S3E16 · Katie Boulton (Katie Jean Health): Food is Medicine

Alrighty beautiful people, here we are back on the Virtus Performance Podcast, can't even say the business name. Katie, welcome. Thank you for having me. Mate, it's an absolute pleasure. First question for you. What gets you out of bed in the morning? Good one. You know what, without being like cliche, I think just being healthy and always wanting to reach your best health. I love that. I'm obsessed by that. Yeah. Are you obsessed with health? I've always been into it, yeah, yeah. Probably not obsessed, but yeah, I've just always sort of been drawn to it. What is it about, actually, what is your definition of health?

What is health to you when you say I want to be healthy or I want to promote health, what is that? What does it look like? Well probably not obsessive, that's not a good start for health. Let's change that word, we'll talk about that. I think for me what's really important is to have a really good balance in life and diet and exercise and all aspects of it. I really think it does come down to balance. I think that's how you feel the best, look the best, are the best. Yeah. Is that it in a nutshell?

Do we have more? I think so. I think that's a really good definition because it allows you to do, it's almost like a baseline or a baseline framework to allow you to live your best life and to do what you want to do. I mean to be fair, I would say when it comes to diet, I would probably be more like 80/20 rule. When it comes to exercise, probably quite similar. When it comes to lifestyle, retains and things are great, but I also allow flexibility too. So that's really it across the board. How has health manifested itself in your life to get you to the point where you are now?

I think I probably started off on my path, so I'm a qualified naturopath and I have two qualifications in naturopathy and I think I ended up there because as a child with certain illnesses that were misdiagnosed medically, unfortunately, I was able to find the right help through natural medicine and different naturopaths. So that sort of spiked my introduction to naturopaths, natural medicine and all the alternative options that are available. And I guess that's sort of how I pursued it. I mean, God, in high school, I had no idea what I wanted to do. No one does.

Like careers coordinator. How crazy are those conversations? Yeah, no idea. Shout out to Walshie if you're watching. I know. We did okay. She doesn't live in my street, by the way. I don't know if she's still there. She's a star. Yeah. But no, oh God, you know, they pull out the quiz, you know, what are your skills and all the rest of it. And it's like, oh, you could be a good nurse or you could be a physio or you know, I could be a teacher. So that's what I got into. I got into a double degree in primary and high school education.

And I deferred, I think, I was sort of interested, but I think didn't really know. Just wasn't. Did you go straight from high school to uni? Yeah. Yeah. I went to TAFE. That's what I ended up choosing. I got an advanced diploma in naturopathy. So you went straight away. Yeah. Yeah. In hindsight, probably would have taken a gap year. Got some life skills behind me. I know, chestnut. Yeah, totally. I mean, I first qualified as a naturopath when I had just turned 21. Yeah. Wow. I think life experience when it comes to treating health conditions is so important.

And I would see clients back then that were like post-menopausal, I can't relate. You know, like it was hard enough trying to relate to women who were like wanting to conceive. So yeah, then there was about a 10 year period in between that time and my second, my degree qualification. And I've learned a lot since then. Like I can talk to post-menopausal women and be like, okay, like can't personally relate, but I understand what's going on for you. Yeah. One of the almost like principles that we built this place on is like, you can't give what you haven't, or you can't share what you haven't experienced and can't give what you haven't gotten.

It doesn't necessarily mean you have to go through that thing. But spending time with people who have, and learning from their shared experience kind of helps you build your understanding and your knowledge base to then be able to help, right? Because you don't have to have gone through the same thing. I love that. I feel like you're the king of quotes, by the way. Yeah, they, the way I look at quotes is like, they're like a framework for living the life I want to live. So when I run into a gap of like, what I

need to do here, or how do I want to be, I just lean on people that have way smarter and have done way more than me or lived thousands of years ago or whatever. I've got like a quote list on my computer that I hear things and save them here and there. But yeah, otherwise I can resonate with quotes when I hear them, love them in one ear out the other. Yeah, I've got, I reckon I've got like 10, 15 that just like embedded into my psyche that just forced me to do things that I know I should do that I don't want to do.

And I like, there's one that we've got on the wall down here, standards we walk past, the standards we accept. I like it. So whenever I walk... I thought you were going to say the other one, the good, good people, good, good ones. Good things with good people. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's up there. But whenever I walk past a piece of rubbish on the, on the ground, like sometimes I walk past it and then that quote, some, like my brain will just, my subconscious will just go like, stand as you walk past and I'll have to go back and get it and I'm like, fuck, I hate myself.

But also... No, but it makes you better. It's a good thing, exactly. Exactly. So that's, that's why I love quotes. It is about you. Alrighty. So for the people playing at home, what is a naturopath? So a naturopath is like, similar to a holistic, say, doctor, not a doctor qualification, but what you would see a naturopath for is basically any health condition and the type of treatment you can expect from a naturopath and we all work very differently. But for myself, for example, would include diet advice, first and foremost, lifestyle advice, always. I think we, everyone can improve those aspects in their life.

Sometimes supplements advice, if it comes to like nutritional deficiencies or if they need adrenal support or hormonal support or whatever it may be, but yeah, just a holistic view on sort of trying to find the cause of the symptoms. So not just giving, oh, here's a bandaid for your cut, but why are you cutting easily or, you know, that, that was a really bad example, but... We'll work on the analogies. We'll get there. So it's taught me through, we'll talk about like your principles around your practice and how you do it and how, what it looks like kind of as we go, but I want to, let's talk about through your journey.

So you did the cert and then you went to, then you went to uni? So I did the advanced diploma, graduated when I was 21. My work experience straight from there, I immediately got a job with another local naturopath. I don't want to complain. We had a conversation pre podcast where Katie was like, I don't want to be the guest that just complains, but I want to find a way to articulate how things didn't go the way I wanted it to. Absolutely. Yeah. So if you think Katie's complaining, throw in the hate mail now, but no, tell it how you want to tell it.

Oh, okay. So I went and got this job with a local naturopath and the agreement was basically like a mentorship. She, when she was at my stage said that she had an amazing mentor that taught her the ropes and she learned so much through that experience. So it was something that she wanted to give back and do. So for me, I was like, wow, hit the ground running. This is awesome. Um, so then I got in and then the agreement sort of was like, even though you're qualified, I don't want you in my clinic giving people advice without me signing off on it.

So I was like, okay, that's pretty strict, but at the same time, how good that I can have all my work proofread by this mentor, like I'll learn so much anyway. It all fizzed out pretty quickly because she was unavailable to meet to approve my works and then my patients were left waiting and I just felt so terrible. But then once I did meet with her, she was like, I don't understand why you need me for all this. Like you can't do anything yourself. This isn't working out. So I left that place and I left and um, it really was like at that, if that happened now, I would feel totally different about it.

I'd probably walk away and be like, Oh my God, like whatever. Yeah. We probably wouldn't sign up for it in the first place. That in that way. Right? No, that's it. And at that time I'd only just turned 21 and like, yeah, just didn't have that life experience or confidence and it really just shook like my confidence out of me as a fledging naturopath. So then I thought, Oh right, like maybe I'm not meant to do this. And I took that with me. And then I got started doing more of what I thought I was good at, which was the nutrition side of it.

And I think I am good at nutrition. I think I'm also a great naturopath, but I, I think my passion, um, sort of war thing over the years for nutrition because a lot of people seek help with nutrition for dieting purposes. Yes. Whereas I use nutrition as medicine and I love that aspect to it. And there's no issue with either one. It's just that my passion is to use nutrition holistically and to help heal and to get the best out of people, not to be on like a super depleting cutting calorie deficit, bodybuilding type of thing.

So anyway, I went on and did that and it lasts a few years and I was so busy doing it and it basically all became online, which at that stage was great because I had no overheads and yeah, um, I guess that sort of was the start of my stepping stone to get into all the fitness modeling and the competitions that I was doing, which is a whole nother story. Yeah. What was that like? Cause obviously you've like the fitness models and modeling and the competitions, there's a, there's the element of the depletion diet and there, and obviously there's the two sides of it, right?

There's a surplus and the, there's the deficit sides and changes depending on where you're at and when your comps are and all those kinds of things. What was that like doing that? But then also in practice kind of doing the opposite in a way in terms of how you're, yeah, I think this is where I was really lucky with my competition history. Um, and I mean that like when I say, Oh, I think it was lucky people were like, Oh no, it wasn't luck. Like you worked hard. Yes I did. But I also was very lucky at that point in time.

I did 24 competitions and I placed in every single one. And if I did that now I would not place in probably any of them because at the time when I was competing, I was the look that the judges were going for today's standards. I'm not. And that's, that's okay. Fascinating how the goalposts move and it could give you a complete, like, it can move overnight. I guess the judges there, like, and that's the thing with effectively a subjective sport. Yeah. Yeah. It just is determined by the judges. Yeah. It's fascinating. But in terms of

where I say I was lucky, I, what I liked about that was I was able to do it and do well through that period of time, um, and not have to deplete the way other athletes were going to like crazy extents. So I would basically eat well, I'd exercise every day and I'd sleep well and I had a pretty healthy balanced life and I did well. So that's why I think I was lucky. If I did that today, I would, I would probably place last, but that's fine. And that's why I don't do it anymore. Because, you know, I'm not what they're after, but I don't want to go to that next level of depletion.

And I see many of my patients who are competitors, both male and female, but say in particularly female who have lost their menstrual cycle or even post-comp, they might've not competed for 18 months and they still haven't got it back, but you know, they've started growing hair on their face or they've got really bad acne and I don't want that for me. And part of why I loved it so much is I felt that I was setting a really good example to be able to bring health to the fitness industry. To me, health and fitness are combined, unfortunately for, in the real world, I think they're two different things.

Like you go to the fitness expos and you're like, well, like this isn't what most holistic coaches or, you know, professionals would deem health. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. What was it, if you could tell, if you could go back and obviously you were promoting this then by what you, what you were doing, but if you could go back and kind of tell yourself and the rest of the population that were there back then with all, you know, now, what would you tell them? What would the, if you could have a billboard in front of them all and they could sit there and read, read a message, what would that message be?

You know what? I sort of know the message without being able to articulate it into one sentence. I think, it's a big billboard. It's a huge billboard. It's like a whole novel. I think one of the biggest things that can really affect people in that particular industry is how you mentioned the goalposts can change so far. That can change overnight or from one weekend to the next. Like you can compete at a state competition and win and then you can do nationals the next day or the next weekend and not even get a look in. So you can present exactly the same.

If not better. And they'll be like, oh, you know, it wasn't what you're after we wanted today. And that's the sport. But that has a huge mental impact on many, many people and I think just to be able to sort of shake people and wake them up and go, come on, like one day when you're not doing this, you look back and realise that the emotional rollercoaster that goes with it is not healthy, it's actually so detrimental. I think that's the biggest learning curve there, among many other things like performance enhancing drugs and you know.

What was it like being in a world that obviously there's such a grey area between the performance enhancing drugs and then the natural and it's obviously there's tested and untested federations and different competitions and things, but what was it like kind of not knowing or not being able to control what other people are doing when it's a competition that's subjective because it's almost like a melting pot of physical and mental potential physical and mental trauma. Yeah, totally. I mean, I competed in all the federations, so both natural and untested, I mean, I never got tested even at natural shows and I was always hand on heart, a natural athlete.

And I prided myself in that to be able to compete against open events or in open events against potentially athletes or whatever they might be on and be able to maintain my own. I don't know what the question was now. I can't remember either. How did that time as an athlete shape what you do now? I think having that first hand experience in, I mean, like I said, I didn't go to any extreme depletions with diet compared to other people, but I definitely was put more into it than, you know, the average day of eating type of thing.

So I think having that personal experience has really shaped me to be able to relate and help my patients now. Being in that world, did you meet people, spend time with people, create relationships with people who were going to that, to the end of the limit? Almost everyone. Yeah. Almost everyone. How did you learn from how you saw them do it and how they may be presented? Well, I think that's sort of the sad part. Like sometimes doing what they might have thought was everything they needed to, to be the best. Sometimes a lot of times didn't really work, not only for their own health, but like it's not actually always cracked up what they might've thought it might be.

Yeah. So yeah, I think that's sort of sad, like to do all these things on a whim and take this and inject that and supplement this and, you know, starve yourself here and whatever they were doing. There's so many different things people did, but yeah, I think that's just the sad part because these things have, can have pretty bad repercussions and long term, like not just always a quick fix. Like I said, I have patients who haven't competed for 18 months and still don't have their cycle back or have started growing like facial hair. So yeah.

Yeah, I always looked, looked at health as like long term sustainable, like capacity building, right? You want to be able to be and do more and that juxtaposition between health and fitness fascinates me because for majority of the population that like don't live in the world that we live in, in terms of we do this every day. The first thing when you talk about fitness, they think of that, they think of bodybuilding, they think of being lean, being shredded, being superficial, it's the superficial stuff. Whereas long term health and wellbeing is, is not that world. Yeah, absolutely.

What's so you obviously competed for a lot of years and then what did your practice look like while you're competing and then when you finished up? So I sort of stopped practicing as a naturopath when I left that clinic first off. I still incorporated it into like my nutrition plans, but I really went down the healthy eating nutrition plan writing programs world for some time over those years I worked alongside health food stores, sports supplement stores, gyms, like operating gyms, I owned a gym. And then it wasn't until like the week before COVID where I was in a workplace that became quite sleazy and I was over it.

I didn't stand for any of it whatsoever and I thought, right, that's it with the help of my partner. I formulated a really satisfying resignation and that was it. And then I decided, right, I'm going to enroll in the bachelor of health science, naturopathy. It was only eight subjects to complete upon my prior study. Yeah. So it's only meant to take 12 months. Awesome. And COVID here, it took two years, which is fine. But the length of what I learned to study. So yeah, then I graduated there and opened my business purely up until this stage has been via zoom consults.

That's worked really well for me because it's quick and efficient and I still feel like I build such a great rapport with my patients and I think people can sometimes be hesitant to book an appointment when it's on zoom because they feel like, Oh no, they won't be able to relate to me. But I, I am, I know that that aspect doesn't lack in my online clinic. Yeah. So I think if you dialled into a zoom and you're actually like eyeballs are on the screen, there's nothing else going on. You don't have your phone on

you like, yeah, it's almost, you almost take away the normal world of, of distractions away from you and you just like, just dial into that what's happening then. And it's there just to have a meeting and have a chat and be distracted. Like I'm completely honed in on finding out your entire health history. Like I want to know you and how I can help you. So yeah. Anyway, I think COVID did help in terms of telehealth. Like it's people are more familiar with that. People know how to use QR codes now. Yeah. So that's, that's what I've been doing since.

Awesome. So what are the, what are the principles that over your journey you've kind of stuck with to help build your practice? What are the, if you were to elevate a picture, your, your business and what you do and what you think is important. What are they? Yeah, that's a good question. I haven't really thought too much about that and what applies to me personally in my practice. I think so much of my education is naturopathic principles and philosophies such as like first do no harm, treat the whole person, which, which basically means, you know, obviously don't do any harm, never implement something that will make something, someone worse before better.

Treat the whole person, meaning don't just cover up the symptomatic picture, like find out what's going on. Like the doctor is teacher, meaning like teach your patient along the way. I think those things really resonate with me. And for how I operate in my clinic, I really do want to, like the perfect patient for me is someone who's long-term in terms of they see me, we, I help them for a couple of consults and then off they go on their merry way and they're long-term as in, in a couple of years time when they have something else that's popped up, they'll come back to me.

But I don't want to see you for every week for the next two years. Go experiencing and learn and build, build your own understanding and knowledge. Yeah. Yeah. Long-term games with long-term people. That's what we're here for. King of quotes. Yeah, it's a good book called Infinite Games. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. So what, what are the kind of, what is your, do your clientele look like at the moment? Like are you, do you see a particular group of people or are you a bit more general and holistic? I like to think of myself as a generalist in terms of I don't specify in any particular area.

I like to delve into all aspects of health for all different types of patients. That being said, I do draw in 20 to 30 year old females with hormonal imbalance or skin issues or gut health issues. And that's probably because I am a young woman who they probably feel they can relate to. And that's probably the type of content I've put up occasionally into like, I think gut health is huge. And yeah, a lot of people can relate to that. Yeah, that's probably a big part of my patients at the same time. Like I see women who are wanting to conceive partners who have previously been told that they're infertile and we sort of help them to not be.

I see males as well. I see women for menopause, post menopause. I've treated kids. So yeah, I do have a broad range of clientele. But yeah. It's always that bell curve right? Yeah. Yeah. Let's talk about some of those issues you mentioned. So gut health. Like what are the two or three bullet points that you want and wish everyone knew and that you commonly see, what issues you commonly see come up? I wish everyone knew that food is medicine. Yeah. Period. That's it. Put that on a t-shirt. Yes. I'm going to print that off for a quote for you downstairs.

You can hang that up. I'll whack it up on the wall. Yeah. Look, what I see a lot of is IBS, which is BS diagnosis. I mean, it's just a blanket term, right? Yeah. It's a syndrome. It's like shin splints. Yeah. A syndrome. It's like, we don't know what's going on with you, so we'll give you this label. There's always a cause for it. And I think something I find frustrating, not particularly with my patients, but more so with their opinion of, "Oh no, that won't work for me. I've tried everything. Nothing works." Heard that before, yeah.

In my opinion, okay, sure, credit to you, you've tried a lot of things, but the things you've tried have not been effective for you because you haven't found the right thing yet. Yeah. Or you haven't done it properly, or you haven't done it long enough, or something along those lines, right? There's so many variables. Yeah. There's so many IBS diagnosis, which is rubbish, which generally consists of gut aches, pains, bloating, constipation, diarrhoea, or both. And that's probably, in a nutshell, like bloating. Yeah. Uncomfortable pain. That's pretty common. Yeah. I mean... Not normal, but common. No, absolutely.

Not normal. Not normal. Should not be just accepted, but bloody hell, is it common. Yeah. Yeah. In terms of your studies, where do you go to learn about gut health and to learn about all of the causative factors and all of the treatments and things like that? So I research a lot of studies through PubMed. They can be really helpful, but I'm also open-minded that I know sometimes that you can probably find a study to back any argument, right? Oh, 100%. So yeah, definitely helpful, but it's not my only go-to. I listen to many health podcasts.

Shout out to ATP. Love their podcasts. Yeah. I need to share that button. Yeah. We used to have a bell. I don't know where the bell is. Is that what it would be? That would be a good shout. We used to have a bell. I'll find a shout out bell. Ding. That's it for a later job. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like podcasts, I've got some great textbooks, but that probably goes back to my education because that's where I source those from. And there are some databases that I have subscriptions to, which have a lot of scientific research that back there, like all the evidence-based ingredients, and that's really, really helpful.

And then I also do a lot of webinars. I'd probably do a webinar once or twice a week to just keep updating. Awesome. It's just constantly filling the cup in terms of what you're learning. And look, I mean, I think that you can never stop learning probably about any industry, but I think when it comes to health, there's so many different... There's an infinite amount of ways to approach any simple thing. Yeah. What's the saying about skinning a cat or something? See, I was thinking that, but I was like, "I don't want to talk about skinning cats."

Many roads lead to Rome. Let's go with that one. Oh, that's nice. I think every road leads to Rome if you want to travel long enough. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, I think that's a fascinating... And something that I've looked at in my practice and my coaching and how that's evolved and changed over the years, and I kind of get to the point now where I'm like, "Well, none of it really matters. What you do doesn't matter as long as you're enjoying it and long as you're making progress and as long as you're not going backwards and not making it worse or doing harm."

Yeah. And I think I read something the other day, and it sort of was similar to what you're saying, not going backwards, not doing harm. And it was basically just trying to clarify the difference between having an opinion because it's definitely scientifically backed or having an opinion because anecdotally that's what you found has worked for you or your patience or just what you believe in. And there's no harm in that. There's no harm in saying like, "I like to do this because I've found it works," but you don't need to always say, "Oh, this is the only way to do it."

When you mention that, you can find a journal article that can back up pretty much any claim that you want. So we end up kind of just, you know, cherry picking the studies that work for us that back up our ideas and ignore the others. But at the end of the day, life is so much more, there's so many more gray areas than that. And I like the idea or the thought process of like everything I know and believe right now is going to be proven wrong at some point because you look at different times in your life when you thought something was, you know, 100% truth and you kind of look back and like, "Far as an idiot."

And you can kind of go through most of our core beliefs and look at it that way. And even the way that, you know, we look at a simple health example, it's like fat was the enemy, then sugar was the enemy, then, you know, everything has had its time being... Smoking was good for you. Yeah, exactly. It's everything's had its time being the enemy. And if we approach all of our current belief systems like that and go, "Well, it's probably going to be proven wrong in a year, a decade, 30 years," it's fascinating, right? So

you kind of go, "Well, we do this," and like I look at the way we coach, it's changed and it's adapted so much over the last seven or so years since we've been in here. And I look at it now and go, "Well, in two years, hopefully we're going to look at the way we do things now." We're like, "Fuck, we were dumb. We were missing the boat or there was different things." But at the end of the day, all you can do is kind of take anecdotal evidence, take your own experiential learning, take the scientific literature of what it's telling us, take it all that, mix it all up.

Do what works for you. Take it with a grain of salt and do something you enjoy because, yeah, I think too many people in our industry, and that's health and fitness and performance industry, just take things away too seriously and live and die by the sort of particular method, whereas at the end of the day- It's a bit defensive. It's not that open. Yeah, we want to be led by the evidence and we want to be evidence led, but we want to be based on principles that are experiential, I think. When it comes to reflecting

on the changes you guys have made here and the way you train people and coach and things, do you find that you're your worst critic? Yeah. Yeah, in a way, but I kind of know that there's nothing to do about what we used to do. But do you think anyone, like any of your clientele here would be completely on the same page with you? Oh, no, no way. Oh, yeah. The way you did that then is, what was I thinking? No. Whereas you were probably like, "Oh." Well, I did this because of this, right? I

think, because we're all very different coaches in terms of our team and we kind of have, I guess, our vertice values and our principles that allow us to do things differently, but the same in that. And at the end of the day, if we can justify what we do and why we do it with our current level of understanding, when we level up- When you're growing. Yeah. Because we transcend what we did and still include that, but then we kind of add more, right? Yeah. Adding layers and adding quality. And I have no doubt it's exactly the same for your practice.

Yeah. It's like when you, if you jump on a webinar tonight and learn something you're like, "Well, that doesn't disregard everything you've learned." No. It's just that you're adding something else. Yeah. Yep. Absolutely. I think that's a big part of growing personal growth, business growth. Yeah. Not only for our industries, but- Yeah. Yeah. And getting aware of your biases and your personal, like the recency bias is one that fascinates me. It's like if you listen to a webinar tonight, there's a very good chance that you're going to start seeing that thing that that webinar's on in every one of your clients over the next couple of weeks.

It's very true. And it's just- It's like when you buy a new car and then you see that car everywhere. Yeah. And you see that car everywhere. This is it. It's just, yeah. So like, all right, I look at what we do and none of it matters, but it all matters. It's kind of that. Yeah. It's both of those things. But if you take selfless seriously and kind of go, well, just do your best, do it for the right reasons, then you just get to show up every day and make a difference. Absolutely. I agree with that.

Yep. Love that. I love when people agree with me. It doesn't happen very often. Actually, we were talking about the different areas before, so we had a little chat about gut health. Can you tell me about conception and what you've learned through study and through your clients over the last few years? Yeah. I think there's a couple of parts to that. So people have come to me who have just wanted to get in the best shape and health possible before trying to conceive. And that's more so about just having some blood tests run, have a look at their new nutrient status, and get them on the optimum end of healthy to start off that process.

And that's really enjoyable and quite straightforward. And then there's the other aspect where maybe a couple who could have struggled to conceive or been told that the only options are IVF or things like this. And some frustrations or roadblocks I've seen along the way have also been like, okay, they might not actually be infertile, but maybe the woman has polycystic ovaries that's undiagnosed. And rather than just using diet as intervention and increasing insulin sensitivity and maybe losing some weight and balancing out the hormones, they've just been offered IVF as a treatment, which is so expensive and not a guaranteed solution.

So I think for me, I lose a bit of faith when I hear that this has happened to people because I think, God, if only you knew that if you improve your diet and lost weight, you would have a far better chance. And I mean, what would you prefer to spend your money on? I mean, how much is the cost of IVF these days? Yeah, it's almost like the IVF, I guess, would be looked upon as the easier option, but it's more of a quick fix. It's more of a... It's a big moneymaker. It's the Band-Aid.

You kind of miss the forest for the trees a little bit and you go, well, let's just ignore all that. And I guess you could say that for almost any medical or performance changes you're trying to make, right? Because most people miss the simple sheet, are you sleeping eight hours a night? Are you drinking three litres of water? And don't get me wrong. I mean, it certainly has its time and place, absolutely. But I just feel disheartened when I see someone who isn't educated about the basics, but sold something really expensive because that's not good for them and it's not even guaranteed.

So why don't we just get them healthy? It is an interesting one because so many people would go, well, it's not working. It's been 18 months. Let's go to an IVF specialist. It's different for everyone. Like, what's not working for some couple that could be really healthy and genuinely doing everything that needs to be done or it's not working because a very unhealthy, overweight couple have been trying, but they're only doing the motion. They're not doing the lifestyles. So you know what I mean? That scenario is different for everyone. And I, yeah, no shame on IVF, I'm not complaining.

I mean, it's a brilliant tool, but it's a tool in the toolbox. I just want everyone to be healthy. Yes. There you go. There's this full circle for you. And yeah, because I find it fascinating because, you know, talking to friends that are trying and have been trying for a long time and like, we were really lucky that the girls happened way too easily, but it was, you know, we didn't have to go through that. Look, I think a really important part when you are at that stage is to have the blood test done, check the, like your nutrient status.

And this is something that I guess is a bit of a controversial opinion, but it's my controversial opinion. And I think the normal ranges on blood tests are far too broad. And I think they're based on the average or sick population. A big, large study of people, big group of people that are in pretty shitty health and maybe just like average health and they go, Oh, that's a normal range. I don't want to be normal with them. And I don't want my patients to fall in that group. Top end of normal should be baseline. Yeah. Yeah.

So I think that's my, my opinion and my goal with all of that. Like if you're told your range is here, it's quite often I'll say, right, that's good. I want you here. And there's good reason for that. And I guarantee I know my patients feel better when they're at this level compared to this level. Yep. So, so what's the, if someone, someone comes to you with, um, with trouble, they're having trouble conceiving, what, what is the process you take them through? So the blood tests, you obviously do some lifestyle stuff. Yeah. Um, and look, to be honest, that's, that's the biggest part of it.

Um, the bloods would include, um, say like the most common nutrients, like iron levels because your iron, I mean, females can be more commonly deficient or on the lower end compared to males anyway, but then carry in a pregnancy, the iron levels deplete anyway. So to be on a really high, healthy range of that, um, vitamin D, I mean, God, the last couple of years through lockdown being inside and everything, um, and we're also in Victoria. So like, we're so far away. I tell you what, less La Nina would be great. Yeah. Yeah. Um, basically all of us should be supplementing vitamin D over the winter months because even if we're outdoors, we just don't get enough.

Um, it's a B12 zinc levels, but even for males as well, especially for males, that would be probably my most common nutrients to test for in a blood test lifestyle advice, um, really comes down to the nervous system, um, and quality sleep and de-stress like, I mean, how many miracle stories do you hear about people conceiving once they stopped trying? So actively and stop stressing about it. Right. Um, and then when it comes to supplements, um, I mean, look, everyone is individual, so it's, it's, there's no blanket rule, but I guess the things I would look for would be like, do they have enough Colleen?

Do they have enough folate? Um, just these nutrients that are really specific for fatal development and early, early stages, just to make sure that they're already in the system. The things that can potentially, if you're at the right level can prevent miscarriages and things like that. Yeah. Yep. And that's, it's quite straightforward and it's, again, that's not guaranteed to always have success. Nothing is, but, um, at least you feel better, you'll be happier and healthier. When we, when we have new members in here, it's similar conversation. We don't do the blood side of things unless there's something glaringly, glaringly obvious, glaringly wrong.

But that conversation around like, here's what's controllable, here's what's not, what's not controllable is the outcome. It's the losing, like it's the being at a certain weight, it's the conceiving, it's the reaching a certain performance metric. What is controllable is eight hours sleep, it's drinking your water, it's finding ways to de-stress, it's cultivated. And those things are huge, right? Yeah. Cause we, and you know, this is similar to what we were talking about before, but our industry, they just, everyone argues over, over the little details that don't really matter and kind of just forget that, you know, at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter how you train.

As long as you're enjoying it, you get good sleep, you get new nutrition, you're going to move the needle. You're going to make, make improvements. Oh, ovulation, sorry. That was the other key thing. That's a major thing that you need to ensure is happening. Anyway, back over to you. You just threw ovulation at me, so now I've completely forgot what I was going to say. That's essential to conceive. You have to make sure you all feel like, not you personally, but yeah, I mean, I have not. Talk me through your process when you have your first consult with the, pardon me, with a new per, new client, client, patient, patient, I say both, I don't know what's, a new human.

When you have a new human in front of you, what's your process? Cause I guess the talking before about people not necessarily wanting, wanting to get on zoom calls or not necessarily wanting to, like making that step to join a gym or see a naturopath or go see a GP or see a psych is difficult. It is. It's the first step that's the hardest. And we want to be able to break down those barriers. So can you give us an insight into what your process is? Yeah. Oh, I mean, I probably have, even though, as

I say, I treat everyone as an individual, I probably have a very similar start of consult rollout that takes place and it's hi, how are you? Introduce yourself. It's a pretty neat snowflake, but at the end of the day, we're all pretty much the same. It's very cute. Um, that, yeah, I want to know, um, have you seen a naturopath before? And that will give me insight into, um, their expectations from the consult. Um, and then I explained basically the rollout of how I like to run my consult, which I will spend the next allocated amount of time asking so many weird and wonderful questions.

Um, and I'll say, although I'm looking over here and then here at my computer, you have my undivided attention. I'm like, you're here. And when I'm over here, I'm taking notes. Um, and then I explain, um, what you can expect from this is guaranteed diet and lifestyle advice and depending on your case, perhaps supplement advice or something else. Um, and sometimes, uh, a referral for, uh, more testing, whether it be like, um, blood test or poo test or whatever it might be. Um, and then, yeah, I basically have the same explanation of, so, uh, I

follow in the consult, I'll go away and formulate a tailored plan and then email that over to them so that they have a copy to it and we can both access it and edit it at the same time. Um, yeah. And then I jumped straight into it and what brings you here today? No, I don't say that. Oh, tell me, tell me how you feel about that. How does that make you? Yeah. It's, I mean, it's, it's a great insight. And so what is the safe was to come see you? What does the first three months look like?

Oh, and obviously saying this from a general perspective because obviously it's different for each person, but if you could blanket blanket, I can't, I can't look at that. And the reason being is there are many patients I don't even see for three months time I might save for one or two consults and then the interventions that we've added have been really helpful and they go away and they might come back in 12 months or, or not, or they might come back for something else. So I actually kind of, you do a, you do a consult or a couple of consults and then it's kind of like, here's the box of stick.

Yeah. And look, there are people who, um, say if it comes to like a hormonal imbalance, something like that, I'll probably say for a minimum three months. And that's because working with hormones can take so much longer to balance out and say, especially with females, um, a big indicator to balance, to, um, monitor the lack, whether the intervention's helpful or effective or not, not effective is based on their menstrual cycle, which is monthly and it takes a few months to get a gauge on if the average is changing or yeah, so it's, it's generally patients

like that that I'll say, um, for probably up to that timeframe, maybe a bit longer, but if I'm seeing you consecutively for that long for the same thing, I'm not helping you. So you're really clear on at the start, like what do you want to achieve? What does that look like? Where are you now? And then you're making sure that you're objectively taking, getting to those places. Don't get me wrong financially. That would be great if all my patients saw me once a month, every month, or however ongoing, but it's just not the reality of it.

And that's kind of what the way I look at, um, like the allied health world, that's the way we want it to be. We want it to be on a needs basis rather than, you know, like one thing that grants my gears in our industry and like rehab and things like that is physios are like, yep, I'll see you next week. Yup. I'll see you next week. Yup. I'll see you next week. Like if you're not moving the needle and actively seeing improvements in this person, then all you kind of just justifying your job and just give them a little massage and make them feel good for the moment.

Yeah. See, I just, uh, I mean, I feel that that's wrong, but, uh, I also just don't find it satisfying as a practitioner, so it's time for consistent, totally. And I think a big part of something I would say would be like nutritional deficiencies. And when it comes to supplementation, generally by the time someone seeks a naturopath cause they're feeling so crappy is they need a supplement to help bump up their nutrition status because it's been ongoing for years. So in that case I would implement a supplement, but I, my goal is not to have someone on that supplement for the rest of their life.

Once they're in a healthy level, say if it's vitamin B 12, I want to teach you all the diet and lifestyle things that you can do to then once you get to a healthy level, come off the supplement and manage it through your diet and lifestyle. Or it might be iron or vitamin D or whatever. Yeah. So that's my longterm goal and yeah. In here we want to create self managed humans and it sounds like your, your views are pretty similar. I just dropped my water on me. It's all good. I'm going to zoom into that bit.

Um, yeah, creating self managed humans is for us kind of our goal, right? We want people to, to want to train here because of the people and because of the community and maybe because of the programming, but at the end of the day, if someone has to move away and go to another gym or do, you know, look after their health and wellbeing themselves, you want them to be able to do that because all that does is, you know, it's like about like a baseline and build framework before all it does is it gives them

a bigger base to build on and to be able to, to do and be more like, sure, it's great being able to pick up a deadlift, but at the end of the day, being able to chase after your kids and, and, you know, run around and go on hikes and do cool shit outside of here. That's why we train. Totally. I think I said before, like the perfect client for me is someone who comes along, we work short term on what needs to be done and then they find a resolution, they're happy, they go away

and then I'll see them next time, which could be 10 years down the track for another issue because they've chosen to come back to me to help them and that is a perfect client for me because that I think is the most rewarding. Um, I think I can develop, continue to develop my skills on something new and not prolong and waste someone's time. So yeah. Awesome. What is the, and this is a big ambiguous question, what does the future look like for you and your practice? Yes. Well, um, I will be diving into face to face consults coming soon.

Um, I hope that is a really lovely, nice experience. Um, because as I mentioned the first time around when I did it a long, long time ago, it wasn't. Um, so I'm really actually looking forward to that. Um, and those consults will, um, I mean essentially what, what patients will get out of it is the same questioning and everything, working on the same types of things they come in for. But the difference between a zoom and a face to face is I can then do blood pressure. I can do iridology, I can do physical examinations if required.

Um, so there will be a longer consult and um, yeah, if it is something that is relating to like a physical component that needs to be looked at, um, that will be a lot more helpful. So, um, that's probably what's coming up next. Um, otherwise nothing too major. Um, I just really want to keep doing what I'm doing. Like I love, what was the first question? What gets me out of bed in the morning? I love what I do. I love health for myself and I love being able to teach that and help other people

improve their health and see, I think the most rewarding part is when they go like, Oh wow, like I did this small change and I just feel better. Like that makes me happy. Um, yeah, and you can relate to that totally. Yeah. It kind of, it ceases when you have those moments, it ceases to be about like, you know, the big picture of the growth stuff and it's just like, well, this is why I'm doing it. I'm doing it because I want to help people get from where they are to where they want to be. Yep.

Yep. It's nice. Yeah. And then you, you empower people to take control of their life and their health and what they're able to do, which is nothing better. Yep. Awesome. Any more for anymore? No. Any, uh, so how do people, if people want to see you, if people want to book consults, how do they get in touch? Yeah, well good question. Um, I don't have a website or anything just yet. Hey, hit me up if you're tech savvy and you know what to do cause I sure don't. Um, yeah, look, I just have a, um, an online booking link where people can, um, book in and prepay for their consults.

I'll whack all those in the notes. Thank you. It's currently just main platforms, Instagram, um, but also on Facebook, just Katie Jean, Katie Jean, Katie Jean Health. That's me. Um, but yeah, if anyone has any questions like, oh, this is what I see a lot of, like a lot of people just booked straight in, which is great and really straightforward and easy. Ideal. Um, but yeah, some people do message and go, oh, like I've been struggling with this. This is something you help with, you can help with. And if that's you and you need to have that clarified, reach out and ask cause yeah, no harm done.

Awesome. Love your work. Thank you. Oh, it's not working. Have a good day. Oh. Be amazing.