Join me, Jackie and Louise for a Ketoverse Crossover episode. They asked me to appear as a guest on their podcast – Fabulously Keto – so it is a fair bit about me but also a chat about a few things, including how to deal with things you find addictive. This is the first of two parts.
Fabulously Keto is a weekly podcast cohosted by Jackie Fletcher and Louise Reynolds.
They interview a range of guests using real food, low carb, keto and carnivore ways of eating. They also feature a quarterly AMA – Ask Me Anything episode – where they answer your low carb and keto questions.
Jackie lives in the UK with her husband and twin boys. After starting on her low carb eating journey in May 2017 and then moving to a ketogenic way of eating in January 2018, she has discovered a passion for everything low carb and keto. In 2019 she decided to make low carb and keto part of her vision to help others on their journey to health and weight loss. Jackie has a certificate in the ketogenic diet, is a nutrition advisor and is a trainee Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner. She is also an ambassador for the charity PHCUK.org (Public Health Collaboration) dedicated to informing and implementing healthy decisions for better public health.
Louise is a military wife to Andrew and mum to three adult sons. In her working life, she was the first Australian female paramedic to gain her PhD and then moved into university and college teaching roles. Since late 2015, both Louise and Andrew have used low carb ketogenic way of living to address a number of health issues along with maintaining their respective weight losses. During 2018, she took a UK ‘gap year’ living, working and traveling and discovered a new found love of pork scratchings and clotted cream where she met Jackie Fletcher. Louise has now joined Andrew on his current posting to Bangkok, Thailand.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary woman, Melina, talks about her journey to becoming a naturopathic doctor and how she uses keto as one of the tools in her toolkit to help optimise her own heath as well as that of her patients.
Dr. Melina Roberts is a Naturopathic Doctor, Author of Building a Healthy Child and Founder of Advanced Naturopathic Medical Centre in Calgary.
She is recognized as one of the top Biological Medicine practitioners in North America. She is a leading authority in the field of naturopathic medicine specializing in Biological Medicine effectively treating digestive issues, chronic disease and cancer. Dr. Roberts is a graduate of the University of Waterloo and the Canadian College of Naturopathic Medicine in Toronto. She did a 2 year post-graduate study in Biological Medicine with Parcelsus Klinik in Switzerland. She has been selected to be TEDx speaker for 2021.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary woman, Kelly, is back for the second part of her story about how she overcame her long struggle with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome.
Catch up with the first part of Kelly’s story here:
Kelly is a 49 year old Brit living in Marbella, Spain.
She began suffering with chronic pain after a whiplash injury which never seemed to heal. After years of neck and back pain she later went on to develop Fibromyalgia, a condition that caused severe widespread pain and extreme fatigue never alleviated by rest.
For Kelly’s story of recovery please see below the Links.
Links
Books:
Healing Back Pain by Dr John Sarno
Chronic Pain: Your Key to Recovery by Georgie Oldfield
The Great Pain Deception by Steve Ozanich
Videos:
Dr. John E Sarno – 20/20 Segment
Dr. John E Sarno – 20/20 Segment
Breakthrough with Healing Chronic Pain | Howard Schubiner | Talks at Google
Fibromyalgia & chronic fatigue – How I recovered after almost 20 years!
I tried yoga, tai chi, meditation, osteopaths, chiropractors, massage, physiotherapy, orthotics, accupuncture, antidepressants, Alexander Technique, EFT, eating vegan, eating paleo, numerous supplements and probably a quite a few more things I’ve forgotten to mention. Relief was only ever temporary and paying too much attention to whether certain foods were the cause of my pain just added to the stress of being ill.
I managed the condition to begin with but ended up pretty much housebound for about 5 years.
I was so desperate to recover but felt very guilty spending more money on my recovery, on me! I got to such a rock bottom one day that I just had to say fuck it because I couldn’t go on being that ill any longer. I researched the top ways people recover and discovered Mikel Therapy & The Gupta Programme.
At the same time some people on a Fibro/CFS recovery group mentioned a book called Healing Back Pain by Dr John Sarno that had been a part of their recovery. I’m so glad I saw that thread and ordered the book. It gave me back my life!
The book is really about chronic pain that occurs anywhere in the body. Dr Sarno explains that Fibromyalgia is a severe form of a muscle tension syndrome called TMS. Read any book by Dr John Sarno but Healing Back Pain is the most concise and available as an audiobook on Amazon, only 3hrs long.
Check out this video clip too…
Also read…
Unlearn Your Pain by Dr Howard Schubiner
Chronic Pain – The Key to Recovery by Georgie Oldfield
A short book to read with a really clear explanation of what’s happening in your body. Followed up with around 8 therapy session by phone. Saying what I was really feeling instead of what people wanted to hear, and not putting everyone else’s needs first, were things I needed to learn how to do. I highly recommend this. Working with a female therapist is better in my opinion.
A DVD course with a really clear explanation of what’s happening in your body. It affirmed what the Mikel Therapy book said. The physical symptoms cause anxiety and the anxiety over the physical symptoms causes the physical symptoms! You just get trapped in a cycle. It made such sense and explained why nothing I’d tried previously had worked. Once you become certain that this is what’s really going in your body you start to react with indifference to the symptoms, this begins breaking the symptom/anxiety cycle. The pain starts to fall away and you get better.
The Gupta DVDs also include NLP exercises to help break the pattern. I found them a little complicated compared to Dr Sarno’s method which is much simpler. He says you must react with complete indifference to any symptoms. This isn’t just “ignore the symptoms and they’ll go away”. This only works when you have read the information from several sources and truly understand and believe that the source of your pain is not physical but psychological. It’s like false alarms are being set off in your body, you just need to learn how to switch them off rather than react to them.
The books about TMS and Mikel Therapy were essential for me. The Gupta DVDs were a great reinforcement but perhaps not essential, although the DVDs contain many inspiring recovery stories that gave me hope and belief when I really needed it.
The TMS Wikipedia site tmswiki.org is a really helpful resource. The Pain Psychology Centre in LA have a great free recovery guide on there.
There’s also a new free recovery course you can get as an app that is based on Dr Sarno’s work called Curable at curablehealth.com
I recently did an online course called The Linden Method. I’d suffered with Anxiety issues for many years. This also helped me reach full recovery.
Before I became ill I was never a sporty person in fact quite the opposite but since recovering I have a new found love and appreciation for being able to move my body freely without pain. I started cycling because it was fun, then I started Zumba. I only danced to two songs in the first class but gradually built confidence in my body’s capability. Now I go twice a week, go cycling every Sunday and have just started the couch to 5k running plan.
There are not enough days in the week for all the fun stuff I want to do. I also stated a small jewelry making business as a hobby and can finally apply myself to learning Spanish now that the brain fog and fatigue have lifted too. I am so happy and grateful that my life is now fun again.
I hope this info gives you an insight as to what worked for me and the hope that you too will recover.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary woman, Kelly, talks about how she overcame her long struggle with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome.
Kelly is a 49 year old Brit living in Marbella, Spain.
She began suffering with chronic pain after a whiplash injury which never seemed to heal. After years of neck and back pain she later went on to develop Fibromyalgia, a condition that caused severe widespread pain and extreme fatigue never alleviated by rest.
For Kelly’s story of recovery please see below the Links.
Links
Books:
Healing Back Pain by Dr John Sarno
Chronic Pain: Your Key to Recovery by Georgie Oldfield
The Great Pain Deception by Steve Ozanich
Videos:
Dr. John E Sarno – 20/20 Segment
Dr. John E Sarno – 20/20 Segment
Breakthrough with Healing Chronic Pain | Howard Schubiner | Talks at Google
Fibromyalgia & chronic fatigue – How I recovered after almost 20 years!
I tried yoga, tai chi, meditation, osteopaths, chiropractors, massage, physiotherapy, orthotics, accupuncture, antidepressants, Alexander Technique, EFT, eating vegan, eating paleo, numerous supplements and probably a quite a few more things I’ve forgotten to mention. Relief was only ever temporary and paying too much attention to whether certain foods were the cause of my pain just added to the stress of being ill.
I managed the condition to begin with but ended up pretty much housebound for about 5 years.
I was so desperate to recover but felt very guilty spending more money on my recovery, on me! I got to such a rock bottom one day that I just had to say fuck it because I couldn’t go on being that ill any longer. I researched the top ways people recover and discovered Mikel Therapy & The Gupta Programme.
At the same time some people on a Fibro/CFS recovery group mentioned a book called Healing Back Pain by Dr John Sarno that had been a part of their recovery. I’m so glad I saw that thread and ordered the book. It gave me back my life!
The book is really about chronic pain that occurs anywhere in the body. Dr Sarno explains that Fibromyalgia is a severe form of a muscle tension syndrome called TMS. Read any book by Dr John Sarno but Healing Back Pain is the most concise and available as an audiobook on Amazon, only 3hrs long.
Check out this video clip too…
Also read…
Unlearn Your Pain by Dr Howard Schubiner
Chronic Pain – The Key to Recovery by Georgie Oldfield
A short book to read with a really clear explanation of what’s happening in your body. Followed up with around 8 therapy session by phone. Saying what I was really feeling instead of what people wanted to hear, and not putting everyone else’s needs first, were things I needed to learn how to do. I highly recommend this. Working with a female therapist is better in my opinion.
A DVD course with a really clear explanation of what’s happening in your body. It affirmed what the Mikel Therapy book said. The physical symptoms cause anxiety and the anxiety over the physical symptoms causes the physical symptoms! You just get trapped in a cycle. It made such sense and explained why nothing I’d tried previously had worked. Once you become certain that this is what’s really going in your body you start to react with indifference to the symptoms, this begins breaking the symptom/anxiety cycle. The pain starts to fall away and you get better.
The Gupta DVDs also include NLP exercises to help break the pattern. I found them a little complicated compared to Dr Sarno’s method which is much simpler. He says you must react with complete indifference to any symptoms. This isn’t just “ignore the symptoms and they’ll go away”. This only works when you have read the information from several sources and truly understand and believe that the source of your pain is not physical but psychological. It’s like false alarms are being set off in your body, you just need to learn how to switch them off rather than react to them.
The books about TMS and Mikel Therapy were essential for me. The Gupta DVDs were a great reinforcement but perhaps not essential, although the DVDs contain many inspiring recovery stories that gave me hope and belief when I really needed it.
The TMS Wikipedia site tmswiki.org is a really helpful resource. The Pain Psychology Centre in LA have a great free recovery guide on there.
There’s also a new free recovery course you can get as an app that is based on Dr Sarno’s work called Curable at curablehealth.com
I recently did an online course called The Linden Method. I’d suffered with Anxiety issues for many years. This also helped me reach full recovery.
Before I became ill I was never a sporty person in fact quite the opposite but since recovering I have a new found love and appreciation for being able to move my body freely without pain. I started cycling because it was fun, then I started Zumba. I only danced to two songs in the first class but gradually built confidence in my body’s capability. Now I go twice a week, go cycling every Sunday and have just started the couch to 5k running plan.
There are not enough days in the week for all the fun stuff I want to do. I also stated a small jewelry making business as a hobby and can finally apply myself to learning Spanish now that the brain fog and fatigue have lifted too. I am so happy and grateful that my life is now fun again.
I hope this info gives you an insight as to what worked for me and the hope that you too will recover.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary woman, Hanna, talks about how it took her a long time to realise that diet and lifestyle could be the key to managing her Type 1 Diabetes but, once she did, how she has run with it to help, not only herself but, many other people struggling to manage the condition reliant on conventional standard of care.
Hanna Boëthius has lived with Type 1 Diabetes as her constant companion for 35 years, and it was as if her whole life fell into place when she started eating real food in 2011. Since her wake up call, she has gained much of her health back, thanks to simply eating the right things and nutrients for her body.
Hanna is an international speaker, writer and action taker, who loves diabetes topics that are off of the beaten track. She’s passionate to find motivational and inspiring ways to bring about a change in diabetes management. Through her own company, Hanna Diabetes Expert, she’s inspired thousands of people with diabetes to live a healthier life by sharing her own story and experiences, as well as the puzzle pieces she’s helped others to find.
She has a profound understanding of how things like nutrition and lifestyle choices can balance diabetes.
She is also the founder of the very first interactive, 100% real food event, called The Low Carb Universe.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary woman, Kathy, talks about her discovery that she had stage 4 lipolymphedema as she approached her 60th birthday and what she did to start improving her pain and other symptoms.
Kathy lives in Centereach, New York with her two children and her husband of 38 years.
Kathy Dwulit came to the Lipedema Simplified Masterclass in May 2019 as a Stage 4 Lipolipedema with a myriad of comorbidities. She had a heart attack 10years ago which caused her to retire from nursing and along with a pulmonary emboli and thyroid issues she was also noticing that her mobility was beginning to get worse over time. She was about to turn 60 which was significant to her because her mother had died at age 62 and she really did not want to repeat that history for her daughters. She remembered how prematurely losing her mother affected her. If there was a chance that she could get healthier she wanted to take it. She also wanted to avoid a wheelchair. She made the decision to faithfully follow all the coach’s suggestions and teachings. She began her keto lifestyle and immediately felt no pain her lipedema legs which were usually painful. Her fellow classmates were having the same reaction.
By July, nearing her 60th birthday she noticed she had lost 20lbs. The weight loss began to feel almost effortless. Her bloodwork, particularly her AIC, a marker for diabetes, and her blood pressure was progressively improving. By the end of the six-month masterclass she had already lost 50lbs and was able to join a health gym at the suggestion of her coach, Megan who she continued with after the Masterclass. Her medication list began to lessen as well. By the beginning of 2020, the medications had decreased from sixteen to six. Her mobility had improved significantly, and she was walking independently without a cane. Working three times a week at the health gym her cardiac conditioning improved by 200 percent in two months
Despite issues with a leaky gut, Small Intestinal Bowel Overgrowth, and newly discovered intolerance to night shades she has managed to remain faithful to Keto lifestyle limiting carb intake to 20 grams as recommended by Lipedema Simplified. As of this interview she is three pounds away from having lost 100 lbs. Her A1C has gone from 6.4 to 5.5. All her doctors are amazed at her progress and encourage her to continue her efforts
Inspired by the vision of Catherine Seo with the work of Leslyn Keith, Megan Pheffer, Raeann Sparks, Mende Staggs, and the other Coaches at Lipedema Simplified Kathy is determined to give back to the Community who has given her so much. She is now the Vice President of Lipedema Project and she has completed the Professional Training from the Noakes Foundation in Low Carbohydrate High Fat/ Ketogenic Nutrition and Treatment. She is now a Mentor with Lipedema Simplified and hopes to soon to become a Coach working with Lipedema women in Stage 3 and 4.
Pre-purchase your copy of Megan Pfeffer’s book: Everyday keto for Lipedema: Eating Well for Lymphatic & Fat Disorders.
Dr Karen Herbst demonstrates Lipedema Diagnosis
Clinicians and others who would like to promote the LCHF way of nutrition by becoming advisors can find accredited online courses and information at Nutrition-Network, from The Noakes Foundation.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary woman, Kate, talks about how keto is the home base that she always comes back to whenever stress takes her off track.
Kate is special educationer who has been practicing her craft for more than thirty years and has worked with students from birth through adulthood. She has specialized in the areas of autism, elementary math and elementary reading. Recently, Kate has returned to a favorite area in education and is working with preschool age students.
Kate grew up in the beautiful Finger Lakes region of upstate New York. She lived in the Chicagoland area of Illinois for almost 20 years. Then, after suddenly finding herself single again, Kate decided to follow a dream and transplanted herself to the mountains of Tennessee.
Kate is here to share her story of discovering Keto and the path of ongoing self discovery it has led her on.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary woman, Amy, returns to talk about thyroid and how it impacts so many of us in the keto community. She discusses symptoms, diagnosis, testing and treatment and whether or not keto negatively impacts thyroid health.
Amy Berger, MS, CNS, is a U.S. Air Force veteran and Certified Nutrition Specialist who specializes in low-carbohydrate and ketogenic diets. Her motto is “Keto Without the Crazy”™, clearing up the confusion and making keto straightforward and simple to follow.
She blogs at TuitNutrition.com, where she writes about weight loss, metabolism, diabetes, thyroid function, and more. She has presented internationally on these topics and is the author of The Alzheimer’s Antidote: Using a Low-Carb, High-Fat Diet to Fight Alzheimer’s Disease, Memory Loss, and Cognitive Decline.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary woman, Jen, talks about how she and David are helping people beat sugar addiction and Type 2 Diabetes with low carb and their GRIN approach.
Dr Jennifer Unwin is a Consultant and Clinical Health Psychologist with over 30 years of NHS experience. Dr Unwin specialises in helping people with chronic illnesses to improve their lives through solution-focused brief therapy (a psychological approach based on solution-building rather than problem-solving). She is former Chair of the UK Association for Solution-Focused Practice.
Dr Unwin’s interest in long-term health conditions stems from her time working as a Lecturer at Manchester University in the 1990’s. Around this time, Dr Unwin contributed to two published books which merged her interest in psychology with physical and mental health conditions. She also completed her Clinical Doctorate in psychological aspects of recurrent urinary tract infections.
In 1996, Dr Unwin was appointed as Head of Clinical Health Psychology at Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust (a position which she remained in for over ten years). During this time, she worked at Royal Preston Hospital where she was tasked with developing the Clinical Health Psychology services in a large teaching hospital. She then moved to Liverpool University where she combined her role as Senior University Clinical Teacher with academia for four years (2007-2011). Dr Unwin completed her Clinical Psychology Doctorate at Hull University in goal-focused hope, spiritual hope and wellbeing.
In 2013, Dr Unwin returned to Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust working in their mental health team to offer psychological support to those living with long-term physical or mental health conditions such as fibromyalgia, COPD, and type 2 diabetes. Dr Unwin became interested in applying psychological techniques which promote resilience, hope, and motivation amongst her patients. She collaborated with her husband Dr David Unwin (an award-winning family doctor well-known for his pioneering low-carb approach to managing type 2 diabetes) to deliver innovative psychological approaches to patients with type 2 diabetes or sugar addiction in a group setting and individually.
Over the past 30 years, Dr Unwin contributed to 19 clinical papers and two published books. She is also a renowned public speaker, having spoken at conferences and events worldwide. She recently retired from her NHS role in May 2019 and now dedicates her time to working alongside Dr David Unwin to provide innovative and results-driven patient care to those with type 2 diabetes and sugar addiction through Diabetes Digital Media (DDM). DDM is an award-winning digital health platform offering scalable and evidence-based health solutions to those with diabetes.
Together, the Unwins have pioneered the use of low carbohydrate diets in the treatment of obesity and diabetes through a patient-centric model of ‘hope’. Dr Unwin believes that “every piece of bad news, for example a type 2 diabetes diagnosis, can be turned on its head to become a golden opportunity for change.” Since the success of the low carb initiative is largely reliant on hope, the most important part is to address the patient’s personal goals. Dr Unwin draws on her extensive psychological knowledge to promote a two-way discussion which is informative, motivating and fulfilling for both doctor and patient.
Through hard work, perseverance and most of all, taking the time to understand each patient’s individual needs and goals, David and Jen Unwin have proven that low carb lifestyles work, that they last, and that they can be made accessible to all.
Daisy’s latest extraordinary people, Kevin, Amy and Brandy, return to share more about what it’s like to Keto in Hawaii and how they pay their Keto success forward by helping others.
Kevin & Amy
Kevin and Amy live on the island of Oahu in Hawaii. This self described foodie couple have been married since 2002 and they’ve enjoyed sharing in food celebration with their ‘Ohana (family) and friends in what is arguably one of the most ‘ono (delicious) places to eat in the world.
But after years of incremental weight gain, an injury or two and finally a potential diabetes diagnosis for Kevin and a mysterious lung infection for Amy, they decided to adopt the Ketogenic dietary model.
Since January of 2020, Amy and Kevin have improved their health exponentially. Kevin is no longer at risk of diabetes, has regulated his blood pressure and improved his sleep apnea. Keto has helped Amy heal from that illness and she has regained her ability to be as physically active as she wants to be.
And in just over 7 months, Kevin and Amy have lost a combined total of over 120 pounds!
The couple has started a Facebook group to help support other folks in making this life saving switch to dietary lifestyle, with a focus on Hawaii centric local flavors and food tradition. Their Keto Kanak Attack group had over two hundred members within a week of it’s creation and is growing daily.
Brandy
Brandy lives on Bainbridge Island in the state of Washington. She is part of a blended family and she and her husband have raised five children, ranging in age from 15 to 26.
Brandy has been overweight since childhood and since she was a very young adult, has weighed more than 300 pounds at any given time. At the age of 43, Brandy was severely insulin resistant, weighed 325 pounds, was medicated for clinical depression, anxiety and high blood pressure, had PCOS and had started developing painful blood clots in her legs.
Now, not quite two years later, Brandy’s life is completely different, thanks to the adoption of the Ketogenic dietary model. She has lost 96 pounds so far, has no blood clots and no symptoms of PCOS. Her blood pressure has normalized all on it’s own. And perhaps most importantly for her, the way of eating has resolved her depression and controlled her anxiety better than any medication she was ever prescribed. She’s Keto for life.
