Okay so first let me say that a lot of my morning ritual has completely gone out the window since having a baby and that’s something I need to be okay with right now.
Health is a journey and we do our best in each season of life.
Right now my season of life requires late night and early morning feeding/pumping sessions. Now in order for me to keep my baby safe & not spill breast milk everywhere, I need to stay awake for those sessions.
This has resulted in coffee before protein in the morning and screens up until moments before I go to sleep — things I preach against for the sake of gut health.
Let me tell you from personal experience: your brain does not function properly on insufficient sleep. And your brain and your gut are connected by the vagus nerve which is vital to things like mood, digestion & immunity.
Yesterday morning I drowsily asked my husband to make coffee while I fed the baby. He reluctantly rolled out of bed and stumbled into the kitchen.
A few minutes later, he comes in to ask me “what vehicle” I wanted.
Excuse me, what?
I look at him like he’s crazy.
He looks at me like “how on EARTH do you not understand what I’m saying right now.”
“Um… if you mean what VEHICLE would I like my coffee in.. a mug please?”
Then he stomps away saying something about how I asked him to make breakfast and that’s what he was trying to do.
“No, darling. I just asked you to make coffee. I didn’t ask you to make breakfast. You’re not making any sense right now. Can I please just have a cup of coffee?” (Me- desperate for caffeine)
Later that day I reminded him of this silly question he asked me and he was like “yeah I don’t know what that was supposed to mean or where that came from.”
He also proceeded to tell me that when he went out to the kitchen, he got out a platter and some kind of supplement capsule. Which supplement? He had no idea.
Then this morning - after being woken up (too) early by a crying baby - I asked him, “can I have more phone?”
What was I trying to say? Two things: can I have my phone, and can I have more water.
The moral of the story is sleep is important. Your brain CANNOT function properly without it. So get your 8 hours if and when you can, and if you can’t - naps are your friend.
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If you’re not convinced your mind and your gut are at all related, just think of any scenario where you've seen or smelled something that made you sick to your stomach.
My husband is a huge WWII buff, so there I was watching Brad Pitt and Shia LaBeouf plowing through Germany in a tank. Percy Jackson showed up as a newbie and had to clean the tank out as a sort of initiation. I'll spare you the gory details, but things he saw and smelled in there made him physically ill. It reminded me just how connected the mind is to the digestive system.
That’s just one example of how our minds and guts are constantly communicating with each other. So it makes sense that our mental state can affect our digestive system in other ways too.
Stress, anxiety and depression can all lead to gastrointestinal issues, wreaking havoc on the gut. And what happens when our gut is out of whack? Eczema flare ups. Then we get stressed or anxious about our eczema and it turns into a vicious cycle.
There’s a strong link between the mind and the gut, and it’s important to keep both in balance. Stress-reducing activities like yoga, meditation and deep breathing can help maintain good gut health.
Even more, do you find yourself being negative or complaining a lot? Making the extra effort to see the good in things rather than focusing on the bad can do wonders for your mental health - and therefore, your physical health. You'll be happier, and by extension you'll be healthier!
I challenge you to do ONE thing today that will make you happier, and see how that feels in your body.
Then try it again tomorrow. And the next day. Soon I'll be willing to bet you feel a huge difference.
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I was so discouraged but I knew what had happened. I was eating too much of my trigger foods.
Overindulgence seems to be a conversation around every holiday. Well, in this case it’s not so much overindulging in too many sweets or too much food in general.
For me, this past weekend was overindulgence in my trigger foods. Again.
The thing with this is that it’s okay to do every so often, because sometimes just having a nice time with loved ones and eating the dishes that were brought to share overshadows the obsession with avoiding all the foods you’re “not supposed to have.”
So I ate foods with garlic and onions and my hands (my eczema trigger point) LET ME KNOW IT.
Was I uncomfortable? Yes. I’ll be honest about that. As I’ve said in the past, my eczema burns and is quite uncomfortable. It can even get to the point of my hands bleeding.
And then of course I was at someone else’s house who doesn’t use the fragrance free soap I do, so that was making it worse with every hand wash.
In hindsight, I truly should have thought further ahead about what I was going to eat and I should have brought a dish that I knew I could eat with no problems.
Even health coaches can drop the ball with this!
Moral of the story is overindulgence is inevitable at times. (Or maybe moral of the story is bring your own dish, always. LOL) So damage control was the next step for me. When I got home the first thing I did was apply my favorite soothing ointment filled with skin-loving essential oils. Drinking plenty of water, taking digestive enzymes, taking a probiotic (sometimes I’ll double or triple up), drinking a warm cup of herbal tea & getting a good night’s rest are next on the list.
And of course, going back to avoiding my trigger foods again :)
Do you know which foods trigger your eczema? How do you handle flare ups? Tell me in the comments!
If you loved this blog post, there's more where that came from in my free Facebook group here. You'll want to get in there now because that's where I'll be launching a 5 Day Eczema Relief Training very soon!
Want to get a head start? You can also grab my new guide on 5 Steps to Taming an Eczema Flare Up here!
When I was going through my health coach’s program for improved gut health, one of the things she introduced me to is dry brushing.
I had never heard of this before. Here's how it works:
You take a handheld body brush like this one, and brush your body starting from your feet making your way up to your heart. You start at the bottom of your feet, work up your legs, then up your back and abdomen. Then you brush your arms, starting at your wrists working your way in.
Apply more pressure in areas that have tougher skin and lighter pressure in areas with more sensitive skin.
Pay special attention to the areas of your body where your lymph nodes are located. Neck, chest, armpits, belly, groin.
Just remember to keep the motions in a direction toward your heart. Once I’ve finished my arms and armpits, I brush DOWN all around my neck and end dry brushing in a circular motion over my chest/heart.
It’s best to do this just before getting in the bath or shower so you can rinse the dead skin off of you, and then you’ll moisturize once you get out.
The idea here is you’re encouraging lymphatic drainage.
Why is this a good thing?
You’re helping the body get rid of toxins. This not only helps your body fight infection and disease, but also helps restore balance in bacteria in your gut. Bonus points for drinking tons of water in addition to this practice to help flush those toxins out!
You’re also exfoliating your skin, helping break down cellulite, improving your body’s circulation & more!
Dry brushing is a great practice to implement for anyone trying to improve their gut health - which truly impacts overall health of the whole body.
If you loved this blog post, there's more where that came from in my free Facebook group here. You'll want to get in there soon because that's where I'll be launching a 5 Day Eczema Relief Training this month!
Want to get a head start? You can also grab my new guide on 5 Steps to Taming an Eczema Flare Up here!
I used to drive home from work feeling like I had an elephant sitting on my chest. I had even convinced myself that I had asthma, and should probably see a doctor.
Then I realized I just wasn’t breathing properly.
It sounds so simple. Breathing is something each one of us is born knowing how to do. So why do I literally catch myself holding my breath?
Stress. Anxiety. Overthinking.
I’ve also learned that I’m not the only person who does this. This is an actual thing — we hold our breath because we’re stressed.
On these drives home from work, I would get in my head and replay scenarios that happened that day thinking of how I handled something. “I should have said this differently.” “I should have done that differently.” “What does so and so think of me now.” “Am I going to get in trouble for that?”
That last one is a side effect of being “the good girl” growing up. Following the rules. Being afraid of getting into trouble. This also falls into the category of people pleasing. Which is a whole other stress-inducing category!
I would stress over really silly tiny things. Still do sometimes (it's much better since using these tips), but I have to remind myself that I’m making things out to be a much bigger deal in my head than they are in real life.
I once heard that worrying is nothing but a waste of time. It’s stressing over hypothetical scenarios that have yet to happen. So you’re literally putting yourself through at least twice the amount of stress than you need to. More if you're replaying it in your head over and over.
If you know something is coming up that you’re worried about, not only are you putting yourself through the situation while you’re worrying — because your brain doesn’t really know the difference between something happening in real life and something you’re making up in your head — but you’ll be going through the stress of the situation all over again when it actually happens (IF it actually happens).
Your mindset is so powerful when it comes to your stress level. You can choose not to get upset over the little things. You can choose not to worry about what might happen. You can choose to see a situation through a different lens and not get worked up over it.
That’s what I invite you to do this week. Reframe your thoughts. Take control of your mind. If you can take control of your thoughts and your mind, you will have truly unlocked a new level of health.
If you loved this blog post, there's more where that came from in my free Facebook group here. You'll want to get in there soon because that's where I'll be launching a 5 Day Eczema Relief Training this month!
Want to get a head start? You can also grab my new guide on 5 Steps to Taming an Eczema Flare Up here!
