Root Cause Healing, Ayurveda, Functional Medicine, and Your Responsibility as the Patient

What if chronic illness is not just something to manage, but something to better understand?

In this episode of Beyond My Diagnosis, Michele welcomes back Cindi Acree, RN, a lifelong nurse, educator, and integrative health advocate. With decades of experience in neonatal medicine and advanced nursing practice, Cindi has seen firsthand how Western medicine excels at acute care. But she also recognized its limitations when it comes to prevention, root cause healing, and long term vitality.

After retiring from clinical practice, Cindi expanded her education into Applied Positive Psychology, Integrative and Functional Medicine, Yoga, and Ayurveda, the 5,000 year old sister science to yoga. She now blends biomedical knowledge with complementary and functional approaches to support sustainable health.

This episode is a powerful reminder that doctors do medicine, but patients take care of patients.

In this conversation, you will hear about:

• The difference between biomedicine and integrative medicine
 • Ayurveda and the three doshas, vata, pitta, and kapha
 • Agni, the digestive fire, and why food combinations matter
 • Ama, toxins in food, water, air, and daily products
 • Ojas, vitality and resilience
 • Functional medicine pillars, sleep, hydration, stress, and movement
 • Why elimination diets can uncover hidden triggers
 • The dangers of unregulated supplements
 • Vitamin B12 excess and unintended consequences
 • The microbiome and antibiotic recovery
 • Forest bathing, grounding, and restorative movement
 • Appreciative inquiry and positive reframing
 • The power of coaching and asking better questions

Cindi shares practical examples of root cause investigation, including cases where symptoms that looked like autoimmune disease were actually nutritional deficiencies or supplement overload.

This episode is not about rejecting medicine. It is about expanding the lens. It is about asking better questions. It is about understanding your role in your own healing journey.

Because it is your body.

Transcript

0:00

(Music) Hello, welcome to Beyond My Diagnosis with me, your host, Michelle Weston. And it's Wellness Wednesday and I love bringing you a new guest, a new expert, a new patient, someone who reflects why I created Beyond My Diagnosis, which is those of us who are living with a chronic condition, who are living with a chronic condition. Know that there are things that the patient is responsible for. Doctors do medicine. Patients take care of patients because it's your body, not their body. And we love medicine, but you as the patient have a responsibility to do the things that you can make a difference with. And I try and bring on people who are learning new ways to use nutrition and physical activity, are you VEDA, yoga therapy, any of those tools for people living with neurological conditions, living with diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, and numerous things that don't kill you, but really compromise your quality of life. So I've asked Cindi Acree to come on today again, because Cindi is a nurse in Ohio and she has been with in the Cleveland, Cincinnati area for a long time. And many decades she's been a nurse making a difference. In fact, now she is a professor teaching nurses to become better nurses. Cindi, what's up? Hey, Michelle, so nice to join you today and talk about all the possibilities that people have to learn to take care of themselves. Thank you. And I have spent my whole career in many decades in the allopathic Western medicine mindset of a pill for every ill and then another pill for all the side effects and it goes on and on and on. Anyway, so when I retired early in 2020 because of COVID, I have my bucket list and I started on things that I wanted to learn and one was teaching yoga. So I'm a yoga teacher and yin yoga is a fabulous form of yoga. It's not acrobatic, you don't have to worry about your position, your pose, keeping up with somebody else. It's just relaxing your connective tissue and nourishing your joints, holding poses, etc. for three to four minutes. And then it's a very relaxing type of yoga. It sounds to me like we call it here restorative yoga. Yeah, that's a form. Yeah. So yin is another branch of restorative yin yoga where we're just, we're not hitting positions really hard and going from one to another. We're going gently and kindly to our bodies for 45, 50 minutes. Because I'm certified also to teach core power vinyasa yoga where you're on the lookout for students not being in the right pose or position or body alignment because you don't want to get injured. Oh, I love that. What a thought, huh? Yeah, it's not that the instructors being nervous Nelly or anything. It's like we don't want anyone to get injured. We want people to be relaxed. We want yoga to, you know, it means community, you know, just being together and deep breathing and personal awareness. Anyway, so in my yoga training, one of the persons did a Ayurvedic session. It's A-Y-R-E-V-E-D-I-C. It's the sister science to yoga. Oh, interesting. That's how they talk about it is it's a sister science. Yes, and it's I just call the Vedic's. Now, some of my friends when I say now the Vedic's recommend and they'll say, well, that's 5000 year old stuff. They're all dead body. No, I would go with the old stuff. Thank you. I'm like, well, they had true, you know, research in the, you know, individual human body, human container type of research. They wanted to be able to sit and meditate longer. So they had to figure out how to stretch, how to eat properly, those types of things in order to sit and meditate longer. Anyway, so I have been hardcore pathophysiology, you know, physiology, how the body works, pathophysiology, things go array. And then, you know, disease and how to treat it. And my scope of practice has been in maternal, fetal, neonatal medicine. So all about reproduction, babies developing, and then babies that are sick, they come out, they don't get the email, come in or sign, it's up to you, kid. We need to do it. You know, you don't have a placenta on a mom anymore. And some of them are just ill-equipped and it's just a race to the finish trying to figure out what they're trying to tell us, how to figure them out. Wow. So oftentimes the babies are a result of, you know, the mother and all, you know, and then we also bring stuff, you know, down through the generations with our ancestors through our genes. Yep. Anyway, so I, you know, hardcore, you know, diagnostic, treating, those types of things. And then getting the kids and moms and dads all together and then out the door they go. Anyway, so I started learning the aerovetics because it was so interesting because it's the way the basic human body is set up. You know, they talk about having, you know, three different dosha's, if you will. Okay. And, you know, the pitot- That's D-O-S-H-I. D-O-S-H-A. Dosha, D-O-S-H-A. So it's pitot, which is like fire, and that's very prominent in, especially menopause. Oh. And then vata, which is more wind and cold, and then kapha, which is more fat and juicy and anxious and those types of things. So we all have all three of these dosha's, but it's good to know how to, you know, keep them in balance. And then, and you can even, you know, go on to Google, you know, what is the Ayurvedic, you know, remedy for indigestion, you know, and it'll tell you, oh, there'll be ginger and yingy or, you know, some natural things, not pepto-bismol or, you know, all of the stuff in it. Over-the-counter stuff. Yeah. When you look at, yeah. So you have your different dosha's. Then they also talk about the importance of the balance between, you know, keeping your dosha's balanced. And then they also talk about the importance of your digestive fire, which is food combinations and how it's not good to combine, for instance, fruit with anything else and cheese and beans. And you know, there's a whole, and you can look this up, you know, online or whatever. And then they talk about the Agni, which is your digestive fire. So you don't want to be drinking ice cold anything while you're trying to digest food because you don't want ice cold water on the digestive fire. Because it shocks it. It goes, you know, zeros it out. So the Agni, you know, is very important. And then they talk about Ama, which is the toxins. And that's what gets so many people sink, you know, in our day and age. It's the toxins that are in our water, in our air, in our food. And I know, plus or minus, what everybody thinks about, you know, RFK Jr. And you know, Always have some good things, you know, make America healthy again. The Mahal. Okay. And you can be healthy again, right? Exactly. It's like, because look at how much we spend and look at our quality of life. It doesn't make sense. The Blue Zones, those are another group of people that they do, you know, olive oil and fish. They have a whole different diet and that's a whole nother domain. You can look at, you know, when you're talking about Agni and food combinations and those kinds of things, there are tons of different diets that people can use. And then also there's a concept called an elimination diet, which is where you take out the big food groups of dairy and, you know, corn and grains and all that type stuff. And then you reintroduce them. And then if you have a reaction, then you know, well, my body's not happy with that anymore. It will have, you know, sensitivities, intolerance, and then allergic reactions. So with the food, you know, it's like they talk about, you know, every one person talked about every time you have something on the end of the fork going into your mouth, you're either preventing or promoting disease. Really? So it's like the power of food and then all the stuff that's in the food. I mean, after World War II, you know, they had to, you know, all the stuff for all the millions of people. Yeah. Okay. So with AMMA, you have it in food, you have it in water, you have it in your air, you have it in your cleaning products for your house, your personal hygiene, your deodorant, your hair spray, the soap you use, you know, there's even a thing about, you know, the shower head, you know, getting that, you know, purified to have better, you know, approach to getting rid of the AMMA. But that is so important. And all this combines to promote what they call the OJOS, which is O-J-A-S, and that's your vitality, your, you know, esprit de corps, being able to, you know, really enjoy life. I love it. So, and so I've, you know, pursued Ayurvedic, which are fascinating, and it's a way to peel back the onion and figure out how people got into whatever disease or... Disease, which I love. That's a very Ayurvedic. Dis-ease. Instead of saying disease, dis-ease means the system is off. Because what happens is your digestive tract, you have a very permeable or like all those little connections in your gut opens up. Okay. And so some of the stuff that should be just going on down and out, it gets into your bloodstream. Well, then your immune system, which is so powerful and keeps it alive, it attacks it. But then you have a concept called molecular mimicry, where, oh, this stuff, whatever it is, kind of looks like the pancreas. So the autoimmune, the immune system is going to start attacking the pancreas as well, because it appears that it's foreign. So you get diabetes or any type of the joints or circulatory system, whatever. So people can get into a lot of disease just from what they're eating, the combination of all the toxins. It's just like a body burden of all these types of different things. So what I, and then also I've, because I'm in Cincinnati and it's everything's so conservative, I decided to start studying functional medicine for nursing and nutrition for nursing. Very cool. Yes. And it's with the Institute of Functional Medicine. And they have a whole approach of looking at what the issue is. And it's all about working on good sleep. It's like seven to eight hours. It's exercise 150 to 190 minutes a week. Good hydration, which is at least 64 ounces. The goal is half your weight in ounces of water. And then the stress management. So whatever you can do for stress management, be it, I've been doing a lot of journaling lately being added the paper and then putting it through the shredder. Perfect. A very good idea. It's a very good idea. It's like, that's like, it's gotten you said what you need to say. Done. Yeah, exactly. All the foul language, you know, whatever, whatever, but nobody's ever going to see it. But just that act of doing something with that emotion, which it's like, you need motion to work out the emotion. So right, the law, right, you know, journal, meditation, deep breathing, any of that type stuff helps. But the cardiovascular system gets into trouble because, you know, we have wonderful bodies, wonderful human containers, but it's still designed to respond to stress to keep us safe. So our system can't tell if it's a Tyrannosaurus Rex or a woolly mammoth facing us or a not so nice boss or someone that's just cut us off in traffic, you name it, fill in the blank, whatever, you know, gets your blood boiling, so to speak. Our system can't tell the difference. So you crank out all these hormones, cortisol and epinephrine and all these different things to mount the response. Well, if you're not doing something, taking a walk, right, you know, doing something with all those hormones and they will, you know, the catacombs, the things that are, you know, designed to keep you safe, to get you out of whatever dilemma you might be in, you have to do something to get rid of them so that they don't build up. So if they keep circulating in your body, your blood vessels are like, "Hey, man, we need to do something about this." And so plaque starts forming along our vessels. So it's like we, you know, end up with atherosclerosis and heart disease and high blood pressure and all that type stuff. So the whole concept of just trying to, you know, stay in balance and, you know, rest well, a good food plan, I don't even use the word "viet" because what are the first three letters, you know? We hate it. It's ridiculous. We always think a food plan. Yeah, it's a food plan. Yes. And then... Or I have some nutritionists who call it a nutrition plan. A nutrition plan. Or a nutritional living. That's another one. And it's like, you know, some people, you know, just absolutely, you know, do not like, you know, changing food or whatever, but because it's like, "Oh, fast food is so convenient." And da, da, da, da, da. And I said, "How convenient is it to be miserable and have to wait a month or two to see a doctor? How convenient is it to keep, you know, beating your body and have to get a joint replacement or surgery and it's going to be three or four months and your, you know, daily uncomfortableness, you know, continues?" So I always try to, you know, just stay in balance and I encourage other people, you know, to do it as well. Because we have the ability to, you know, heal ourselves and we have all the answers inside us. Within us, which you and I discuss all the time. We do. We have the ability. But she and I have studied coaching and especially both of us love positive psychology, positive leadership because you want to partner with somebody and you want to reflect to them and say and ask them questions that may elicit a more powerful response that somebody would go,"Oh, I ought to do it. I never thought I knew that or I could do that." It's like, well, blah, blah, blah. So it's always nice to have someone who can reflect, right? Right. And we as coaches, we work on asking the best possible questions that are evoking and generating where we go beyond the conscious, you know, mind, the monkey or, you know, what, infernal, you know, battle person or, you know, whatever you want to call it. So you ask these questions that goes past your, you know, defense mechanisms and then the true answers come from within. So you know, coaching is very, very good avenue. And so with the chronic illness, it's like trying to figure out, I always look at it as people either have had too much or not enough of something and it could be a whole host of things and then trying to unravel it. And you know, if you can catch disease progression early enough, you can, you know, backtrack it. But then if people are far, you know, into the disease process, you can't reverse, but you can at least make their symptoms a little bit more manageable. And everybody's chemistry set is different. Everything, you know, it's like intolerances of different things as we get, you know, older and that type stuff is different. So it's just, you just have to be self-aware and pay attention and network or get the power of the professional. I find that the DO, the doctors of osteopathy... Which I love. Yeah, much better because they aren't schooled in every single diagnosis and, you know, I mean, they are in a way, but they're more on health promotion. Yes. And the type of... My pain management person is a DO, which I really like. Yes. So, and it's just a fascinating world of, you know, just working with the things that, your grandma used to tell you, you know, as far as eat your greens, eat your... Excuse me. You know, you have a good food plan, drink your water, stay away from the alcohol that's like poison, the caffeine, all those, you know, things that are kind of crutches for people. Just work on better sleep and more water and those types of things and that'll keep up your energy. Supplements is a whole other ball game. It's like the FDA made a huge mistake, I think, in my opinion, of not regulating supplements. So anybody can put out anything. And I look at the backs of the vitamins and that type of stuff and there's, you know, 5,000 times the amount of vitamin B12, for instance. And I'm like, really? Well, you're not going to absorb all that, but do people really need all that? And what's that doing to their, you know, system? I know of a gentleman that had his family, his father had prostate cancer and his PSA blood sample was going up. Okay. And he was having symptoms of prostate problems and he was worried about, you know, and I'm thinking, well, I can look up and see what, you know, some of the other types of things that cause, you know, what they call benign prostate hypertrophy or just a big prostate causing problems. And come to find out he was taking a five hour energy drinks. He's a nice person. Can we discuss this though? My husband likes them. What the heck? Don't do it. It's like it's... What did you find out? Tell me what you found out because I would love to. No, no, no. I asked him, could you please take that out of your diet? Could you please take out these, you know, gazillion milligrams of vitamin B12, especially, out of your, you know, take vitamins, you know, that don't have all this. Now, there's a fine science of what we call the first pass. When you're taking things in through your mouth and GI system, the IV is straight into your system, but then you don't know how much you're going to absorb and then there's a science of, you know, what you should have with or without things, you know, going through your system and eating at different times. So, this individual took out all this ex-survivor B12 and his prostate is very happy. Yes, they made him. How simple was that, right? Well, that's just it. I had another person, my cousin, for instance, her daughter was a vegetarian and she was asking for prayer for her because she was having all these neurological systems and they were thinking that she might have multiple sclerosis. And I'm like, really? You know, so I said, well, you know, get some things checked out. You know, low vitamin D levels are very easy to, you know, help people get, you know, back to a normal level. Vitamin B12, especially vegetarians, they don't have as much. She started being a pescatarian and putting fish in her diet and then taking vitamin B and she's back to perfect health. But could you imagine if she didn't get the appropriate professional advice of looking at these root causes versus just going, oh, well, you're going to have, you know, multiple sclerosis or, you know, whatever and here's some medicine and goodbye and good luck. It's like, no, no, no, no, go to somebody that's going to look at root cause, peel back the, you know, leaves of the onion and layer of the onion and figure out what is the root cause of this problem. Yeah. And I agree with you. I think that, you know, when we can look at it, I have, I'm fortunate and I think you feel the same way. When you have good teachers, when you have good people who can guide you, not just teachers, but guides, my holistic pharmacist is like that. And he has, he and his wife, Elena have two pharmacies called Vita Health Pharmacy. He works a great deal holistically. So my supplements and even things like, I was talking about this yesterday, even things like probiotics, you don't take the same probiotic for years or months. You take a probiotic for a specific issue many times. So let's go here. If you are on antibiotics, depends on what antibiotic you're taping, Dave would say, let's do this one while you're taking the antibiotic. While you're taking, he didn't say, take this for the month. He said, while you're taking this antibiotic, let's help your gut, which is our second brain. Just have a little ease because Cindi, I know, um, antibiotics are very hard on the body. They're just, they do what they're supposed to do. You really know what they do, right? But you know, they just stir up the universe. Microbiome, the gut microbiome is totally destroyed. It's wrecked. So, you know, yogurt, kefir, um, you know, any of the fermented foods, you know, try to be populated, you know, when you do have antibiotics, just offset. And with UTIs, even with the UTI, I'll come in and I get them a lot because that's one of my symptoms when I developed MS. We go through things. Sometimes it's sacroblarity. Sometimes he changes it to one that's refrigerated. Sometimes he changes one that's shelf stable, but don't just go into, and I'm not hitting them. I'm not mad like a Walgreens or Walmart or a GNC. Make sure that you are doing the homework to see, do you need, like Cindi was talking about, do you need more B12? Maybe you don't need more B12. Maybe you're just doing it because your friend Joe is doing that. Takes a time for you, especially when one is living with a chronic condition, to do blood work. My girlfriend was surprised when I said,"I have blood work done at least four times a year because I have a chronic illness and I may be taking a lot of D3 and I've been taking it a lot with neurological patients. We need more D3." Most people do, but especially with people with neurological. I need to make sure it doesn't get toxic. If I'm not letting my biomedical team make sure, even your NP, just say, "Can you just run B12 for me? Can you just run and see how my calcium? Can you just run and see how my iron is?" You may not need it at all, or you may need less than you need, or you may need more. But if nobody who has done the work to figure out what we know from Arduvada, what we know from 5,000 years of things, you may be making choices that become toxic, like what Cindi said. Here, this guy had this situation, but all you had to do was adjust something that's simple. He had started a new medicine. It wasn't like he had to start going to have more and more tests. It was an adjustment. Our bodies tell us something. When you listen to your body, because it's your body. I'm going to say it like 5 million zillion times, you're all going to roll your eyes. Doctors do medicine. Nurses do medicine. They do medicine. It's called biomedicine. It's biologically medicine. So then we have integrative medicine, complementary medicine. If you're not looking to say, "What's my responsibility with this chronic condition? What do I do for myself as the patient?" How am I able to respond responsibly? And respond, thank you. I like that you connected those two words. Because if you don't understand, how are you able to respond? Because it's your responsibility. It's your body. We never hand bodies over. That's what we developed HIPAA. You have rights. You don't just do what the lemmings do and just fall off the cliff. You ask questions. So we know that there are really good things. I've been using supplements for 25 years, but I've gone off supplements and I've added supplements and I sometimes take it and then for months or years, I don't take it. So be wise because it's your body. How long would you like to have the best quality of life? I mean, nobody wants to have a chronic condition, but in America today, we have most people, not all, but I'm going to say most, I think Cindi would agree, have more than one chronic condition. Yeah, I think it's around 60% of the American population. Thank you. That's great for me to know too. 60%. So that's more than 50, guys. You have to look at that. Pooh-poo that physical activity doesn't make your quality of life better. I didn't say you had to do what Cindi does, which I love. I'm jealous. She goes and runs marathons. She does walking marathons, running marathons. She travels the country with a group of women who do this because they enjoy it. They do this together. But she likes that. Me, I go to Pilates. Cindi may not even be interested in Pilates. I do that for cross-training. See? There you go. But for me, with core strengths and getting up and down and having balance issues and stability issues with drop foot, it is brilliant for me. So everyone has the opportunity to find out what they want there to do, what their body responds positively to. I enjoy this. I still say the same story about my girlfriend, Tammy. She hated the gym as much as I did. I hate exercise. Exercise. And she didn't enjoy riding the bike at the gym and blah, blah, blah, and using the, you know, the recumbent bike and so forth or using the treadmill. But it took her... She was a bariatric patient. She... More than 20 years ago, she lost over 130 pounds. So she's kept it off. She got involved with a bike group. They go ride around in, you know, Westchester, in wherever she is, and she can do like 20, 30 miles. She loves it. Didn't like being on a recumbent bike or a treadmill, but loved that. And it took her a long time to find what physical activity she would enjoy. Nature is so refreshing and just nurturing for us, you know, and grounding. Just walking around outside without shoes on, you know, with the grass and the earth. Then there's forest bathing where you go through, you know, trees and forests and just look at how magnificently they're built and constructed. And then something can be lobbed off from a lightning storm, but they just keep on growing, you know? Yeah. And nature is very good. But you... Yeah. And don't you... Once you say that also, you know, I also tell people meditation doesn't have to be formal. You have to cross your legs, lay down, do a chakra thing. I enjoy it. Cindi may enjoy it, but you may not. That may be like, "Oh, I can't stand it." You taking a walk in nature, a walk, not a run, not a jug, taking a walk makes a difference. You're in the chloroform. You're in the green. You're with what surrounds us. Enjoy that. It takes your whole like blood pressure down. It gives you a second to just regroup. That could be five, 10 minutes. It doesn't have to be 50 minutes. But sometimes knowing that and learning that could help you have a better quality of life, right? Right. Absolutely. You know, and learning about nutrition. No, do you have to go cold turkey and not use food that's over processed or preservatives, you know, with preservatives? I'm not going to say that you're going to just flip a switch, but start reading labels. Start looking. The first five ingredients better not have sugar in it, better not have something that you can't even pronounce the name of. Okay? That's what your body's supposed to do with that. Yep. And so those are the things as a person and as somebody who has a chronic illness, we can help ourselves. And I'm not trying to be a show off, but I can say at this point after 25 years, my expertise is to offer people ways to help themselves. Right? Yep. And you go through things, you know, leaving a career. That's a big life change. You know, even though you can fill up your days, you may want to really look at what do I want to do? How do I want to participate? And I think that people like Cindi who come from medicine, who have crossed over into complementary and integrative tools and looked backwards at Ayurveda, my husband's a Buddhist, he has the ability to just calm his system because he looks at the world differently. I love that. I feel very fortunate that we have lots of different ways to do things. So explore, explore and take what Cindi and others I bring to the show here on Beyond My Diagnosis every week and consider there are ways I could start learning about ways to help myself journaling. You don't have to just journal. You could record it. There are apps that you can set up that instead of writing it, you just start talking and you have the ability to share it that way. Whatever works for you. But Cindi and I and others have taken the time to figure out what can I do for me? And it's your journey. And on that note, Miss Cindi, I love, you know, checking in with you. She's off to Sedona, Arizona to do another walk with friends. And you guys let me know what you guys have found that you love. I will make sure that when you're listening to this, we also post some of Cindi's favorite Ayurvedic sites and other things that are integrative and complementary that she loves because I think she's a good resource for me and for others. But, you know, every week I want to be able to bring people really good tools and strategies. And both Cindi and I are coaches, but we coach differently. And I like that we do that because not everybody wears, you know, high heels. Sometimes you wear flats and sometimes you need a person who comes at it from a different perspective. So Cindi, thank you so much for coming on and have a great trip. I'll check in with you on the other side. Thanks, Michelle. Oh, what a pleasure. I am happy to report without any chronic illness. I take no prescriptions. I just do supplements, good food plan, practice what I preach. And motion is lotion. And just, you know, keep on keeping on positive mental attitude. Instead of frustration, it's opportunity. Instead of people being fill in the blank whatever bad word you want to use, just people have human faults and they have strengths and you're just not seeing what their strengths are. So just... At that moment, you're just seeing that, you know, everybody has their stuff and... No, just reframing, staying positive. Very important. And how do we talk... And also, Cindi's been one of my mentors and how do we talk to each other when we're meeting, how do we talk to each other when we're frustrated with how somebody else is saying something or asking us to do something. And there's ways, and I'll make sure she gives me some of those resources, on how we communicate. So I've been very fortunate because how we use words makes a difference. Absolutely. Right? Word, create, world. Absolutely. Yes. And I have a quote from David Cooper-Rider who's a PhD prepared professor at Case Western that created the whole world of appreciative inquiry where you're just focusing on the positives. Sure, there's negatives and, you know, there is, you know, get bombarded with negativity all the time, but if you focus on the positive and strengths and, you know, looking positive for the future with hope, things are a lot cheerier and your system pays attention, you know? It really does. And on that note, you know, really, she just said to you, she doesn't have chronic conditions, but she's been in this field for such a long time. She has moved through biomedicine, being a nurse, working with doctors, working in hospitals, working with patients. To now, she has incorporated all these tools that are complementary. And as she just said, where she is as a 50-something, like, you know, I am, we're doing well. Knock on wood. We continue to do that because we do good things for ourselves. It starts here. You start with yourself. Absolutely. Thanks, Cindi. You're welcome. Take care. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Beyond the Diagnosis. Something we talked about today resonated with you. If you're craving deeper understanding, better support, we just want to know you're not alone on this journey. Make sure to subscribe to my free substack at michelleweston.substack.com. That's where I share personal insights, expert takeaways, and extra resources to help you stay informed, empowered, and one step closer to the clarity you deserve. And if you found this episode helpful, leave a review or share it with someone who needs to hear it. Your voice helps this message go further. Until next time, keep asking questions, keep trusting yourself, and keep going beyond the diagnosis.