Have You Been Gaslit By Your Genetics with Rian Overcash, Certified Nutrigenomics Counselor

Discover how personal health struggles led Ryan Overcash to transform the wellness landscape as the founder of Habit Method Health. Faced with baffling symptoms like tachycardia and hypothyroidism during her late teens, Ryan’s relentless pursuit for answers inspired a unique practice focused on precision wellness and functional genetics. This episode unfolds her journey of self-advocacy and the creation of a health empowerment platform, highlighting the importance of patient education and personalized care.

Uncover the groundbreaking potential of genetic testing to elevate your health journey. With over half of the population carrying genetic variants that impact the methylation cycle, Ryan sheds light on how understanding these can validate symptoms frequently overlooked by practitioners. Learn from her personal experience of transitioning from synthetic to natural thyroid medication, proving that questioning traditional treatments and championing for oneself can revolutionize health outcomes and defy the permanence of certain conditions.

Explore the profound ways our environment molds our health and genetic predispositions. This conversation goes beyond genetics, examining modern habits like "bed rotting" and "doom scrolling" and their impact on our well-being. With enlightening dialogue around communication with healthcare providers, we address the complexities of navigating the medical landscape. This episode is an invitation to listeners to evaluate their environments, engage proactively in their health choices, and embrace the power of informed, personalized health strategies.

The Gaslit Truth Podcast will be live and in person at the Feed the Recovering Brain Conference in Dublin, Ohio

Join us with the top names in brain health, including Christina Veselak, Hyla Cass, and Julia Ross, author of The Mood Cure.

We’ll be bringing you interviews and behind-the-scenes content as we explore how nutrition transforms mental wellness.

Chapters

• 0:00 Personalized Health Through Functional Genetics
• 16:12 Empowering Health Through Genetics Awareness
• 31:06 Understanding Environmental Health and Genetics
• 44:57 Navigating Healthcare

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:20

We are your whistleblowing strengths, Dr Tara Lynn and therapist Jen, and this is the Gaslit Truth Podcast.

Speaker 2: 0:28

Yeah, welcome everybody. Today we've got a special guest on and I'm going to introduce her today. This is Ryan Overkash, and Ryan is the founder of Habit Method Health, which is a concierge health practice focused on precision wellness through functional genetic insights and a personalized approach. In addition to her clinical role, she leads B2B partnerships, driving innovation and creative product development across various aspects of the health landscape, including wearable devices and supplement formulations. So Ryan is, her work is shaping the future of wellness. She is bridging a gap between science and practical solutions for individuals and businesses alike. Everybody, welcome to the show, brian Overcash.

Speaker 3: 1:12

Thank you so much for having me. This is so exciting to be here chatting with you both today. Welcome.

Speaker 1: 1:18

Yeah, technology problems. And if you all want to be gaslit for the first time, my mic isn't even working. So if you're looking at YouTube like.

Speaker 2: 1:28

Ooh, you got something fancy in your ears. This is a prop today. Is your hair a prop too, cause it looks like damn perfect today. Is that a wig?

Speaker 1: 1:39

Man, I'm wearing a wig, the wig reveal. Man. It took a lot to get you here today, so welcome to the show. And, man, I think I met you a couple of years ago on TikTok. Right, it's been a couple of years, We've been friends since TikTok, that's right, I think.

Speaker 3: 1:56

During all the COVID shutdowns we became buddies and were chatting about all of the exciting things happening at that time, and from there we've just been able to nerd out together, which has been a blast.

Speaker 1: 2:10

You know you do nerd out well, I have to say, especially when it comes to genetics. You blow me away with the information that you have and how you use it. But I think that there's some risk in that too. Right, Because everyone is looking for that silver bullet. But before we get started into that, I think it's really important if you're willing to share your story of how you got to this place, because I think it's very fascinating and I think it would resonate a lot. So, whatever you're willing to share, please have at it, Sure.

Speaker 3: 2:44

Yeah, open book policy here. My story is often how I share my experience and how my practice developed. When I was in my late teens, I started developing these kind of strange symptoms that when I check in with my doctor, they'd usually tell me well, this is normal, or stop eating cheeseburgers, or you know, you're just getting older and I thought this was really odd. And as this list of symptoms grew to close to 52 issues that I was really struggling to figure out, I was developing kind of this sense of dread as I would go in to talk to medical practitioners. This went on for almost eight years and I was simply being passed from specialist to specialist, really without anybody truly looking at what was happening to my health or giving me an explanation as to why.

Speaker 3: 3:34

I was a health coach at the time. So I felt like I had some insight and I just didn't have somebody there kind of helping me put the puzzle pieces together and I just started to really give up. It felt really frustrating. I felt like I was running out of time, energy, money, quite an expensive journey to figure out all of these things going wrong with your health and eventually found the world of functional medicine and I thought this is going to be it. This is going to give me all the answers and if I just find the right supplement or the right test, I'm going to be resolved, and that was kind of the second round of being gaslit. So I think that that really forced me to come to terms with how to educate myself, how to advocate for myself, and that's really what my practice is built on is helping people use tools and information to educate and empower so that they know exactly what they're trying to solve for and why.

Speaker 2: 4:35

It's that simple. Can you share, Ryan, what some of those symptoms were? What were you going through?

Speaker 3: 4:42

This is a long list, but I have some highlights Me too.

Speaker 2: 4:44

Yes, going through this is a long list, but I have some highlights. 52. We don't need all 52. This isn't like Baskin Robbins we need all the flavors. But a nice Reader's Digest would be awesome, yeah.

Speaker 3: 4:54

And you'll kind of start to see why I was passed from specialist to specialist, because obviously the American medical system is really set up in a bit of a myopic way where specialists are only trained to look at these individual areas. So I was diagnosed with tachycardia, with Gilbert syndrome, I was diagnosed with something similar to rheumatoid arthritis, chronic cane disorders, issues with my heart, my kidneys, gastroparesis. All of these were idiopathic, meaning doctors were not able to tell me why these were developing. I developed hypothyroidism. My hair was falling out in clumps, I was developing rashes, eczema, psoriasis, misdiagnosed with certain types of skin issues. I was at one point told that my kidneys were failing no reason why, just won the unlucky lotto of the week. And trouble with my menstruation cycle. I was getting headaches. I was at one point hospitalized for jaundice.

Speaker 3: 5:55

These were all really concerning things that a normal, healthy teenager should not experience, and the fact that they were all coming together for me in the short time span where I had been formerly a very healthy young person was pretty questionable and I think it should have raised the alarm. It should have sent up some signals that something was wrong and something needed to be addressed. I need to put together a list so that people can see that these symptoms, this wide array of symptoms, really could be simplified into a few categories and a few bodily systems that probably just needed minor support. But because we were treating these with more of a patch job, one symptom would come up. We'd patch it. That would cause a new symptom. We'd patch it. It was really difficult to figure out where to start untangling the mass.

Speaker 1: 6:48

Right yeah, what did you figure it out? How did you figure that out?

Speaker 3: 6:53

I would like to use this as an opportunity to give genetics a lot of credit, but I do think that for the most part right now, genetics is being used often in a really poor way and it's being marketed and positioned in a way that's quite misleading for people. So this would be a great way for us to sort of educate people on the benefits of genetic testing but also protect them from some of the things. I think the rabbit holes people go down. And you know, by all means, it's not a unicorn, it's not a magician. Genetic testing is there, just like any other testing, to give us valuable data, insight, education and key objectives that we should consider. But it's not a magic key, it's not going in the wrong hands. It's a very expensive piece of paper. So what we're really after here is an interpretation that is valuable and actionable data. That's what matters most with all testing. And ask me your question. I think I missed your question. Did I remind me? What did you ask me, dr T?

Speaker 1: 7:59

No, I asked you something about how you got to know what was actually wrong, and that's where you went into genetics on this. So but, but I want to say I think that's really important. It reminds me of the genetic class. It's relatively I'm air quoting new, because it's really not new the one that tests for medications like this. But particularly what psychiatric medication partners well with your genetic code? And I have been banging the drum on this one for quite a while because I'm like it's not that simple, it's not that binary, and because I think people want the magic bullet right, they want the golden ticket, they want this med will work for me because my genetics say so and I'm like I feel that that is using genetics incorrectly and maybe you have some insight into that.

Speaker 3: 9:51

I agree completely. I think one of the most important things for us to stay focused on when we're working with someone or if somebody out there is looking for answers to their health focused on when we're working with someone or if somebody out there is looking for answers to their health is understanding individuality and personalized approaches, and that's where genetics can be really beneficial. It can actually show us areas that maybe we don't need to be focused on, maybe areas that our body does a really significant job on its own and we can spend our time, our money and our attention elsewhere when it comes. I will not pretend to be an expert in pharmacogenomics at all. I think genetics can give us great insight in how you metabolize certain key nutrients, and I think this is where nutritional genetics is really effective.

Speaker 3: 10:32

If somebody is looking to choose a supplement that is genetically compatible for them, or even determine if that supplement is relevant, compatible for them, or even determine if that supplement is relevant, what we need to understand is genetics offers a steady line of information, so this is kind of our constant, but what we need to factor in is real-time data that can be layered on top of that, and that personal, human element of health is not going to show up on a genetic test.

Speaker 3: 11:00

So there are some really key critical considerations that should be made when we're building protocols based on genetics. You know there was a study I think you guys may have seen this and Dr Terrelin remind me if we've already talked about this but there was a study showing that for elderly populations, the key to longevity, the factor that made the most difference, was not their genes and not their supplements, and not even the food they ate. It was the purpose that they had in their life. How much purpose and value are they contributing to society? Did they have community? And so that's a great example of ways that our soul, our community, our human element is going to contribute to our long-term health.

Speaker 1: 11:45

Yeah, I love that a lot and it reminds me of the happiness studies, where they studied people in the United States with college educations against the happiness of people that lived in third world countries, in the literal grass huts. And the ones in grass huts were happier, more satisfied with life because of their sense of community and purpose purpose towards each other, not just towards self. And I think this is an important key because I do find that many people who struggle, particularly with mental health issues, is because they do lack purpose, you know, or they lack community. They they lack something within relationships but they're still looking for. Well, it must be my genetic code that's causing these problems. Right, it's got to be, because, genetically, my grandma was also depressed. Well, maybe your grandma was also lacking community and purpose, I don't know, you know, so we can learn from our ancestors in that way, not just genetically, but also how they interacted with the world.

Speaker 1: 12:46

I think those are important things to share with people, that it's not always genetics that is telling the whole story. It certainly can help. And I think about I think it was because I did the genetic test with you. I believe I've done a couple of them, but one of them cause I did the genetic test with you. I believe I've done a couple of them but one of them said that I metabolize vitamin D differently than a lot of people, so I have to take more vitamin D than what is typical for people to maintain higher levels, and I thought like that was that was pretty important.

Speaker 1: 13:12

So there's really nothing that's going to change that for me. Community won't change that for me, but it can certainly inform what nutrients work well for me, you know, and what I might need to do to maintain certain nutritional levels, you know. So there's there's two sides of these things, but I think from that mental health perspective, maybe we need to not look so internally, meaning genetically, for the answers. Maybe we need to look at our lifestyle and our interactions with other people. So it's interesting.

Speaker 3: 13:46

It's all important, right. These are all pieces, that sort of build, these are the ingredients that build the recipe of health, and if we put too much stock in one category and we really don't disperse the importance across these other areas of relevance, I think that's when people end up feeling really frustrated, like they're spinning their wheels or they're spending a lot of money on supplements not really knowing why they're taking them. You know, the supplement industry is another area that I think has been sort of recategorized as, like the end-all, be-all or the anti-pharmaceutical, and I often feel like if people realized some of the secrets that go on in the manufacturing world, they might be really Okay, you're like okay.

Speaker 2: 14:32

So, before we get into that, because I want to know, I want to know something that we paused on before, because we're going to talk about this, because you have a role as well in some like lead formulation pieces for supplements that you do as well, so we're going to talk about that. Can you tell our listeners, when you decided, when you got to a space of doing some of this genetic testing, okay, what did you learn about yourself that you didn't know, what were the things that came out of this that then changed what you were going to do next?

Speaker 3: 15:03

I would say when you asked me that question, the visual that comes to my mind is almost like this segmenting of these two categories that allowed me to filter through what felt like a lot of just noise, a lot of of tangled up information and genetics allowed me to say root cause or side effect, and that really helped me get clear and get organized and really reduce kind of how, where I was exerting energy and not getting traction in my health improvements. So, um, when we we learned that I had some trouble with my methylation cycle, it became clear that being prescribed birth control pills may be a real challenge for me. It was depleting my folate, likely my magnesium and a lot of cofactors related to my methylation cycle, and we've seen this major popularity rise of the testing MTHFR gene alone and that's a really insignificant way to look at the full picture of this cycle. I have had people come to me and say I've been diagnosed with MTHFR and I'm like whoa, whoa, whoa, let's step back there. That's not the way we want to look at this. Over 50% of the population carries genetic variants somewhere in their methylation cycle and all this is really going to tell us is how to make better decisions through our life, our food and our choice in support, whether that's supplementation or medication. It's not a diagnosis and while we can't change our genes, we can very, very easily influence the outcome and provide support. But it goes back to being fully educated, fully informed. You know advocacy, and advocacy for yourself and the way that you communicate to your doctors. So if you, if somebody really wants to invest in genetic testing, what needs to go along with that for them to get the maximum benefit is a deeper understanding of why this information is important.

Speaker 3: 17:04

So I think allowing me to validate the genetic information did really validate a lot of these things, because I think one of the ways that I felt really gaslit was often being told that my invisible symptoms that were difficult to codify and difficult to track or to prove to my practitioners, were really valid, that maybe some of these pathways, these insufficient pathways that I was not doing a great job of supporting in my lifestyle, could be really relevant to the symptoms that I was feeling.

Speaker 3: 17:37

And I think for a lot of my clients, if I can point to a piece of paper and say, hey, here's why you've struggled with migraines, let's see if we support this pathway, if you get non-all improvements. That's a great start, but the other way that I think we really utilized my genetic information was kind of cutting down on the amount of support options I was considering and really focusing to two or three key supports that felt doable and tangible. Because that's one of my rules for healing is this has to be sustainable, whether that's financially sustainable. Building your habits, your lifestyle. If you're a busy mom and someone gives you 40 supplement protocol, odds are you're not going to do it. That's not sustainable for your life. So, um, I think, with with my experience with genetics, I saw faster improvements, doing less and got really focused on the things that were going to be key contributors to my outcomes.

Speaker 2: 18:40

Okay, so what? What? Yeah, tell us just like. What are those couple categories that you switched for you? What did you have to change, either lifestyle, or even nutrition wise, or supplement wise? What did you take away? What'd you focus on?

Speaker 3: 18:55

I tell the story all the time. I've been in remission now for 12 years and so you know some of these ideas I'm kind of having to like go back into my vault and pull out. One of the biggest things that I think changed was getting off of a synthetic thyroid medication and really starting to understand.

Speaker 1: 19:14

What's that?

Speaker 3: 19:14

Sorry to hear you. What's that? Sorry to hear you.

Speaker 1: 19:19

We're going to talk about that.

Speaker 3: 19:21

Yes, I mean, what we really saw is genetically. I had some insufficiencies in pathways that help convert T4 to the active thyroid hormone is T3. And I always like to tell clients this is sort of like you pulling up to the gas station in your, your new car and telling them I need a full ticket gas and they hand you a bucket of crude oil and they say, well, wait, it's the same thing To your car. It is not the same thing, and for those of us with insufficiencies in some of these pathways, it can be a life-changing experience to finally get those nutrients that the body is so desperately needing to function. I do think that there are probably some opportunities that we could have looked at even more upstream than that as far as supporting the thyroid or why we were in a thyroid deficiency state to begin with, but that was a pretty overnight change that, when I learned about these pathways and how the decision-making around these medications could change my outcomes so quickly, it made me start to wonder well, why are we not doing this for everyone? Or why are we not considering the pros and cons of these different medication choices for everyone? It was sort of just this blanket approach Everybody gets put on synthetic thyroid support and we don't ask questions and if you don't get better, we just continue upping the dose until your hair falls out.

Speaker 3: 20:45

And that seemed insane to me. That seemed insane, and so that was one of the fastest, I think. Within probably 14 days I started to feel like my brain was coming back online. I had struggled for a long time with dysautonomia, pots, low blood pressure episodes, kind of just feeling like I was walking around in a foggy world, and it was like the scene from Wizard of Oz where everything started coming back in color. And that was when I really knew, okay, we're onto something. And worked with a really great medical provider who became one of my mentors to accelerate some of these programs.

Speaker 1: 21:22

I'll tell you so. This was several years ago, ryan, when I was talking to you. She had mentioned natural thyroid for me and just as kind of a point of getting curious about it, and I think the thing I told you was I've asked and my providers have all said it's too late, because I had been on synthetic thyroid for decades. At this point and a couple of it's too late. You know you can't switch over. It is what it is and I did. I found someone who switched me over and it wasn't too late and it actually worked too well. I'm going to say that it worked too well, too quickly, and so finding that balance again did have to happen.

Speaker 1: 22:05

But I have felt so much better on this than I've felt in decades prior, you know.

Speaker 1: 22:12

So I'm like when you hear something like it's too late, it's too this, it just takes that hope away, like this is just going to be it for the rest of your life.

Speaker 1: 22:21

And then suddenly somebody does say let's try it and see what happens, and you're like I'm down and your whole world can change in just by asking questions and not taking no for the answer. You know you could have easily, as a young person, taken all of this like I'm just doomed, taken all this like I'm just doomed, I'm just doomed forever. I can't imagine being your age, having 50, some massive um, problems, symptomologies, 50, some you know at your age and not thinking like this is just going to be it for me, like the amount of hope that you had to hang on to all the time and the amount of curiosity, like hats off to you, because I know many people would just stop short and be like this is just, this is just going to be my life forever. Where do you think that hope came from? That? I think that's a good question, like where do you think you had that hope?

Speaker 3: 23:13

Yeah, how did you keep it? Well, I've never been short on tenacity, unfortunately for my parents. They, you know they. They said my first word was why? So I've always been kind of a squeaky wheel.

Speaker 3: 23:26

I've not been afraid to be pushy, and I think that one of one of the other rules for healing we talked about sustainable practices is mindset, and I think this is probably something that you guys talk a lot to your patients about is mindset is really key. I will not work with someone if they've decided that they will not get better, that they are doomed and that this is as good as it gets. There's no way I can help anybody. And so for me, looking back, I think the most relevant and key, I think the most relevant and key factor in my ability to gain remission was my mindset and my belief that, without a doubt, I was going, I was not going to stop until my health was improved. I didn't necessarily know what that looked like. There were days that I certainly was, you know, really cranky and crabby and maybe crying and frustrated and throwing my hands up, um, and it just really exhausted of feeling terrible. But I knew, without a doubt, I was not going to stop, and I think sometimes you have to dig deep. You really have to dig in and find a source of strength. Or, going back to our idea of community, you have to be around people that are with you.

Speaker 3: 24:30

One thing that I do always caution, and I think this really pertains to female clients. I don't know why. I'd love for you guys to tell me if you've seen this as well. But I think there's a lot of identity that gets wrapped up when you are struggling with a chronic illness and there's something happening in society where it's like permission to wallow. And I really get nervous about working with people who come to me and their handle is like PCOS forever, girl. If you want to have PCOS forever, that's your prerogative, but I can't be helpful until you decide that you're going to be the PCS, no more girl. And that's really important. And I really think the way that we talk to ourselves, the way we talk about ourselves, we talk about our illnesses, needs to be discussed more.

Speaker 3: 26:20

I think community groups are great, but if you find that you are surrounding yourself with people who are also not willing to make the decision to get better, you have a roadblock and that's really an easy thing for you to control, and that's really an easy thing for you to control. You may be struggling to find a practitioner or to save up enough money to work with someone you want to, or take the functional medicine route or go buy all the supplements. I understand that finances are certainly a hurdle. They were for me too. Medical debt was a terrifying part of my young adult life. But mindset is something that's free and it's available to each of us every day. But mindset is something that's free and it's available to each of us every day, and if you need a chat about that, you can find me on Instagram very easily and I love to give pep talks. So I think, believing that I'm going to get better and believing that my body knows how to heal itself and is wise in its expression of symptoms you have to just make the decision.

Speaker 1: 27:22

This is reminding me of and I still see it now, but it was a couple of years ago, I think it was during pandemic times the movement of it's okay to not be okay. Do you guys remember that? I do.

Speaker 1: 27:33

Yeah, everyone was posting it's okay to not be okay, it's okay to not be okay. Do you guys remember that? I do. Yeah, everyone is posting it's okay to not be okay, it's okay to not be okay. And I was like, yeah, for the short term, like for a short amount of time, like sometimes it is okay to not be okay, like I have the flu, I'm not okay. But I was like, what is this message? And I actually posted I think it was in a therapist group. Actually Somebody said, you know, just a reminder, it's okay to not be okay. And I wrote just a reminder it's also okay to be okay. You know also, yeah, yes, exactly, yes, it's okay to want to be okay as well.

Speaker 1: 28:13

Like I feel like to that point, like we do live in this space of just keeping people sick due to mindset sickness, if you will. You know the negative side of life, the downside. Like you know, let's commiserate in. You know they're called support groups, not commiserating groups. Right, we're supporting each other to move in a better direction rather than just supporting us all staying stuck right here and being miserable. So I think that that is a huge well, if we talk about genetic expression a little bit, you know, because you can turn on genetic code or shut off genetic code, like how valuable is mindset in genetic expression period? I would, I would guess, under stress, like that would be pretty powerful. Not that you're turning it on or off with your mind in that sense, but you know, the stress that you put on your body could be a very negative type of stress to express some of the negative coding that you have. Is that right?

Speaker 3: 29:14

I mean, is that an accurate thing to say yeah, and actually, some of the more recent epigenetic studies are really looking at what we think of as like environmental influence.

Speaker 3: 29:24

So, and there's a great book I hope I don't butcher the name, it's called you Are what your Grandparents Ate, and it really is one of the wildest facts People are always sort of blown away by. This is a grandmother who is pregnant with a daughter is actually also pregnant with her granddaughter and influencing genetic expression in genetic variants three generations back. So think about how important it is for us not just for ourselves today, but for future, our kids, our grandkids to really be communicating and in touch with our body and in a way that your symptoms, in my opinion, are always the body's way of saying I need a little help, I need a little support. Can you back me up on this? And that's a great system, right? That's a fire alarm telling us, hey, kind of smoky in here before the house is on fire. So why do we not listen to that? Or why has it become acceptable to sort of mute that fire alarm?

Speaker 3: 30:24

and not pay attention to what the body is really asking for. I think if you can communicate with yourself, mindset becomes really easy. And please don't get me wrong, I feel like if I was listening to someone say this when I was a sick patient, I would have said give me a break, I can't heal myself by thinking my way out of this. This girl's an idiot. That's probably what would have come up for me. It's just one piece of the puzzle and it's a really important piece that you're probably not going to get from your family practitioner or the average doctor. So just keep it on your radar. That's my encouragement.

Speaker 2: 31:07

In our notes. Before we started today, we had sent some notes back and forth and you talked about there's two things you mentioned in there which I think both of you are touching on when you're talking, and it was this idea of bed rotting and doom scrolling. And when you were just talking about, when you were talking about, yeah, and I was looking some of this up because I'm like, okay, I know what doom scrolling is, what the hell is bed rotting? So I'm looking it up, right, and I'm like, oh, okay, that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 31:33

And what I think is fascinating is this idea that we have these predispositions genetically that may exist for us, but here is a great example of how an environment, in staying within an environmental space, can flip them on, turn them off right, because that, to me, is what I think about when I think about bed rotting or doom scrolling and sitting in these spaces. So if you want to talk a little bit about that, ryan, cause this is I think it's putting some like new term technology, hip, hip words. I don't know, I don't. This must be a hip thing to say bed rotting now, okay, I know I'm old, I'm in my forties.

Speaker 3: 32:08

I don't know these things. Yeah, it's definitely like a younger term.

Speaker 2: 32:19

Yeah, all right. So let's talk about the genetic piece to this, though. Are you turning on something or being predisposed to factors by engaging in these types of environments and living in this way?

Speaker 3: 32:30

And this is not a new idea, but I will share it because every time I share it with a client I just get this sort of like mind blown. Gaze back to me. But the body is constantly looking for balance. Right, it's looking for homeostasis and as scientists, we understand this. It's, I wish was talked about maybe more commonly.

Speaker 3: 32:49

But when we're out of sync or symptomatic, we're dealing with one of two things, or maybe both a toxicity too much of something the body does not need, and a deficiency not enough, of something the body does need, and any type of imbalance. We often hear about nutritional deficiencies. We aren't really talking about environmental deficiencies, so this could be something simple, like a sunlight deficiency, or what about like a fresh air deficiency? We've talked a lot about vitamin D as a hormone that impacts not only our immune system but our circadian health, our brain function, the way our mitochondria respond to light. These are all really easy ways for us to improve our health. Now think about taking a human body that requires exposure to light, exposure to great, we'll say, fuel. So that would be like nutrients, minerals, all of the things that fuel the human body and instead putting it in a dark room with a little tiny blue light screen and confusing the heck out of your cells. It's kind of no wonder that everyone we know is dealing with some kind of symptom that they are searching for help on.

Speaker 3: 34:00

When we're talking about epigenetic modification, environment is critically important, just as you know, I think, say overriding genetic information, because it does not matter how brilliant your genetic code is, if you are living in a moldy home, you're going to eventually have some symptoms pop up. So everything from in my clean environment practices, we talk about things like tossing toxins, getting them out of your house so that you are not dealing with chemical inhalants. That's a great way to really inexpensive way to improve your environment. We talk about endocrine disruptors. What are they identifying them? A lot of people are talking about plastics and the way our food is packaged in plastics and how confusing that can be from an environmental standpoint. But let's also think about cleaning up our environment from an emotional stance, our stress levels, what we do to reduce our stress. I think bed rotting and doom scrolling are certainly examples of maybe ways that we are self-medicating and searching for some kind of maybe dopamine response or connection to community. But it is creating patterns that the body is not necessarily coded to interpret.

Speaker 1: 35:29

Well, you know, I was thinking about the environmental toxicity that you're just talking about. I've had so many people that have crossed my path, who have had jobs that influenced them, that are in touch with a lot of chemicals. You think about hairdressers, hairstylists. I had someone who was a swim instructor, swimming lessons for almost 30 years in a chlorine pool all the time. I had someone who was a mortician, an embalmer, you know, and For mild exposure, yeah, refuse to wear PPE, right, because why? Over time? And I was like, oh, this is why you know. So, if you even think about it, like if you do janitorial services or you're around heavy metals or foundry we've got a big foundry by us foundry workers like, consider your environment, consider at least trying to protect yourself from your environment. You know on these very, very basic levels.

Speaker 2: 36:36

Yeah, I, you know this takes me back to Ryan Terry and I did an episode that we called our dirty 30 and it was our 30th episode and we talked about 30 big things we have perpetuated like icky, horrific things as therapists right throughout all of our years, and one of mine was, um, the belief in sharing with people that like a little mold exposure isn't, isn't gonna do shit, right, like little mold never hurt anybody, right, and we worked in environments that were full of mold. Um, in the prison systems.

Speaker 2: 37:07

That is head-to Um, you can see yeah, and we would have staff that would sit in these um, they sit in these little bubbles and the bubbles are completely sealed off. I mean, it's, it's plexiglass all the way around you. Everything is sealed and locked. And our staff would spend hours of their days, of their I mean hundreds of hours of their lives, thousands of hours in these bubbles because it controlled all the doors to open all of the inmates' doors, all the doors to the wings where they lived. It was the electronic hub of the buildings and they'd be filled with mold and so people would spend thousands of hours in this mold-filled bubble, in this mole-filled bubble.

Speaker 2: 37:49

And it's an interesting thing to think about now, in hindsight, now that I know more about this, now that I understand this more. I have clients that come to me now that are from the correctional system, that this idea to them it's very foreign. To be able to say this to them, it doesn't really compute. And so, educating them and breaking it down a little bit, I had someone say, well, do I just need to leave my job? And I said you might have to, you might have to, like, we have to make really and I know that this is I'm going to go on a tangent for a second here.

Speaker 2: 38:23

But, like, a lot of functional medicine is about lifestyle, is about lifestyle. It's so much about lifestyle, right. And sometimes we have to make big decisions to change our fucking lifestyle or we're not going to get better. And I'm not saying it's the thing, right. I mean Terry and I both left Corrections after many, many, many, many years of being drained. I knew I wouldn't make it to retirement if I stayed. So I made a huge life choice that seemed impossible to walk away from that. And do I feel better? Absolutely. And are there about 100 other things now that I do along with that? Because it's just not the thing, just like genetic testing is not the thing.

Speaker 2: 39:08

But I think we have to get to spaces where we empower our clients, to get them to a space where they can look at. I might have to make some large lifestyle choices. I might have to completely change what I do for a living. I might have to leave my spouse. I might have to re-budget my life so that I can put some money into looking at healing myself. Okay, like these to me are big choices that that we make. So I said to this client I said you might have to look at doing something different. And all of a sudden the lights go off, like this is an implausible idea. Two, three, four months later they come back and they're like okay, I've been getting curious about this, like I'm living in mold all day. Yeah, you are.

Speaker 3: 39:56

And I think this really goes back to the idea that you know people will say all the time well, what's the big deal? People have been living in these old moldy buildings for a long time. I think one the way that you express we can actually look at genes and determine if you are someone who's going to be highly sensitive to mold and have a lot of trouble clearing it and so, while the other members of your family may be fine and you're not, this is definitely something worth considering. But I also think when what we're really seeing, if we zoom out and look at this from kind of a global illness approach, it may not be the mold, it may be the immune system, and the immune system is really. We're seeing these kind of overly responsive immune symptoms across the board. And what is that telling us? For me, that sounds like a threshold issue that we are being bombarded from multiple angles. And maybe 30 years ago a little bit of mold was not a big deal, but in today's world we're getting. The immune system is exhausted, it's tapped out, we're not giving it the resources it needs to support, and so we are seeing downstream insufficiencies and everything like mood, behavioral disorders, doom scrolling, feeling unmotivated or you or general, like the more traditional mold symptoms, nosebleeds, respiratory issues but at the end of the day, we need to evaluate the immune system and we need to evaluate the full body and the full health protocol, health routine, in order to understand that.

Speaker 3: 41:28

This is kind of why my company is called Habit Method and not Supplement Method is because I really think that the habits are the foundational building piece of how we do everything else in our life. And look, creating new habits is hard. There are a lot. There are books and books there's an entire section in Barnes and Noble is about habits. So obviously this is something that people really struggle to swap out, even when they have the information. Your I do now to implement new habits, but I remember what a struggle it was just to remember to do something small, integrating a new piece of a protocol or, even worse, stop doing something. That was muscle memory and I don't know if you guys remember this. I was a product. I was a 90s kid and I was a product of kind of like the Bath and Body works generation, where everything you know the candles and the body wash and it was. I thought people were crazy when they would tell me to stop using all of these chemicals. That was just one, really, um frustrating it's still a thing.

Speaker 2: 42:47

It's still a thing. Ask my 13 year old go look in her bedroom. It's disgusting. Every time I open the door I'm like, oh my God.

Speaker 3: 42:57

It really. I mean, and and people will ask me all the time like what? What do I think started these cascades? I mean, I think I was put on a series of pharmaceuticals that um could certainly contributed to to health, poor health outcomes, but I think my environment was definitely a factor. One of the earliest symptoms I remember having is stomach aches as a really little kid, maybe like in second or third grade, and they put me on Tums every day. I would just have Tums for like breakfast, lunch and dinner for a couple of years, and then I decided one year that I was just only going to eat ramen noodles, and so that was kind of my staple for years was like ramen noodles and peanut butter and jelly, and imagine a little growing body trying to um to fight off and have a strong immune system and, have you know, be in a clean environment when all I was giving were, you know, anti-nutrients. So when I really think about this from an environmental perspective, habits, key, um, multiple pieces to the puzzle and baby stepping in is pretty critical.

Speaker 2: 44:10

Yeah, yeah, so you started. Then Habit Method Health. Tell us about what that is.

Speaker 3: 44:16

You just mentioned it before, so Sure, yeah, I'm a complete accidental entrepreneur. I had no intention of being a practice owner. I was doing a lot of health coaching and helping people. It really started as patient advocacy. People would ask me hey, I am trying to figure out a way to talk to my doctor about such and such, and we'd really work on ways to communicate and from there it became a lot of education helping patients understand what they were after, what their goals were, helping to set a series of benchmarks for them to improve their health outcomes. Sometimes it was educating on foods, supplements, medical labs they might want to ask their doctor for and really enhancing communication.

Speaker 3: 44:58

I think one thing that's always a little shocking to me and we really have a need for is teaching people to communicate effectively with their doctor, and most of us at this point know the stats. Doctors have three to seven minutes once a year to sit down with you, do a physical, you're in and out before you've even thought of what you want to say to them. So figuring out. I used to attend doctor's appointments with clients regionally and it was always really shocking to me because when you can speak that language with the doctor and you can ask very efficiently, this is what we are looking for, and this is why could you help us do that? You get a completely different experience. Of course, there's going to be times where providers say no, I'm not comfortable with that and that's your obligation as a patient to decide. Is this time to find another, a second opinion, another provider, maybe somebody else that can join in the mix, or am I barking up the wrong tree and this is just a waste of my time because this provider is just not in line with the goals that I have for my own health and really taking that, being empowered and making informed decisions? When I became a certified nutrigenomic counselor, it was really because patients wanted to know where to start, and this was the best option I could give them where we weren't chasing our tails. We were building sort of this foundational understanding of how do they metabolize certain things, what options are going to be the biggest bang for their buck, and then maybe some things that we shouldn't waste time and money on, and it really helped us hone in and figure out exactly what are we solving for From there.

Speaker 3: 46:42

Habit Method has really been under since COVID, a massive evolution. I am sort of just along for the ride, and so we've worked with over 2,500 healthcare professionals at this point to help them integrate either passive revenue streams or determine how to get in touch with the types of clients they want. In this conversation We've talked a lot about the patient frustration, but there's definitely a burnout culture happening in MDs, dos, naturopaths, even health coaches are feeling this. So figuring out ways that we can offer information and education to the patient population really looking for this in a way that does not make a provider just want to punch themselves in the face, that's absolutely critical at this point, at this stage of the game, it's a necessary focus. And then, organically, we just sort of landed into helping businesses sort of figure out how to create better offers that deliver improved patient outcomes. And I've been so honored to be a part of some of these companies that are just looking for improvements in the healthcare system that can bring, let's say, resolution to kind of this medical merry-go-round we've all witnessed.

Speaker 2: 48:04

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 48:07

Well, I like the provider perspective right, focusing over there too, not just on the consumer perspective, because, I mean, jen and I are providers too and we are overtaxed and tired and all of the things right. And the deeper I get into my practice, the more complicated people are, like more complex physical health problems and mental health problems, and stacking of medications, and just people are very complicated. Now that has been a huge shift. Since when I first started in private practice, you'd see somebody with maybe one med or two. Sometimes right now, they're four, four meds, meds, five meds, and then plus health medication on top of mental health stuff, and it's like you know. Starting with these people is really difficult, and they are. They are, I was going to say, struggling, but they're suffering actually. Um, in this environment and I did want to circle back real quick because I wanted to kind of drive the point home about genetic testing isn't the end all be all. It's not the silver bullet that people are looking for, as evidenced by and I'm going to share my story of anxiety when I had it. The worst was when I was working in the I'll call it a toxic environment, not necessarily mold filled. Probably was, though, but other people right, this is when I was working in the I'll call it a toxic environment. Not necessarily mold-filled probably was, though. But other people right, this is when I was working for the state.

Speaker 1: 49:37

When I left, my anxiety remitted almost instantly. It was gone, like gone, okay. This is anxiety that I had every day for a half a year that I had never experienced before. If I were looking for the answer, like oh, what is the answer to my anxiety? Like why, why? Why am I having it? Why am I having it? And I was, like you know what? I got to get genetic testing done. That'll be that will tell me why I have anxiety.

Speaker 1: 50:05

I've had genetic testing done after that, and the big anxiety markers like COMT are non-existent for me. Like these big markers are non-existent for me, like these big markers are non-existent for me. Why did I have anxiety? Environmental factors.

Speaker 1: 50:19

You know people that I work with, so I would have been looking in the wrong rabbit hole to solve something that could have been well. It was helped by just leaving that environment right. Been well. It was helped by just leaving that environment right, making the big decision that Jen was talking about to change your life in a big way. Otherwise, you know, and I would have been medicated and stuck and still thinking like, oh, there must be something wrong with me that I have this amount of anxiety instead of there's something wrong in my environment that my body is saying, instead of there's something wrong in my environment that my body is saying, you know, help me, please get out of this. So, again, I would have looked genetically at that time and been, you know, befuddled and stumped if I wouldn't have been able to look at, like, this is an environmental problem for me, environmentally with the, with the work that I was doing, you know.

Speaker 3: 51:10

So that's. That's really why I say it's an expensive piece of paper if you don't have the right interpretation. You really need to know what are you looking at and what are you looking to solve. One thing I will say about genetic testing that I think is really beneficial and people sometimes overlook this is the fact that because it doesn't change, it is kind of like your user manual for life. I refer back to the same genetic test I had done gosh almost 15 years ago now when I'm looking for specific information or a detail that may be more relevant to me now, ethically moving into the direction of.

Speaker 3: 51:48

You know we could understand somebody from early years early developmental years, how to support them to avoid things like childhood ADHD, focus issues, frustration in school, maybe looking at fertility years, understanding how to help prevent some of the issues we're seeing now with diet, lifestyle, pharmaceuticals if needed, and then elder years and how to prevent, let's say, the early onset of degenerative brain disease.

Speaker 3: 52:14

So if we have that constant state of information, I think the real-time data becomes even more valuable. Your blood work becomes more valuable. It's really easy to start creating this multifactorial level of data collection. That's kind of what we're all after. We just don't always have it organized that way, and I think what's unfortunate are a lot of the companies that are really popular right now with genetic testing are great, really, really great at marketing and not really great at delivering information. So they're, they're testing, you know, three or five or maybe eight SNPs and expecting that to be some kind of life-changing delivery for people. Um, when really all it's it's meant to do is is create a binary association with a supplement you may or may not need.

Speaker 2: 53:04

Okay, so I'm glad I've, I'm glad you brought this up and I know we only have, you know, a little bit of time left, but I want you to touch on this the gaslighting of supplements. Okay, because, you're right, best marketing wins. Okay, and oftentimes how that will come to us that are taking just handfuls of amino acids that they just buy all over the damn place, right, like amino acid for this, amino acid for this, amino acid for this. And I'll sit down and I'm listening, right, and I'm like, okay, you got so much happening right now.

Speaker 2: 53:45

Like, where did you hear about this? Have you done some testing? Have you had your serotonin or dopamine levels done? Have you done a genetic testing? And they're just like, well, no, I saw an ad on TikTok and so I started buying these amino acids and I'm eating GABA by the pound and I'm just like, okay, okay. So can you spend just a couple minutes talking about cause I know that you have a role in some formulations as well for doing some supplement stuff Can you talk about that and real quickly, about what people should look for or just be cautious of when it comes to being gaslit by that marketing from supplements?

Speaker 3: 54:18

Yeah, and I don't know that there's necessarily like this. I probably don't have a cheat sheet available for everybody yet, but I would say, always proceed with caution, ask questions, ask the company. Don't be afraid to ask a company, even a provider grade company, for a certificate of authenticity you deserve. If you are going to spend your money on something, you deserve to know what's in it. And what's difficult right now is companies are using things like proprietary blends, which are a way for them to protect their formula. But as a consumer, it's really difficult for us to identify if we are sensitive to certain things, because it's sort of all blended together.

Speaker 3: 54:57

I also really encourage people to mimic nature, because if things are found in isolation in a supplement that are not found in isolation in nature, it's probably not doing what you think it's doing. So, for example, like um taking a single amino acid, it's not really the way it works in nature. I'd much rather suggest you have a great steak or a great um, eat a chicken off the bone, roast a beautiful chicken for dinner for your family. Um, I'm gonna get a lot of flack for saying this, but this is my truth and we are on the Gaslit podcast. So the most difficult people, I want to say the sickest people that I work with are usually vegans and vegetarians, and I oh, yeah, yeah, the depletions are, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 55:49

It's very difficult, especially in America, to get proper nutrition if you eliminate basically any food group, entire food group, and I do think that animal products possess a really interesting superpower we probably haven't yet tapped into.

Speaker 3: 56:06

I was, as I mentioned, an expert in ramen noodles and a peanut butter and jellyitarian for many years and so I will absolutely, to the day that I die, talk about how much influencing including animal products in my diet made a drastic change in my health, my hormones, my brain health. I do think that it's pretty critical, and what always blows me away is people are so willing to spend $60 a month on a collagen powder, um, from a brand that's posted all over TikTok shop, but they're not willing to, let's say, eat something other than boneless, skinless chicken breast, and this is really where what we think of as healthy. We've absolutely been gaslit about what foods are good for us and right for us, and glutamate and GABA in particular are really interesting pathway for me. We can do some genetic testing around this, but glutamate is a stimulant, right, I mean, it's a neurostimulant in the brain and it's meant to be there at the right dose at the right time. But when, in the presence of a particular gene mutation, it can be upregulated, and taking exogenous GABA can actually make, increase that glutamate response in the brain, making people feel kind of ping pong ball, anxious, distracted, ball, anxious, distracted and so I really don't recommend.

Speaker 3: 57:35

We see a lot of like L-glutamine being a popular supplement right now. L-glutamine is a derivative of glutamate and so if you are someone that's struggling with anxiety, that might be something to look at your supplements and decide. Is this contributing to this kind of upregulation that I feel, and sometimes it's the right thing at the wrong time. You're just not at a place in your health journey where this supplement is the right match for you and maybe try it again at another time. I would say company transparency is going to be key. Ask questions, get curious, and simple is always best, in my opinion. The closer you can get to nature, the better. If you can get most of this from your diet and really be wise about the food choices that you're making, I think we can really simplify supplement protocols and make people's lives easier.

Speaker 1: 58:28

Yeah, yeah, I love that Wonderful conversation, yeah, and I'm going to wrap this up by apologizing for how crappy my microphone is today, so sorry if you all stayed with us this far. Usually it's not quite as bad, but anyway. So thank you again for coming on the show. Ryanyan, it was a pleasure talking to you. Yes, right.

Speaker 2: 58:55

Where can people find you, ryan?

Speaker 3: 58:57

um, instagram is habit method health and uh website habit method healthcom. We have some information there and I just love organic conversation, so feel free to send us a message and let us know how we can be helpful you can nerd out.

Speaker 2: 59:11

Feel free for organic conversation, we'll nerd out, all right. Well, thanks for coming on the show. Everyone thanks for listening to the Gaslit Truth Podcast. You know you can find us anywhere that you listen to podcasts. We're also on all of the things the Facebook, the Instagram and, if you want, you can send us an email of your gaslit stories at the gaslit truth podcast at gmailcom. And thanks everybody for joining us today.