How to Heal Nervous System Dysregulation: A Root-Cause Approach

Hi and welcome to How Humans Heal. I'm Dr. Doni Wilson. In today's episode, I'm going to be talking with Dr. Kali Livingston about nervous system regulation and dysregulation. What does that mean and what can you do to help create a more regulated nervous system and what does that look like? And I'm so excited to have this conversation with Dr. Kali. She is the founder of Roots Deep Medicine. She's a licensed naturopathic doctor like me. She's She also has a podcast called the Vital Spirit Podcast, where she explores this concept of nervous system regulation, as well as the gut-brain connection and psychoneuroimmunoendocrinology in general. I'm so glad for you to be here with me today, Dr. Kelly. Thank you so much for joining us.

Thank you for having me. I'm really excited to be here as well.

Always so fun for me to get to talk with another naturopathic doctor because right away I'm hoping listeners and viewers see how you and I come from this connection with nature, right? It's naturopathic medicine. It's how nature can help us heal. And I really feel like you are a perfect example of that. You really— in the work that you do, you really help people understand how nature can help us heal. in so many beautiful ways, including our nervous system. And so I wanted to just get a sense for people to get to know you a little bit because you originally started by studying psychology, right? And philosophy. Is that, how do you, do you think that influenced or, and influences how you help your patients now with naturopathic medicine?

Yeah, absolutely. When I went to my undergraduate education, I went to Columbia University in the city of New York, and I thought that I was going to be pre-med, And to be totally honest, I was so overwhelmed and dysregulated by the idea of calculus and biochemistry and all of the things that that entailed. And I knew deep down I was really more curious and interested in studying psychology. And so I remember meeting with my advisor and saying, you know, I have this idea that I want to study bioethics and the ethics around health and healing. And it wasn't really a major at that point. So I combined a major in psychology and a minor in philosophy, and I kind of just designed my own program, essentially. And I really loved depth psychology and learning about Jung and all of the kind of deeper inner study of human behavior. And so that's where I got my start. And I had a wonderful mentor. I worked in his lab. It was called the Affect and Relationships Lab at the time. And when it came time to decide where to go beyond my Yeah. And he said, no, no, no. He knew me really well, and he said, you will be so bored. You're going to study one thing for the rest of your life and write papers on that one thing, and that's just not going to feed your appetite. You're very curious, and you're already asking questions about physiology. And he knew that I had initially thought I was going to be pre-med, and he gave really great guidance, and it kind of set me off on a different path. And so I started doing research at Columbia Presbyterian, and I, again, I had that bug of, I wanna go to medical school. And as I was doing my MCATs and working as a medical assistant, the audiologist at the practice I was working at said, you know, you're really describing something that exists and it's not conventional medicine. And she told me about naturopathy, and I looked up the principles of naturopathic medicine, and I said, That is what I'm meant to do. The whole person, that's what I've been looking for, mind, body, and spirit. And I'm not particularly religious, I'm extremely spiritual, but my dad was a minister for 40 years. And so I had this, I think, unique blend of really being drawn by science and research and medicine, but also wanting to have that mind and spirit aspect. And as you know, that is what we do. So I'm very grateful for her. I can't even remember her name, but she changed my life.

So that's amazing. Isn't it something how— and I think that's— it's so true. When we start getting really clear of what we're looking for and we speak it, then other people will help us find it too and be like, this is what you're describing. This is something you can find. That's how I found Bastyr University and naturopathic medicine too, is just by saying, hey, I'm looking for this. And then Oh, that exists. Here it is. And I love that you're really sharing that, that even naturopathic medicine, where a lot of times we do talk about the physical body, you know, like gut health and hormones, and, and even if it's joint pain, or, you know, we're talking about the physical body, but as naturopathic doctors, we're really also trained in supporting people on an emotional and spiritual level. And I think that I like to highlight that because sometimes I'll be talking to a patient and they'll And like, they realize like, oh, wait a minute, we're talking about emotional spiritual stuff here. And do you find that with your patients too? Where they're like, oh, what's— something's different here. Why are we talking about this?

Very often they say, oh, I didn't realize I was coming for therapy. That's a very classic line that I hear frequently. And they haven't really necessarily thought about everything as all interconnected. And I absolutely start, I say to new patients especially, we're gonna start with the physical plane of existence because sometimes they're not Looking for anything else, right? And if we can remove obstacles to cure on that plane, then we— I find it opens up conversations around everything else. And, you know, you're not going to talk about levels of consciousness when you're not pooping. So we start with the physical, typically.

That's a great way to say it, Kelly. Absolutely. We have to start somewhere, and it's a really good place to just start with getting things moving, right? Like getting the bowels moving, getting the person hydrated, getting their circadian rhythm. And I know these things you really are so great at talking with and teaching people about.

Thank you.

Like, how do we, how do we get back to our circadian rhythms in our life and our, our human existence in this natural world? And then that can lead to other transformations at deeper levels. Maybe you can share us a little bit about like, what, what do you suggest? How do people know if If they need, where they need to start, you know, do they need to start with circadian rhythm? And if so, why and what should they do?

Yeah, well, if we're, say we're looking at it through the lens of nervous system dysregulation or regulation, patients usually wanna know, well, how do I know if I have a dysregulated nervous system? And so let me even rewind and say that. Yeah, start there, that's perfect. Yeah, so as you know, we talk about, you know, removing obstacles to cure and we talk about creating the conditions for healing. And I find that if a person has what I would maybe say is a more dysregulated nervous system, then they might struggle with sleep, they might struggle with regular bowel movements, they might have low energy, they might have brain fog, or, you know, some mental health struggles, depression, anxiety. And so I think first things first is understanding that there are going to be times in a day and in our life where we do feel dysregulated, and really normalizing that human experience of coming in and out of dysregulation. And the point is that we have that sympathetic you know, fight-or-flight aspect of our nervous system. We have cortisol, it comes up in the morning, it helps us wake up and deal with the rest of the day. It's not that that should not exist, but we also have the brakes. We have our parasympathetic rest, digest, and heal state. And so just auditing with a person like, do you— are you able to fall asleep? Do you wake feeling rested? Are you pooping? Gives me a really good idea around not only their circadian rhythm and then their HPA axis health, but also are they able to go back and forth sympathetic to parasympathetic in in the way that our body's designed to do. And very often that's the place we start. And I usually start, I kind of have these pillars, or I, not kind of, I do have these pillars that we walk through. And so step 1 is always recognize and remove sources of inflammation and what I call maladaptive stress response. So again, if we're in that more sympathetic fight, flight, or even freeze state more frequently, and just acknowledging that, recognizing that, you know, knowing those terms is step 1.

And then, Yeah.

Introducing tools and techniques and, you know, whether it's a regulation tool or an herb or just a regular sleep-wake time so that we can start to balance out that parasympathetic nervous system response. And I think the longer that I practice, you probably notice this too, like the world is changing, right? There are so many notifications and stressors and technology, and a lot of patients are disconnected from the natural rhythms and from sunlight and from the earth and from air. And so getting out into nature just in the morning is just a wonderful first step. So if you acknowledge there's some dysregulation and then do a practice like that, it can be a really great first step for people.

And I love that it's, it's such a good way to get back in connection with your body, you know, because like you're saying, we have, we have so much going on, being pulled in a million directions. Appointments, to-do lists, phone calls, text messages that we, we forget sometimes that we're even living in a human body. We're like, it's kind of like you have to have a moment where you go, oh yeah, I have a human body. What is it keeping up with my— and let alone if someone's going through a major stress or trauma or change in their life, then it's really easy to lose track of, you know, what's going on in my nervous system, in my body. And And so I love that you're talking about how do we, how do we first of all become aware of that? And then second of all, how do we start making changes to address it? And, and just, just to— I want— I really just want to clarify, like you said, this term dysregulation, for anyone who may not be familiar with that, you know, why, why do you think we're— why do you think that became the term, you know, and do you think it's a good term for describing this?

I mean, yes and no, right? Because I think then people feel Like, if I'm dysregulated, something's wrong with me, and there's nothing wrong with you. Your body is going, your body-mind is going to be dysregulated at times, and that's appropriate. Your nervous system is essentially designed to keep you safe. And so there are times where dysregulation is warranted, and it essentially should be there. I think that a lot of nervous system kind of regulation tools and techniques have become popular essentially on social media, which is now where some people do look for health guidance if they're not getting it, you know, from their doctor at the time.

Yeah.

And so I think people might think I should always feel calm, and that's not the case. That it is the case that our body-mind should be able to come back to a state of regulation after a stressor, but it's not the case that you're always gonna float through life without any sort of dysregulation. And so I would look at it more as, are you— is your body unable to achieve those kind of natural states throughout a day? And again, the circadian rhythm is a good way to assess that. And if you're not, so sleep's a great example. For example, right, if you're not able to fall asleep or if you're tired all the time, there's a chance that there's more dysregulation happening. And so I usually, first things first, ask patients, you know, do you understand the different nervous system states? And I'll often show, in polyvagal theory, there's an autonomic map. So I'll give them the language of the autonomic map. And so a lot of times people have heard of fight or flight, and so I'll show them, you know, fight or flight is sympathetic activation. Do you exist in that state mostly? And then I'll show them dorsal vagal shutdown, and that's part of our vagal— vagus nerve, but it's a more shut-down state than the fight or flight. And then I'll show them ventral vagal, which is social engagement where you feel joy and compassion and peace. And I'll say, you know, the point is not to stay there all the time. You're going to move up and down this ladder. But if you can have some language to identify the state that you're maybe more prone to being in, and then we can work on some tools to use to move up and down the ladder. That's regulation. It's the coming in and out. And our body-mind is designed to come to homeostasis and balance, both with physiological events and with psychological stressors. And so introducing that concept is sometimes really empowering because they've never thought of it that way. You know, a lot of patients are handed a medication for crying too much or feeling hopeless and shut down. And if they have the language around, their nervous system, they don't feel so broken or like they need an external, you know, drug to fix them, quote unquote. So yeah.

Yeah, the word balance, I love that you're introducing that because it's, it's not what we're usually— we're so likely to aim for this or that or black or white, or am I doing it right or wrong? And, and as naturopathic doctors, we really learn, oh, actually what we're going for is In science, it's referred to as homeostasis, like you said, but it's this balance point. And it's, it's hard to get your finger on it sometimes, right? And it's not the same for everybody. So it's this, it's a little bit of a moving target. But that's the goal is how to find that sweet spot for you in your existence, right? How do you explain that to your patients? What, what?

Yeah, well, sometimes I really like I relate it back to myself and I'll talk, you know, patients see me as, you know, their doctor is very professional and balanced and calm. And I say, listen, that is, that is not my innate state. And I tell them, you know, my, I tended toward more of a fight state and more sympathetic dominant state when I, when I don't feel safe or I'm dysregulated. And I'll really give them examples from my own life to, Mm-hmm. Make them feel safe to have those conversations with me. Like, I'm a human, I work on coming back to homeostasis. It's something I actively participate in. And, and I introduce to them the fact that I, for many, many, many years, have practiced yoga and have a breathwork practice, and that I have this tool. I, I usually describe the parasympathetic nervous system as something that you have to exercise so that, number one, you're not triggered into dysregulation as readily or easily. And so, number two, and then number two, you have the muscle that you activated and practiced and strengthened to come back into regulation. So I think that that's important to just understand that it's going to happen.

It is. It's so true. We have the— I say we have a built-in, you know, stress response, and good thing we do. We need to be able to protect ourselves when it's necessary. But it's meant to protect and then go back into the— what's referred to as this rest and digest, right? Like doing the healthy optimal functioning to keep our health going, and not Not that we're going to be constantly in a stress state, but like you're saying, like, we constantly— if we think of it like a bicep curl, we're constantly working the stress response. Like, even if we're not actually in stress in the moment, if we're thinking about what we're— we're creating something we're stressing about, it recreates that stress response even if we're sitting there in our living room. And so, but the parasympathetic muscle doesn't get as much of a workout.

No. And I also introduce a framework where essentially I'm educating patients around the fact that the story in your mind is very often going to follow the state that your nervous system is in. So I ask them to notice the state that they're in, name it, recognize the story that they're telling themselves, and then practice a tool to shift out of that state. And so that can be Really powerful because it takes the power away from the story that your mind is looping on, whether it's rumination or anxiety or whatever it might be.

Yeah, a lot. I mean, I, as you know, I help a lot of women with who are dealing with an abnormal Pap smear and high-risk HPV virus. And that's a very common loop is all the what-ifs. What if it gets worse? What if I give it to someone else? What if I need a procedure? What if it causes cancer? And it's a, it's Whenever there's any kind of fear, whether it's about HPV or any other health issue, right, it can get really— it can grab onto you and hold you very tight. And before you know it, you don't even know you're in it, right? Most don't even. But I love how you're teaching how do you gain awareness and not judge it, right? It's not about judging it or pushing it away.

Right.

It's about, let me just have awareness for what is this? What is the— what's happening here? You know, you have to kind of be able to create space for yourself to be able to then say, hey, maybe I can shift this and, and create a different story to follow.

Yeah, what you're describing is so common that we live in autopilot, right? And we don't always have space to respond and we're just reacting. And so yeah, creating that space initially is, is typically one of the first things that we work on.

What are some of your favorite ways to guide people to do that, if you don't mind me asking?

Yeah, no, of course. Well, breathwork is going to be my favorite because it's simple, it's free, it's the most effective. So just long, slow exhales is going to activate your vagus nerve and bring you back into that parasympathetic. And it's so fascinating to me over the years as my yoga and breathwork practice become more and more and more part of my life, That I can immediately tell when a patient walks in, again, not in any sort of judgmental way, but I know if I ask them if they have a breathwork or some sort of mind-body practice before they even answer. And so just introducing them to the concept that they can control their nervous system state with breath. And the most simple, again, is inhale for 4, exhale for 6. It's really that simple to turn on your parasympathetic response or a physiological sigh. Most people know, for me, it's when I'm looking at the moon, out the window at the river when I get out on my paddleboard, but it might be when you're with a pet you love or in your grandmother's home smelling her cooking and you do that sigh where you're like, that's a physiological sigh. Most people kind of do it innately. So you can actively participate in that type of a breathwork and you can activate your vagus nerve. And so I think also just understanding that we have control and power over how we feel, and it's not just this runaway train of dysregulation. It's not that I'm going around doing exercises all the time, but I've introduced things enough to my physiology that my body knows, oh, okay, all right, I'm going to calm down. Here we go. We're safe.

Yeah, I always think it's so cool that we have these built-in mechanisms to trigger the parasympathetic nervous system via the vagus nerve a lot of times. But we never learn about— we don't learn that in school. You don't learn that. You don't hear that. The doctor's office doesn't tell you that. But here you and I are saying, okay, these are essential tools to having a human body and navigating a human existence is knowing that you can, you can actually elicit, you can intentionally give a sigh, and it's gonna give you that sense of dropping your nervous system, shifting the nervous system. How do you say it? You're like gonna shift it back into—

Yeah, shift is a great word. And, and some people are really uncomfortable with Breathwork at first, and you have to titrate. And so sometimes I'll start with calming herbs. I'll start with nervines, maybe a passionflower tea. I'm actually drinking some myself right now 'cause I was a little nervous to go on our interview. So I will often, if a patient is, you know, either they recognize that they don't wanna do a breathwork practice or they don't wanna do any sort of mindfulness or meditation, I'll have them lay on a yoga block and just give some inputs to their fascia, some kind of pressure inputs. Maybe I'm opening up their psoas, Or they're relaxing their occiput muscles with just laying on a yoga block. They don't have to intentionally do anything other than lay there. And I might combine that with some calming herbs and just the real activity they're doing is just being and just being present with self and letting the Vata and the vital force kind of do what it's meant to do. So sometimes breathwork is just too much for a patient or not enough or not what they're looking for. And so—

Nice.

Just being, you know, just being in the moment Which sounds really simple, but it's one of the most difficult things that I ask a patient to do.

Having optimal cortisol and adrenaline levels is essential for health and longevity. And yet the stress in the present and in the past can affect our cortisol and adrenaline levels, causing them to be too high or too low. The thing is that we're not all affected by stress in the same way. So over the past 2 decades, I've been researching and discovering how to help my patients recover from stress, and I've identified the 5 stress types, which are the 5 common patterns of disruption in cortisol and adrenaline levels. The reason why this is so important is because the treatment is different when cortisol is too high we use different herbs, nutrients, and other modalities to bring levels back to optimal than if the levels are too low. So that's why I, through research, developed the stress type quiz, which allows you in under 2 minutes to discover what likely your cortisol and adrenaline levels are, so then you can make decisions about which herbs, nutrients, and other healing activities to choose to help optimize your cortisol and adrenaline again and improve your health now and into the future. Just go to stresstypequiz.com where you can take the quiz and take it from there.

I agree.

It's—

we really— that's another thing for us to just practice is like, let me just like— because we think I'm doing nothing or I'm being lazy or I'm, you know, we've got the pressure of somebody waiting for us.

us.

And yet it is so essential. And as women especially, I think this— I know this happens for men too, but I especially hear from women about how we are so taught through society to be taking care of everyone and not taking care of ourselves. And so it feels selfish or self-centered to take 5 minutes to just be.

Yes.

And yet now we are in a time where Women need to learn how to do this. We need to learn how to be. So I love that you're emphasizing it. What are your thoughts on— I don't know if you have some thoughts on, you know, just how this is such a gap in women's health.

Definitely. So very often I'll hear from patients, well, you know, I don't have time to do that. Or, you know, let's give an example of maybe an early perimenopausal woman. So she's in her late 30s and she has young kids at home. And I Acknowledge with her that we're going to talk about mind-body, we're going to talk about nervous system, she laughs and she's like, I don't have time for that. And then I have to unpack a little bit. Well, first of all, how do we carve out time? But second of all, what would happen if you didn't just rush around and do all the things? She says, well, I have to clean the dishes and I got to do this and I got to go drop one kid off at 8 and then pick the other one up at 11. And you can hear it in their story how it's like a runaway train. And so I Yeah. And so I just ask them to pause for a minute and dig a little bit deeper and get a little more curious, like, what would happen if we carved out time for ourself? What might that— when might we be able to do that? Can we take a bath a couple times a week at night? Can we wake up 5 minutes early and have 5 minutes to journal or do a breathwork practice? And so I do, I hear it creep in in the stories that they tell in that they They have this idea that they just can't, they don't have time, things will fall apart if they're not constantly doing and going. And I think just unpacking that a little bit and getting curious and providing a safe space to do so. Like I say, look, I'm a single mom, I run a company. I'm not saying don't do anything, but I'm also then going to, that's when I really do find labs are really helpful because say we are looking at cortisol or we're talking about pregnenolone and adrenal reserves and they see in black and white on paper, Okay, this go go go go go is actually impacting my labs, and then I explain how long term that's going to impact their sex hormones. They kind of like okay, all right, okay, breathwork got it got it. We'll build it in, but it's not always the first thing. It's it's not. I think sometimes there has to be a trusting relationship, a therapeutic relationship built between us where they they know that I'm not going to judge. It's a safe place. I get that life is hard, but I'm still going to bring it back to these kind of foundational healing practices, or I'm. just throwing supplements and diets at you. And that's just not how I practice. So, yeah.

And it's interesting. What comes to mind is just acknowledging that if we want to create change in our health, we're going to need to create some change in how we're relating to our bodies and taking care of our bodies. And yet we don't— there's this window of tolerance, right? So if we do too much too quickly, It may backfire, and we'll be right back to where we started from or have a flare of some sort. So, you know, at the same time, right, like learning with this awareness, same awareness of realizing, oh my gosh, I'm in this loop, can also help us realize, oh, I'm, I'm, I'm kind of got myself cornered into a box here. And I, if I go too much either direction, I feel worse. So how do we, you know, just helping patients to make little small incremental changes so they can actually expand their zone of comfort zone.

Another helpful tool, I did a training for HeartMath for trauma years and years ago, and they use something called the depletion to renewal grid, which I don't know if that's trademarked or anything, but it's very simple if you just think about looking at things that deplete you and things that renew you throughout a day. And they actually map it onto cortisol and DHEA. But essentially, if you just audit your day and you go through and you say, what is depleting me and what is renewing me and how many things are in that column and how many things are in the other column. It sometimes is eye-opening because we do kind of put blinders on and we do just push through. And women are amazing creatures that we very often can do that, but that's not sustainable and that's essentially the recipe for burnout.

Absolutely. Well, and as you know, I mean, that's what I have also written about in in my books, including the Master Your Stress, Reset Your Health book. And I love that you are pointing out how testing, for example, cortisol levels can make such a difference to us as providers when we can, and for patients, right? To be able to see, okay, it is one thing to know that we are stressed. We all have some stress and we all have some degree of dysregulation. And yet, what is that? What is the domino effect, right? It goes from that stress and dysregulation that is not getting addressed, and it is like a domino effect. into dysregulated or imbalanced cortisol levels and adrenaline levels. So I'm just, yeah, curious for you to talk more about what you find with, maybe we can talk about the cortisol testing and how that's helped your patients.

Yeah, so I don't always run cortisol as the first line of labs because essentially I want us to focus on the gut-brain axis and focus on Yeah. On food as medicine and dietary changes first. So I typically will run cortisol as the second kind of tier of lab work. And it's not to say it's wrong to do it first, and sometimes I do it in a different order depending on the patient. Everyone's story and path to healing is unique and different. But essentially, if, again, I'm able to, as you said, map out their cortisol pattern, then it allows me to open up conversations around that kind of their daily life and those habits and inputs that are coming into the system as stressors every day. So I also will then relate it back to adverse childhood events and early traumas because you'll see different cortisol patterns and different pregnenolone patterns based on adverse childhood events and different traumas that they might have had historically. And so again, it kind of takes away some of the emotionality. I'm not necessarily asking every patient to unpack their trauma. Some do, not everyone does, but we can then link what's happened in the past and their chronic You know, traumatic stress response to what's happening currently in their daily life. And so, if say someone's cortisol is really high, I can talk to them about some cortisol reducing herbs or some more parasympathetic habits. I'm not necessarily going to say like if it's high or low at this time, we're going to do these things at this time. But sometimes it does open up that conversation around well, wow, you really are very stressed in the afternoon. What's going on in the afternoon? And let's have some habits that we add into your day that are relaxing and rejuvenating. and replenishing for you versus just those stressful or depleting ones. Or if it is flatlined, that might explain fatigue that maybe wasn't explained by their ferritin or some other lab work. And so I find it helps to understand not only the stress response, but what other physiological systems might be impacted by that as well. And I— because I work a lot with perimenopause and menopause, having the conversation around the kind of the buildup of stress over their life and how that then impacts their sex hormones and their experience of that transition is a big aha moment. And again, I hold space for women where I'm not saying like, you're living your life this way and this is going to be a bad transition for you. I'm saying let's become more aware of things that we can change, that we do have the power to change, so that this becomes a transformation that actually is amazing and awakening and positive. And you can feel the best that that you've ever felt in life. And you don't have to just be on autopilot and running those same programs or behaviors. You can use those labs as an impetus for change.

Yeah, I agree. I completely agree. It can be so helpful to see the objectives and then, yeah, help people to relate it back because then sometimes you're like, oh yeah, that's what's going on at that time of day. Or, and, and yes, Like you're saying, well, when we see a cortisol level, it's really showing us as practitioners, not just what your stress of the current moment is, or that week or that day that you did the collection, but it's an accumulation from your childhood and even prior to that and how your body relates to stress and how, where that's landed you at this moment in time. And so then we can, and it also impacts our, what we're gonna recommend, right? If we see a high cortisol, we're gonna suggest different herbs and nutrients lifestyle changes than if we see a low cortisol. And so it can really individualize the support for recovery from, from stress, trauma, dysregulation. And, um, so yes, I agree, it's so helpful. And to, to know that cortisol, when it's either too high or too low at different times a day, it then throws off the other systems. Like you're saying, it can— yeah, estrogen and progesterone, it can throw off your gut So let's go into that a little bit. What do you—

Yeah, I gave a lecture this past spring at the CNPA on rhythms in perimenopause and menopause, and essentially it was on the HPA axis and cortisol and essentially exposing our bodies to light. And then of course I wove in mindfulness-based stress reduction and all of these things. So a great example would be, yeah, so say we see someone has a blunted cortisol curve or they have low morning cortisol and they're really struggling to get started with the day. Maybe they're describing burnout, and then they're also struggling with sleep because they're not having that drop-off from cortisol being higher to lower at night. And so maybe they're not making as much melatonin because our body does a little dance with cortisol and melatonin production. So I'm going to say to that woman, okay, well, we're going to go outside instead of looking at our phone right when we wake up. We're going to go outside and expose our eyes to light. And that light exposure to our retina actually communicates with other organ systems. So it's going to It's going to impact your hunger cues throughout the day. It's going to impact your ability to fall asleep that night. And so showing them that curve and then having a habit that's as simple as literally just going outside. And if you can't go outside, I'm lucky that my bathroom looks out where the sun is rising. And so if it's freezing cold, I am not one to want to go outside personally, I admit that to patients. So I sit basically on my toilet and I let the sunlight—

Yeah.

I open the window and I let the sunlight come in my eyes. And I do that for a few minutes before I do anything else. And maybe if that patient, like we're giving the example, has that low cortisol, I'll use licorice extract. Obviously not if they have high blood pressure, there's, you know, time and a place for different herbs, but I'm then going to educate them on, yes, different adaptogenic herbs and ways that we can use natural therapies and tools alongside those behavioral changes to impact not only that cortisol curve, but all the other organ systems that take that light information and then give you feedback throughout the day. And so it will even help with things like cravings. night cravings. So for a lot of women are struggling with that as, as we go through perimenopause and menopause. And so just that one change can really impact a lot.

So I love that. I think about it as like multitasking, but healthy multitasking, where you can make— you can do one simple thing, just getting some light in your eyes in the morning, and it has this positive ripple effect through the body where it's like everything shifts in a positive way. And, and so you don't have to work so hard to address each individual thing downstream because you've got something upstream that creates a greater shift. And, and I think a lot of practitioners miss that, unfortunately. They're— even if some, you know, sometimes practitioners are of course doing their best to come into addressing things more holistically, but they might be just kind of like catching things at the downstream, you know, oh, let's do this hormone or this herb or this, this, this, and it's, and it's, it could help. But it's what I see, like what you're describing, when we can go deeper or at a more overarching area and start there, then that ripple effect makes it so then we, we can use so much less to create change. And, and, and it really also So really brings this awareness back to this concept that the symptoms and health issues we're addressing are really a message from our bodies. And I know this is something you like to talk about as well.

I love to talk about this. Yeah. So there's a couple of things that I was thinking to respond to there when you said that. So yes, symptoms are the most beautiful communications from our body, and I'm not saying that they're are fun always. I don't always share all of my personal health journey, even on social media, because it kind of, it honestly kind of bothers me when influencers are like, I had this and I had this and I had this and I cured this and that and the other. And again, it's kind of perpetuating this idea that we're broken or that we're the diagnosis or we're the label. But I have struggled with a lot of different health issues throughout my life. And I look back on all of those as messengers and communications from my body. And I learned, about my blood sugar dysregulation. I no longer have thyroid issues. There's a lot that I've worked on and resolved in my own mental health and depression. And so anytime that I've had a symptom, whether physical or mental, it has led me to making a change, and sometimes drastic. I do share openly that I don't drink alcohol. There have been times in my life where I've had to get really clear about what messages my body and mind were telling me and listen to them. And I wouldn't have resolved those issues than if I had suppressed those symptoms or if I had ignored them or looked for the quick fix or easy way out. Because the longer I do this, the more I can confidently say there is not a quick fix in a healing journey. And you can have, quote unquote, quick in the sense of like, if you figure out what's going on, you're not gonna struggle for years and years mislabeled or misdiagnosed. But essentially it comes back to these foundational pieces that really shift the needle and create those foundations of health.

Yeah.

I think another good example of that and more concrete kind of lab scientific, I guess, essentially, is if you think about pregnenolone. So pregnenolone is your mother hormone, right? So I like to talk about pregnenolone as if you picture a train, pregnenolone's at the train station, and you can go— if you live around here, they would understand New York City or New Haven, but we have listeners everywhere, I'm sure. So just picture a train can go north or a train can go south, and if pregnenolone is right in the middle, pregnenolone can go and become progesterone and cortisol. So it can go south and it can go and make your stress hormone, or it can go north and it can become your estrogen, your testosterone, your DHEA. It can become your sex hormones. So you can't be going both directions, and your body's going to prioritize going south. And so there's lots of research on PMDD and depression, chronic depression, and pregnenolone being low in those patients. And a lot of times that's related to the fact Mm-hmm. That pregnenolone was going south and making so much cortisol that your body then through a negative feedback loop says to your brain, hey, I don't need any more of this cortisol anymore. And so pregnenolone goes down. Then guess what? You don't have enough to go north and make all of your sex hormones. So if you think about messages from your body as communications where you can then say, okay, was I sending all my ingredients one direction and neglecting the other? And oh, what are the natural tools that I can use to balance out those train tracks and go, So kind of keeping things in, again, homeostasis, then I'm going to reverse symptoms versus just give a hormone or give everything going north and not ever take into account the fact that you'd been shunting everything south. So hopefully that makes sense to people not living in the New York City tri-state area because I usually do use different cities as guides in that analogy.

Absolutely.

But yeah, symptoms are telling you something. When I do the deeper kind of soul work with patients, or I'm doing more depth psychology or archetype work, I also do experience that you can have physical symptoms that don't, you know, quote unquote, have a physical cause, right? So that's why I start with really thorough lab work. I'm not saying to neglect it. I'm not saying there might not be a time or place for a medication, but a lot of times there are manifestations of something that is a more kind of spirit or soul message. And so unpacking that too. Yeah. I think is a really interesting way to look at symptoms as well.

And it's, it's sometimes people— it's sometimes the challenge is it seems like, you know, like I hear people say like, oh, is that really gonna work? It sounds good, but it's like, really gonna work? You know, because it's like we've been taught, oh, we're supposed to go to a doctor's office, get a prescription for a pill, go to the pharmacy and buy it, and then that's gonna Fix everything, you know. So it's really like, this is a whole different way of looking at how we relate to the human body and how we heal ourselves. And so I'm so glad for you to put it into words and be like, this is what this can look like, a little bit of what it can look like. And, and I agree with you, what I see is profound change for people when they discover— they discover, rediscover this connection with themselves, and they rediscover their body's innate ability to heal. when it's given the right support. And they— and then all of a sudden they go again. It's like you're saying, it's not that we're anti-medications or procedures when they're necessary. It's just, wow, what if— what if the person can create a healing experience in their body and then not need an outside intervention?

Yeah, I had a patient who had long-standing IBS, and he— he was a male patient because I do see men as well. And he was like, so basically what you do all day long is I said, well, yeah, that is some of what I do. Because he never thought that there would be a way to solve his IBS. And working together, pretty quickly his symptoms were turning around, and he was just like, I never knew my body could heal from this. This is incredible. And so, yeah, there's some deprogramming. That's why I have many episodes on what I call a health awakening journey. And it's not that it's going to be for everyone. But it is a journey and it is an awakening. And I just love introducing people to the idea that there are options. There's another paradigm out there, and it's worked for a lot of people.

Absolutely. I'm so glad that you're doing your work to share about it. And I can't wait for you to share more and more and more because I know you've got a lot in you that's coming.

I got a lot of fire. I got fire in me. Me too.

I recognize it because I've I had that too. So I know what it looks like, and it's, and it's so exciting because you're, you're just a fountain of, of inspiration and, and information for people. And so definitely anyone listening in who wants to stay in touch and learn more from Dr. Kelly, I'll have her, her links to her website and her podcast, The Vital Spirit, right? And the Vital Spirit Podcast, and you have also your Vital Spirit Method, which is, I think, what you've been describing here.

Yeah, it's essentially what I've been describing. I realized over the years that it would help patients to have a framework and a roadmap so that they can see where we're starting and where we're going. You know, on a health awakening journey, you don't wanna be blind and in the dark and not knowing what's coming next. And so I have mapped that out so they can see, oh, we start with the gut brain axis. We start with these labs and we work on the HPA. They see the journey mapped out for them, and that's been really helpful. My clinic is Root State Medicine Clinic, but I selected Vital Spirit because I truly am a vitalist. And in practicing in Connecticut and utilizing nature cure, I have gotten to witness the power of the beast and the power of natural healing. And so I wanted vitality, or the word vital, essentially, to be built into everything that I communicate. So, yeah, the Vital Spirit podcast and the Vital Yeah, that's beautiful.

And maybe just touch on a little bit more about this, how you help people with the gut. And I know you have a gut healing program that you offer.

I do. Yeah, it's called Calm Gut, Clear Mind. And so essentially, again, over the years, when you see enough patients, there is absolutely a unique individualized plan and treatment for every patient. I'm not saying ever that it's one size fits all, but You start to see patterns emerge and you do learn, okay, there's certain things that I need everyone to do. And so I started out with the language of what I call the seeds of health, because patients would be overwhelmed in the beginning. They're like, oh my gosh, Dr. Kelly, you want me to do this and change that and eat this and breathe and move my body? And so the seeds of health are really these foundational habits that we kind of all need to do. And food as medicine is one, and mindfulness and breathwork is another, and hydration. And I have episodes on each of these that I'm building out slowly over time so I can share with other people. But basically, Calm Gut, Clear Mind is what I would want every patient to do before they even meet with me. And it's introducing them to pillar 1 of the Vital Spirit Method, which is again, recognize and remove sources of inflammation. And it's starting to educate them on the role that the gut has foundationally in every other aspect of our health. And that gut-brain axis is really the communication between our gut and our brain and back, you know, vice versa. So if we have a lot of inflammation in our gut or leaky gut, then we might experience things like brain fog, depression, anxiety. So much of What we see physically as symptoms comes from inflammation, and obviously that starts in the gut, or in the way I practice, it does. And so in Calm Gut, Clear Mind, I'm walking patients through, okay, what do we add to nourish our body? What can we take out that is just inflammatory for everyone? And I just start educating them about the profound impact that that gut-brain axis has on everything else. And I joke with patients, you know, if you did 80% of this 80% of the time, 80% of your symptoms would go away because you might not even need me. You might not need any hormonal support, or, you know, hair, skin, nails, and spirit is the last pillar, for example. Like, you might not need to do anything for your hair or skin because you've worked on your gut. And so foundationally, that program is, is 21 days, and it's really teaching them how to recognize and remove inflammation and then replenish and rejuvenate and nourish their body.

So, uh, this makes so much sense to me. Absolutely. We might as well start with the things that are going to make the biggest And inflammation is another one of those things. It's like, it's hard to put your finger on it. But it's like, and sometimes we even try to do tests to find it, like blood work or food sensitivity tests or whatever. We try to see the inflammation. But when I think when you and I hear a person's case and their symptoms, that's often the message from the body is there's inflammation in here.

Right.

And, and so then you and I start going, okay, then we got to start dropping inflammation, because as soon as the inflammation starts dropping, things already get clearer. You use the word clear in there, right? The mind gets clear, all the fogginess goes away, and you can actually start to go, oh, now I see what was going on. But I think a lot of people are walking around in that fog of inflammation and not realizing it.

Yeah. And if things don't get clear in a way that you would expect from having done this many, many times over many years, then you will dig deeper for stealth pathogens or some other source of inflammation.

Yes.

And when we're talking about the vagus nerve too, the vagus nerve controls inflammation to a degree, so through our acetylcholine pathway. So if you even just think about someone who's holding tension or maybe unprocessed emotion and they're just chronically bracing, well, then they are essentially not going to have vagal tone that's able to reduce inflammation or have communication between the gut-brain axis happening in an effective, efficient manner physiologically. So they're going to feel that. You're going to be symptomatic from that. So again, back to just lay on the floor on some yoga mats blocks is where I always end up with patients, because that's going to have an impact on so many different aspects of their health.

Oh my gosh, thank you, Kelly. That's so— it's so simple, and yet so powerful. And I've seen your Instagram posts where you show us, you show us how you go paddling on the water, you show us how you lay on the yoga blocks. So you're not just saying this stuff, you actually do it and videotape yourself doing it.

Yeah, I I started a program called Burnout to Balance years ago because I was burnt out. I, you know, giving and doing for patients and running a business and being a single mom, and like every email you get from a patient, having that sense of urgency. And I learned the hard way that I cannot let other people's sense of urgency become my own. And so for years now, I practice yoga every morning. I drop my daughter off at school. I have my parasympathetic practice, and with patients, I call it parasympathetic snacks throughout the day. And without that, I would be much more dysregulated. So I 1 million percent practice what I preach and I would be crazy if I didn't. I just like, I would feel crazy. I just couldn't, you know, live a balanced, healthy life without having those inputs of calm, restore regulation in my own life.

Oh my gosh, I love that calm, restore regulation. It's like showing us, hey, that, that is the way through, you know, If we are overwhelmed with life, and there is one option where we just let it take us down, or there is this other option where we say, hey, how can I help myself through this? And it is through this calm, restore regulation that helps us through it.

Yes.

I agree. I guess I would say I was the single mom running a business. Now my daughter is 23, almost 24. And now I am a single grandmother because I have a 3-year-old granddaughter. And so it is true.

Amazing.

Sometimes it is when we are in those situations as women where we are like, hey, we need to be independent and taking care of things. And yet, if we have to find a way to do it while still taking care of ourselves, and to hopefully inspire those of you listening in to say, if you too are in a situation where you are like, oh my gosh, I need to figure out how I I can take care of my family and take care of myself. This is how we're doing it. This is how it's happening.

And it won't be yoga for everyone, but a mind-body practice that provides a framework is really key. And there's a, you know, there's a path laid out and there's philosophy and a spiritual practice behind that. It's not just me moving my body and me breathing. There are kind of lessons. And again, this framework that I come back to when life gets really hard and when I have traumatic losses in my life, which I've had, and I'm hitting rock bottom, I have this framework to hold on to. And so, I tell patients it does not have to be yoga, but finding something that can guide you is extremely helpful in that kind of spiritual growth aspect, which absolutely looks different for everyone, and I'm happy to help them find something, but it is a missing piece in the healing puzzle for a lot of patients when they first come in.

Maybe, especially since you're touching on spirituality, and with your knowing your childhood, was around, you know, really like a spiritual community. But how, yeah, what, how do you help people with understanding? What does that mean, your spirituality? And how—

Yeah, so in the group program I taught, I record, so I don't even talk about like my childhood and that, that aspect of it a lot, because I think that religion has a lot, carries a lot of weight that can be negative, so it can be positive for people. But I tend to say when I teach spirit that to me, when I'm working with a patient, what it really means Yeah. And what that means is time in nature and time with self. So the ultimate kind of spirituality to me is connecting with your inner self and your inner knowing in nature. And that's really accessible, right? Like, you can go to the beach and look at the water and be quiet with self. You can touch a tree. It doesn't have to be a formal religious or spiritual practice. So I really try to highlight, you know, the idea of the sense of awe or wonder, things that We kind of, we understand that when we look at the Grand Canyon, we're like, that to me is a very accessible experience of spirit. And so, yeah, just really getting out in nature and being with yourself, not distracted by a podcast or, I mean, listen to our podcasts, I think they're wonderful, but not when you're tapping into that inner knowing.

Yeah.

And it is something that's hard to articulate because it is a felt sense, it's an experience. And so going to a yoga class, for example, and having that moment where you're like, Oh, I get it.

I feel—

maybe you do feel physically like your shoulders drop, or maybe you do feel bliss, or you do feel union and connection with others around you. So it, it's hard to put these words to it because it is an experience, but I do find that just being out in nature is something people kind of get. They, they know that feeling. We, we all know like, oh, it feels good to sit at the beach, right? So I think that's a good starting And that can be spirituality.

That's, that's practicing or being in that, that sense of spirituality where you can find yourself and your essence. And sometimes then you can find your, your purpose, your passion, your priorities, your values that are going to guide you then forward from there.

Yeah, I introduced the framework of the 3 Ps a lot where you have to know your patterns. So that might be lab patterns, it might be behavioral patterns, patterns or archetypal patterns. You have to know where you're placing your power on the healing journey. Are you giving it away, or are you recognizing that there's this innate force within that heals? And then you have to be present and present with self. And again, being in nature is an easy way to do that. Not everyone can sit on a mat in silence, but being out in nature is accessible.

I love that. Thank you so much, Kelly, for sharing all of this. And, and Things that, that, you know, people can do and now they make sense. And so I can't wait for all of you to try some of these ideas that Dr. Kelly's been sharing with us and share back with us. And, and definitely you can reach out to Dr. Kelly if you'd like to connect more with her, work with her on these tools for your health and healing. Thank you again, Dr. Kelly, for being here.

You're welcome. Thank you for having me. As, as I said when I introduced interviewed on— interviewed you on my podcast. You have been such a guiding light and a mentor of mine, and preceptoring with you, and now just seeing you help women heal is really an inspiration. So thank you for having me here today.

You're so welcome. You're so welcome. And thank you all for listening in. And if you're new, I'm so glad you're listening, and I welcome you to subscribe so you don't miss the next episode. And I look forward to connecting with you again soon. Take care.

Bye.

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