Your Labs Are Normal. You Still Do Not Feel Like Yourself.
Your labs came back normal. You feel anything but.
You thanked the doctor. You grabbed your papers. You sat in the parking lot with your
hands on the wheel. What do you do with a clean report and a body that says
something else?
I hear some version of this from women all the time. I don't feel like myself.
One thing first. Normal results are good news. Keep going to your appointments. Keep
asking questions. I'm a coach, not a doctor. Nothing here replaces the people who know your history.
But a lab report answers one question. Is anything out of range today? It can't answer
the question you came in with. Why am I so tired? Why is my brain foggy by two
o'clock? Why do I feel like a guest in my own life?
Here's something that matters. Normal does not mean optimal. A normal range comes
from a wide group of people. It's built to catch disease. It tells you nothing is flagged. It
doesn't tell you how well your body is working. You can sit inside the range and still feel
nowhere near your best. That gap is where functional medicine starts looking. It's worth asking your doctor where in the range your numbers sit.
Women's health has long been under-studied, and the people in the field say so. At a
women's health conference in Boston earlier this month, organizers said the field still
needs more research and more money. Women's health groups are asking Congress
for $20 billion over ten years to close the gap.
Good. That work matters. But it's slow. You don't have to wait for it to take your own
body seriously.
I ran an orthopedic practice. I set my own hours. I made good money. On paper, it was
perfect. But I was so busy building my outer empire that I missed what was going on
inside. I had small symptoms I never paid attention to. The kind you don't mention to
anyone, even yourself.
Then in 2013 I woke up and could not stand. I couldn't grab the covers. I crawled to the
bathroom. That's the day I got my rheumatoid arthritis diagnosis.
I'm not telling you this to scare you. I'm telling you because the whispers came first.
They always do.
Here's the science that changed how I think about all of this. It has a big name:
psychoneuroimmunology. It's the study of how your mind, your nerves, and your
immune system talk to each other.
In 1975, a researcher named Robert Ader ran a test with rats. He gave them sweet
water along with a drug that weakened their immune systems. Later, he gave them only the sweet water. No drug. Some of the rats still got sick. The taste alone had taught their brains to turn down their immune response.
Then a scientist named Candace Pert followed the chemical messengers that carry
these signals. She found them in the immune system and the gut, not just the brain.
Your feelings aren't stuck up in your head. They're wired into the rest of you.
Your feelings aren't stuck up in your head. They're wired into the rest of you.
And this science is still growing. This August, a researcher named Janice Kiecolt-Glaser
at Ohio State shared a review of forty years of work. Her main point: stress that comes
from our relationships and social lives can speed up how fast the immune system ages.
It can raise the risk of diseases linked to inflammation. She also found that loneliness
and rocky relationships turn up the body's stress response. The hopeful part: changes in how we live and eat may help shift that.
In February, scientists at the Feinstein Institutes reported something else. In lab tests,
they found brain cells that switch on for both inflammation and emotional stress. The
lead researcher said these cells are a shared pathway where immune signals and
stress come together. It's early work. But it points the same way. Your mind and your
body are not separate.
That's why I separate the signal from the story.
The signal is what your body tells you. Tired by two. Shoulders up by your ears before a
phone call. Sleep that doesn't refresh you. The story is what we pile on top. This is just
normal now. I should be grateful. I'm being dramatic.
If your mind and body talk all the time, the story matters. Your body hears it too. The
signal deserves your attention. The story deserves a second look.
If your mind and body talk all the time, the story matters.
When I work with women, I look at three places, because three pieces run your health.
Your body: what is it telling you, in plain words? Your daily patterns: whose list fills your
calendar? And what you believe deep down. That's the root.
Most plans only touch the first one. So you start. You make progress. You stop. You
start again. The plan wasn't wrong. It just left out most of you.
Under all three is the part I most want you to hear. You were never broken. You were
covered. Years of being everything to everyone put veil after veil over a woman who is
already a Master. You are Divine Spirit in a Sacred Vessel, wearing a business suit.
Your Spiritual Guidance System has been trying to reach you the whole time. It uses
signals to do it.
Your Spiritual Guidance System has been trying to reach you the whole time. It uses signals to do it.
Here's your Inner Empire Master™ Invitation. It takes about a minute. Tonight, write
down one signal your body gave you this week. Then write one story you told yourself
about it. Keep them on separate lines. Notice which one you've been living from.
I am The Inner Empire Master™. The work is to unveil your true identity, so that your
symptoms are seen as signals that you learn to answer. That is where the
transformation happens.
Normal labs are good news. But normal isn't the same as optimal, and it isn't the whole
conversation.
Meet the expert:
Debbie Roppo, NBC-HWC, FMCHC, is a National Board Certified Health and Wellness Coach and a Functional Medicine Certified Health Coach, one of fewer than one in ten coaches in this space who holds true board certification. After a rheumatoid arthritis diagnosis in 2013, she rebuilt her health through functional medicine and inner work, and she now teaches women that symptoms are signals worth listening to. As The Inner Empire Master™, she helps women who are still leading and still building unveil the Divine Spirit within their Sacred Vessel, so their Spiritual Guidance System can lead the way.
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