There was only one time, that I remember, when I felt whole, complete and perfect in my body. I think it was around age six. I’m now 41.

I’ve struggled, for as long as I can remember, with myself and how I think I should look and other people’s judgements of how they think I should look. Of course, that is their issue however, it’s hard not to take that on (literally) at such an early age.

Before I knew it, I developed my body image issues and the constant voice in my head that kept me small and believing that my body is too big, too flabby and with too much cellulite, which always translates into I’m not good enough and judging myself against every other woman that crosses my path.

What a lot of people don’t know is that I have not only struggled with my body image but with the fact that no matter what I do, nothing seems to work. I’m what most people consider healthy, in fact a lot of my close friends and family have said that I am the healthiest person they know. When looking at my food diary, my naturopath said to me that I eat healthier than she does. You can only imagine my surprise and my frustration. I’ve spent $$$ after $$$ on personal trainers, gym memberships, the right running shoes, the perfect training outfit along with getting up at sparrows fart to walk, run, jog before work. Has anything made a massive impact…no…not really!

Upon my journey of health, what I have discovered is, it’s not just calories in…calories out. How can it be when it hasn’t worked for me over many many years of trying. There had to be another answer, another way, which led me to becoming a Health Coach.
The most impactful thing I learnt was, there is no one rule for everyone…someone’s foods is someone else’s poison. (Thank you Joshua Rosenthal – Founder, Director and Primary Teacher of Integrative Nutrition). Now, this is not rocket science and on some level, I already knew this from the amount of reading and research I have done but again something wasn’t right.

After noticing a few things that started happening with my body along with an unexplainable and complete loss of energy, bouts of depression, PMT, terrible mood swings and instinctively knowing I wasn’t absorbing any of the nutrients I was trying to nourish my body with, my next stop was a naturopath.

The first thing to do was to order bloods…the second was to talk family history, to which I answered Mum passed away 5 years ago of neuro endocrine carcinoma better known as cancer in the gland system which is related to hormone imbalances and disfunction. What I realised while sitting in the patient chair was, I was experiencing very similar symptoms to what my mum experienced years ago, when I was a teenager. Of course, my next question was, am I doomed? My naturopath answered no, however explained that we need to work out what’s going on with me as I have a predisposition to many health issues which could lead me to the same fate as my mum at age 60.

After we did lots and lots of rounds of bloods, for lots and lots of different things, what came back was lots and lots of imbalances, particularly hormone imbalances, another being a mutation of the MTHFR gene (what the mother**cker is that) and the coeliac gene. The first thing to do was cut gluten out of my diet completely, along with sugar and dairy or I would end up with an autoimmune disease along with a myriad of other imbalances and dis-ease to deal with…awesome!

While my blood results were quiet daunting, it was also very liberating as I left justified for the first time because I knew something wasn’t right with my body, I just didn’t know what.

I had been following the paleo diet for a little while, because it made sense to me.
I never really liked dairy (except for chocolate and chocolate ice-cream). When I ate bread,
I bloated up however, I’d still eat it once or twice a week. Pasta…so delicious however, again after eating it I bloated up and would go into a complete food coma and feel so groggy. Sugar…well…we have a love affair, how could I ever break up with sugar however, I did get myself to a point where I would only eat 70%+ cocoa.
BUT, even the paleo diet, when I did follow it 100% made pretty much no difference to me.

The next thing I found out about was the autoimmune paleo diet, what is that and what does it mean? The autoimmune paleo diet, is an extension of the paleo diet, cutting out nightshades, nuts, seeds and eggs. What the hell do I eat now…?

Well…after trying out and cutting out a couple of nightshades and nuts (ones that I didn’t really like anyway however, ate because I thought they were good for me), I have actually felt better. So, I have decided to ‘listen to my body’ and embrace the autoimmune paleo diet along with a good gut cleanse, because I also think and instinctively know that something is going on with my gut health and it could use some cleaning up.
And if that’s not enough, through all my reading and research the one constant is in the ever-increasing scientific findings and research on the GUT and how important our gut health really is and as a health coach I should probably take that on board.

So, what’s the lesson here?
There are five key lessons that have made a difference to my health journey so far and they are:

• Listen to your body. It knows more than you give it credit for
• No one knows your body like you do – not even your Dr
• Do not take on anyone’s judgement of you…ever
• Trust your instincts
• Do your research

However, the one I want to touch on now is ‘listen to your body’. When I stopped listening to my body it started communicating with me in a different way, it actually physically started screaming at me… when I continued to eat gluten my body would react in what I now call gluten spots and they are red and flaky blotches that pop up on my stomach. When I eat nightshades particularly the red ones, (tomatoes, chillies and capsicum) my legs will come out in a big red rash and when I eat nuts (some, not all) and too much fruit my stomach bloats.

What I realised is, I have been listening to everybody else, but not me or my body. Even down to the opinions and judgements of others and how I should look, for pretty much my whole life which has only led me to questioning and not trusting myself.
Had my mum listened to her body sooner than she did, she may still be here today. However, it is only recently that I realise, this is the lesson she has left with me and for me to share with you. Start learning to ‘listen to your body’ and trust it.

I am not perfect, in-fact far from it…BUT I am learning to BE perfect in my imperfect body.

So, I invite you to embrace and accept YOU as you are and where you are on your journey, be it health, wealth, spiritual or life.
Be YOUR version of Happy and join me in moving forward together. inspiring and empowering other to be theirs.

Until next time…BE YOUR HAPPY!