Decoding Disease with Dr. Rue
Learn to see your body through a different lens.
There comes a point where you begin to sense that what you are experiencing cannot be fully explained by symptoms alone. Patterns repeat, progress feels incomplete, and something deeper is asking to be understood. I’m Dr. Rue, a naturopathic physician focused on chronic illness and integrative oncology, where the work is not about chasing conditions, but about observing the terrain in which they arise.
In this space, we explore how the body adapts, how systems communicate, and how environment, metabolism, and lived experience shape what you feel day to day. The body is not random, and it is not working against you. It responds in ways that reflect its internal and external worlds. As you begin to understand those responses, your relationship with your health begins to change.
These are quiet, intentional conversations designed to bring clarity without removing complexity. If you have ever felt that your experience does not fit into a simple explanation, you are not alone. This is a place to listen more closely, to reconnect, and to begin seeing what may have been there all along.
Decoding Disease with Dr. Rue
Tools For A Body On Alert | Ep. 086
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When was the last time your body truly felt at ease?
If you can't remember, your body probably can't either. Many of us have become so accustomed to living in a state of constant vigilance that stress feels normal. But the body was never designed to heal while preparing for the next threat. Over time, that survival state can quietly influence everything from energy and sleep to immunity, inflammation, and long-term health.
In this episode, we explore what you can do about it.
Decoding Disease with Dr. Rue
Decoding Disease with Dr. Rue
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So, what do you actually do with a nervous system that's been running hot for a decade? Before we get to that, I want to help you actually recognize this in yourself or in someone you love. Because a lot of anxiety doesn't look like what people expect it to look like. It's not always the racing heart, the shaking hands, or the obvious panic. Sometimes it's the mother who can't let her daughters out of arm's reach or the friend who always needs a backup plan for the backup plan. Sometimes it's the person who's exhausted by 9 in the morning for no reason they can point to. Because their body has been quietly bracing since the moment they woke up. Sometimes it's someone who seems completely fine, composed, high functioning, holding down a job and a family and a full calendar, while internally their whole system is running at red line every single day. If you're trying to recognize it in someone you love, watch for the small tales, the person who always has to know exactly where everyone is, or the person who catastrophizes ordinary situations, jumping straight to the worst-case scenario for something as small as a late text message, the person whose body seems to carry attention constantly, shoulders up, jaw tight, even when they insist they are relaxed. And if you're trying to recognize it in yourself, ask yourself honestly, when was the last time your body actually felt at ease? Not distracted or busy, actually at ease. If you can't remember, that's worth paying attention to. Now let's talk about what to actually do about it. I want to give you real answers here, not just the science of why it happens, because knowing why your body's doing this doesn't automatically tell you what to do about it. So let's go through some of the actual tools I reach for in clinic. And I'll be honest with you, this list deserves whole episodes of its own later in this series. Today I want to give you the map, not the full territory. Adaptogens are often where I stut. These are herbs, things like ashwaganda, rhodiola, holybasil, that help your body regulate its stress response instead of just suppressing it. They're not sedatives. They're more like training your HPA axis to respond more appropriately so it doesn't fire quite so hard over a sleepover, for example. For some patients, breathing exercises alone make a measurable difference. And I don't say that lightly. Some patients, cannabis products have a role too. Use thoughtfully and medically, not recreationally. It's not right for everyone, and it's not the first step for most people, but for the right patient in the right form, it's a real tool worth discussing with your doctor. And underneath all of these, there's something I consider even more important than any single tool on this list. You need an outlet. And that can be anything: prayer, meditation, a person you actually talk to, a journal you write in honestly instead of performing for. What matters is that whatever it is, it gives that fear somewhere to go instead of somewhere to sit. Because here's the piece I see most often in clinic, more than any specific diagnosis. People bottling things inside. They don't recognize what they're feeling, or if they do, they decide it's not worth mentioning. And it just sits there, running quietly in the background. Recognizing what you're carrying is the first tool on this entire list before any adapt to gen medication or breathing technique. You cannot address what you won't name. We're going to come back to every single one of those tools in a much more in-depth way later on in this series because each one deserves real time, not a summary. For now, I want you to walk away from this knowing one thing. It isn't hopeless. There are real practical paths back from a body that's been running on alarm for years. Next time, we're going to look at what happens when the same alarm system runs for so long that it finally exhausts itself completely and stops sounding altogether.