#295: Hashimoto's Healing Blueprint: Own Your Diagnosis, Rebuild Your Health

If you've been told your labs are fine while your body is screaming something's wrong - this episode is your turning point.

Esther Yunkin, RN, spent 17 years in emergency medicine before she walked away to help women with Hashimoto's do more than survive their diagnosis - she helps them heal it. She joins Dr. Tabatha to break down what Hashimoto's actually is, why most women go years without answers, and what you can do starting today to become the CEO of your own health.

In this episode:

•        The difference between hypothyroidism and Hashimoto's - and why it matters

•        Why 90% of hypothyroid patients have Hashimoto's but never get tested for it

•        The five categories of root causes - and which one we avoid the most

•        Spiritual stress: what it is and how it drives autoimmune disease

•        The seatbelt breathing trick that interrupts fight-or-flight on command

•        Why vitamin D is a hormone - and what your level should actually be

•        How to stop lowering the bar on what 'normal' feels like

Esther's free resource:

Download "10 Thyroid Questions You Should Be Asking Your Doctor" - a printable guide to take to your next appointment.

https://healthwithhashimotos.com/questions-for-your-doctor/

Resources mentioned:

•        Esther's podcast: healthwithhashimotos.com/podcast/

•        D3K2 Lift: shop.fasttofaith.com https://shop.fasttofaith.com/product/d3-k2-lift/

Closing scripture: Isaiah 40:31

"But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."

For just five dollars, you get five days with a certified one-on-one coach guiding you through your hormones, your gut, and your faith.

Go to ftf.fasttofaith.com/empoweredbyfaithdiy

Ready to go deeper?

The women who hear this episode and feel something shift — they belong in the Fast to Faith Sisterhood. This is where faith, functional medicine, and identity work come together with a community of women who are done managing symptoms and ready to lead from healing.

If you feel called to take that even further — to guide other women through this exact transformation — the Fast to Faith Coaching Academy is where that calling becomes a career.

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Fast to Faith is hosted by Dr. Tabatha Barber — OB/GYN, functional medicine physician, and founder of the Fast to Faith Sisterhood and Coaching Academy.

Transcript

Why So Many Women Lose Hope

Dr. Tabatha 0:28

They are afraid to deal with the fact that they hate their job or their marriage is toxic or that they haven't spoken to their child in two years, or they just are not living as God designed them to live. They're not doing what they're called to do.

Ashlee 0:47

Well, they're literally living in fear and worrying about tomorrow so much instead of relishing in the fact that we have today.

Dr. Tabatha 0:59

If you're tired of doing all the right things and still feeling exhausted, stuck in your body, and disconnected from God, this podcast is for you. I'm Dr. Tabitha, a triple board certified functional medicine physician, and I help women stop fighting their bodies and start healing them God's way. Let's get into it. Exhausted, dismissed, told your labs are fine while your body is screaming something's wrong. I have Hashimoto's, and maybe you do, or suspect that you do, and you're still searching for real answers. Well, I need you to hear today's episode because my guest is a registered nurse who spent 17 years in the ER before she walked away from it all to help women with Hashimoto's to actually heal, not manage, heal. She is here today to tell you exactly what questions to ask, what your doctor might be missing, and why you are the CEO of your own health. So stay with us.

Ashlee 2:12

I hope that the women in our community, the women watching, listening to this, are like feeling it and they are empowering themselves.

Dr. Tabatha 2:20

Yes, exactly. So welcome to Fast of Faith, ladies. I'm Dr. Tabitha. Joining me as always is my beautiful co-host, Ashley. It's gonna be a good episode.

Ashlee 2:29

It is gonna be a good episode. And it's continuing the theme of someone who left conventional medicine and flipped over to the dark side.

Dr. Tabatha 2:37

Yeah, it's amazing how like attracts like. Yeah, you know?

Ashlee 2:42

Yep.

Dr. Tabatha 2:42

Oh my gosh.

Ashlee 2:43

Well, and I just think it goes back to, and I keep saying this every episode, just like the mission. Like God really has this huge mission, and it's exciting to see everyone team up.

Dr. Tabatha 2:52

He does. And the truth is conventional medicine is gonna implode itself. You know, I worked for years to try and change the system from inside, and it's just not. It is so broken, and so there's countless other providers realizing that, and they're jumping ship, and they are on the mission to actually heal and reverse disease. And so if you're listening, I want you to have hope because Hashimoto's is not a death sentence, it is it's not something that you have to suffer with. I was diagnosed at 17, and I'm the healthiest I've ever been in my whole life at 51, and my antibody numbers are like almost non-existent. So we're gonna dive into all of that today. And if you don't even have a diagnosis of Hashimoto's, you still need this episode because

Meet The ER Nurse Who Left

Dr. Tabatha 3:48

it is one of the most undiagnosed conditions that there are. And I promise you, somebody is that you know is affected because it's estimated that 10 to 14 million Americans actually have Hashimoto's. It's seven to 10 times more in women than in men. It's very dismissed, undertested, under-treated. So we gotta dive into all of this. Yay. Okay, I'm gonna sing my guest's praises. She's so awesome. I was actually recorded on her podcast last week. So we're gonna dive in. Her name is Esther Yunkin. She is a registered nurse. She has spent 25 years in the healthcare system, 17 in the ER. Uh, her podcast is called Health with Hashimoto's. So that tells you right there that we're not just living and managing disease. We're actually trying to get healthy. So she helps exhausted women regain their energy, feel like themselves again without getting overwhelmed, because that's a big deal. And I love this part. She lives in rural Minnesota, y'all. So she is just as cold as we are today on this May morning with her husband and her four boys. She homeschools, gardens, and raises chickens. So welcome, Esther.

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. I've listened to your podcast for a couple years, and you do such a good job of educating people and helping them advocate for themselves. So thank you for what you do.

Dr. Tabatha 5:19

Oh, it is my greatest pleasure, actually. It's like one of the things that God has called me to do. And I love connecting with providers like yourself because the truth is you can Google a lot of stuff and you can get a lot of information. But until someone helps you connect the dots and they share their story of how they made it through the fire and came out on the other side, refined and doing amazing, like you can just lose hope in all that information, right? It can be overwhelming and very depressing, wouldn't you say?

SPEAKER_01 5:58

Yeah, for sure. Like people ask about, you know, barriers to joining something, you know, and that commonly people talk about like money or time. And I say one of the biggest barriers for women is they it's not time or money, it's hope. They've lost hope. They've tried so many things or they've gotten too overwhelmed and they just don't have a hope that things could be better.

Dr. Tabatha 6:20

Yeah, exactly. So ER medicine, emergency medicine, it's designed to keep you alive, but it's not designed to make you well. So how the heck did you go from an ER doc to helping women heal their Hashimoto's?

SPEAKER_01 6:36

Well, I'm not doctor, but I was in the ER as an RN. Um and yeah, on those days when you're saving lives, you know, picking somebody up off, you know, the ambulance brought them in from the side of the road and you're like packaging them back together. That's awesome. Standing next to somebody's bed and pushing meds to keep them alive for literally the next 30 seconds. Um, that's awesome. That's why we're there in the ER. But so many like individual people kept coming back over and over and over for the same things, much less, you know, the same common complaints. And I just got burnt out with that. I'm like, I'm just putting short-term band-aids on chronic things. I'm not actually making a difference, I'm keeping them alive for the next day. But really, we're just symptom managing until the next crisis comes. Instead, I could help them prevent these crises. So I went back to school for holistic health and education. And at that time I was naively thinking, well, the ERs are overloaded, Western medicine is broken, so everybody obviously is going to come seek out preventative help. Everybody obviously needs this. And then I found out, oh, yeah, a lot of people are stuck in crisis mode. They don't want the prevention. And so that was another learning curve of me. But um, yeah, it was just I got I got sick and tired of just putting band-aids on what I knew was a fixable pro problem.

Ashlee 8:00

So you said that there were several people that you s you kept seeing come back over and over again. Was there something specific um that you saw that kind of was that like I need to make a change?

SPEAKER_01 8:13

Not really. It was the it was just the overall. But there was one father specifically who I was like, oh, I did make a difference. And he would come in with his kids. I was often out in triage, which for anybody who doesn't know, you come into the ER and you talk to the nurse, uh the triage nurse, and she figures out like how sick you are, how fast you need to go back. Um in a busy ER, the E the triage nurse is also like ordering labs and tests and everything that she thinks the doctor is going to want. Um and there was this one dad who kept coming in with his kids for ear infections. And every time, as part of my assessment, I would ask, I could smell it clearly, like, do you smoke? Like, obviously, it was a yes. And so I would just give one sentence of, Did you know that smoking increases your kids' risks of ear infections? And he came in so frequently with his multiple different kids. And so I mean, he got my little spiel a couple times, and then one time he came in by himself and he's like, You're that nurse. And I was like, What are you talking about? He said, I just want to let you know I quit smoking. And it was, I think that moment sticks in my head because I wasn't lecturing him, I wasn't getting down on him, I was just saying, Do you know about this that could help your kids? And he made that lifestyle change. And as a result, you know, his kids probably had less ear infections, which means they were on antibiotics less, which means their gut health was better, which means their immune system was better. So many things changed because I educated him on one thing, and I think that was the moment was like, Hmm, I I think I want to help more people make changes.

Dr. Tabatha 9:47

Oh my gosh, I'm so grateful that you did that. I myself suffered with chronic ear infections all through my childhood because everyone around me smoked. It was the 70s and 80s, and like that's just what everyone did. And I was on antibiotics all the time, and I had gut issues always. So bravo to you for doing that and just planting those seeds. That's so important. Okay, let's dive in. We just had an episode a few weeks ago with Dr. Amy Horneman. She was talking a lot about the thyroid and T3 and 4 thyroid hormone and lab values and all of that stuff, but we really didn't dive into Hashimoto's. So I would love for you to just explain to the listeners what is Hashimoto's and how is it different from hypothyroidism? How does it cause hypothyroidism? All the things that women need to know.

SPEAKER_01 10:44

Yeah, so Hashimoto's is two things. It's one, it's an autoimmune condition, and that's the primary thing it is. And then every autoimmune condition is named after what it attacks in the body. And so Hashimoto's your body is attacking your thyroid. So it usually causes hypothyroid, which means your thyroid is not doing enough. Sometimes it can also cause hyperthyroid symptoms because as your body attacks the thyroid, then your thyroid, like as it's as it's dying, it's releasing a whole bunch of thyroid hormones. So it can be very confusing as you can have hyposymptoms and hypersymptoms. But because of that autoimmune condition part, like we have to address what it is that causes the autoimmune problem. And that is where Western medicine has failed people with any thyroid problems. Um, Dr. Horneman probably already talked about the fact that, you know, when you have thyroid symptoms, you

Hashimoto’s Versus Hypothyroidism Explained

SPEAKER_01 11:42

need to be checking your antibody levels because it is estimated that 90% of people with hypothyroidism have Hashimoto's as a cause of the hypothyroid, but the doctors don't check. They just say, here's your medicine, you're gonna be a lifelong pharmaceutical patient, and we're gonna have to adjust your medication as your thyroid dies, then we're gonna have to go up instead of saying, let's address your immune system so that we can prevent some problems and your body can heal.

Dr. Tabatha 12:11

Yeah, absolutely. So, what does a typical patient present as when she has Hashimoto's? Because I know somebody listening right now has never been tested and she is struggling with what you're about to explain.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Yes, think of your thyroid hormone as the ignition key for every cell. So if your cells don't have the ignition key, they can't turn on, which means your body is running slowly. And so, what does slow mean for different body systems or organs? You know, slow in the brain means depression or brain fog. Um, slow in the gut means constipation or problems digesting. Uh slow hair skin and nails means that your hair is falling out and it's not growing as much as it used to, and your nails, maybe they're brittle. Um, just think of every single hypothyroid symptom is the slowing down of something. And so it affects everything. But because every single person is individual, how one person experiences that slowing down, it might look completely different from somebody else because it's what your body is, you know, devoting the keys to. It only has a set number of ignition keys. So where is that gonna go and what's gonna suffer in your body? It might look different than your friend's body.

Dr. Tabatha 13:32

Yeah. I love that you mentioned depression because absolutely when your thyroid is not functioning well, you're not making your new neurotransmitters as well. Your brain is not firing on all cylinders, and that brain fog can actually feel like low mood and depression. And as you're explaining all of this, I'm just thinking about how it takes women not months, but often years, to get diagnosed. So this slow gut motility, this constipation and improper digestion continues on, which leads to bacterial overgrowth and yeast overgrowth and vitamin and mineral deficiencies. And like by the time you get diagnosed, you have all of these other sequelae, all of these other medical problems that have ensued because the thyroid never got managed and addressed. And so the picture can get really complicated. I just wanted to point that out because I've I think that sometimes we see patients, they have dealt with that those feelings of depression and sluggishness and constipation so long they have told themselves it's normal. And that is just how life is. And it's not until they get like a SIBO exposure, you know, they have like such bad bacterial overgrowth that they're just constantly burping and gassing and all of these things, and that is what actually gets them to the doctor and gets the diagnosis. When you say that's the kind of stuff that we see at with a lot of women, yeah, that's exactly what we see.

Ashlee 15:15

And they're just they think they just keep kind of raising the bar of like what feels normal. Yeah or really it's really the opposite, they're lowering the bar, but they just are like, Oh, that feels fine.

Symptoms That Get Dismissed As Normal

Ashlee 15:25

That feels fine. Like, oh, I haven't gone to the bathroom in four days. Like, that's just normal. And more and more people are doing it. So if you tell your friends and they're like, Oh, I haven't gone to the bathroom in three days either.

Dr. Tabatha 15:35

Right, exactly. So we're all tired together, we're all exhausted together, exactly. And so I am here to say, like, you don't give in, don't put up with that anymore. Yeah. And like, there is hope and there is healing. So I want to dive in, Esther, and talk about the fact that when a conventional provider says, Oh, you have Hashimoto's, you know, your your antibodies are elevated, here's your thyroid medication, good luck. What do you say to them?

SPEAKER_01 16:10

I say, There's so much more you can do. I mean, your doctor just handed you essentially a life sentence without any hope.

Dr. Tabatha 16:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:17

But there is so much you can do as an individual. And the first thing to understand is that there's more to learn. As somebody with Hashimoto's, you just got a gift and a job, and that is to become the CEO of your own health. You might not have wanted that job, but it's yours. And so as the CEO of your own health, you get to now look and say, what do I know about my thyroid? What's going on? What do I know about my root causes? Do I know anything about what's causing this Hashimoto's? And what can I do? And who do I want on my team? Your doctor is on your team. You can fire your doctor, you can hire another doctor, but your doctor is part of your healthcare team. But they don't call the shots, they don't make that ultimate decision. They make recommendations, like even a prescription. They say, Here's the prescription, and you have to choose to fill that and take it, which I highly recommend doing. Uh your thyroid, your body needs those little ignition keys. Accepting that prescription is not accepting failure, it's accepting help. So take the medication. Don't ever think that I'm saying don't take medication, but you have to dig down and figure out, okay, what are my root causes and what can I do? So

Become The CEO Of Your Health

SPEAKER_01 17:33

perhaps like I have a root causes revealed, like mini course that somebody can go through in an hour. So maybe they go through that and they say, okay, I have these five root causes. So then your next job or your next privilege is to say, okay, this is what's going on in my life. This is how much bandwidth I have. So this is what I'm choosing to focus on. Because you're probably not going to address all five root causes at the same time. You only you know what you have bandwidth for. So that's your your privilege and your job is to figure out what you're gonna implement.

Dr. Tabatha 18:09

Oh, I love how she framed that, isn't it? So good. That is good. Oh my gosh. Okay. So what do you see most commonly with your clients as being the root cause?

SPEAKER_01 18:22

Out of all of the root causes, I think we all deal with stress. That is that is number one. And you know, I've done a podcast episode on the five different areas of stress. You know, you have physical stress, emotional stress, you have dietary stressors, you have environmental stressors, you have spiritual stressors. And so just in that one little, one little bubble of stress, you go in so many different directions. Um, and so that is something that I work with every single client to calm down what's causing the stress, but also give somebody resources to respond to stress. And the easiest one that I teach is diaphragmatic breathing, which I know you have talked about, you know, breathing with your belly, slowing down, being intentional with your breath, and just helping your body switch from that fight and flight mode to the rest and digest mode, um, even in the midst of stress. When I had four kids, you know, four kids under six, whatever they were, getting out of the house and getting into the car was always stressful. Figuring out shoes for everybody, making sure everybody was dressed appropriately, getting them buckled into their car seats. And I realized for myself that every single time I sat in that driver's seat, I was already like stress sky high. And so for myself, I figured, okay, this is a stressful moment. I need to build in a trigger so that when I plug in my seatbelt, that is my trigger to take a deep breath, relax my shoulders, relax my jaw, relax my tongue,

Root Causes And Stress Basics

SPEAKER_01 19:49

relax my neck, take another deep breath, and then we can go. You know, it was just a small moment where I know that's a stressful situation. I can't not get my kids in the car and buckled up. Like that's going to happen. I can obviously try to lower the stressors by making sure everybody has shoes at the door, but things happen. And so it's my responsibility to respond in that stressful situation and lower my body's response to that stress.

Dr. Tabatha 20:17

I love that so much. It is really important to pull yourself out of that fight or flight as often as possible. And I love how you connected it with a habit that you always do. Like you buckle your seatbelt, and so that is when you do it. Because when you have it stack, that is how you can create new habits. I love that we talk about that a lot.

Ashlee 20:39

Me too. It kind of reminds me of like when you brush your teeth. Like you know, when you have to do it every morning, every night, sometimes in the middle of the day. And so you just you gotta add those, those little things in. And I think it's okay too. Like, I know personally on my desktop computer at home, I have little sticky notes of things to remind myself to do. And I think it's okay to put those sticky notes places and remind yourself to literally breathe. Like it is okay to breathe and to sit down and eat and like allow yourself to relax.

Dr. Tabatha 21:07

Yeah, I would say put it on your fridge because you do need to shift into parasympathetic before you eat, or you're not gonna digest your food properly.

Ashlee 21:16

You really do. And we don't give ourselves the time and space to do that.

Dr. Tabatha 21:21

Yeah. Real quick, I just want to interrupt this conversation for something super important. Even though we need to take care of ourselves spiritually, emotionally, and physically, we do have to take care of ourselves at a cellular level. And that is why I have my Fast to Face supplement line. So let's just take a minute to hear about something that might be the game changer that you need in this season. We really need to up-level how we're taking care of our temple. I used to treat mine like a garbage can, I will just be honest. And I'm not okay with that anymore. So this is one of the most important things to me, is that I'm taking high-quality supplements that are actually doing what they say they're doing, and I'm getting my money's worth, and I'm not making my body worse by putting the wrong stuff in it. So let's talk about Hormone Tame Essential Multivitamin, because even though it gives you all the vitamins and minerals you need, there's extra goodness in there, isn't there? You have a bottle sitting next to you. Tell us about Hormone Tame.

SPEAKER_00 22:32

Hormone Tame is five products in one. Um, if you listen to the the other episode, one of the things that we talked about is oftentimes, you know, women are just people we're taking a lot of supplements. And the nice thing about a lot of the um supplements that we have here at Fast of Faith is that they're they're just so consolidated, where you could take this and you are basically taking five products. So, yes, this is gonna be a multivitamin,

Breath Triggers And Nervous System Reset

SPEAKER_00 22:58

but there is so much more. We actually kind of refer to it as a multivitamin on um steroids. One of the key things that this is gonna be helping is your mitochondria. All you need to know is that they are responsible for so many systems and processes in your body. The reason that we need supplements is because we're just supplementing areas that we just can't really kind of get with our food. So we're filling in those gaps. And so hormone tame is inviting the body to just fill in all of those gaps. So you got to fill those gaps. And hormone tame, it will help to do that.

Dr. Tabatha 23:33

Esther, you said spiritual stress. I want to talk about this because that you can't Google. You can Google gut infections and all the other stuff, and we talk about all these things all the time on the podcast. But what the heck is spiritual stress and how does that affect our immune system and our and how our body's functioning?

SPEAKER_01 23:55

Yeah, at the basic level, I believe spiritual stress is when you are not living as you are designed to live. Um, and so whatever somebody's beliefs are, I mean, you and I believe in Jesus and that there is one way uh to heaven, there's one way to eternal life, and that is confess your sins and put your faith in Jesus. Um, but every single person, regardless if they believe that or not, has a set of beliefs that they feel like they should be doing, like they should be living this way. And um, and if you're not living in alignment with what you believe is true, then that is spiritual stress. And another aspect of spiritual stress is it's not love versus hate, but love versus fear. You're designed to live in peace and in love, and so any time that you are living in fear, that is also a spiritual stressor. People think of that as like an emotional thing, and while it is, it is also a spiritual stressor. So there's a couple different things that we can talk about in spiritual stress, and people tend to like put it in different categories. Um, but if you're not living with as you believe that you should be living, that's a spiritual stressor. And if and if you're afraid, like deep anxiety or surface level fear, it's all a spiritual stressor.

Dr. Tabatha 25:21

Oh, I am thinking of so many patients and clients right now. That is their number one issue. That is what's keeping them sick, that's what's keeping them stuck, is they are afraid to deal with the fact that they hate their job or their marriage is toxic, or that they haven't spoken to their child in two years. Um, or they just are not living as God designed them to live. They're not doing what they're called to do.

Ashlee 25:54

Well, they're literally living in fear and worrying about tomorrow so much instead of relishing in the fact that we have today.

Dr. Tabatha 26:01

Yeah. And let's just call out the fact that that's really easy to do. You and I do it all the time. And we have to check each other and check ourselves like, hey, I think you're spiraling again. I think you're like freaking out and and stressed about stuff. You don't need to be stressed out. We need to

Supplements Break And Hormone Tame

Dr. Tabatha 26:18

hand that over, put it at the foot of Jesus, you know? And that's normal as human beings, right? So don't even feel bad about that. That's just our normal daily struggle, but I promise you it's making you sick, right, Esther?

SPEAKER_01 26:35

Yeah. Yep. I mean, it's one of the root causes of any illness, not just autoimmune problems, but you are designed to function a certain way. And if you're not living that way, they're not functioning optimally.

Dr. Tabatha 26:50

So, how do you even coach women through that? How do they even begin to tackle that?

SPEAKER_01 26:56

Sometimes they don't, quite honestly. They want to focus on other things, things that they feel like they have more control over, like their diet. Um, you know, facing our fears and facing living in alignment with what we believe, that it it feels out there, it feels a little scarier, a little harder. And so some people just don't. They're like, I nope, I don't want to go there. You said you said there's eight root causes, and you said there's body, mind, spirit, diet, environment. Let's do all of the other things, not spirit. Yes.

Dr. Tabatha 27:30

And and at Fast of Faith, we just encourage women, just have a conversation with Jesus. Even if you don't know that, I don't know if Jesus is my savior, I don't know if I believe that he's God. I would still recommend you have a conversation with him because you would be shocked, like what comes out of that. And tell him you're angry, tell them you're disappointed, tell them you're confused or frustrated, whatever it is. Like get real about how you're feeling and what you don't understand and what your struggle is. And we see women do this while journaling, and they have so much revelation. And God starts to talk to them, and they're like, why hasn't God ever talked to me before? Uh, because you never got still and

Spiritual Stress And Living In Fear

Dr. Tabatha 28:20

asked. Like, I've just had this vision all week of God being like an excited little puppy. He is just wanting your attention, he's waiting for you to like pet him and talk to him and run around with him.

Ashlee 28:32

Slow down and acknowledge him.

Dr. Tabatha 28:34

Yeah, just acknowledge him. And he wants to love you and guide you and direct you on a better path. Like, he doesn't want you to be in the pit. A lot of that is self-induced, unfortunately, and we don't recognize that because we're all doing it together, right?

Ashlee 28:52

Well, and you get stuck in that negative headspace too. I think we really have to focus on gratitude and what is going right in your life and focusing on that as well as the negative. And so if you're constantly surrounding yourself by people who are focusing on the negative and never the positive, you just get stuck in that rabbit hole with them. And so you gotta sometimes be the one that is crazy and is like, listen, guys, I know we all got a lot going on, but let's what do we have going on that's good? And eventually you're gonna just be around other people who are positive because those negative people will just fall away or they'll change and you'll be the game changer in your little sisterhood group. But it's not easy to be the first one to step out and be like, we're gonna change the mindset here. Because you do, you people look at you like you're crazy.

Dr. Tabatha 29:37

Well, yeah, and Esther led with this. It starts with your language. Like, I get to do this. This is actually a gift that I now have a diagnosis, and I I get to take care of myself. So if you can reframe it with an attitude of gratitude, you're already conquering it, right?

SPEAKER_01 29:58

Yeah, yeah, yep. So good. And like Ashley said, learn to look for the gratitude. Gratitude journaling is huge. And if you know if you need help, you can Google it. Or you can read, I think, is it a million miracles? There's a really short book, and it teaches you to look all around you and see the just like the miracle of taking a breath, like what's happening on a level to make that breath happen, or you go outside, what what miracle is happening to make that grass grow? Like you can you can get small and you can look. Oh my goodness, there's so many blessings, so many miracles all around us. We just have to take time to look.

Ashlee 30:35

Yeah, and time, again. It's we just we literally are just like poof, we just let everything blow by. Like, I know.

Dr. Tabatha 30:47

That action of like paying attention to the present moment is actually how you get yourself or someone out of a panic attack. So if you have anxiety to the level that you are hyperventilating, your heart is racing, you're physically feeling that anxiety of a panic attack, it is because you are worrying about something in the future that hasn't happened, and the solution is to pay attention to the present. What do I see? What do I smell? What can I feel? What can I hear? And you get oriented back to the present moment and get into that attitude of gratitude, your body will shift out of that panic attack. And so it's like we need to do this on a micro level as soon as the anxiety starts. Don't wait until you've reached that breaking point. And so if you do it every day, you won't go into crazy anxiety and panic, hopefully, unless there's a medical issue going on, obviously. But so much of this is controllable. And I want you to be encouraged that we have way more control over our body than our doctors make us think

Gratitude Practices That Shift Anxiety

Dr. Tabatha 32:00

that we do, right? So let's talk about some physical things that we can do because um there's some basic misinformation going on out there, like the sun is bad, and you should uh lather up with sunscreen and avoid it at all costs because it's gonna give you cancer and kill you. Like, please share with my listeners why that's a lie and why we need the sun.

SPEAKER_01 32:28

Oh man, we could do like 10 episodes on the benefits of sun and of light and of the different spectrums of light or the different, you know, colors of light. And I'm sure everybody who is listening to a podcast has probably listened to other episodes about, you know, red light therapy or blocking the blue rays at night. You know, we've heard little bits and pieces of different colors. Um, but what about the sun in general? Like just getting outside in the sun as soon as you can in the morning. It changes your hormones, it changes your health. There are so many benefits. And, you know, getting outside in the middle of the day, that's been vilified, I feel like the most. But that's when your body does the most vitamin D production from the sun exposure. And vitamin D, low vitamin D levels, are a root cause of autoimmune disease, all autoimmune diseases. Back when I was in, I think I was in nursing school, so this was in like the early 2000s. Even at that time, we knew that um the majority of people with MS grew up in an

Sunlight And Vitamin D For Autoimmunity

SPEAKER_01 33:32

area where there was not vitamin D. Like there was like lines, you know, on the equator. Like if you grew up north or south of this line, you had more of a chance at MS. And they're like, that was vitamin D. That was the sun. There are so many things that the sun does for us. And then, you know, you take little bits, okay? One thing that the sun does is help us produce vitamin D. There are so many things that vitamin D does for us. Like, God has just given us so many gifts, and the sun, sunlight, exposure to the sun is just one of those many, many gifts, and it impacts your health every single day.

Ashlee 34:10

And your mindset. Oh, and your mindset. I feel like when the sun is out, I have so much life and energy and things that I want to do.

Dr. Tabatha 34:18

Yeah, and it's gray, you're depressed. But literally, I didn't see the sun for like four years during residency. I lived in that hospital, and if I wasn't there, I was in my bed sleeping at home. I never saw the sun. I never took vacations. That was when my Hashimoto's was the worst. It was so out of control. My antibodies were over a thousand, like they just didn't register.

Ashlee 34:40

They were just guessing you weren't taking a vitamin D something.

Dr. Tabatha 34:44

No, my vitamin D was like, I don't know, 11 or 15. It was something ridiculous in the teens. And like under 30, you are so susceptible to disease and getting sick and not being able to fight that off. So share with everybody why vitamin D is important for your thyroid health.

SPEAKER_01 35:09

It's vitamin D is responsible for like 300 at least different things in your immune system, which is so many. So just overall, I think, you know, if somebody's listening, they're like, I don't want to learn 300 things. Just know that vitamin D helps your body do what your body is supposed to do, it helps it function correctly. And vitamin D is a hormone. So, you know, let's talk about all of the hormones. We want everything to be in balance. We want everything to work as God intended. And vitamin D, whether sun exposure or supplementation, if you're not getting out in the sun, um, it just helps your body do what your body is supposed to do, including your immune system. We'll just keep it simple.

Dr. Tabatha 35:52

Yeah, exactly. So you need to have a vitamin D level up above 60. 60 to 80 is where I find women function best. Um, there's, you know, different camps on that. But once you start getting down below 50 or 40, you're gonna struggle. Your disease is not going to go into remission. You're not gonna feel well mentally, you're gonna struggle with recurrent infections. So that is why we made our vitamin D supplement because we're going out covered in sunscreen, not getting enough of it if we are going out, and we're afraid of the sun. And even our makeup products now cover that up. And so you can't make vitamin D if you have sunscreen on. So I just want to encourage you to check, get your levels checked. Your doctor hopefully will order that for you. But um by and large, if you are not out in the sun on a regular basis without sunscreen, you probably have vitamin D deficiency, and you probably need at least 1,000 to 5,000 IUs every single day. If you're really depleted, you're down in the 20s, 30s or so, you probably need 5,000 to 10,000 IUs a day, right? So I just want to quickly share that we do have D3K2 lift at shop.fastafate.com. And this product is so awesome because it's an MCT oil. It's a fat-soluble vitamin and therefore it needs to be in fat to be absorbed into our body. And I love the liquid version because you can just absorb it right into the bloodstream inside your mouth. You don't have to rely on your digestive tract, on your stomach. So it's a high potency D3 with K2 as MK7 because that helps your body deliver your calcium to your bones and to the hard areas that you want it, not to your soft tissue areas like cardiovascular system. And it's essential for thyroid health, for bone health, for immune health, for your cardiovascular system, all the things. So I would love to just extend a 20% off offer. If you have never tried that, go to shop.fastfaith.com, use the code podcast, it will be your favorite vitamin D supplement. It's so easy to take, it has no flavor, like it's it's so easy. So thank you for letting me share that, Esther, because people don't need to suffer, right?

SPEAKER_01 38:35

No, they don't need to suffer. And and it's one of the easiest things to fix, too. Once you know your vitamin D number, and if your doctor hasn't ordered it, that's one that you can get online. You can, I think I had ordered the first time like through the mail. I got a little kit in the mail, poked my finger, drops of blood on a little card, mailed it back in, and then you know, a couple days later, there was my number in my email. And then all you have to do is dose your supplement accordingly. It's so simple to fix that root cause. If you're gonna look at, you know, a dietary root cause, that's gonna take, you know, some overhaul and some work and some investment of your time and your energy and your money. Vitamin D, it's like a simple lab test, and then you take a supplement every day and you get out in the sun when you can. It's so simple and so easy to correct. Yeah, exactly. Oh my gosh.

Dr. Tabatha 39:25

Well, Esther, this conversation was exactly what our community needed. So thank you. Um, where can our listeners find you, connect with you, and grab your free thyroid question guide? Tell us about that too.

SPEAKER_01 39:39

Yeah, that question guide was something I think we all create from what we needed, and it was definitely something that I needed. It is 10 questions to ask your doctor. And at the end of that PDF, there's a one-page printable that has all 10 questions on it with space to write your notes. You just take that to your next doctor visit, and you can get some real answers if your doctor knows. Because some of the questions your doctor might not have an answer to. Um, and that's fine. That just tells you it's time to dig deeper and get some other people on your team. But the best place to find me is somebody's already listening to this podcast. So um, you know, after this episode is done, search for the Health with Hashimoto's podcast and listen to one of those episodes next. And then health with Hashimoto's.com is where you can find everything, including that freebie, that 10 questions for your doctor.

Dr. Tabatha 40:28

Okay, ladies, I want to leave you with Isaiah 4031 today. I think this goes along great with the conversation we had with Esther because the Lord wants you to have hope and He is going to renew your strength if you if you search him out. So go and meditate on Isaiah 4031. If you've never opened a Bible, just Google it or just you know, write down what I'm going to read and just meditate on it. Meaning, think about the words and ask God,

Vitamin D Targets And D3K2 Offer

Dr. Tabatha 41:04

what are you trying to say to me in this verse today? And you would be surprised. I think you're gonna get a revelation. So let me just read this really quick. But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength, they will soar on wings like eagles, they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. That hope is for you, ladies. They is you, that is us. God is speaking to us. The Bible is living and active, it is the nourishing word of God. I would invite you to invite him into your journey because he is the true healer, he is the true physician, and he wants you to overcome this and live an amazing life. John 10:10 says that Jesus came to give you life, life abundantly, here now on this earth, not in the afterlife. Yes, that's gonna happen, but right now. So there's no reason to struggle anymore. Thank you, Esther, for giving us hope and for this awesome conversation.

SPEAKER_01 42:10

Oh, thank you. It's been an honor to be here. Thanks, Ashley.

Dr. Tabatha 42:14

Thank you. Have a good week, ladies. If you like that episode, I have one favor to ask, maybe two. Can you hit subscribe and give me a heart? I want Apple to know that this is important information to you because when we tell them that, you will get more of it. So use your voice. Hit subscribe, hit the like button, share with a friend. And the other thing, I want you to download the five day challenge and get started on it. Take imperfect action. I will see you in the Fast of Faith Sisterhood. Till next time.