#119 Clean Eating with Allison Schaaf

The information provided in this podcast is educational and not intended to diagnose or treat medical conditions. Dr. Donnie Wilson struggled for decades to solve her numerous health issues and heal her body. But with focused determination, she healed herself, and in doing so, she discovered the Dr. Donnie stress recovery Protocol. On this show, you're going to hear from doctors, nutritionists, and Experts along with Dr. Donnie, who will give practical advice and wisdom to help heal your body. This is how humans heal.

Hi, and welcome to how humans heal. I'm Dr. Donnie Wilson, and I'm so excited to introduce you to a good friend of mine today. Allison Schaff is a dietitian and a chef, and she has created a amazing website and tool called Prepdish to help people to eat clean ongoing. I'm so glad you're here with me. I also want to say, and we'll get to talk about this a little bit today, too, that Allison has created the Miss Kim Carriage Hope desk. So we're going to touch on that, too. But we really want to start by talking about clean eating and how Allison has made it easy. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Thank you for having me. It's good to see you. It's been a while.

As always, Alison and I love to talk about cats and chickens because we both are animal lovers, too. In addition to being totally into food as medicine and health and all of that, we both love animals, too, right? Oh, my gosh.

Animals and travel and I feel like there's a lot of similar passions.

You still have your chickens?

Oh, yes. Oh, yes.

I love that. Because the thing is, like, really, to me, you have fully embraced food as medicine and, like, food as a part of your life and living, you know, from the time you wake up till the time you go to sleep, and probably even while you're sleeping, you're thinking about how to, like, have food be not stressful. I mean, I think that sometimes with. When people think about eating clean or even just eating in general amidst their busy lives, food becomes a stress. Like, how am I gonna. What am I gonna eat? And how am I gonna have the right food at the right time? And how am I going to eat in a way that optimizes my body weight and my health and. Right, like, all these different. How am I going to do this? Is overwhelming related to food. And somehow you kind of, like, figured out how to navigate all of that. I mean, tell us a little bit more, Alison. Like, how did you. How did this happen for you? Where did. How did you get so into food and Eating clean.

Well, I'll back up a little bit. It started so I actually went to culinary school and knew I did a culinary nutrition program because I knew if I wanted to. If I wanted to get into nutrition, I wanted to know how to cook. But if I was going to get into cooking, I knew I wanted to, like, you know, if you're going to spend the time to do it, make sure it was healthy and nourishing for our bodies. So that's kind of My background was as the chef that also has a nutrition background. And in my career, I started out cooking for people as a personal chef. So I went into people's homes every week. I mean, sounds all the. I'm kind of like now wishing I had myself. But, you know, I'd cook. And the way I had my business set up is I would visit each of my clients one day a week and basically get them set up for the week. So I'd kind of do all the chopping, mixing up sauces, and then I'd leave instructions on so that, like, at dinner time, I wouldn't actually be there and they could, you know, prepare their meals. And as I was doing this and building my business, I realized, well, gosh, like, by the time I got to, you know, five, six clients, I kind of, like, maxed out. You know, you can only go to so many homes in a day. And as I kind of got further long into it, I realized, well, gosh, like, I really have gotten fast at this because, like, in the beginning, I could do four clients, and then five and then six, because I got faster at it, more efficient. I was always trying to figure out, how can I, you know, do this good, quality, healthy food, but, you know, from a business standpoint, bring on more clients. And as I did that, I realized, well, gosh, I have this system that I've created. And so basically, I took a, you know, several months as I was doing this personal chef work, and I thought, hmm. And I kind of started jotting down notes and recipes and all the efficiencies that I was coming up with. And I'm like, I think there's something here, because so many people, you know, I'd, you know, I'd meet someone for the first time and tell them what I did. And everyone's like, well, I want a personal chef. And that's great, and maybe you're in a season of your life or that's an option, but for a lot of people, you know, it can be price prohibitive. And I was like, well, is there A way that I can reach more people than, like, six people. Right? You know, like, I want to reach. And even if I hired a chef, you know, I'm not going to be reaching thousands of people. It's maybe dozens. So I was like, how can I really get this in front of a larger audience? So that's what I started doing, was writing down again, the recipes, kind of simplifying them, figuring out how do you get in out of the grocery store really quickly, how do you plan? How do you kind of get that week's worth of meals prepared ahead of time? So I started doing that, and I was actually 10 years ago. So 10 years ago, I'm writing this out and figuring out, how do I get this online? How do I sell this to people? And I was really shopping that. And over those next few years, I was still working as a personal chef, but figuring out how to get it online. And eventually, eventually it got to the point where it became Prep Dish. And I was sending out these weekly meal plans and helping people. And, you know, kind of fast forward 10 years now, you know, that vision of helping more people, you know, we're helping thousands of people getting their meals prepared, you know, doing it themselves and basically teaching people. I know you said something in the intro about, oh, gosh, you know, you're thinking about food all the time. But with Prep Dish, the whole idea is you don't have to think about it, right? Like, you do the plan up front, you do the hard work up front, front for like an hour or two, and then you don't have to think about it. So like, every day, I don't have to think about what's for dinner?

Think about it. Yeah. And then you get it all planned, and you can do whatever else you want. I love it.

Yeah. Well, and now, you know, when I created this, I was single, on my own, and, you know, within that 10 years, I got married, and now I have two little kids, which has always been, you know, sort of a lot of our audience has been these busy moms. And now I'm in the shoes of a busy mom. And I'm realizing that these meal plans really are helping in the way I set them out to. Because at the beginning of the week, I print out my meal plan, I order the groceries, and then I have my plan in place, and I'm not having to scramble if we have a babysitter in or a relative or my husband look at the plan and see what's for dinner.

And they can do that. And so it's really cool now this far in that I went from creating it to now actually really benefiting from it.

That's amazing. That's so cool that you get to use them in your family too, and to like. So basically what prep dish does is you sent. People will sign up for a membership, and then you're sending them that basically the menu almost as if it's their. Their home kitchen is a restaurant. And you're saying, here's your menu and here's what you need, the food you need to purchase and how you need to prepare it so that you have the food ready to eat, Right? Something like that.

Correct. Yeah, it's. It's really. There's kind of three key pieces. And like you said, it's a menu and you've got a grocery list. So, you know, you take. It's very specific. If you go to the store, it's organized by the store departments. Again, I was really thinking efficiency or you can, you know, order them on. Order your groceries online. So that's the first piece, the grocery list. And then the really key, key piece is I call it prep day. But it's really just that meal prep. So this is what I used to do for cl. This is how you spend one to two hours, say Sunday afternoon or Monday evening, do all your chopping, mix all your sauces. So then that third piece, which is. I call it dish day, but it's really mealtime. At mealtime, you don't really have to. Not only do you not have to think, you really don't have to do a lot because you've already done the heavy lifting during that meal prep time. So. And we have what we created now called super fast plans. That's one hour of meal prep. So if you invest one hour of time upfront, the rest of the week, it's just a breeze because everything's kind of done ahead of time. And then you just dive in and like, finish things off. You know, put it in the oven or heat it up on the stove. And then that way, that dinner time, you kind of get rid of that scramble. You know, it's like, ah, it's dinner time. I've got like 10 minutes. What. What can I do that's fast? And it's already sitting in the fridge waiting for you. The plan's there. So that's. That's kind of how it works, start to finish.

I mean, I. I know for me, even just cooking for myself, I mean, for years I was cooking for. For me and my daughter, and now I'm mostly just cooking for me. But even then, I want the meal preparation part each day to be like 15 minutes or less. You know, like, I'm like, I'm all for, like, I don't, I don't want to, I don't have time to be spending an hour every day or figuring it out at the last minute. And it's so nice when you're just like, okay, we, we have it organized in a way where you can just, you know, basically be ready to prepare it to eat and then, and then move on from there to go do what else you gotta get done. Because so many people have, like if your kids are in activities, right? Or you're, you know, maybe they, even if the kids are in class during the day, you might be also working or you've got other appointments and other things to do. There's not, it's not like we can spend the whole day cooking a giant meal every day. It's impossible.

Yeah. And, you know, I want to talk a minute about decision fatigue. And then also. So whether or not you're using prep dish, to me, the key to like, healthy eating is actually to have a plan. So by this I mean, you know, with prep, we do it for you or just simply, if you're listening to this, you're like, oh, yeah, that's a good idea. Spend an hour or even 30 minutes at the end of the week or over the weekend. Jot down what you're gonna have each day and, you know, make sure you have those ingredients. So then that way when dinnertime comes along, you're not having to figure something out on the fly. Because to me, that really is what's gonna set you up for success with healthy eating. It's so hard at 5 o', clock, 6 o', clock, 7 o' clock to make a good decision about what you're gonna eat. Right. Like you've been making. So this is where the decision fatigue comes in. You've had so many decisions to make all day long, and then maybe the end, you know, you have that last work call and it goes a little bit over and then you're hungry or hangry, and then you're trying to figure out what's for dinner. Well, at that point, your willpower, you're going to reach for whatever is easy. So unless you've taken that time up front, you're probably just going to, you know, it's easy to do takeout or frozen pizza or whatever is just kind of like autopilot. So if you can kind of make Those decisions up front, when you're in a better head space and really thinking what's best for me, like, what do I want to do? Right. I think a lot of people have, you know, these really good intentions. Like, I, I bought the food, I want to eat healthy, but then again, they're waiting to make that decision until dinner time. And that's not when you're making your best decisions. Right. Like, I know for me by that time and then the kids are screaming and like, I'm just like, get it done.

Yeah, I love that.

Yeah. So really making those decisions ahead of time.

So, Allison, how did you get into clean eating and gluten free meals in the first place?

Well, it's interesting because the gluten free piece, that's been there since the beginning because I myself am gluten free. And in the beginning, I did all the recipe creation and the recipe testing. So I knew if I'm going to create all these recipes, you know, I have to try them. So they have to be gluten free. And in general, the, you know, early recipes, they were all the way I was eating because I was doing all the recipe testing. So that's where that started. And then from there, you know, a lot of the clients that I was working with, with the personal chef work, I got a lot of referrals from local doctors, especially, you know, like some functional medicine doctors that were working with diet. And so I saw with a lot of those clients that they did well, you know, when they would remove gluten and dairy, maybe a grain free diet, sort of paleo style. So, you know, it started out all of the plans, we had one option and it was gluten free and dairy free. And then from there I added in the paleo just because I saw what a difference it made for some of my clients that I was working with, we did some shorter term, like an autoimmune protocol that's sort of like an elimination diet, again based on work with clients and seeing the difference it was making. And then, you know, over the years, there were a lot of customers that were on a lower carb or keto style diet. So we added in that, that plan basically because of consumer demand. And then from there, the most recent plan that we've added, I referenced earlier, it's called superfast. And this is currently my favorite plan. This was for all the moms that were like, you know, the meal plans, the prep required is usually, you know, one to two hours. But some people really pushed us on that and said, hey, like an hour max. Like that's all I got. So we really challenge ourselves to how can we do healthy meals with only one hour of prep. And so that's where the super fast plans came into play still, you know, lots of vegetables, really healthy on those. Gluten free is optional. So we, you know, if there's pasta, you can use gluten free or you can use whole wheat, kind of depending on, you know, your diet and your lifestyle. So and again, dairy is always optional. We always keep dairy light and keep it to where it can easily just be omitted because I know there's, you know, people that have dairy intolerance or is their allergies. So that's how we handle that. But the super fast is sort of that just overall healthy, family friendly meals. So right now that's how it works is, you know, when someone signs up for prep dish, they have access to all of these different meal plans and then from week to week they can figure out what works best for them and their family and, and their diet and their, you know, health needs.

So I love it. I love it because so many people that I, so many patients that I work with, I'm helping them to identify their food sensitivity. So we usually, I recommend a, a specialty food sensitivity panel so we can see the IgG and IgA food reactions. That's where oftentimes I'm identifying like a dairy sensitivity. Like you're mentioning reaction to case seen in a way, for example, or reaction to egg or gluten. And so then to be able to have help eating that way is so key. It's so useful because if a person is just coming into this and like, what am I going to eat? Right? Like they're like, okay, I need to avoid dairy and gluten, but how am I going to do that? What am I going to eat? It can feel overwhelming at first. And so for you to be able to have these menus and meal plans already figured out for people and it's not the same every week, right? You're, every week they're getting a new.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's different every week. And the beauty is it takes the focus off. I think what happens a lot when people have to, you know, they have a sensitivity to a food, it's like, oh, all the things I can't have, right? There's this big focus on what you can't have. And with prep digital kind of shifts that focus, like, oh, what can I have? Like, oh, there's all these delicious meals and you don't Even notice it's gluten free. Like we call it gluten free, so people know that. But one of the cool pieces of feedback we get a lot is I use your meals when we have company. You know, like anytime I'm entertaining, if there's going to be someone coming over and you know, I do the same at my house. And no one's saying, oh, this is a gluten free meal, you know, no one knows. It's just this really tasty, delicious meal that you know, happens to be gluten free. So it's really that focus on what can I eat, not what's being taken out. And the same goes for dairy or, you know, legumes or whatever it might be.

And that's one of the things I love, you know, that I stated from the beginning about you is just making food something that we enjoy and that we don't have to feel stressed about, including, like you said, we don't want to focus too much on what we can't have or what's inflammatory to our bodies. Including sugar. Right. I mean, that's the thing is one thing I noticed I was mentioning cooking with my mom. One thing that still my mom does is she puts sugar in a lot of her recipes. And I'm always like, wait a minute, there's no need for sugar in this recipe. I think if we eliminated it from the recipe, it would probably taste better. And what do you find with that? I mean, I'm assuming your recipes are all probably don't have added sugar, but tell us more about that.

Yeah, I mean, sort of the same thing. Like it's like these are tasty, delicious meals. And because there's no sugar, no one's saying like, oh, where's the sugar? You know, it's just using a lot of fresh flavors. I love using things like lemon and lime for some, like nice pop. And then like a lot of fresh herbs really can add good flavor. And you know, really utilizing sauces. Like I love a nice pesto or chimichurri or you know, even balsamic vinaigrette. And balsamic vinaigrette can be as simple as balsamic vinegar, olive oil and a little salt. You know, it's really, it doesn't need to be this elaborate recipe to add flavor, you know, so adding flavor to foods but in really healthy ways so that it's delicious but still something that's going to be nourishing for your body, like leave you feeling good after you.

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So.

Yeah, I think it's so cool when we can make these, learn how to make these sauces ourselves at home and make them clean and easy and, and at first you don't have it all down. You know, I think it's important to like realize that it's like at first you might try one or two recipes or meals and then kind of get it integrated into your flow. What do you encourage people to do with that? How do you get started with it?

Yeah, well, and that kind of goes back. So we, this active Facebook group that we have, you know, people in there are so encouraging. We have, you know, an email sequence that walks people through it, but really just, just having the patience and knowing that over time it's really going to make sense. That first week or two is kind of figuring out how the system works and realizing there really is a reason. There's intentionality behind everything that's in there in that meal plan. And so really kind of trusting the process and figuring it out a big thing too is like in the beginning, okay, follow it, figure it out. Like you said, maybe do a reduced number of recipes. But then over time. The really cool part that I love seeing people do is you can really make them your own. You can substitute, you can make swaps. And you know, we have ideas on that in our weekly newsletter. But the more people can start to make it their own, the more they're going to stick with it long term. You know, they can say, hey, this is great but my family would prefer asparagus over broccoli or they don't like salmon as much as like this a cod. So you know, just making those Easy substitution options. You know, it's really something that they can make their own.

Oh my gosh, that's. That's so cool. And I love that you have a Facebook Facebook community because then you feel like you're not on your own with this. Like, you can connect with other people who are also trying to avoid certain foods that are triggering inflammation or decreasing their sugar or balance. I would think this is also going to help a lot with balancing blood sugar levels. So whether a person's intention is like, someone might be coming to this because they everything, I would think anywhere from trying to lose weight or optimize your weight to helping reverse autoimmunity or any other kind of inflammatory condition or even for fertility, which I want to shift and talk a little bit more about your work with helping people with fertility. But I mean, are there other health issues that people come to prep dish with? If just so listeners are like, oh, this helped. This, this helped for. This was my health issue too? Yeah.

I mean, I think any health issue that has a diet or nutrition, like, kind of core of what's going on, which I think is most health issues, it's just kind of finding that. Right practitioner, finding someone like yourself that can kind of recognize that. But anyone that knows, like, maybe their diet isn't quite what it should be. And I think deep down people can kind of know if, like, I'm not quite there with nutrition, doing something like this is a good way to just kind of get back to like a reset, back to a healthier way of eating. And then, yes, removing the gluten and the dairy, a lot of times people will see a difference. Or like you said, a happy side effect might be weight loss. You know, we don't lead with, hey, this is going to help you lose weight. We get people that say it all the time though, right. If you're eating more whole real foods, healthier foods made from scratch, again, side effect of that can definitely be weight loss. So, you know, and the, you know, with the low carb one, sometimes people are using that to help balance blood sugar. So, you know, just a whole array of issues. And definitely a lot of people, it's someone in the family with an allergy or intolerance with a lot of that because you have control over what food you're buying. You know, like, I give you the grocery list, but if there's a nut allergy or anything like that, you are in control of what you're buying. And you can, can easily substitute and make the meal plans and the meals Work for you.

That's so cool. So then you have like the structure and the idea of it, and then you can, you can tweak the recipes to match for your family. And I love that idea too, because yes, sometimes it may be one or one person in the family that really needs to be gluten free, maybe has more severe sensitivity or celiac disease. And yet, you know, really we want to be cooking for everyone together. So if we can have a meal plan that allows for that so that everybody's enjoying the food and it's, and it's, you know, just. You know what I mean? Because there is something about eating together. Do you, do you touch on that too? Like just this concept of being able to have a meal eaten together in a. And it can be a healthy meal. I mean, I think we're so used to meals eaten together, going to kind of being unhealthy comfort foods. But how do we bring this concept of eating meals? Because I saw a study recently on how much that helps us with our life and our stress reduction to have actually time spent eating together.

Yeah, I mean, that's something we talk a lot about, is like really my goal at the end of the day. Yes, the healthy eating is nice, but like having a family meal, having everyone sit down together around the table in a calm way, which can be really hard, right? Like I have a three year old and a one year old, like literally sitting down and being, I mean, how much better is your digestion, people, you know, you have digestive issues sometimes just sitting down and being calm and taking a few deep breaths, that might be way better, you know, like, and I mean, I'm into the nutrition stuff, but like sometimes just being able to sit down and, and for kids, I mean, how important is that to like put the phones away and sit down? And so that is really something we talk a lot about. You know, another thing we talk a lot about, we have different challenges throughout the year, and right now we're in the middle of one for picky eaters and how you deal with that and how to navigate when your kids, you know, are maybe resisting certain foods and are there, you know, kind of some behavioral things that you as a parent can do to help encourage healthy eating in them. And sometimes it's not, as it may be different than what you realize. Like, it's not actually it's you doing less instead of more oftentimes, but kind of helping guiding parents through that. Like, how do you do that? But I mean, number one is like, you're Preparing these meals and modeling that behavior. So yes, the family meals are just important for so many different reasons.

It's so true. I mean when I work with a lot of families too, you know, from trying to get pregnant through pregnancy, postpartum and when, when kids are young and through, you know, supporting parents through that and supporting their kids and, and I really realized like even with food introduction for babies, let alone, you know, older, so much of it in through childhood is about just interacting with food and experimenting and getting to feel comfortable with it. And I feel like we have such an opportunity to teach our children a new way of understanding and interacting with foods in a non stressful way. You know, like I know from, even from my childhood and definitely from, from many people's childhood, eating was stressful, you know, like either because they weren't having a nice calm family meal or because there was certain like punishments related to eating, like you have to finish all the food in your plate or, or you know, things like this that kind of ended up bringing stress into the meal. And I feel like the more the kids have a chance to do the planning, be part of the cooking, eating healthy foods that help them feel better than they and and to feel calm in the meal preparation, it's a whole different experience related to food that is going to influence their whole lifetime of eating.

Yeah, I mean, absolutely. I'm just such a big proponent for, you know, everyone, everything you just said. But you know, really like, you know, with my kids from the time they're six months old, this is the food they were eating. You know, we sat down, we had a meal, they have some of what we're having. Sometimes they eat it, sometimes they don't, but most of the time they do. And you know, they've really become adventurous eaters because of it. So it's been really cool to watch their habits that's evolved just from kind.

Of eating this way because this is the food that's available. So this is normal and familiar.

Yeah, they don't know any different.

Yeah, yeah.

They'll sit down and people are like really? They're eating the salmon or the salad or you know, this vegetable and. Yeah, and you know, usually they do and sometimes, you know, there's certain. But yeah, they just, that's what they know. They don't know any different to ask for anything different.

Yeah, I mean that's how my daughter grew up too, of course, with her mom as a nutritionist and nature pathic doctor. And I do think it definitely can make a difference and it's just helping everybody's health overall. I wanted to make sure and touch about your fertility journey and your fertility work, because I know that.

Alongside of doing the prep dish business, you were also, as you mentioned, creating your family, growing your family. And in the process, you saw the struggles women go through. You experienced it yourself, the struggles of fertility and miscarriage, and. And you've now created a separate, whole support network for women experiencing that, too. So tell us a little bit about that, too.

Yeah, so that was a very unexpected part of kind of this last 10 years. Like I said, you know, prep just started 10 years ago. And then within that 10 years, I met my husband, and we wanted to build a family. I didn't have any reason to believe we'd have any struggles at all. But we went into it and unfortunately ran into the issue of.

Miscarriage. I started having not just one miscarriage, but multiple miscarriages. And as I was going through that, as you can imagine, it was very. I mean, the hardest thing I've been through, you know, in my. In my life. And going through that, though, as. As an entrepreneur, and my husband's also an entrepreneur, I was kind of shocked that, like, I didn't realize that, you know, I'd had a friend or two that had had a miscarriage, but I didn't know that it was actually even possible to, like, have. You know, I ended up having five in total, and that wasn't something I'd ever known. And so to have that happen to me, it was just. I felt very alone. I fe. Very lost, and, like, just not knowing what was going on.

Okay, so then you were going through all these losses, pregnancy losses, and you were looking for resources, and you're like, oh, my gosh. There's. There's not. There's not much available. And I mean, this is. The thing about you, Alison, is like, you're like, hey, if. If I'm struggling with this, then there must be other people. Let me create a resource for people.

Exactly. And I was. I think where it started was, you know, my background with a, you know, master's in nutrition. Like, I was used to reading studies, like, reading the literature, when it came to, you know, nutrition issues and when it came to these miscarriages, fertility issues, I would Google, you know, I was diagnosed with antiphospholipid syndrome, which is a blood clotting issue. And. But when I would Google about. I mean, the articles, they would just be kind of like one or two paragraphs. It was kind of. I call it fluff, you know, And I'm like, if someone. And you know, there's a lot of different things that can contribute to miscarriage, especially in a recurrent loss. And I'm like, if you're googling this or wanting to research it and find out more, like you really want to know what's going on, you want to know, like, okay, if this is the protocol, I'm being recommended, what does the science say about that? Are there things that I can do with supplements? Are there things my husband can do? And the answer actually is yes, but it's really hard to find that, you know, the male. How does the male factor contribute to this? And finding that information, I really had to like kind of dig deep. And so I was like, there's gotta be a resource and I'm gonna create it basically. So, you know, that's what I set out to do. And that's where I started so, you know, as Miscarriage Hope Desk and I started with our library and really creating these in depth articles that get into the, you know, really nitty gritty and like, what does the science say behind different protocols and supplements and how, what things can people be doing to help prevent this? Right. Like any, when you're getting into, you know, each miscarriage, it's like if you could prevent even one, like, it is so worth it because it's just so much to go through. And so knowing there's other people out there with similar struggles, I was like, I've just, I've got to create this. And so, you know, it started with those articles and then there's actually there's a podcast with interviews of experts and people that have been through it. There's stories of hope on our website, you know, Facebook group and Instagram and just like different ways that people can feel not alone. Right. Like, I guess the bottom line is like, I don't want them to feel so alone and to realize like, oh, there's other people going through this. Let me connect with them. And hey, there's also some science out there on different things that might be contributing that maybe your doctor isn't going to mention. Especially like on miscarriage two or three. And now like sometimes they really don't start doing much until there's more than that. But there's testing. Oh, that was the other big thing is creating a testing checklist. Like, take it to your doctor. What things can you be testing for? And just really helping to empower women to be their own advocate and to learn to take control of their lab work and see if there Might be lab work that's missing. Sometimes there's simple. I mean, I say simple, but like, you know, there's a structural issue and if you don't get that fixed, you're going to keep having this issue. So just really trying to find those ways to prevent, you know, prevent it from going on over and over. And how can I help those women and those couples to, you know, get to that baby and, and to, you know, figure out what might be going on? Because there is a lot that can be done in terms of lab work and protocols and such. So.

Yeah, no, I'm so, I'm so excited when I, when I heard that you were creating this because I, I've been helping women and in, with preventing miscarriages for, for more than 20 years too. And it's, it is, it's so I completely agree with you. Like, I go into, to whenever I'm working with a patient who I know is working on conceiving, I say to them, like, I want to let you know that as soon as you tell me you're pregnant, I'm going to go into miscarriage prevention mode. And that's going to be very, you know, before that we're doing everything we can before even the pregnancy to have you set up, set up for success. But as soon as you hit pregnancy, I'm going to be like, let's prevent a miscarriage because it is such a gap. I mean, I'm also trained as a midwife and I've worked in the women's health field for a couple decades. So I know that this is a gap in care. Like it's between the. You really are not going into obstetrics care until usually 8, 10 or 12 weeks of pregnancy. And so you're kind of on your own at the beginning. And that's when the highest risk of miscarriage is, is before you even start care with your, your obstetrician. And so I think, so I know that so many women are on their own. And as you mentioned, it's a standard of care to not really follow up until a person has three miscarriages. And I feel like that's absurd when there's so much we can do even before the first miscarriage to prevent even a single one, let alone if you have one miscarriage. There's a lot we can do, like you mentioned, in terms of testing and protocols to support preventing a second one from happening. Because as you mentioned, it is so it's, it's a lot to go through pregnancy loss even once. Let Alone five times. It's. I'm really sad that you had to experience that. And I, and I. So I'm so excited to be able to help prevent that. So I'm so glad for everyone to know about the miscarriage Hope desk so that they can find. So that people can find prepdishreptish.com and I'm gonna put the links down below and you can find a miscarriage hope desk@miscarriagehopedesk.com Also on social media, right?

Yep, yep.

Anywhere else that you encourage people to reach out just to. So they can get a better sense of these resources that you put together and where to begin.

Well, we do have. So with prepdish, there's a two week free trial. So if you were like, it might work for me, it might not. Try it out for. For two weeks. You can see all the plans, all the different, you know, diets that we talked about. And that's prepdish.com. Dr. Donnie. So, you know, that's already set up there. And then, you know, with Miscarriage Hope desk, like I said, there's that free lab checklist. It's just miscarriagehopedesk.com labs. And that's a good place to start if you've had a miscarriage. You can look, take that to your doctor, print it out, be like, okay, am I missing any of this testing? Like, why? Just kind of understand, like, maybe you don't need to do every test, but you need to know why you're not doing certain tests and like, why one may or may not be appropriate for you. And really kind of, again, take control of the lab work as a starting point.

Oh, my gosh, it's so amazing. Like, you, you. I love that you have this, like, with your personality, it seems like you're like, hey, there's a way to organize things so that we can make it simple and we can actually move forward and address things efficiently. And also part of you is this just wanting to help people, to not have to struggle in where. Where maybe they haven't had the support that they need. And I think that's such a beautiful thing about you. Alison, thank you so much for all that you've created and for sharing it with us here today.

Well, thank you. It's always a pleasure to get a talk with you and I appreciate you having me on.

You're welcome. Oh, my gosh. I. And I always am, like, thinking I want to come hang out at your house for a day. Like with the kids and the animals and the food and just be like this. Sounds like a dream place to hang out all day. I love it.

Hey, anytime you want to come to Texas, you're more than welcome. We have goats now, so it's just a little like, hill country oasis. So anytime you are more than welcome.

I love it. I love it. And I'm sure you're inspiring so many people to create their lives that way, too. You know, like, it's possible to be connected with nature and eat healthy and enjoy our lives and be healthy at the same time. Yeah. All right, well, thanks again, and we'll be in touch. I'll. I'll. I can't wait to share this with everyone and anyone who's listening. If you have questions or comments, please write into us. Definitely. Write us your your comments and feedback and subscribe so that you receive the next episode of How Humans Heal. Talk to you soon.

Thanks for listening to How Humans Heal. If you liked this episode, leave a rating and a review. And for more resources, visit drdani.com.