February 2026 Sherri meets with Missy Bane a Functional Health Coach

Welcome to the Balanced Body Podcast, where Sherri Griggs, owner of Balanced Body Health and Wellness in Omaha, talks to us about health, wellness, and balancing hormones.

Welcome to the Balanced Body Podcast. I'm Sherri Griggs with Balanced Body Health and Wellness, and this is the first podcast of the year for us, and we have a few changes. You might happen to notice that John is looking different because this really is not John, you guys. So for those of you that have been following us, you know me. But for those of you that are getting into the new year and thinking about getting healthy, aiming to get healthy, wanting to make changes, positive changes in your life, I am a nurse practitioner in Omaha, Nebraska. I specialize in hormone replacement, gut health, Preventative medicine, right? The kind of medicine that when you go to the doctor and they go, oh, you're borderline diabetic, well, we'll just watch it, eat better. No, no, no, no, we don't do that. We don't want to watch you become diabetic. We want to make sure you don't. So that's the kind of thing— work with your cholesterol, metabolic health, autoimmunity, all those things that you feel like people are never listening. That's what we're talking about. So my background, personally, I've been autoimmune for a very long time, and it was because of those autoimmune diseases that I was forced to take my own care into my own hands. Nobody helped me. Nobody told me what to do to prevent a further autoimmune disease or what I should be doing to take care of myself. And my last autoimmune disease, I'm happy to say, was 8 years ago, but it was type 1 diabetes. Yeah, so I don't want anyone else to have to get that. So I went on— that's when my journey really started, preventative medicine. Even though I always say I grew up in Western, right, like internal medicine in the '90s, uh, it doesn't get much more traditional than that. But that's where my journey is. Um, hysterectomy, 20 3 years ago. So I've been on bioidentical hormones for 21 years. So I am walking the walk with all of my patients and frequently experimenting on myself before I recommend somebody something for them. So let's hear about you, Missy. Tell us about you.

So I'm so excited to be here, Sherri. Thanks for having me. Um, I am a functional health coach. What that means is I'm a health coach, um, that really looks at the foundation of health and wellness. And that all came, much like you and lots of other practitioners, came out of the need of— I had a health crisis 15 years ago. And my doctor, basically, when I told him I was sick and tired of being sick and tired, and he wrote a prescription for an antidepressant because I told him— I couldn't work out the way that I, you know, really wanted to. And I felt like crap all the time. And it was starting to get me a little depressed. And he wanted to give me an antidepressant and my head exploded that day. And long story short, I got injured from working out a couple days later.

Hmm.

My family went on a trip without me with a group of friends. I was in the bed on muscle relaxers and I was Done. I was completely done. So I ordered protein shakes. I ordered all kinds of different food plans. I went on all these things. Basically, I discovered that I was gluten and dairy sensitive. And once I cut those out of my diet, my life, my health completely changed. But nobody was talking about it 15 years ago. And I started kind of teaching people around me. At the time, I had a different business. I was a full-time portrait photographer. But I'm like coaching my clients that I'm photographing because they're like, what have you been doing? You look amazing. Um, and so that's— I was shouting it from the rooftops to anybody who would listen. And then I found functional diagnostic nutrition where I knew I could look at functional labs, whether it was stool testing or blood chemistry analysis. I really felt like people could see a shift when they could look at labs. And we could come up with a plan. They were so motivated and they got so excited, but also we could then retest and they could see all the things that had shifted in their health. And that lit me up like nothing ever before. And so I was— that's when I totally shifted my career. You know, my health continued to improve. My family's health shifted. They— my girls at the time were preteens and they weren't super excited about all the goldfish going in the trash can and all of those things. But, um, you know, fast forward, my oldest daughter is in her last year of, uh, ND school and she's going to be a naturopathic doctor in June. So we're super excited about that. But anyway, so I've been functional health coaching for a long time and that has evolved over the years from one-on-one practice to now I've been, um, in sales with supplement companies. And it kind of has just past experiences kind of collided into this opportunity. And it really is just a merger of all of my, what I feel like are my strengths. I love sales. I love bringing solutions to people. I love working with practitioners and talking about health and wellness all day. And so it's just been a really good sort of, you know, pivot for me in my career. And so that's kind of me in a nutshell. Um, I've been married for about 30 years. We just moved from Virginia to North Carolina. So this last year has been a season of change and stress like no other in my life, honestly. Um, but all really good things. And, um, you know, just excited to be here and talk to you, um, about all things wellness and health and hormones and gut health and all the things that I can see get you excited and that you love to teach and do such a great job. Um, at empowering people and educating people. And, um, yeah, so, yeah.

Well, and that's one of the things we agree on. We love to be able to see the changes, right? We've talked about, you know, the tests that we can do, the gut tests and the blood serum and cortisol and all these things that we can test. And as people are feeling better and then still— and be able to see a change, right? To be able to see a change in the numbers, to know that Well, as we will in the future talk about vitamin D, to know that that vitamin D level has gone up, right? We're making positive changes and we feel better, but now we can see the numbers, right? See what's going on with somebody.

We're not—

So motivating.

It's—

yeah, it is.

It's great. And that's one of the things like the InBody, right, that I can see muscle and fat ratio that Makes a world of difference to so many of my people that feel, you know, they're getting on their scale at home and they're like, my number's not changing. And they come in and they've converted 4 pounds of fat to 4 pounds of muscle.

Yeah. And amazing. Yeah.

The difference that makes in your metabolism, how much healthier you are.

Yeah.

How you feel. So that— isn't that something, how many of us have gotten to where we're at because of our own personal experience?

And the common denominator out there, for sure. Yeah, it is.

It is rare that I find somebody that, well, I'm into this because I thought it was interesting. I think that's where our passion and our empathy and our absolute understanding Can come from because we're living it.

Yeah. Well, and I think when you not only feel a shift, a profound shift in your own health, you just want it to happen for everybody else, especially when you see somebody suffering or struggling. You know, it's just, I think it's the human in us that we all just want to help people to some degree. You know, I think probably some of us go to bigger extents than others, but yeah, it's so satisfying. You know, it really is amazing.

It is interesting that you talked about— so 15 years ago, and I want to say it was probably about that, that I worked with, um, she was a chiropractor, but I also believe she had a nutrition degree of some sort, and we did food allergy testing. I, I bet you'll know this answer. This isn't a test, but I bet you'll know. So we did food allergy testing, and everything I was eating I was allergic to. So I took all that food out and I changed, switched up my diet, and we did the test again, and I was allergic to all of the new foods I was eating.

Yep.

Because leaky gut.

Leaky gut.

Yes.

Yeah.

In hindsight, and I had no gluten sensitivity, no gluten allergy, no gluten anything. Now, in hindsight, because of that experience, when our patients come in and say, I want to do food allergy testing, we have to do gut testing first. And I tell them that story because if these food particles are leading— leaking into your system, your body sees it as a foreign invader and it makes antibodies. You're going to test positive. And we still do a 30-day elimination because guess what? I need to be gluten-free because of my Hashimoto's thyroiditis, my autoimmune. And if I eat gluten, I feel hungover the next day. But I tested negative to all the gluten stuff.

Same.

So it's interesting. It's, it's, um, it's knowing, like, you know, you're, you're smiling, you're like, I know what it is, it's gut health.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The food testing, when people ask me about it, because I have a daughter that's anaphylactic to nuts, so we've done You name a food allergy test over the last 25 years, I've done them all. I can guarantee it because I left no rock unturned with my child. Um, but the food allergy testing that I recommend now is how do you feel after you eat?

And I—

And if you can't advocate for yourself and think about the symptoms that you have, is your nose running? Are your eyes itching, watering? Do you bloat? Do you get constipated the next day? Do you, you know, so I have the whole list and people just, you can see they just get excited because they're like, all that is happening and now I got to figure out what it is. So every time they eat, they're like, okay, I think it's this. And then they narrow it down and then they think it's this and then they narrow it down. And literally within a week, we can usually identify at least a couple of things that we know you just need to stop for a little while. Just cut it out for a little while. People get upset about their gluten and their, and their dairy. But if you do it for a little while and you bring it back in full force, then we know it's causing your inflammation. It's causing your bloating. It's caught, you know, you're getting the symptom, right? And sometimes I'll tell them it might not be your gut.

It might just be your joints ache. It might be that you feel foggy or like me, I feel hungover, which means my stomach's a little upset and I just feel Kind of foggy.

For me, it's joints. It used to be my thumbs, then it was my toes. It's really weird. Yeah. And, and now it's just kind of— sometimes it's all just an all-over joint, like I feel arthritic almost, you know. So yeah, I love that. And it's free. That's what I keep saying, it's free. We don't have to pay for it. You don't have to.

And I have to tell you that I've been doing this now a little over 2 years, and I've not done food allergy testing on one person. Not that I wouldn't, It's just that we find leaky gut, we do the 30-day elimination, and we find the problem, we find the inflammatory food that many times they're like, I had no idea. We had one young lady, it was soy, and it was so hard for her because, you know, she reintroduced soy and she actually got some serious gut problems, and then she was to the point where if she accidentally got into it, She would have problems, but it made a world of difference, and the weight just started to fall off of her once we got that out of her, out of her diet.

Yeah. Yeah, I love that. I love hearing stories like that. Heal and seal the gut, and then potentially you can go back to it. Doesn't mean forever, always, right? You know, for everyone, you can heal the body and then go back to it potentially.

Love it. There's still something else. Okay, then maybe we do need to Look at some food allergy testing, or, um, a patient that said she couldn't figure out what food was bothering her because sometimes she had diarrhea and sometimes she didn't. This had been going on for 20 years. It was a parasite.

Yep.

A parasite, one that should have been self-limiting, that her body should have cleared. So the more we talked, it became a discovery that maybe when she was tired or she'd had alcohol or whatever, when her immune system was just a little weakened, Then this parasite could take over and she'd have diarrhea, which is why sometimes with certain foods she did and sometimes she didn't with the same food, because it had nothing to do with the food for her, right? Yeah, it was what her body was like with that parasite. So that goes back to your gut testing and needing to know.

But those are the things that make a practitioner like yourself so amazing is that you have that insight that what, what your symptom is often associated with is not always the culprit. And it's really debugging, debugging that symptom and really understanding what could be, you know, kind of causing, you know, your body to respond a certain way. And that's really where you're so valuable in that because you have that experience and that, you know, even just the, the science, scientific knowledge that goes along with knowing all the things that you know. So, um, so I would love to hear more about how you do things and how you work with people because it's, you know, it sounds like you leave no rock unturned.

If I can, if I can help it, I don't. I even do DNA testing. So, um, specifically for, for weight loss, right? If someone wants to lose weight, what is— what genetically do you need? Not everybody needs a GLP-1, or not everybody needs something for food noise or a stimulant. What does your body genetically need? Um, when John was on here talking all the time, his was— part of his was he had to avoid saturated fats. That was huge, and he never felt full. Genetically, it said satiation. So he learned that don't just keep eating till you feel full because you're not going to. Pay attention to how much is on your plate and then eat that knowing. And he brought it up several times, what a world of difference that knowledge made, to have that knowledge and that understanding. So I like to start out that way, to have a Good foundation, right? I talked about elimination. So everybody starts with detox, not the crazy, you can only drink this crazy liquid for, you know, a week or some of these weird things. Um, but, you know, a good shake with some detox, help with liver detox supplement and clean food. Hormone people do 2 weeks. People that were going deeper, we're getting into their gut, we're doing a month, we're doing 30 days. And getting those inflammatory foods out. And while we're doing that, we're waiting for test results to come back. So we're always working towards that goal, getting that foundation with that nutrition. We, you know, we get the test results back, and then I put together a very detailed wellness plan. And everything is step by step, and why you take this particular supplement, what it does. Everybody leaves with their little stack of education so that when they— it's a lot. That's always what's said. Oh my gosh, this is so much. But it's never overwhelming. There's always that information you can look back on. We keep it organized and there aren't any dumb questions, I say. So people can portal questions and just to make sure that I tell everybody, if you're my patient, And somebody says to you, why are you taking that? Your answer will never be because Sherri told me I needed it. That will never be your answer. You will know.

That's awesome. And I love the genetic testing because, I mean, how many— I can't tell you how many women I've supported over the years wanting to lose weight or whatever it is, or just even feel better. And nuts were the healthy thing, but— and they're pounding nuts by the handful and They can't digest fats. They don't break down fats. They don't. It's actually doing the opposite of what their goals are. So I love that. I love— that seems like a really great tool to have just from the go.

It's wonderful, Missy. It's— it makes so much difference. And the nice thing I tell people about it is once it's done, it's done. That's your DNA. You can always go back and look at it. And I, I do when I do the the consultation and we look at, you know, what are some of your symptoms? Is it food noise? Are you a snacker? Do you have a history of depression? Do you have anxiety? So sometimes we throw in some neurogenic testing so that we can see if that might be part of the problem, because we need to address that as well. It's just, it's just one size just doesn't fit everyone. Just because something works for me doesn't mean it'll work for you. And then you get depressed and You get beat down and it's maybe you don't try again.

Love that. That's great.

So that's where people like, and like you come in because you can help people with the nutrition. It's not as hard as they think it is.

Yeah. Sometimes it's just really taking the time to find habit changes, you know, or just finding swaps for the things that For the nuts that, you know, your tests are telling you you don't digest well or you don't process well. Let's find a, let's find a substitute for those nuts because emotionally you might love them.

Right.

And, but maybe physically it's not the best thing to support you right now. So let's find a swap. Um, and it's a lot easier than it sounds. Um, so many people will tell me, oh, I was really hating you after that first call, but Once I realized I just swapped the habit, they were able to really see shifts happen pretty quickly, which is fun.

It does. It's— I remember when I had to first go gluten-free and I had that 3-page list of all the things that gluten could be in. Okay, that was a 3-hour visit to the grocery store to read labels, and it was really overwhelming. But now it's easy. It's easy.

And I just And it's not as emotional, right? I suppose after a while.

Yeah, yeah, it's just, it's just a fact and it comes easily. And then if you want to be very blunt about it, I actually did a call— we already did a podcast with a gal named Valerie who works for corporate America in the food industry, and it's really good conversations about what's put in our food products and our processed foods and, um, you know, knowing The amount of ingredients. And, and quite honestly, if you are not eating gluten, you're pretty much getting rid of all the processed foods much, right? Which are good for us anyway.

Yeah.

Ultra processed. So, all right, you guys, here's what's going to be coming up. So because of Missy's wonderful background, right, she said she works with the supplement company and being a health coach, we're going to dig in To some of those supplements. So I'm listening to a book. You guys have heard me talk about Tom O'Brien before in The Autoimmune Fix. He has a new book out called You Can Fix Your Brain, and he was just talking about omega-3s. And I have a test to see if I have enough omega-3s, so we'll be doing one on that. We'll be doing one on vitamin D. We'll be doing things on hydrochloric acid. He was bringing that up. I had no idea some of the symptoms you'll have, and all you need is more hydrochloric acid. Crazy. Um, peptides. Oh, BPC-157, hearing about that a lot, and that is an amazing peptide and very safe and easy to take. Um, creatine. Oh my gosh, Missy just filled me in on a study that came out about creatine, so we'll talk about that and just some of the foundations, right? And what we'll do is know they're coming up. We'll try to stay and make sure we get one out every week for you guys. And if there's anything that you want to hear about or have questions about, email me info@balancedbodymedical.com. Super easy. Go to my website. You can sign up for a free discovery call, call and pick my brain, ask questions, and I don't know. I'm gonna put you on the spot, Missy. Health coaching. Can people reach you if they want to do health coaching?

Um, yes, technically. Um, I'm not active. I'm not, I'm not necessarily taking clients right now, but I have so many resources, so I will 100%, um, love to have a conversation. And I'm a connector. I love connecting people. You know, if you go to my LinkedIn page, I just— not for the sake of connecting, but just for the sake of— I love feeling like if I can't answer a question or I don't have a solution, I really want to find somebody that can help you. And a lot of— I've had some just amazing experiences in doing that and following my gut, and it just lights me up. It gets me excited too. Yeah, make connections. So if I can't help you, I certainly will help find somebody who can.

Questions for Missy, send them to me. I'll get them to her. Yeah.

And maybe we'll make—

will be one of our podcasts.

Absolutely. Yeah.

So, well, thank you so much for— I'm so excited. This was good. Thank you for joining me today. Thank you for agreeing to be my co-host moving forward. I think we'll have a lot of fun, and I hope that all of you find this Very helpful.

So until next time, this has been the Balance Body Medical Podcast with Sherri Griggs, owner of Balance Body Health and Wellness. If you're looking to find Sherri, go ahead and look for the website balancebodymedical.com. If you're looking for the business and you want to find Sherri at her office, you can find her at 10815 Elm Street in Rockbrook Plaza. Thank you.