I would like to share my personal health journey with you.

I am in my late 40’s and right now I feel the healthiest I have been! Sounds strange, I know! You would think that in my 20’s I should have been able to say this, but I couldn’t. I have suffered with digestive issues all my life. Mostly the type of symptoms you don’t like to talk about, such a bloating, severe diarrhoea, tummy pains and constipation. Also, my cycles were a nightmare and the monthly pain was out of control. My health issues seemed permanent and ongoing. My tummy could be upset by anything! I never knew when I was going to end up with severe abdominal pains and crazy diarrhoea! I was often exhausted and rarely felt full of energy. But nonetheless, I just got on with life thinking that this was normal. Whenever I was taken to the doctor as a child, the doctor would find nothing wrong with me. So I believed this was my normal. Besides, these issues were really personal and I was embarrassed to share any of this with anyone. So for the most part I suffered in silence.

Roll on to my child-bearing years, and my issues had gotten no better. Trying to fall pregnant was a difficult struggle, one to this day I have kept very private. But what I know now, is that may struggles in this area could have been addressed and resolved. If I had my time again, I would have worked on my own health before trying to start my family. I believe that my health and the health of my babies would have been quite different had I been in better health first.

When my long awaited third child was a baby, our family went through an extended time of stress. One of my children was diagnosed with a chronic lifelong illness. Around this time my extended family went through very tough times for a period of years. Funerals, house moves, and caring for remaining family members added to my stress levels for such an extended time. In fact, when I was going through it all I didn’t even realise how stressed I was! Like many mums out there, I just got on with it because my loved ones needed me to.

When my child got sick I realised that I could no longer deny that my health was struggling. I needed to fix it. How could I help my child if I couldn’t even keep myself healthy? So, my real journey to health started out of pure necessity. As well as the issues described earlier, I also had severe joint pain (especially in my hands and feet), brain fog, exhaustion, inability to concentrate, patches of hair loss, psoriasis and many more issues. I was a walking inflammatory mess! However, every time I visited a doctor I was left feeling unheard. I am sure that the doctors dismissed my health issues thinking I was postnatally depressed and stressed. Only one doctor gave me a push in the right direction, and that was to look at food intolerances. At the time, I don’t think that doctors in Australia thought much of food intolerances. I personally experienced multiple specialists tell me that they didn’t believe in it! Like food intolerance was a made-up entity which required a blind faith for it to exist!! The medical profession at that time were not helpful.

So, my journey of self-treatment began. Hours and hours of personal research and listening to Functional/Integrative Medicine doctors share their knowledge. I would try anything that I thought might help me. I consulted with many natural therapy providers, all of whom helped me somewhat on my journey. This was one expensive journey which was full of trial and error. But I am so grateful for these practitioners because they all helped me in some way to get through.

When I first found Functional Diagnostic Nutrition® I was sold on their philosophy and dove right on in. My health journey is not at its’ end but is ongoing and forever changing. But with FDN I now know exactly how to test and search for healing opportunities in my life, and I can confidently know that my health will never be as bad as it once was. It is now my desire to help others to do the same in their lives. “Test, don’t guess” is the motto. I truly believe that everyone needs to be empowered and educated to make their own health choices. Knowledge is power and I am here to help you gain knowledge about your body and empower you to seek a healthier future.