The Health Hunt: Real Healing Journeys, Everyday Wellness & Expert Tips

Ep 14 - When Doctors Say “This Is Forever": Finding a Turning Point After a Chronic Illness Diagnosis with Debbie Roppo

• Sandi Magder and Daniel Schuman • Episode 14

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Hearing "this is forever" after a diagnosis can feel devastating. In this conversation with board-certified health and wellness coach, Debbie Roppo, she shares what happened after the initial shock of her rheumatoid arthritis diagnosis, including mindset and practical changes that marked the beginning of her healing turning point

This is part 2 of our 3-episode conversation with Debbie. If you're new, start with Episode 13 to hear her full diagnosis story

Debbie was told her rheumatoid arthritis was a life sentence. She was warned that her future would only decline. But today, she’s living proof that a diagnosis does not always get the final word

In this episode, Debbie shares the real steps she took after being diagnosed with autoimmune disease, including the functional medicine approach that helped her look beyond symptom suppression and start asking deeper questions about root causes and lifestyle triggers

We talk about the changes that made the biggest difference including nutrition, movement, stress, mindset, and why the mind-body connection became the true turning point in her recovery and remission journey

What You’ll Hear in This Episode

  • Debbie’s simple explanation of functional medicine vs traditional medicine
  • The lifestyle shifts that helped her calm inflammation naturally
  • Why she believes the mental and emotional piece is often the hardest part
  • How thoughts and stress create real physiological changes in the body
  • Early warning signs and learning to listen to your nervous system
  • The power of language: “I was diagnosed with…” vs “I have…”
  • How identity shapes chronic pain, healing, and long-term health outcomes

This conversation is especially meaningful for anyone navigating:

  • Rheumatoid arthritis
  • Chronic pain/chronic illness
  • Stress, inflammation, and nervous system regulation
  • Patient advocacy and taking ownership of your health journey

Even though Debbie’s story centers on RA, this episode is about something universal: the “now what?” moment that comes after ANY diagnosis

Connect with Debbie

Debbie is a board-certified health and wellness coach and founder of The Inner Empire, where she helps women build sustainable health, energy, and resilience from the inside out

Text us your thoughts, questions, or takeaways. We read every message.

All views, opinions, and commentary expressed on The Health Hunt Podcast are solely those of the hosts. They are shared in a personal capacity and do not represent the views, policies, or positions of any current or former employer, including any organizations with which the hosts may be professionally affiliated.

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What Happens After the Diagnosis? (The Healing Turning Point Begins)

Sandi Magder

Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Health Hunt Podcast. A human, humble, and sometimes humorous exploration of how to level up your health. This is part two of our conversation with board-certified health and wellness coach Debbie Rope. In part one, we sat in that moment that so many people know. A diagnosis stops you in your tracks. And you have to figure out now what. Today we pick up right where things start to shift. What Debbie did next. How her story moved from fear into action. We'll talk functional medicine, the lifestyle changes that helped her body calm down, and the important mind-body piece that took her from doing all of the things to truly healing. This is the transformational, uplifting, light at the end of the tunnel part of the story. So if you're in need of some feel-good talk, and I think we all are, get comfy and enjoy. But as you know by now, the Health Hunt Podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only. We're not medical professionals, and nothing shared should be considered medical advice. Always consult your healthcare provider before making changes to your health. Now please enjoy part two of our interview with the inspiring Debbie Rope. So here's where I really wanted

The First Changes: Food, Movement, and Listening to the Body

Sandi Magder

to get into, first of all, because I know the outcome. So it's, you know, I want you to walk us through what then happened and how you got to where you are today, because it's it's a great story, and I think it will be helpful for people to hear it. Yeah.

Debbie Roppo

Uh when I learned about functional medicine and I started to find what and and what functional medicine is, uh, think of it this way. Uh, for the people that are listening that might not really understand it, I love analogies. I love stories. So it's if you're driving down the road in a car and the red light is flashing, danger, danger, right? On in your car. And you pull into the mechanic shop and he opens up the hood and he just cuts the wire. And no longer is the red light flashing and sends you on your way, which is a a bit what traditional medicine does when it comes to just suppressing a symptom, right? Uh, in functional medicine, we get under the hood. Why is that light flashing? And that's what I really started to question. Why was my body attacking itself? What was going on for me? And again, it's going to be different for everybody. Uh, but I found that I started changed my diet. I did a lot of things with that. I stopped drinking alcohol. Um, uh, I did, you know, drink off and on for a while. Now I'm completely, I just don't at all anymore, just because now I'm in my, I'm almost 60 years old. I'm certainly don't need to be hurting my body in that way. Though I'm not saying people should drink or not drink, that's up to you. But I so I really changed my diet. For me, getting off of gluten was a miracle. I, it dramatically shifted how I felt right away. I don't think it does that for everybody. Um I really started to focus on healthy, what fed my cells, healthy fats, different things like that. I also went into movement to change how I was moving. I was doing a lot of workouts that were damaging, really aggressive workouts. And then I just really got into yoga and stretching and being a lot more gentle with my body, uh,

The Missing Piece: Why the Mental & Emotional Work Mattered Most

Debbie Roppo

honoring it more. And I got to about 75% where I felt, wow, I feel like really, oh my gosh, this is great. I'm doing really, really well. And I just couldn't get that next piece. Um, and that's where the mental piece came in. That's when I realized, wait a minute, I've got something going on. The physical side was for me easy. Cause like I said, I'm a buffalo. Are you kidding me? Give me a list, boom, bum, bomb. I'm gonna be, I'm just gonna do it. And I'm extremely self-disciplined. Once I decide something, it's it's a decision. And so I was, it was easy for me to kind of do the physical side of it, but the mental side of it, when I started to learn that every thought I had was a chemical cocktail going into my body, how my cells listened to how I spoke and what I experienced, that was a whole different ball game because for 40 years, I was 42, however old I was, I was cruel. I was brutal to myself. I and when I started to become aware of that and started to explore that side of it, that to me was the most challenging part. A lot of people think it's the physical side, but it wasn't for me. It was how do I, how in the world do you change your mind? Like, how do you stop being mean to you? How do you, and I didn't even realize how mean I was until that awareness came in. I remember researching this and I was like, wow, well, I'm not, I'm not really, I'm not that bad. I don't really say mean things to myself until I started paying attention. And I was like, holy crap, you are so mean to yourself. You're so brutal. Uh, and that piece was huge. And so that was the really the last piece. And then the consistency of being okay with 80-20, not needing to be perfect, being more gentle with myself. Um, I I'm not on any medication. I've never been on any medication. I don't have any um problems. Uh, and it's been it's been a long journey, and it's a lot of ups and downs and learning. Uh, but that's it's really been the physical with food, movement, and then that huge piece of the mind-body part.

Sandi Magder

Yeah. That's, I mean, we've had we've talked about this too. I don't know if I mentioned, actually, I worked with Debbie for about six months where she was my health coach. And so we did all of the things with, you know, food and all of those things,

Chronic Pain, Stress, and the Mind-Body Connection

Sandi Magder

but the biggest component is the mental side. And the personal development journey that I have been on started maybe two, three years ago from a place of understanding how much it contributed to my healing. Because I'm someone who was kind of doing like all the things, and same thing where I get to a ceiling. And the way that I envision it, it's almost like there's like a gigantic cinder block above you that you can't poke through. And that cinder block is the emotional component, which makes sense because it's like, think about it, in your head. And I don't mean in your head like you made it up. I mean it's like it's in your mind. So that, you know, and and I've been, again, I have 30 years of rewiring to deal with. So it's and I didn't start right away, but I always knew, and I could, this is why I'm so sort of such a believer in the mind-body component, at least in my case, because I remember when it came on. And it came on at a time I was a very high-pressure kid. I I put crazy expectations on myself to the point where like I was scared to get one thing wrong on a spelling test. And I was trying to get into Harvard, and I was, it was my last year of high school, and my body was like, we can't do this anymore. And I had had all kinds of illnesses leading up to that, but clearly they they went away or they weren't enough to get me to stop. And so I'm a pretty firm believer that that is a catalyst. And even then, I I remember knowing even when there were good days or better days, right around exams, my entire body would stop. It would seize up. I couldn't get out of bed. And it was that because an exam is a giant porn of point of failure, right? If you've had a really amazing school year, that those final exams could make or break you. And so the mental side of that, and again, we'll have people on and we'll talk more about this. But I'm, you know, I I I love talking to them about this. And I it it's I love hearing that you had sort of a similar experience and that you were doing all the things health-wise, but then to get over that 80% hump and to really see a significant mark change, you know, that was really the trigger for you. And also, you know, I I love that you're on a regular basis. I mean, everybody's gonna have aches and pains, but you're essentially chronic pain-free. Yeah. And that's that's something I want people to hear because you were given a diagnosis where you were told you were gonna be in a wheelchair. And I've seen you in public many times and they've never seen you rolling in a wheelchair.

Debbie Roppo

So you know, it's interesting because I think the mental piece,

Meditation, Tingling Signals, and Learning to Shut the Storm Down

Debbie Roppo

I was again blessed. I don't know. Uh, I think that the great universe, or whoever you want to call it, uh really, when I was a little girl, I would get the hiccups, or I would get a my stomach would hurt, or I would get a headache. And I would go into my room, shut my door, and sit on my bed. And I remember sitting like in a yoga pose, and I didn't know, you know, in a meditation pose. I didn't even know what meditation was at the time. It was not not not on our radar screen at all growing up, right? And I would sit and I would get quiet and I would make my hiccups go away, or I'd make my headache go away, or I would make my stomach ache go away. And it just was something that I did. I could just, I could do that, right? And that little piece, when I started to do the mental piece, when I learned, that came back to me like a like an ocean wave, right? It just washed over me that the power that I do you remember when you were little and when I actually just got goosebumps just talking about that because of it, it was such a powerful moment for me when that kind of connected. Like, do you remember what you did when you were little when you had faith and you believed and you didn't have all the nonsense of how we grow up and no, this is the way life actually works, right? When you when you were just in that magical time. The best. How do we go back there?

Sandi Magder

Like we just need to go back there.

Debbie Roppo

Right, right. We're unicorns, we're still real, right? You know, like how do how do we like how did we, you know, how do we do that? And so I I do that to myself now, right? And when you said that high stress moments, you felt it. I will do that as well. I call it tingling. I will be in an experience or, you know, I'm a busy woman. I've got a lot going on in my life right now, right? So it'll get and I'll start to feel the tingling. That's what I call it, where I'll start to feel like almost like a tingle in my joints. When that happens, I shut it down. I sh nope look at my schedule, what can I remove, slow it down, and I just get quiet. I get into meditation, I I really stop, I'm real conscious. What's your mindset? What are you thinking? Do you think you're behind? You know, all of these things. And again, I'm able to stop those that tingling from happening. And that is mind-body work. And I know it sounds magic, like I'm talking about some guru, but it's it's available with with training and with uh with faith.

Sandi Magder

Yeah. With belief. Well, there's actual real neuroscience behind it. Yeah. So I'm gonna get someone who can explain it a little better than I can, but it's actually not just woo-woo. It's it's real. And it's that's why your body currently loves you so much because it's talking to you and you're listening. And you've learned how and you've learned how to ask questions. I mean, I've heard people that when they have a pain, they'll kind of stop and take a moment and and almost ask it like me, what do you want?

Debbie Roppo

And that's I literally also, what do you want? And it tells me every time, be quiet. I want you to be quiet. I want you to shut down. I want you to Okay. And I'm listening I listen and the symptom resides. And I know that it's neuroscience, right? I know because I do this work, I've been doing this work for over a decade, right? I know what's happening. And once you start to know, and then you experience it, it's it's it's extremely powerful.

Sandi Magder

Yes. And I think that knowing is is important, right? Because you have to believe it. It's it's really hard to, you know, you can't sort of like affirmation your way out of things. Because you feel it. Like, how many times have people have tried an affirmation and you're saying it, and you're like, that's not you, you have an internal conflict, like it just feels wrong. Like, doesn't make you I know maybe at some point, like until you make it, you could convince your brain, but for the most part, that belief is probably one of the most important factors to allow you to then really open yourself up, remove the weight of the world in that sense. And right.

Debbie Roppo

Yeah. And I think that that's why it helped me so much because when I was little, I could do it. I remembered that. And then I sat and I was having these, this, this, my finger, oh, this one right here. Well, just killing me. And I sat and I I made it go away. I was able to stop it. And uh, and but again, it's not with a push, which is so not the way we do things, right? We want to push it, we want to make it, we want to. This is what it's a letting go. It's a surrender, it's an allowing. It's okay, I'm okay. I'm right where I'm at, no matter where I'm at, mentally, physically, in my career, all of it, um, it's okay. It's okay.

Sandi Magder

And that's that piece for me was powerful. Well, that's important. And so that kind of brings me into the next thing I want to talk about because I, you know, I mentioned then Damble Joe

Overwhelmed by Health Advice? The Case for Simplicity and the Blue Zones

Sandi Magder

because I say all the things. But I was doing, and you know this from when we met, like all the things. I have a ridiculous giant box of supplements. I was doing the I I knew all the things to do. And so, A, first of all, that becomes overwhelming because you start your day with a thousand things that aren't even work related, or I have my dogs, it's not dog related, they're me related. And so it's almost like I start the day with a full-time job and then add that in that I'm on social media, just sometimes just looking at plants or dogs, but social media reads my mind and it sends me 75 other supplements that I absolutely have to have, plus a mix of don't do these things. And then, you know, like fear, fear the air, the water. I think I saw something on Instagram where the guy was like, you know, he went through 17 different types of water and there was something wrong with all of them. Like, do the filtered water, do that, and and so I I want to hear sort of your perspective. And I also as a health coach, both for yourself and as a health coach, how do you navigate living in a world like this where there's so much information and feeling like, and also feeling like, you know, health is something you get to experience and there's things that that will be good for you, but that it you're not gonna die if you forget to take one supplement. Because that could derail you. You could do all the things, and then the hundredth thing you didn't do, and you tell your brain, oh my god, I didn't do that thing. And so there's no way you're gonna feel good because you sort of prophesy that that one thing was so important. Yeah, this is such oh God, I love your questions.

Debbie Roppo

Okay, so this is so important. So this is what I did. I went crazy and I'm oh I da da da da. And then I found the blue zones. And there's the people that are living into their hundreds without any disease, and they don't go to the gym and they don't take supplements, right? These are people that live slow and easy, and that changed my world. I don't take a bunch of supplements. I take supplements as supplements to my food. So not every day do I take them. It depends on what I'm eating that day, right? I don't I don't feel like, and this is gonna sound uh maybe uh strange for some, but I don't feel like we have to do all the things because I know that the slower I get, the quieter that I get, the calmer I get, the pure, the simple foods, right? We don't, and I think once you start to know that it changed everything for me. Now I just eat really good, healthy, full, whole food. I love the rainbow eating, right? When I'm looking at the grocery cart, oh do I have something red in there? Do I have something orange? Do I have something yellow? Simple, it's fun. When I'm creating my food, I go pop AF, right? Is there's our protein in there? Is an omega's in there? Is there probiotic? Is there an antioxidant? Is there fiber? Yep, good, done. Right. I my water, you know, so it's it's for me at this point in my healing process and how I live my life, the simpler, easier, slowest way I can do it, I believe is the best.

Sandi Magder

Yeah.

Debbie Roppo

And now that I we can think, especially in this biohack world, right? Where we gotta go out and we're gonna do 7,000 and do this and do this, I think that's just the opposite. I I truly do. Not that all those things are great, we can do them, but it's the slowing down, it's the it's the letting go. It's it's I feel like that's so powerful. Does that make sense to you guys?

Sandi Magder

Yes, even the way you're describing it, it feels like a relief because I and I know this and I heard this, and it sort of changed my mindset. When you're telling your body you need to do all those things, you're telling your body it's not healthy. You're it's a it's a versus there's a fear response and you have to do all the things, but also when you are in this, I have to heal, that is

Health Isn’t a Future Destination: Reframing the Healing Mindset

Sandi Magder

implicit in you're not healthy.

Debbie Roppo

Sandy, uh, what you just said there is the the golden ticket today. Because this is one of the things that I try to help my clients see. We often think of ourselves as our health is out there somewhere. Out there is that future healthy self. Someday I'm gonna get to her. Boy, I can see her. She's incredible, she's amazing. I work with women, sorry, Dean, I think she a lot. Forgive me, but he too. All right. So it says some future, somewhere out there, something. I don't see it that way. And you know, Sandy, I talk about, I believe she's in here, she's already here, here, and it's my job to unveil the unbeliefs, unveil the uh unhealthy eating, unveil because why if I love myself and I think that I'm this incredible divine creature, uh queen, well, I'm gonna choose food that's really healthy because that's what a queen freaking eats, right? Right? Am I gonna move my body in a way so if it's this internal thing, and that's my whole inner empire kind of concept, right? That internal piece, it's I'm already her. I'm just unveiling her. I'm just taking off the veils of, oh, your old beliefs and the way you think things are. I get rid of those. And as I've gotten rid of those, I've exposed this woman who who can is healthy and vibrant and strong. It's not something I have to go find somewhere out there, and maybe hopefully I can get her. She looks great, but does that make sense?

Sandi Magder

Yes. And I just have to say for the audience, because they don't know you, this is the first exposure to you that they've had. Every time I have ever seen Debbie, this is her energy. And again, I'm sure she has, you know, days where maybe she's tired, but like this is not, this is her energy. And so what she's saying is legitimate. And another thing, and we've talked about this when we were working together, and I've caught myself doing this probably my whole life. And maybe it was a way of like procrastinating and and not having to sort of do things I was afraid of. But I had that mindset of. One day when I'm pain free, then I will do all of these things because I won't be exhausted, I won't be in pain, and I can do them. And that's that's a very dangerous trap to get into because A, health is a moving target, and I kind of want to talk about that a little bit later. But B, again, that's reminding myself that I have pain and I'm not healthy now. And I'm just nonstop reinforcing it. So if you're always like, oh my God, I gotta get healthy or I gotta get out of this pain, then there's a sense of urgency that becomes very problematic to sort of the mind-body connection and it keeps you stuck.

Dan Schuman

So I'll say this. I just want to jump in really quickly. I don't know Debbie very well. I'm I'm learning getting to learn more about Debbie as we um have these, and it's wonderful having her on. I will say this if someone drops the golden ticket line and then goes to talk about things, if they're doing any Willy Wonka dropping, you have all my attention. So if you ever drop a golden ticket, I am all in. And I just every time you talk, I'm thinking, I'm a buffalo. I'm a buffalo, I'm a buffalo. So I sandy. That's a shirt.

Sandi Magder

So that's for sure a t-shirt. That's so we joke we've been joking in all the episodes, like we say things and but we we are legitimately probably gonna have a t-shirt line. And I think now the buffalo is gonna have to make its way in there because that's just the best analogy.

Dan Schuman

So love it. Love it. Very much love.

Sandi Magder

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love it.

Debbie Roppo

All right, sorry.

Sandi Magder

No, no, I I that's I love that.

You Are Not Your Diagnosis: Identity, Language, and the Power of Belief

Sandi Magder

And I I also got excited about the golden ticket. So thank you for giving that to me because I've been watching, I watched Willie Wonka, you know, way before I even got arthritis a million years ago. Oh, I actually want to say this because you taught me this. And I've talked about it and I've really held on to this. Uh the label of my arthritis, I have arthritis, is incredibly harmful because and I know this, and I I know this from all the diagnosis that I've ever gotten. It becomes an identity of sorts. And it and it's almost like you can like I again, I had was diagnosed with spinal stenosis, and I can see it and feel it in a in a visceral way. It's like literally I can I can almost imagine things grinding. And so I've been trying to change my language, and I know that you say I was diagnosed with, and I love that, but I struggle with it a little bit because I feel like it confuses people. And because I still have pain, then I feel like it needs more context and people just understand when you say I have arthritis, but I haven't been tested and I like I stopped having, you know, getting medications and getting blood work and things like that for it. So it's been probably 10, 15 years, right? So I'm still using that reference in part because I think it's what people understand, but I'm aware of how detrimental that can be because I keep reminding my mind and body that they have this thing.

Debbie Roppo

Yeah. We, you know, we talk about that, and I know that you're gonna have someone on that, you know, with the more science behind it, but that that our cells listen, we know our cells listen to everything we say, everything we think. Right. So I always say I was diagnosed with, and there's this little part inside of me that does like a happy dance, like, yeah, that's what I was diagnosed with, but right. I really have that. And and and my cells then know that, like, oh wait, right. And I know again, this sounds guru-y and it sounds like it's woo-woo, but it's science. We know this now. We know that what our minds, right? If you and and this kills me because if you just look at the placebo, yes, we know placebos are are incredible, they can work incredible things with they've they're doing scans where someone they'll give someone say, I'm giving you this medication, and their body starts to react as if the medic and it was never given, right? So the mind is extremely powerful. And so I personally I never ever say I have. It's always I was diagnosed with.

Sandi Magder

Yeah. And you uh that's when you said that to me, it stuck with me. So I I try and reframe it, but again, 30 years of using certain language, but but I when you said it, it was so profound to me. And I always had understood about the identity of like I'm not I'm not my arthritis, first of all, my. I I don't want it. So like my like let's get rid of the my because it's not it's not something I want, you know. I just it's just the language when you break down some of the small words that you use, it's so powerful.

Debbie Roppo

Yeah. Well, they even say, like, when they talk about, I think it's in the Atomic Habits or something, I don't know, where they say, if if a s someone that has smoked, right, and they don't want to smoke, if they say I'm a smoker, you know, yeah, I smoke, um, but I quit smoking. Yeah, they're still a smoker. As opposed to someone that says, I'm a non-smoker. Right? It's it's that they they'll say that the one that is saying, Oh, I quit, that means they identify, I am a smoker who's quit. That's their identity that they'll probably go back to smoking. We know this, and that's when I'm listening to clients when I do that first initial call, I listen to how they speak and I know where they really are, not where they think they are, but where they really are. Because if they're saying, Oh, I'm a non-smoker, and then you talk, oh yeah, I used to smoke, but I'm a non-smoker, that person, they're probably not gonna start smoking again. And it's and I feel that same way with my own body, right? That if I, if I'm identifying in myself, in my core self, I am the healthiest, most vibrant, strongest. I'm gonna be 60 years old. I just was the other day, just the other day, I was thinking, because a couple of years I'll be 60 years old. And I'm like thinking, I'm like, oh, sexy 60, right? Like I didn't know ready for it. I'm getting you that t-shirt, FYI. You're getting a sexy, sexy. I mean, I am ready for it. I it doesn't, that age, that number does nothing to me. I don't believe in the oh, oh, that's the decline, the aging, the I don't. It's I can't wait for it. Bring it off.

Sandi Magder

Okay, well, I want to be you when I grew up because I've got a big birthday coming up this year, and I just don't why don't I'm ready to cry. I I cry on my birthdays, that's a whole other discussion for another day, but I I love that. But I actually I'm excited that you brought up atomic habits because I want to hear more about how you work with your clients.

Wrap-Up + Teaser for Part 3

Sandi Magder

And that's exactly where we're going to pause for today. Because what Debbie just shared is so important. A diagnosis may be the beginning of a chapter, but it's not the end of the story. Getting a diagnosis can feel like someone just handed you a life sentence. And if you've ever been in that moment, scared, overwhelmed, spiraling, we want you to hear this clearly. Debbie was told this was forever. She was told where it would lead, and yet she's here. She's living proof that the story you're told in the exam room is not always the whole story. In this episode, you heard what happened after the diagnosis, the shifts she made, what helped, what didn't, and why the mind-body piece and slowing things down became the turning point that moved her from surviving to healing. So if you're listening and thinking, okay, but can I actually do this? Start small. Pick one thing from today's episode: one gentle change, one new question, one moment of self-kindness and self-compassion, and try it this week. And if you know someone who's been living with chronic pain, chronic illness, or a fresh diagnosis, please share these episodes with them. It might be the hope they didn't know they needed. Now, next week in part three of our interview with Debbie Ropo, we zoom out and we get practical. How do you make changes that actually stick? When you're exhausted, when you're overwhelmed, or afraid of failing. Debbie breaks down her coaching approach, and we get more personal with a few raw questions. So join us next week for part three of our conversation with Debbie Ropeau.