Imagine if you knew exactly what you had to do to optimize your health. How would it feel to take back your health? No more feeling helpless or searching for answers from professionals who honestly don’t have them. We work with you, where you are, and support you so you don’t feel alone, or overwhelmed. You will join a community of people who are in the same position you’re in, and our team will walk this journey with you.
Peeling The Onion of Chronic Disease.
Illness is never simply one discrete process or dysfunction but rather a bundle of factors all woven into your story and biology. Understanding the original causes, or root causes, for your illness is an essential task to determine where we start first, which layer to peel away, or which knot to untangle.
Our first task as partners is to persistently seek the cause(s) of the illness. Thankfully, there are only six root causes for illness: Infections, antigens, toxins, stress, poor diet and genetics.
The 7 Ingredients of Optimal Health
Our second task is to identify the seven “ingredients” needed for optimal biological function. The presence of any of the six root causes of disease and the absence of any of the seven essential ingredients creates imbalance in the body’s physiological process and lays the foundation for chronic disease. Together, we will become experts in assessing the deficiency of these “ingredients” and provide the necessary conditions for thriving.
Throughout your journey, you will think less of ‘naming’ your disease, and more about understanding what is driving it.
Fortunately, the body knows how to heal if we remove the impediments and provide the proper conditions in the right order. This takes time, patience and persistence. The trick lies in having a place to start and understanding how to peel back the layers of dysfunction and in what order.
The Right Order of Things: Peeling The Onion of Chronic Disease (cont’d)
These steps are listed in order of priority for peeling the onion of chronic illness. This is how
we practice Functional Medicine and what we have found leads to the most success in healing. Sometimes we will do multiple things at once, for example, immediate dietary changes and treatments to heal the gut. Healing is a process. And not always linear. It is more like tailoring – making adjustments each step along the way until we get it just right.
1. Start With Food
Food is a powerful clinical intervention in chronic disease. You will learn to apply it, and use it skillfully, with the guidance of your practitioner and coach, utilizing a whole foods diet.
In Functional Medicine we believe that food is not only medicine but also information that can turn on or off various gene expressions and provide energy for your body. Nutrition is not one size fits all.
2. Get Moving
Cardio-respiratory fitness is the most important predictor of human health & mortality. You will learn about the specific DOSE of exercise that is correct for you.
Your coach will work with you to design and implement an exercise plan that you can do for life. Our unique activity app will keep you on track with your goals.
3. Remove Food Allergens or Sensitivities
Delayed food sensitivities are among the most potent triggers for chronic symptoms and an
inflamed immune system. A trial of a comprehensive elimination diet with systematic food reintroduction is a powerful therapeutic and diagnostic tool.
The closer you follow this, the faster you will know how much food is playing a role in your illness. Sometimes we just recommend elimination of the most common triggers of symptoms, or we may recommend a more comprehensive program.
4. Fix the Gut
Health starts in the gut. The digestive tract has an independent nervous system, and contains 70% of our immune system. We will assess your gut through history and appropriate diagnostic tests (for gluten sensitivities, inflammation in the gut, unwanted bugs like parasites or yeast).
We will then aggressively treat the causes of gut dysfunction, including leaky gut, delayed food sensitivities, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO), yeast overgrowth and parasites. We may use herbs, antibiotic, anti-fungal, and anti-parasitic supplements to eradicate the triggers of intestinal dysfunction.
5. Optimize Nutrient Status
Vitamins and minerals are necessary for every biochemical reaction in your body. Without adequate amounts of nutrients for optimal health your biochemistry gets stuck and you get sick. The most common are magnesium, zinc (for immune function), vitamin D, B6, folic acid, B12 and omega 3 fatty acids (EPA and DHA)
Depending on testing, other deficiencies may be found and treated. Our detailed diagnostics allow for individualised and personalized prescription, and our practitioner exclusive products ensure the best chance of success.
6. Balance Hormones
Hormonal and neurotransmitter dysfunction is rampant because of dietary influences on
hormones (sugar and refined flour), endocrine disruptors or xenobiotics (petrochemicals and
heavy metals) and chronic stress. The delicate balance of hormones is essential for health and understanding the factors that cause disruption and restore balance of hormones is essential.
Of the dozens of hormones, four categories are the most important for treatment of chronic disease, namely insulin resistance, the stress response and adrenal insufficiency, thyroid dysfunction, and sex hormone dysfunction.
7. Support Energy Metabolism
The end result of poor nutrition, environmental toxicity, infections and stress, is injury to the mitochondria, (our body’s energy factories), unchecked oxidative stress and the loss of energy and ultimately cell death.
This has led to epidemics of obesity, diabetes, fatigue, developmental and neurodegenerative disorders, and accelerated aging. We assess mitochondrial dysfunction using organic acid and amino acid analysis, and support and protect mitochondrial function.
8. Enhance Detoxification
Detoxification is one of the most important and metabolically demanding functions of our
physiology, and one that health professionals learn little about. Just ask anyone with renal or
liver failure or chronic constipation. The toxic burden of 1.5 billion Kg of petrochemical
toxins and 2.6 million Kg of mercury unloaded into our environment every year has put an
undue stress on our capacity for detoxification.
Identifying heavy metal toxicity, particularly mercury and lead, is an important part of diagnosing and treating chronic disease. Based on test results, treatment could start immediately, but may occur after your digestion, immune function, hormones and nutrition has been normalized.
9. Mind Body Balance
Finding meaning and connection in the context of your illness and within the tapestry of your
life, relationships and beliefs is indeed, an essential pillar of the healing process. We support you to develop skills in self-care and nourishment and stress management, such as exercise, yoga, meditation, or other ways to balance your mind and body.
These are actually both the first and the last step in healing. Learning to deeply relax, let go of worry, and build trust in life and the healing process, is a necessary ingredient for becoming well.
10. Look for Hidden Infections
If we find you don’t respond fully to treatment of the basic systems outlined so far, or if you have lab results that indicate inflammation, testing for hidden infections often identifies unsuspected triggers:
Viruses, atypical bacteria, tick-borne illness, and dental infections (root canals). If there are no bugs inside, we consider the possibility of exposure to mold in the home or workplace.
Our Programmes
1. Our signature, 16 week, invite only programmes, include a variety of highly personalised diagnostic tests, individual diet, physical activity & lifestyle recommendations, targeted supplementation based on lab results, health coaching and holistic education.
2. Our self paced mini courses will guide you on your transition to a plant based whole food diet, help you lose weight safely and keep it off and/or start an exercise programme.
Jenny Hague - Functional Medicine Practitioner
Jenny's personal journey.
If you are ready to make a change in your life, if you are sick and tired of being sick and tired. Book your call now.
Comments