybe not as much, but I mean, maybe even with endometrium that is such an undiagnosed condition, diagnosis and exclusion until you do surgery, which you don't always want to do. You know, that's a lot of adhesions in there too. So I've seen some weird things. Yeah. You do in this space. Yeah. And I think it's tricky because like you said, every person is different. So it might have been structurally related. Sometimes there can be an alien, right. Kind of stays open. And then there's obviously like you have low enzyme levels or you've got the low last days. So it can be really hard. So tell me I would love to know kind of your approach. How do you, how do you find root cause for the like. What is your kind of when you're thinking about like how do you you know, what are you looking for. Yeah. So for categories and looking at the root cause I mean step one we have to get an actual Sibo diagnosis. I love stool testing, but we know stool testing is not diagnostic for Sibo. But sometimes we don't always need to do the breath test. I'm a big believer at looking at symptomatology. You know, if they have this chronic bloating where it progressively gets worse throughout the day, the brain fog and our logical issues combined with looking at like the gut zoomer with vibrant, you know, to make the decision to still treat for Sibo and try to identify. Yeah. And also stool test. As you know, we can see beyond just Sibo or a breath test we're just looking at are you positive or negative for Sibo. So versus diagnosis of see both your breath test or just looking at overall symptomatology combined with a stool test. And then I always start with the person first and foremost. And so we're usually looking for a few different things. I usually put them in different categories. So one, is there any signs of digestive insufficiency. So we can look at some of these symptoms. So do they have you know maybe fatty stools. That could be a big trigger of it. Maybe. Do they have issues digesting protein. Maybe they're getting some reflux like symptoms. Of course the stool testing can also give us some greater insight as to fat malabsorption, bile flow, all of those different things. So basically anything that's going to impair digestion as a whole, low stomach acid, low bile flow, low pancreatic enzymes, and then we'll look a little bit further at medications too. So this is a big part of getting to know the PPI is that you have all the stomach acid. Looking at two four only medications, there's a big connection to with that that I've seen. Is this. Yeah, I've seen some research on the connection between T4 only medication. So not the, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that contributing to Sibo, history of antibiotics, and then, different, tricyclic antidepressants too, can be a big one for people. So we look at that, I think PPIs are one of the biggest ones that I've seen with Sibo, for sure. Oh my gosh, every person who's came into my practice, who's been on PPIs, they have the worst gut issues. And it's it's really sad because I and you know, there's probably but there used to be the warning where you only put somebody on the PPIs for a short period of time. And now I see people who are on them for for years and years, and then they can't even get off of them. It's with a lot of medication. But we'll look at that. We'll look at if there's any sign of adhesions, like under mysterious different surgeries that they've had, on their abdomen, C-sections, tummy tags, all of those could be contributing factors. And then, so, motility. Yeah, that would be the fourth one. And so sometimes. Yes. What's happening with the body's migrating more complex, those cleaning waves. So I know for me, in the bodybuilding world, I was constantly eating, you know, throughout the day. So I wasn't getting that adequate fasting period in between meals where that MSC action really comes into play around that 3 to 4 hour mark, which is really important. But I think the biggest factor that I see with people on motility is typically that sympathetic dominance and living in a chronic cortisol state, and that was it for me. That's for a lot of people. But we know that, you know, the gut can't have optimal motility when we're chronically stressed. And so it's looking at these four areas with each person combining it with testing. So we'll do the stool tests. But we also like to look at toxins. And we like to look for mold toxicities. We like to look for toxic heavy metals. I want to understand what's happening still with the hormones the cardiometabolic side of things, the thyroid. Because if there's hypothyroidism, that's gonna also slow down the motility. So we have to be able to look at the full picture. And it's not just the lab markers. It's right, you know, the functional lens of how is all of this interconnected, creating this person's symptomatology and the story of why they have Sibo, why it continuously relapses. And from there, you know, once we're able to gather that info, we can then progress them into some kind of a Sibo diet. I think what a lot of people don't realize is that Sibo diet like low Fodmap or specific carbohydrate diet, even elemental can be a treatment for Sibo, but a lot of the low Fodmap diet so, I see a lot of dietitians, nutritionists put somebody on a low Fodmap diet and they feel better, but they just leave them there. And then over time, what happens to gut the diversity, you know, continues to decrease? And then they're on this restrictive diet and they feel very limited, which just creates more stress within the body. And in turn, we're actually creating more fragility within the body instead of actually creating resilience. And so we do a low fermentation diet for a short period of time, usually just to help focus on mitigating symptoms for that first month. And then we move into active treatment. We like the herbal approach when it comes to active Sibo treatment. We've done some elemental diets. I just find for most people it's it's difficult. Yeah, it's really restrictive. For myself, I ended up doing the vaccin neomycin. I did a lot of the combination antibiotics, and then I ended up doing the herbal approach. But I find the herbals can be incredibly, you know, effective. Sometimes we need to do a few different types of herbals, maybe change it up. We also pair that with carb pulsing. It, it has been even more effective. So what we'll do is four days on with the herbs combined with a little bit more carbohydrate. So actually pulling the person out of doing more of this low fermentation diet, to try to make the bacteria a little bit more alive and active. It's kind of like the approaches where they've studied giving somebody five grams of, guar gum with the different herbals, and it's been more effective. So we'll do that, and then they'll actually come off of their herbs for three days. Then we'll go low carb. And so through this approach, it's also been great for people with metabolic issues as a whole. But we can then rotate different herbs if we need to. And that strategy has worked really nicely, especially because if people aren't feeling too well on the herbals, it gives them that sense of relief on those days that they come off to realize, like, okay, this is just. Yeah. Then they come off and they're like, oh, okay, I'm actually feeling a bit better. But, you know, especially if they're getting, you know, some bad symptoms or die off reaction when they're on their active treatment. It can be mentally difficult for a lot of people. So now with like the findings on say that, you know, where you can see endotoxin or yes. Things like that are using peptides. Yeah. We are using different peptides in my practice. I'm actually in the process of launching my own hormone and peptide clinic, orange and med here. So maybe when this comes out it'll be open or starting in Florida. Then we're expanding out to some of the different states. But we have started using more of the gut healing, peptides. So we started with BPC 157, which everybody knows. But we have recently been using a peptide called La Raza Tide. You're la. So many people don't know about it. Yeah. Big fan of La Raza tide. La Raza tide is the one that's been studied with, celiac. Yeah. Because it specifically acts on the skin receptors. Yeah. So those two have been great. Familia haven't used it a ton. I want to learn a little bit more about KBB though. Yeah. It's really good for inflammation. I feel like those three are really kind of good power. Power stuff with that. Yeah I think those are great to add in to more of that healing phase that people really need to work on. And so for us, we're always working on the gut first and foremost. And later today I'm talking a bit more on peptides, but I think so many people are turning to peptides before they've actually addressed the internal physiology. it's like one of these very seductive things because like, maybe it fixes you quick and it possibly being another Band-Aid approach, you know, but I think to your point, you kind of have to start with the basics, right? Yeah. You talked about in your work that there's like sequence that you. I talked about that. Yeah. So we have a functional framework that we bring all of our clients through. And I do think that it's important to make sure that we address a lot of these internal issues. What is happening with the gut, the blood sugar stress detoxification, toxic load before we transitioned into putting somebody on like GP ones, or those type of peptides. Because what a lot of people don't understand is these peptides, although they're they're great tools, is they're interacting with our physiology. And so GLP ones, we do see changes with some of our metabolic hormones. We see triglycerides improve. We see one see improve. We see glucose improve. However it's not addressing the downstream issues that led to the insulin resistance or the metabolic issues in the first place. It's not addressing a lot of the inflammation. And so you can see two people, one person get on GLP one and another person get on it. One person has life changing results and they lose all this weight. And this other person gets on it and maybe they have negligible results. And that's because two very different physiology internally. And if we don't look at those things first, then we're not going to get the most benefit out of a lot of these peptides. And so my practice, focuses first on removing a lot of these core stressors. And so we're going to remove phase is very similar to like the the the five the five hours of the gut. But removing food triggers. So for somebody this could be food intolerances. This could be inflammatory foods. Anything that could be disrupting the gut, adding inflammation. We focus a bit more on blood sugar balance, and then we'll usually do a bit of a protocol to open up a bit of the detox pathways. And maybe depending on some of their symptoms, we'll do a little Fodmap diet. We'll do an IP diet or just a general anti-inflammatory diet. It just depends on what their core issues are that they're coming in with. So we focus on to remove blood sugar control, reduce inflammation, use their on. This time is when we get that person's lab results back and so I like to see how somebody responds even before we move in to active protocols with what has come back with their labs and the power of doing this is we can actually assess if somebody is, I mean, maybe has a really high toxic load, for the person, maybe we do a bit of a flush protocol on and they start to get bad Horkheimer actions or a lot of symptoms. That usually tells me they have probably a lot of toxins. And then usually when we get their lab results back, they do they have a lot of heavy metals or they have a lot of mold. Or maybe someone starts to get, some histamine reactions. And so I know now for this person, I don't want to do any kind of aggressive verbal protocol because they're going to be very symptomatic, for seeing if somebody maybe has Sibo, if we're not doing a breath test, how they respond to that low Fodmap diet is also going to be a pretty big indicator. Do they get relief? Do they not get relief? So we start with that always first. And then based off the labs, you know everything's customized that we do with each person. But we follow the same framework. So after we go in to remove we then go into eradicate. So this is typically where we're focusing on eradicating any kind of overgrowth that have come back in the gut. And so parasites any, any pathogens, Sibo focused, seafood focused, maybe just severe dysbiosis with a lot of opportunistic bacteria. We're still focusing a bit on detox during this phase. Working a bit on digestion upstream. If there is any issues there with bile flow or stomach acid, we ensure that we've actually been able to eradicate the overgrowth. And then once we know that we have. So we'll retest. We'll then progress our clients into more of gut health. So I always describe it as gut healing. It's a protocol. Gut health is more of a lifestyle. And so we'll move them into gut health. And this is another phase where we're focusing on rebuilding back up that microbiome. Maybe we're continuing with some gut lining repair, working a bit more on the immune system. This is also a nice phase because it gives that person a bit of a break. Especially if they were getting some Daff reaction or different symptoms during the eradication phase. And then after this we'll move into mitochondrial support and then some detoxification too. So it looks a bit different for everybody. But if they had mold or if they had heavy metals, we'll progress them into doing a detox. And the time frame looks a bit different for each person, how long they're going to be in that phase, but they typically progress a lot better into, you know, this type of a detox. Once we've worked on the gut and we've done all of those phases a bit before, and then, you know, we'll normally retest after we've moved through one of these more aggressive detox protocols, see where we're at. And if that person's feeling a lot better with their, their symptoms normally, you know, you probably get this. You run so many labs that no one ever has perfect labs. Yeah, I don't think you ever know they're not static. Being influenced by the environment, by your current day to day stressors. But in general you should see probably a significant improvement. Yeah. Yeah we see the improvements. And that's why I think it's also important to not just focus on the labs, but also how that person actually feels. What is their energy like, what is their digestion like, what are their designing levels like as an indicator of the nervous system? And if we've seen significant improvement, we'll usually then progress them out of maybe that healing phase into focusing a little bit more on metabolic flexibility, trying to bring more stressors into the picture. Because most of the people who come into our practice when we're in this initial healing phase, it takes roughly six months for them to go through it, give or take a bit, you know, depending on what comes back with the labs, some people, it could be up to a year. You know, they have mold toxicity in different things. But really in this window we're focusing on reducing as much stress as possible and then increasing recovery as much as possible. And once we've been able to progress through that and maybe we increase heart rate variability, we're not focusing in this period of time really about aggressive weight loss. Maybe, we'll get a lot of people who come in and they're like, hey, I want to lose fat and they want to build muscle. But I also have all these gut issues, and I have PMS and heavy cycles, and we really share with them, hey, we can work on all of these things, but we have to do it in the right order. So we're going to focus first on healing. So reducing the stressors we're not going to be trying to do any kind of PR is in the gym or run marathons. Give the body the rest that it needs, increase recovery. And then slowly, as we're seeing improvement, we can start to bring in more stressors, work a bit more on that metabolic flexibility as a whole. And then, you know, as we continue to see more and more improvement, that's where, you know, we can actually really work on creating more resiliency within the body and within the nervous system. And that's where we find people are in a much better place to focus on more of these, you know, fun, sexy goals that they have, whether it's esthetics or performance or just in general optimization, I love that. So I think that it sounds like you are just truly working on, And then trying to help the body get back into homeostasis. And then after that, you know, adding on to kind of more, I guess fun or like you said sexy or things. But it's true. Like if you don't really focus on body burden first then you know it's like you're just dealing with the toxic sludge situation. Well then people wonder why they're not getting better. Typically not only are they not usually achieving their performance or their esthetic goals, but then they're also not achieving any progress with trying to heal their gut. Or maybe they're struggling with sleeping issues or different hormonal issues as a whole. And so we really do have to pick. It's not like people don't see results. My clients lose weight all the time when they're in that healing phase. But I always just describe it. We have to pick one goal in bodybuilding. We don't build muscle and lose fat at the same time, right? The person who tries to build a ton of muscle and lose fat ends up going nowhere. So we focus first on, you know, trying to bulk up and build muscle. And then later we we cut back and then we end up with this, you know, beautiful physique. But we there are two different processes. Healing is different than optimization and performance as a whole. And the body has to be able to handle that capacity. Yeah, I love that. And I bet that your own experience as an athlete. Oh yeah, I yeah, I was the person who just pushed past whatever my, my body was saying, like, hey, slow down for just gonna keep going. And I said something. She said, you know, I kind of have a high pain tolerance. And I was like, I think, you know, most of my patients who are athletes. Yeah. Health, relationship to pain. You just push past it and then yeah, I mean, that's been one of the things that I've had to really heal through. And I think a lot of my clients in my practice have to really heal through, is learning to actually listen to our body. You know, I'm not that great. Oh, yeah. I'm that person. I can, you know, outwork a lot of people. I can push past, you know, a lot of different physical cues, and then I end up with burnout and then insomnia. And I miss and, you know, the downward spiral and, I why I don't know why this happened. And it's like, well, buddy, we were giving you lots of cues every step of the way, but you didn't listen. How do you feel like? Because you are, you know, working with a lot of people, from a kind of nutrition lens. Have you do you see a lot of people with, what are you doing in this day and age? I do, yeah. Whether it's diagnosed, usually it's not a lot, but I think especially people who have had gut issues, people have a gut issues, usually my most, complaints, clients that I work with because they're so desperate to heal their gut issues, but especially when they've struggled with their health, it's creates this fear for food for a lot of them. And even when their gut starts to improve, it's difficult. And I think we can actually. Yeah, to allow ourself the relative freedom to be able to enjoy food again, to enjoy life again, you know, for my own healing journey, you know, I was so focused on the healing side of things, and I was doing the herbals and all the antibiotics. And I remember there was just this period where I kind of let go for a little while. I had been doing it, but I didn't focus on it as much, and I just shifted and focus on living my life. And I remember the day I was out to eat with friends, and then all of a sudden I was like, oh wait, I haven't like, thought about like my food and paying close attention. And it was in that moment that I was like, wow, I think my body is really healed because one, I wasn't even noticing my gut symptoms anymore. But I do think a big part of that actually came from allowing my brain to also shift out of the hyper focus around healing and restriction, and trying to make everything perfect and actually allowing my body to live. And what that really did for my own healing. I think it's really tricky because when you want to, you know, when you're like a high achieving person and you are used to your goal oriented and you used to kind of like making things happen. And I see this on my practice, I think it's really easy to get lost in that, you know, in that process where eaters that check lists off and do all the things. And then I think what gets forgotten is that it it's it's it's almost a little bit. Yeah. For our bodies to recalibrate. Yeah. Something that I've said before is that you can't rush in for healing because it's that exact mindset that created disease in the first place. And so it's, you know, being intentional with their healing but not trying to force our body into healing and such an interesting thing. Yeah, it's a it's a a little bit of a tightrope because I think it's really easy to like white knuckle. Oh yeah. It's the exact opposite, what the body needs. So focus on your patient's nervous system. Yeah. I mean actually all of our coaches went through doctor. Doctor Pausch blanking on his name. Doctor Portia's, poly vagal certification. They had one that was focused on the gut brain axis, but also bringing in the nervous system. And, you know, one of the philosophies that we carry in my practice is healing. Growth and restoration can only take place when the body feels safe. And so when the body's in that parasympathetic state. And so a lot of what we do with our clients is first educating them on the nervous system, right? If we are constantly operating in this upregulated sympathetic state, the body is not going to be able to heal as much as we're doing the perfect diet, as much as we're doing all of the protocols to the tee, because the body actually has to make that nervous system shift into parasympathetic, we want to stay there, you know, because I think also too, we stay in parasympathetic all the time. That's where actually we become fragile. We create fragility in so optimal health. Right. It's the ability to go back and forth. It's the ability to go into sympathetic something, stresses us out, exercise all of these things. You know, the concept of our misses where we have these small stressors. I was relate everything back to the gym. Right. But you go into the gym, you stress the muscle. But if you stayed constantly, you know, stressing that muscle, the muscle would get smaller. But we stress the muscle. We then shift into recovery and the body builds back stronger. Went to the gym and you would never you never build a muscle. Yeah. Like that. That moderate healthy middle. Right. Yeah. Optimal health metabolic flexibility to 100%. It's interesting how the body has these two dualities. Everything right. You know kind of switches between both know a little bit about, you know, optimal health lies in the in between between going back and forth fasting and feeding, you know stress in recovery. And it's any time that we get stuck on one side of the spectrum where disease occurs, we get stuck in more of this stress state. This is where disease, burnout, dysregulation occur as well. If we're always stuck in parasympathetic, we create fragility because the body's actually not able to handle any kind of stress. We see this right with people who never expose their immune systems when they're younger to, you know, different things. And so they're always constantly getting sick. And so we have to be able to handle both. It's different when the body is, you know, dysregulated at the core. That's when we are we're going over here for a period of time on purpose. We just can't stay there. And that's the problem that I see is people go over there, especially when they have these health issues, but they get stay there and they they get stuck. And then over time they're sensitive to a million foods. They've dwindled down their diet. Oh, they feel better when they're eating their perfect diets and they're controlling everything. But as soon as they go to eat and they go off of it and they flare up and then they go right back. So that's why, you know, a lot of my approach and my practice, yes, we focus on the healing, but we progress. People beyond just that healing phase into actually rebuilding stress inoculation and actually creating a system that's resilient. Who can handle stress and life and everything that it's going to throw our way. Yeah, we actually had the honor of, interviewing Doctor Sharon Berquist, who wrote a book about stress. To get that you do need some stress in order to be healthy. You know, whether it's exercise, whether it's exposure to sunlight, whether it's, even, you're into accidents, all of that or little stressors that our body that reacts to and responds to and then creates you know, creates health, right? Yeah. You know, I think that we're a kind of a society, you know, I say we're so scared about stress and yes, you know, probably being under sympathetic, you know, drive 24 hours a day that isn't good for us. But I do think that I like what you're saying that resilience you know. Yeah. Because if we have the fear for any of these things that the fear of, you know, all the different foods or the fear of stress and it's like oh my gosh, everything's bad, everything's toxic. Right. That's not creating health as a whole. And yeah, so I'm a big believer of creating a system, a person who's able to handle, you know, a lot of people might think that I'm super restrictive. I eat very healthy, but I'll go out, I'll have some things that maybe aren't perfect, and I don't flare up and I don't overthink it. But the majority of the time I'm doing things that are conductive for my health, for my microbiome, for my nervous system. But I'm also not doing it 100% of the time. So I also trust my body. And I think that's an important piece to you have to be able to trust your body if you go off. And I think if you don't trust your body, if you're stressed about going out and eating one small thing that's off of your perfect diet or traveling, I see this all the time. They end up creating the symptoms that they're afraid of in the first place. Yeah, I think it's, be interesting to think about, like, you know, the blue zones or places in the world where no one really worries about their diet, but they thrive right now. I think the Spanish are the ones of people. And so, yeah, has to come back to the nervous system in that conversation. A lot of time in community at meals. Yeah. Drinking wine, probably laughing, singing songs. I don't know, I think that it's just a lot of these cultures living the awareness pretty foreign to like, you know, America as it is, you know, these days, like, we're just so rustic. It's probably global, honestly. But, you know, when when life is so rushed and you have so much pressure and everyone's hustle culture and everyone's grinding, you don't have time for slow living. But I think humans are made for slow living. People thrive when they can do that. Yeah I think it's also to in these different cultures you see the amount of connection and the emphasis on family and friends and relationship. And you know that of course plays a huge role in our health. Yeah I think we've lost village. You know and then ways here. And so in this generation. So I think people are looking to their village on social media. You know trying to find that belonging. But. You were meant for each other. Yeah. So coming back to the question on the nervous system and focusing with that on our clients. And so, you know, as we go through the education about why the nervous system is so important in healing and health as a whole, creating the awareness for that person, you know, which states that they're in. I think most people don't even have the awareness of, you know, I'm right now in a hypervigilant state. I'm I'm up regulated or, you know, right now this is what parasympathetic actually feels like. You know, people are just going and living throughout life. So one is actually just creating more awareness around their body and their nervous system. And then for most of our clients, because they're focused more on healing, it is helping them introduce activities that can help regulate the nervous system. And so the social connection piece. Right. I really think it's the social isolation and just living in this virtual world, it's not the same. Yeah. And that was a big thing that, Doctor Parrish really talked about is, you know, neuro ception at the core, which is where, you know, the brain is actually scanning our environment and then we're co regulating with each other. We do a little bit of this neuro section, maybe on like a virtual type setting phones. Not at all. But we have the most amount of this Co regulation take place when we're in community and when we're around people. And so, you know, if we look at how often we're just doing everything virtually. And that's me I mean my entire business is virtual. I'm on zoom all day. And then I'm like, why? Why am I, like, stressed or feeling maybe this, you know, tightness in my body and I have to be very conscious and I have to be intentional with shifting out of that space. Getting outside, getting in nature, getting the sunlight, you know, just helping co regulate my nervous system. So it's that duality. I have a lot of stress in my life because I, I run a really large business. So it means that I have to be that much more intentional in creating that other polarity of how do I actually know down regulate. And that was something I used to be really bad at. I just lived constantly in the entrepreneurial life. Yeah, there's no there's no back and forth. Right? It's just one. Yeah. Yeah. And that that was I wasn't agreement but it was. Yeah. An internal agreement that I had with myself after I reached a phase of burnout. I just promised myself. And I'm like, you know, nothing is worth sacrificing my health. Nothing. I will not burn myself out because I did reach a point, even after my gut issues. And I was growing my practice. And, you know, I started to develop a lot of insomnia. I had my own nervous system dysregulation, anxiety. And I remember I was like, logically, I don't have fearful thoughts. I didn't it didn't make sense, but it was just my body was constantly in this, just stress state. By focusing on building a business, you could say I was in a bit more of a masculine state, which is there's truth to it if you get into all of that. But, you know, I was just in it and I never would come out of it. And so that created burnout. Yeah. I think that's, you know, kind of in this current we're very driven. We're very, you know, goal focused. And people just grind until they go to bed. Now this day, you know, the grind for 60 hours a day. So there's no time for decompression. There's no time to just come home to take a nap and and I know that the world really kind of. In some ways encourages that behavior. But to your point, I think that if you can step back and you can think about the balance, then I mean, that's tough. But yeah, I also will say women have a much more sensitive, sympathetic nervous system. And so I think if you put a man and a woman and this is preference and not, you know, pro any direction, but the reality is is men can get away with a lot less sleep than women can. Men can work longer hours and it not negatively impact their nervous system as much as women. And so a lot of what I did was try to keep up with a lot of, you know, the guys, and then they were fine. And then my nervous system was like off and dysregulated, and I didn't really understand it. But once I realized that, you know, the the nervous system response from men and women, it is very different. With different forces within our body, you know, our hormones, you know, they're completely different. In life. Yeah. Capacity basically. Yeah. I love, tree doctor Tracy Simms work if you're familiar with her. And her big thing is, you know, women are not just a little men. You know, we are completely different, you know, in our in our physiology and what's happening with our hormones. And so it's not just to give a woman a smaller amount of things. And most of the research, you know, for, for a really long time was done on men or menopausal women. And so, you know, women were very much neglected when it came to different studies on medications, antidepressants. And so, yeah. Okay. Thank you. Can you let everyone know how to find me? Yeah. My website's Rachel. Sure. Com and you can follow me on Instagram Rachel Scheer or Rachel Scheer. Nutrition is my practice. Thanks so much. Thank you. Thank you all for tuning in to the Vibrant Wellness Podcast. If you found this episode valuable, be sure to subscribe so you never miss a conversation like this. And don't forget to follow us on Instagram at Vibrant Wellness for more insights, education and updates. We'll see you next time.