Case Study for “A”
Bio-individual nutrition is for everyone. Not just those with chronic illness or ongoing digestive woes. There is much we weren’t taught growing up, when it comes to the care and the keeping of our bodies. Knowing the best choices and habits to love your individual body WELL increases health and happiness all around. When we’re able to participate in more of life, have the motivation to partake in life’s joys and can plain show up with energy - our overall wellness multiplies.
Let’s take a look at one young Mom’s case study of eating all the right quality foods and still coming up with painful acne, an uncomfy gut and mood regulation struggles. Constipation had become the norm after having her first baby, now 1, which she was tempted to accept based on family history. She felt the bulk of her issues were hormonal, as they would ebb and flow with her cycles, but after chatting, I knew we needed to start with digestion. Did you know that by-products of the gut and its inhabitants can increase hormones and create acne, bloating, heavy periods, cramps and more?
Our plan for client, “A”, was to spend 6 months working together. The GI Healing Package would work her through our Rewind and Reset course and Love Your Guts course, as well as run a GIMAP and MRT-176 Food Sensitivity Test, giving us solid digestive and food reaction data to work from.
We started with 1 stool a week (constipation situation!), hormonal acne breakouts, bloating, gas, tiredness after meals, as well as nausea and feeling very winded at workouts. In an effort to shift her weight, she had been exercising regularly with HIIT workouts and weight training, but saw no weight change. Her past history included occasional antibiotics and tetracycline for acne. She also had a family heart disease history and wanted to look at some blood labs to check on this, so we ordered those, alongside the GIMAP and food sensitivity test.
She dug into her video coursework and began to implement foundational change like:
Drinking half her body weight in ounces
Exploring animal fats and greatly reducing seed oils
Using blue light blocking after 4pm (winter time start)
Taking epsom salt baths 1-2x/week
Chewing her food and sitting at meals over 30 minutes
Adding in more and new veggies each day
Working toward 100% gluten free diet
Eating within an hour of waking up, having her food before coffee
Choosing walking, yoga and stretching workouts any day that she felt drawn to rest > heavy workout
Her stool test came back with slightly elevated h.pylori, low beneficial bacteria, relatively minimal bad bacteria (this section looked beautiful, really!) and depressed immune markers.
Starting with GI function, she was to implement lots of chewing, slower meals, sitting at all meals and liquids away from meals. We added in supplemental stomach acid and bile supports as our first big goal was to get her stooling more often than once a week.
For nutrient repletion, we used a blood sugar and stress supportive multivitamin with methylated b-vitamins, while we waited for heart and methylation related bloodwork to come back.
In support of her low beneficial bacteria and depressed immune markers, she increased fiber in her diet, moved to a veggie-full paleo diet, added a supplemental fiber and high dose probiotic.
We then addressed the results of her food sensitivity test. These are the condensed results, but she planned to remove the red foods for 6 months and the yellow foods for 3 months. She did note that a few of the foods that returned, namely tomato and milk, had been foods she suspected as being bothersome.
Our next call together worked on food support and strategy, food prep plans, food sourcing questions she had, recipe ideas and more “get it done” support. At his call, she noted her stooling increased to almost everyday. The only additional change we made was focusing on what 100 grams of protein looked like over a day and making that her goal.
After 3 months of her protocol, we met and she reported staying consistent, much more easily, with her habits. No bloating, very minimal gas and nearly no GI discomfort at all. Her skin was more stable, feeling and appearing more smooth, with no cystic acne. She had acne since age 10, so this was a HUGE win!
Her energy level had improved and she was working through the emotions of achieving these results by stepping away from her HIIT workouts and trading them for family walks and walking/nature breaks throughout the day. Her weight had budged by just under 10 pounds, too.
Periods were no longer super heavy, no cramping and limited bloating the few days before her cycles were starting. Since we expect to see menstrual changes around 3 months in, because of the way the body develops eggs, this was wonderful progress!
At this point we reintroduced the eliminated 3-month foods and started to remove supplements that were introduced to rebalance her microbiome from stool test results. All foods were successful, even dairy in moderation, which had been a long-time digestive and acne trigger. With beef back, she was able to incorporate more collagen to help boost her protein levels more easily and give her energy support on workout days. She expressed at this point that “my period just snuck up on me, with no symptoms that I usually have” and “my skin is amazing”.
We decided to wait a month to allow her microbiome to settle after coming off most supplements in order to retest. In June, we rechecked just the h.pylori section of her stool test, as the rest looked good, overall. Survey says - no more H.Pylori, too! At this point she noted that dairy in full-force in her diet seems to not have shifted anything at all. She was working back toward more intense workouts that she loves for stress support and muscle building and was even sick with a bug once, but her digestion didn’t get involved like it had in the past.
Supplementation, at this point, was down to what remained of her multi-vitamin and a main digestive support as well as direction to maintain her probiotic rotation and increased fibrous foods for 6 months and beyond.
My favorite part of this case is that this new mom was freed up for so much normal living with her family. Her symptoms weren’t terrible…ok, 1 poop a week is pretty miserable. But that constipation and low beneficial bacteria, combined with poor digestive habits left things just upside down enough. She wasn’t passing toxins out in daily stools, so they were expressing via the skin. She was working at her weight from the good place of HIIT and weight training - but her body was unable to receive the quality food she was feeding herself because of the low good bacteria. The stool backup had impacted her bacterial balance more than she had any specific pathogen present in large forms.
Taking a 6 month season to recalculate, refocus, rest and learn about her body changed everything. She’s on no ongoing supplements, had no relapse in symptoms and is miles more equipped to be her own therapist when she feels her health habits inevitably shift!
If “A”’s story sounds familiar to you or you’re simply curious about what health change can look like for you - book a clarity call and we can chat specifics about how you’re feeling. I love my “Mom crew” that gets started at the end of summer - we’re able to get those tests sent off and foundations in place as you get your kids back to school. And we hit the ground running once they’re in class with test results, more time for your self care and that back-to-school energy to build health that carries you through the holidays.
