Episode 2-Building the Bridge
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Tess: [00:00:00] Welcome back to Sick of Sick Care, the Wellness Reframe, the podcast where we stop outsourcing our wellbeing and start asking better questions about our health. I'm your host, Tess, nurse and functional diagnostic nutritionist and herbalist, and today we're exploring a topic that's near and dear to my heart.
How do we build the bridge between standard healthcare and alternative healing models? Because let's face it, this isn't about throwing one out and keeping the other, it's about integrating the best of both for whole person healing. So let's dive in. Let's talk about first why the divide exists. I mean, let's be real. Modern medicine has saved lives from trauma care to emergency surgery to managing acute disease. We owe a lot to scientific advancement, but the system wasn't built for prevention. It wasn't built to address [00:01:00] subtle symptoms like fatigue, digestive issues, chronic inflammation until they've progressed to really full blown syndromes and illnesses and disease.
And that's where alternative or complimentary models really come in. Acupuncture, herbal medicine, functional nutrition, Ayurveda, energy work. All of these have a place in supporting and managing health. These models really focus on prevention and kind of, um, you know, the whole person approach and restoring balance, supporting the body's natural healing mechanisms because our body always wants to work for us.
But for a long time, these approaches have been dismissed as either woo-woo, quackery or unscientific, and that my friends, is where the disconnect lies. So why do we need this bridge and not a wall? Here's [00:02:00] the truth. It's not standard or alternative. It's both. You can take a prescription when needed and explore herbal remedies.
It's important to consult with a provider that's familiar with both. Um, you can respect your doctor and want a provider who listens to your story. You can get lab work done and support your liver or gut function with food and plants. We need a new healthcare conversation. One where we're not shaming people for using medication or using herbal remedies. We're not dismissing people who wanna use food as medicine or recognizing that what works is deeply, deeply individual and respect both data and intuition. I call it being health literate, body literate and self-empowered. That's the middle path, that's the bridge. So [00:03:00] what does this really look like in real life?
Let's say someone has ongoing fatigue. In standard care, they might get labs for anemia or thyroid, and if those are "normal", people are told they're fine. Incidentally, the minimal labs that are standard for these are not telling the true story, but that's for another episode. In functional care, we dig deeper.
We look at nutrient depletion, cortisol patterns, inflammation, mitochondrial function, and gut health, for example. But not only how they operate on their own. But also how they are working and affecting one another, because remember, everything touches everything, but neither standard or alternative is wrong.
But together the picture can be much more clear. Let's say you're on medication for high blood pressure, for example, [00:04:00] standard care will monitor the meds. Holistic care helps you optimize nutrition, stress, movement, and sleep to support long-term outcomes. Maybe even get you off, you know, those meds eventually. That would be great, wouldn't it?
But it's not about rebellion, it's about reclamation. And blending these models is really how you can start walking that bridge as a patient. Start tracking your own health data. For example, you know your symptoms, your food, energies, sleep when you start certain therapies, you know, whether it be standard, um, you know, medications or using herbal support.
And you also wanna start asking your doctor deeper questions like, why is this happening? Not just what do I take for it? How do I get rid of the symptoms, right? If they're not willing to dig a bit deeper, you may need a new doctor. [00:05:00] You wanna start getting curious about integrative options, you know, like herbs, acupuncture, functional medicine.
That's one area that you can start gathering more information about to start. Um, but vet your practitioners. You want someone who sees you as a whole person, not a lab value, not just working off a piece of paper. No one person is the same. And we all have genetic makeups and we're bio individual. There's just not a one size fits all model that is going to work. But trust your gut, and your intuition, but you also wanna back it up with science. You know, this is important, but you get to choose your path.
Now, building the bridge means respecting both traditional um, and complimentary or alternative, and science. It means letting go of the [00:06:00] idea that there's one right way to heal. It really means holding space for both a stethoscope and a steaming mug of an herbal tea formula. So if you're tired of being told it's all in your head, if you're ready to be seen as a whole human being, welcome! You're not just a patient, you are a partner in your healing.
So thank you for tuning in today and in the next episode, we're gonna talk about the stigma around alternative medicine and how "quackery" got attached to ancient healing systems and why that's changing now. So if this episode gave you something to think about, follow and share it with a friend, it helps us build that bridge one conversation at a time.
And as always, let me know your thoughts and questions. I would love to hear from you. And be well, stay curious and don't let anyone make you [00:07:00] choose sides. This is sick of sick care, the wellness reframe. See you next time.
