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Gut Check: GI Health, Recovery, and Building Endurance with Lauren Callahan
27 Plays1 year ago
Your gut is your "second brain." The gut produces neurotransmitters and metabolites that influence your mood, sleep, and physical health. So what happens when your gut isn't doing well? Discover the far-reaching implications of gut health and powerful impacts on both your bodily recovery and positive mindset when the gut returns to balance. Plus, learn how you can run an ultra marathon (literally or metaphorically).
Lauren Callahan is a gut health expert and Reiki master who helps people heal by coaching them through individualized gut health roadmaps. She's also the author of "Couch to 50 Miles: The Story of a Girl, a Trail, and a Relentless Need to Always Run."
Connect with Lauren at goddesshealth.org.
In this episode:
- Mindset shift: Understanding how much we're capable of
- How gut health affects the body and mind
- The biochemistry of neurotransmitter production
- Gut health in men vs. women
- What it's actually like to get your gut tested
- Complexities that individualize gut health
- Celebrating small steps
- Receiving energy and mentally detoxing
Connect with us at SuenoLabs.com. We're currently looking for contributors and podcast guests!
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Transcript
Introduction to Gut Health and Personal Story
00:00:00
Speaker
Have you ever had that experience where you know something's wrong but you can't explain what it is? Maybe you go to the doctor and they do all the usual tests and they say, well, seems like everything's fine. But you know that you don't feel yourself. Your appetite isn't normal. Your mood isn't normal. You're not sleeping well. Something is wrong.
00:00:21
Speaker
Well tonight's guest says when that happens, one of the first things to check is your gut. The gut is often called the second brain and what's happening in your gut has a tremendous effect on the rest of your physical health as well as your mental state and your sleep. For Lauren, understanding more about her gut health helped her become an ultra marathoner.
00:00:42
Speaker
And she's here to tell us more about the science behind what works and also what makes this such a highly individualized topic based on her experience working with different patients as a therapist.
Lauren's Personal Journey and Resilience
00:01:00
Speaker
Tonight, I talk with Lauren Callahan, a gut health expert and Reiki master about her journey into understanding the nutritional and psychological aspects of creating an individualized gut health roadmap.
00:01:21
Speaker
I'm Jimmy Leonard. This is Swenio Labs.
00:01:28
Speaker
So Lauren Callahan, welcome to Swinio Labs. How are you today? I'm good. Thanks for having me Jimmy. Yeah, sure. So glad to have you on the show. So one of the things we're going to get into is nutrition and recovery and all of the different things that you do, but what put you on this path? How did you get started in all of this? You know, about eight years ago, you know, actually now that I'm i'm looking, I'm realizing it's actually about 10 years ago at this point.
00:01:56
Speaker
I came back from Bangladesh um to live in Louisiana with and i with a half full suitcase and $500 to my name, and I had lost my two children. and you know To say that I was at the bottom of the barrel is um putting it quite mildly.
00:02:13
Speaker
um I'll jump ahead and tell you that you know i like I have my children. and I actually have a wonderful co-parenting relationship with my ex. you know Things are very different than they used to be. But at the time, it was quite dramatic and I was also healing from a traumatic background in my childhood as well. so um there There was a lot of healing that need to happen um and I was building my life from the ground up. eight And so I was very much in this place of poverty and scarcity and scarcity mindset as well. And again, you know, a lot of healing that needed to happen. And so on this path of scrambling to put myself together, I'm actually going back to school to get my master's in counseling and which that meant that I was sitting all the time. So I needed to do something. So I started walking slash jogging a mile a day. And you know, when I tell people now that I'm
00:03:04
Speaker
you know, running ultras and doing Ironman events. You know, one of the first things I hear from people is, Oh my God, I could never do that. I can barely run a mile. And I love for people to know that, you know, just about eight years ago, that was me, right? I could barely run a mile.
00:03:21
Speaker
So that is where I started.
Running and Relationship Dynamics
00:03:23
Speaker
I would say that it progressed. You know, that this is one of those stories that some of your listeners will say, oh, that's really beautiful. And others are going to say it that makes me want to gag. But basically, um the man who is now my husband, you know, walked into the coffee shop where I worked for a short period of my life.
00:03:42
Speaker
And we lost each other. And a year later, he walked into the yoga studio where I was teaching at. And he told me that he was training for his first half marathon at St. Jude's Hospital because his daughter, now my stepdaughter, is a St. Jude's patient. She is cancer free. And so it was one of those things where I said, well, I'm a runner too. ah Let's train. Yeah.
00:04:03
Speaker
So that that really was a huge part of us building our relationship in the beginning was we we ran together, we drug all of our kids out to you know every 5K that we could. So we spent a lot of time running. And then later on, I would say, you know, at the point where it really progressed was my husband actually had a friend that he grew up with.
00:04:22
Speaker
who had moved to North Carolina. And he came into town in Louisiana for a day to run a 50 mile ultra. and And it was within a mile of our house as we live right by a trailhead. That's in Kasachi National Forest. He came into town. He ran 50 miles. He came in first. He won the race. And then he hopped in his car and he drove back. And we were like, oh my God.
00:04:45
Speaker
Is he immortal? you know That was the moment where we really began to question, God, what are we capable of? What can we do? This is like a friend. It wasn't just somebody on Instagram that you saw doing something really cool. like This is a normal person like us. What else are we capable of? and i I think that put us on the path of really both of us and and kind of in different directions, but put us in the path of really questioning, what are we capable of?
Transforming Failures into Growth
00:05:12
Speaker
What can we do? What is possible?
00:05:14
Speaker
Yeah, well, I'm in the first camp of people, you said, where I do think that's beautiful because um it's definitely not the same as your story. But my wife and I, we actually met in high school, cross country, believe it or not. go so um Yeah, we ah we also kind of have that as as part of our story. we We were high school sweethearts and then we broke up for a while and then we got back together. But it's the the thread was always that we both enjoy running. so Not quite the same as your story, but i I relate to that part of it. But yeah, I think that is a a really good and and powerful realization of what are we capable of? For some people, it's it's not running. you know Maybe you do CrossFit or or cycling, or you know it maybe it's not even like athletic in the traditional sense, but just to to not be
00:06:00
Speaker
limited by what you've maybe been told in the past or or what you thought of yourself in the past or and that that one bad experience of, oh, I ran 5k one time and it hurt. you know Just to look beyond that, i I think is really powerful. It's is freeing to to ask that question in a positive way.
00:06:19
Speaker
Yeah. And I love what you said to, you know, it's the effect of like not being bound by experiences in the past, certainly things that we've believed about ourselves in the past, because, you know, if you, if you had asked, um, you know, younger me, if I would do some of these things, right? If I'd be capable of, you know, completing an iron mid or running a 50 mile ultra, I would never, like would never be on the radar, right? So certainly past beliefs about ourselves, um, and even past failures.
00:06:48
Speaker
And you know I write about that in my first book, House to 50 Miles, that you know just because you failed at something in the past, that that has nothing to do with your experience
Gut Health's Impact on Performance and Career
00:06:57
Speaker
today. Absolutely nothing, right? like It's like it doesn't even exist.
00:07:01
Speaker
Yeah, and even just holding that the definition of that word loosely, you know, what does it even mean to fail? Yes, you know, it's like you if you went out and you did it, that's experience. That's, that's learning. It's probably what we all tell our kids is, you know, like, as as long as you tried your best, or as long as you're working hard, but then we don't tell ourselves that. It's it's very true. I mean, it's it's a learning experience.
00:07:24
Speaker
So running great. I love it. Another thing that you've really connected to this to you is the nutritional aspect. So I was wondering if you could talk about where that comes into play. So once, you know, I started progressing and running and I was interested in those longer distances, um, you know, I i wanted to run a marathon.
00:07:46
Speaker
and I tried for four years to run a marathon. And you know i'm I'm a decently healthy person. I live a decently healthy life, right? special you know Especially now, but at that point I could say that too. you know it's see I'm 43 now, so you know somewhere yeah around the 40 range at this point. There's no reason. you know If I'm putting in consistent training and living a healthy life, have no major medical problems, like there's no reason to not be able to run a marathon.
00:08:14
Speaker
And yet I kept running into the issue of repetitive injury, particularly around my knee, recovery, inflammation, you know, missing training days because of being sick sometimes, that was a thing. But honestly, I really didn't even think about that. That was kind of just something I expected was normal, but just a lot of issues around energy and inflammation and recovery and and injury. And so I started hearing about gut health.
00:08:40
Speaker
And ah again, I did eat decently healthy. I really did. And and my husband and I had actually worked to you know cut out a lot of sugar um from what we ate. So you know we were there. But still, I was hearing about gut health and how the gut is like your second breathe and how it's connected to everything.
00:08:58
Speaker
And I started hearing stories about athletes um who improve their gut health and how they weren't having repetitive injury anymore. And my first thought is, well, that's good marketing. okay So I'm going to improve my gut health and I'm not going to have issues with my knees, right? Yeah, that, that makes sense, right? Yeah. yeah You know it's how it's not even connected to your skeleton or your muscles. Like how could this relate to anything?
00:09:26
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. But i was I was curious enough. And you know, I'm always in the pursuit of being healthier. And you know, the question that I kept coming back to was,
00:09:38
Speaker
You know, I eat healthy food. Is it possible that my gut is not healthy enough to receive and process what I'm actually giving it? Certainly when I would go to the bathroom, this question would come up because it just sort of appeared that maybe things weren't processing the way that they should be, right? And you know, that was one of the best questions that I ever could have asked myself.
00:10:00
Speaker
Because what I did was I tested my gut, and this is the first thing that I do with all of my clients is I test. um So we know exactly what we were working with. We can take 90% of the guest work out. You know, if I could basically give a grade to what I got on my gut health test, it was like an F. Wow. Yeah. And I mean, again, I was a healthy person. I was doing all the things, you know, go to the doctor and they say, oh, everything's normal. Yeah, Lauren Kelly doesn't get an F and be okay with it.
00:10:27
Speaker
So, so I went on the path of improving my gut health and, you know, I can be, I can have a little bit of a competitive spirit. So, you know, I made it like my laser focus rate for about six months for sure. And after six months, I go out into the woods and I run my first marathon. I finally complete it.
00:10:46
Speaker
And then not only that, you know, a couple months later I go out and I run a, I do a 50 mile run and then I do my first Ironman and then I do another 50 mile run and then I do in another Ironman and then I do a hundred K and I did this all within one year. So yeah. So for me, you know, gut health opened up amazing doors, um, certainly athletically and with my injury, uh, uh,
00:11:11
Speaker
that too, I meant to say energy, but yes, like with the repetitive injury, with um you know inflammation and recovery, and I just had so much more energy, I felt so much better. But in addition to that, you know all along the way, I would have these moments where I would say, oh my God.
00:11:27
Speaker
I'm sleeping again. And I hadn't realized that it was a problem. Like I it just had become a new norm for me, but it didn't really, you know, I just accepted as normal. And I'd have these other moments where I'd say, wait a minute, I don't, I don't have anxiety the way that I used to. It's just gone. And you know, I was a therapist and I didn't do more therapy to make the anxiety go away, right? I just improved my gut health.
00:11:52
Speaker
And I know these other moments where I'd say, wait a minute, I don't have bloating and the in the gastrointestinal issues like, you know, just put out there like diarrhea and things like that. I didn't, I just didn't have it anymore. ah Again, I had just accepted this as part of like normal midlife, midlife stuff. And then it was just gone. I didn't have it. And so You know, for me to have all of these changes, just in, you know, certainly athletically, but with my overall health, that was when I started saying, okay, I really do love therapy and I love being a therapist, but these people that are coming into my office, I want to ask them what's going on with their gut.
Science Behind Gut Health and Mental Wellness
00:12:30
Speaker
I want to know, are they having a major uphill battle right now with their sleep, with their mood, with their energy? You know, I can help them all day long.
00:12:40
Speaker
you know, heal trauma, like work on the things, but physiologically, do they have a major uphill battle? And it really is a matter of just healing their gut. So Lauren, I'm curious, when did this hit you? Cause you talked about you did your first marathon, you did the 50, the hundred, and this is all like, at what point did you really make the connection? This is because of how I'm treating my gut differently.
00:13:05
Speaker
Yeah. So I would say really within that, within that six month window, when I first was really working on my gut health, that was when just all along the way, I would just kind of have these aha moments where I would say, wait, what? Whoa. You know, I've been trying to, you know, I've i've experienced this forever and now I don't. Right.
00:13:27
Speaker
And then after the six months it's kinda like if anything would go awry i would say oh wait a minute that's not even a problem for me anymore let me let me go through this like checklist you know for my gut and what works for me. And so you know the ability to just be way more in tune to.
00:13:43
Speaker
um a body that feels good right like you feel good now and that is your new normal you know i would say that one of the things in particular that really stood out to me and i think this is because i was a therapist and also because i had a history of trauma that you know i was had been healing through was when I tested my gut, what I had not known previously was that serotonin is a gut metabolite. I knew that it was a neurotransmitter, it's associated with our mood, right? But I didn't know that it was a gut metabolite. And I didn't know that 90% of your body's serotonin is actually produced in your gut. And so when I tested my gut health, my serotonin was really, really low.
00:14:29
Speaker
And I was like, wait a minute, I am doing all of this stuff to, you know, heal myself, right? Like I'm doing the work and, you know, therapy and, and, you know, other things, right? Like, you know, yoga and mindfulness, and I'm doing all these things. And I work every day to help other people with their mood. And I have like, really low serotonin. So it it really surprised me. And it made sense. You know, at that point, I was like, Oh,
00:14:56
Speaker
Okay, it's not just that I need to do more therapy, and I love therapy, I still have therapy, it's great. you know But really, it was kind of this realization like, oh, the answer is not like I'm not working hard enough with therapy or whatever, that actually, you know this is something with my gut. And so over the next the next six months when I work to improve my gut health, and then I retest my gut, and I see that my serotonin levels are now fine.
00:15:22
Speaker
they're within optimal. And experientially, I'm not having the depression and anxiety that I used to. And I'm not having anxiety to keep me up at night. like I can sleep. you know Melatonin is a downstream metabolite of serotonin. eight So now that my serotonin is up,
00:15:38
Speaker
I'm a happier human being and I'm sleeping at night. So now I'm a much nicer human being. And then, you know, serotonin is also hugely responsible for your digestion, a lot of other processes. So everything else is functioning. So I think Feeling experientially and seeing my serotonin go up, that was a huge one for me to say, wow, okay, I was suffering and didn't need to. And there are a lot of people coming into my life, like in the therapy room and otherwise, that I know that they don't have to suffer either. This is actually, I don't want to say a simple fix, um it simple maybe not always easy, but kind of a simple fix.
00:16:22
Speaker
I think that's interesting. You know, we we talked about running, obviously, that i I've been running long enough, you know, you see all the posters and t shirts, like running is 99% mental. And you know, there's kind of this idea of like, you have to be in the right mindset to be able to finish a marathon or to finish an ultra. But of course, you have to be physically fit to, you know, no one would deny that nobody would say that you can just tomorrow go out and run an ultra, like there is some training you have to do and your body has to be ready for it. And I think making that connection to mood and to anxiety and depression is really interesting to think it is mental. There are some things that we could do to care about our mental health, but there is a physical aspect too. And we can't gloss over that. We can't just say that what's happening physically in your body has no bearing on your mood.
Signs and Testing for Gut Health Issues
00:17:10
Speaker
Yeah. And we we missed that, you know, and, and, and it's hard also, you know, to see, you know, when I talk about seeing, you know, people who are coming into my office and in therapy, but you know, out that otherwise as well, but seeing maybe women in particular, I mean, I see this with men, but it was women in particular that, you know, are struggling with their mood, for example, and it shows up, you know, everywhere, right?
00:17:36
Speaker
And so they go and get a prescription for an SSRI, right? And, you know, what happens then, you know, this is not a conversation on like whether or not you should do that. sure Yeah, we're we're not entering a position on that. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's a very individual thing, but you know, it's, it's worth being educated on that.
00:17:55
Speaker
You know, an SSRI is going to shift your serotonin production to your brain and away from your gut. And, you know, with serotonin being responsible for so many other things associated with your gut health, that can come with a host of problems. And, you know, for some people, that works out fine. And then for other people, you know, they end up with huge issues with their energy, with their immunity. um You know, God, it's even their motivation, right? Like we're talking about running. I mean, I've talked to a lot of athletes who are just like,
00:18:25
Speaker
i don't like I don't want to do this anymore. And funny enough, your gut health is completely related to your motivation and dopamine production and all that. you know You can't separate mental health from your physical health. So there's so many threads that we could pull here. You talked about your knee injury. We talked about mood. We talked about not sleeping well. I imagine there are probably people listening to this conversation who are wondering, huh, what's the state of my gut or how's my gut health?
00:18:53
Speaker
are there common indicators that you could point to you that say, if this is going on for you, it could be something with your gut. Yeah. You know, this is one of those things that, um, is, is probably like a frustratingly elusive Lee vague kind of answer, but it's what is the truth for me. If you're experiencing just about anything,
00:19:20
Speaker
related to your health, one of the first things I would say is let's check your gut. And and that is, their nice it's I mean, it's just related to everything. And I guess, you know, maybe as an example for that, you know,
00:19:33
Speaker
you know I had one client who you know had really actually like a host of um of health issues going on and a lot of chronic pain, but you know God, it was such a strong person and and doing everything that she knew you know to be a healthy person. um you know As an example, like she she had a vitamin B deficiency.
00:19:51
Speaker
and She was taking a supplement you know that that her doctor would prescribed to her, but what we discovered in looking at her gut health was that her her gut health was just so poor that she actually couldn't take it in and process it. Then I have another person who you know she experiences bloating to the point where she can barely drink enough water. right She drinks half the amount of water that she needs to because she gets bloated on everything. right and so you know so And so she's dealing with energy and sleep and and and with bloating and you know we take a look at her gut health and and certainly like we we automatically like see several answers to that. um But I remember one thing that really surprised me that she said, um it we saw that her the gut metabolite uric acid was high for her. you know Typically that's gonna show up with certain kind of lifestyles like maybe eating way too much beef or having way too much alcohol or something like that.
00:20:46
Speaker
None of this applied to her. um There were other reasons. and And so we could we could figure that out as we talked together and looked at her results. But the interesting thing that came out of that that I was getting at was she said,
00:20:59
Speaker
Oh my God, I've been going to my physical therapist because my feet hurt. And he keeps telling me everything's normal, right? This theme keeps coming up. We're like, we're, you know, going to get the test done and hearing, Oh, everything's normal. And you're like, no, everything's not normal. And so, you know, she, this is another case where she's being told everything's normal. And then she goes, Oh, it all makes sense now. Like it's gout, right? Cause her uric acid was high and I was giving her pain and inflammation at her feet.
00:21:27
Speaker
Like, that never would have been on anybody's radar, right, without looking at her gut health. So I guess, you know, coming back around to your question, you know, are you tired all the time? Are you having trouble with weight loss? Are you having trouble, you know, with falling asleep at night or or waking up in the middle of your sleep? Are you having trouble? You know, are you feeling grumpy, like, all the time, right? Or, so you know, crying for seemingly no reason, right? Are you having brain fog?
00:21:55
Speaker
Like every every health outcome that you can think of, you know, I don't mean to make it sound like gut health is like this magical thing, but the the point is that it goes to the source of what is out of balance in your body. So when anything feels out of balance, I would suggest taking a look at your gut health and starting there.
00:22:17
Speaker
I mean, you mentioned earlier that it has the nickname of being our second brain. So if you think about it in that respect, if something is not functioning properly in your brain, it really does affect everything. Yeah, absolutely. Hormone regulation. I should have said that one. That's a big one that comes up a lot as well.
00:22:38
Speaker
Maybe if you're not sure, you should ask the people in your life, have I seemed grumpy lately? Have I seemed like I'm in a fog? And you can find out who your true friends are when you ask that question. You've mentioned a couple of times getting your gut tested. Someone who's who's unfamiliar with that, how frightening is that to get your gut tested? I'm so glad you asked that. So I'll say right off the bat, it is not a stool sample. but Okay, it is actually a very simple, it's a very simple test. So I'm sure, um you know, there are many places that do it differently. um I partner with a business that i I had such a positive experience with, so I continue to use their tests.
00:23:17
Speaker
um And it's a simple pinprick blood test. So you get it in the mail, you prick your finger um and you mail it off. So it's super simple. um And then at that point, you know as far as my work goes, you know I work with registered dietitians that specialize in gut health. And ah you know we test 11 different gut metabolites and there are many gut metabolites, ah but these 11 are The ones that tend to show up over and over and over again is related to just about every major health outcome that you can think of. So yeah, simple tests, you know, we get those results and then I work with people to turn it into a reality over the next four months. and And we also retest as well so that you can see, you know, where you have improved what needs a little bit of work. You know, I said we take about 90% of the guesswork out and then
00:24:07
Speaker
The other 10% is really, you know, you're a human being, you're not a robot, so sometimes there's still a little bit of figuring out that needs to happen there.
Personalized Approaches to Gut Health
00:24:16
Speaker
What do you think makes it so individual? Why why does everybody need to be on a slightly different path?
00:24:23
Speaker
You know, that's a great question. I think um there's a few answers to that. I think one um is in my experience, males and females show up differently. In my experience, women tend to have a harder battle with their gut health. And this is truly, you know, with women who are, you know, ah women who are doing all the things to be healthy, right?
00:24:52
Speaker
And then, you know, maybe I'll have a man who, you know, lives on like beer and ranch dressing. And they're actually not doing so bad in their gut health. I mean, it can be a lot better. But my point is that.
00:25:08
Speaker
women seem to struggle a lot more. And even that, I think is for various reasons. um I think hormonally, you know, what is happening to a woman, especially as she ages with estrogen and progesterone, the the effect of those hormones on the body is, you know, it's it's completely interrelated with your gut health. So I think that that is one of the reasons why things are so individual.
00:25:32
Speaker
Certainly, I think that ah you know our our history, right like what sorts of medications have we taken over time? um you know how How much have we consumed highly processed foods? How much stress have we lived under? um you know Those things can have a cumulative effect.
00:25:51
Speaker
right so you know, somebody who has lived under, you know, chronic stress, their entire lives and has always had that like low level inflammation from that. Um, you know, they're going to have a different, they could have a different gut health reading than somebody maybe who hasn't lived under that kind of stress. So I think, you know,
00:26:12
Speaker
lifestyle factors, environmental factors. and you know It can get kind of complicated too, I think. ah not Not complicated, but it becomes different when somebody has maybe maybe in just more complicated history of like pain, um like physical pain, trauma, medications, um you know things like that. They they just begin to you know interplay with each other and um in a more complicated way. So, you know, I just think that, yeah, all of those factors can make one person's gut health very different from another's. And, you know, I have a funny illustration for that maybe is, you know, when I tested my gut health, one one gut metabolite that I test is 3-methylzanthine.
00:26:56
Speaker
So that is a really good indicator of inflammation and stress that is related to caffeine. And so when I tested this, my 3-methylzanthine was actually really, really high.
00:27:09
Speaker
And here's the thing, I don't drink coffee. I drink black tea. No, I drink strong black tea and I would drink, you know, a couple cups a day, but it was tea, you know? oh ah So, you know, I and did some, I did the work to reduce my caffeine. But when I tested my husband,
00:27:28
Speaker
Now it's different now, but at that point in our lives, the man could put away some coffee. Like people came over to our house, you know, the coffee was strong enough that people would usually like only pour a half cup and then top it off with hot water. and So but when I tested him, I was like, dear God, his three methyl xanthine level is going to be through the roof. And you know what? It wasn't.
00:27:53
Speaker
It was like a little bit high, but not really. Mine was way worse than his. And I was like, what the heck? And you know, so I mean, this is kind of a classic case that I could give the general principle, reduce caffeine, and that would likely help your gut health. And it and it would all day long. But is that the thing for you? Well, for me, it was. And for my husband, not so much. and So yeah, everyone's just different.
00:28:21
Speaker
Yeah, there's just so much complexity to the biochemistry and just all the other factors in your life and maybe even genetic components. I mean, yes, so yeah it's it's not gonna not gonna be exactly the same. That makes sense.
00:28:38
Speaker
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Holistic Factors Affecting Gut Health
00:28:53
Speaker
You mentioned how it could be so many other different things related to stress and, but then is, is treating your gut health primarily dietary then? Yeah, great question. So nutrition is definitely a primary importance.
00:29:09
Speaker
But your gut health really is so much more than that. So you really could just go on a perfect diet all day long. um But if you didn't get sleep and you you know lived in a constant state of stress, um you would likely have a gut that is having some problems. right So yes, nutrition like food is like medicine. right So nutrition is highly important.
00:29:34
Speaker
But it's it's your gut health is not so straightforward, um which is maybe another reason why I tend to work with people over a four month period because it's more than just saying eat this and
Adapting Training to Gut Health
00:29:44
Speaker
don't eat this. right There's a lot of other things that factor into that. you know Certainly sleep and stress are huge. um Hydration, ah you know could be like for athletes like over training, right? That's a that's a certain amount of stress on your body. um So yeah, there's a lot of different factors. You know, something as simple as, you know, I mean, to me, this is kind of a funny one. But honestly, you know, let's think about this, right? There's certain gut bacteria that you know, is I mean, it's good bacteria, your gut likes it, you only get it from dirt.
00:30:17
Speaker
has nothing to do with your nutrition, right? It has everything to do with your amount of screen time, right? And the fact that you need to go touch grass sometimes. So it's, you know, gut health is all-encompassing.
00:30:29
Speaker
Yeah, it's like you maybe the doctor ordered, run barefoot in the yard. not that's right that's right That could be okay for you. We obviously talk a lot about sleep on these senior labs episodes, but one of the things that I think comes up a lot is, you know, you mentioned earlier that when when gut health is bad, sleep is bad, and and there's such a relationship there. I think that sometimes there has to be this sort of tiered, renormalizing to what good sleep is. Because if you are a person who it takes you an hour to fall asleep every night, and you wake up multiple times per night, and then you wake up earlier than you wanted to, and and that itself is stressing you out, then maybe the first step is fix some of that. like You know it's start to fall asleep better, like you sleep a little bit later, but then you think, okay, I'm sleeping better. Well, no, you're actually just like,
00:31:18
Speaker
a little bit down the journey, but good sleep is something that you still haven't experienced yet. And I think that's that's part of it too. is like you know Nutrition is the same way. It's like if you if you don't eat vegetables and you eat one salad, you're not like, okay, I've now arrived. it's like that's That's a good first step, but it's still not quite building that habit of filling your body with what it needs.
00:31:42
Speaker
And I think that that can just be harder to know when it comes to something like sleep, because we don't necessarily have societal examples that are super clear and well-defined of what good sleep looks like. Yes. Like we, I feel like we continually, um, you know, lower the bar as far as, you know, what is healthy for us, so but we can continually raise the bar as well. Right. And the more you.
00:32:06
Speaker
um experience good sleep. you know and Maybe the more you're at least aware that more sleep is better. right you um yeah and you're It just takes some renormalizing. But something that you said, what what it made me think of was, you know even in run culture,
00:32:24
Speaker
you know, or, you know, triathlon culture, certainly you're going to be encouraged to put in the work and do the hard things and wake up early and do your training plan. Right. And I feel like there's an element of, um,
00:32:38
Speaker
you know, in the in the endurance in the endurance sports world of encouraging us not to sleep, right? Because you're just, you know, you're going to buck up and do the hard work of waking up early. And, you know, there was one race in particular that I was training for. I think it was when I was training for my first half-hour manner of my first fall.
00:32:56
Speaker
where I had to say, you know what, that does not work. I cannot recover the way that I need to, and I've got to get a full night's sleep. And so that's my priority first. And then I'm going to figure out how to fit my training into the rest of the day.
Celebrating Personal Growth in Athletics
00:33:12
Speaker
Yeah, or and you know sometimes people are so convinced that you know you shouldn't exercise before bed, but I know people who are just not morning people. And they're like, if I go for a run in the morning, I'm a zombie. But if I go for a run in the evening when the sun's starting to go down, I feel great. And that's just the right time for me to exercise and toss out this one size fits all. Yeah, exactly. I've i've met with that as well, even with myself, right? Like, I haven't worked out today. It's 8.30 at night. Well, there's a time that I have to do it. It's probably not, you know, some people would say don't ever do that, but that's what works.
00:33:50
Speaker
All right, so Lauren, speaking of endurance culture, people have probably heard the phrase couch to 5k. You have a book couch to 50 miles. So, uh, is that a different mindset or is it just like the same kind of mentality to the next level?
00:34:11
Speaker
Yeah. You know, i I would say in a sense it is the same mindset. I would always encourage someone to celebrate exactly where you are. Right. So if you're on the couch and you get up to, you know, walk for 10 minutes, let's celebrate that. Right. If your goal is to train for a 5k, let's celebrate that. If your goal is to train for a 50 mile, great. You can do that too. Let's train for it. Right.
00:34:37
Speaker
So in that sense, I would say that I feel like the mindset is very similar. Celebrate where you are, be willing to grow. Is the training similar? No, I would say the training, once you get past um maybe like a marathon distance in particular, I feel like the training does actually change up quite a bit. And and maybe there are some micro ah mindset things that that do need to happen for you to run an ultra. You know, there's a lot of like,
00:35:06
Speaker
needing to be willing to you know be willing to slow down in a sense of you know because you're going such a long distance so even things like that you being willing to eat like you have to eat right whereas on a 5k you don't have to eat while you're doing it so there's definitely some micro um mindset changes that need to happen but on the whole i would say celebrate you where you are and be willing to grow Maybe not everybody is, is into the kind of extreme athletic side of it too. And so that that's a good, a good takeaway that I think really makes it universal. There's no comparison. There's absolutely no comparison. Like the only thing you're comparing to is where you are right now and where you want to be tomorrow and where you want to go after that.
Resources and Reiki Practice
00:35:47
Speaker
Well, Lauren, we've covered a lot of good stuff here. Where can listeners go to learn more about you and what you do?
00:35:53
Speaker
Yeah, so you can go to my website, goddesshealth.org and ah you can get access to my books on that website um as well as I do offer an opportunity for um like an introductory gut health assessment where you can get that assessment and then you can talk with me for about 15 minutes to get you started on a good path toward healing your gut.
00:36:14
Speaker
And are these virtual consultations too? right yeah Yeah, actually everything is, everything is virtual, even the Reiki. Yeah. So that's part of my practice. And a lot of people are inter-aware that you can, um, do a Reiki practice at a distance. Um, but that is how I received Reiki is very powerful and effective and is how I do it for my clients. So I'm able to work with people anywhere. So how does that work to do Reiki at a distance? Reiki is an energy healing practice, right?
00:36:43
Speaker
Energy is not bound by time and space and the way that you and I are. And you know that's absolutely very beautiful, energetic, you know even spiritual kind of concept. um However, that's also quantum physics. That's mathematics. that's Medical technologies are showing us the same thing, that energy is not bound in that way. um And so you really can sense healing, Reiki energy to someone at a distance.
00:37:09
Speaker
and Like I said, that's how I experienced it the first time. It's very powerful and effective and that's how I continue to give it to my clients. yeah you know i like i I want to mention too, um just because of the focus of this podcast, maybe one of my first experiences with Reiki.
00:37:26
Speaker
You know, everyone experiences Reiki differently. It heals and balances on all levels. In that sense, this is one reason why I love it. Like, gut health and Reiki are practices in a very different way. Heal and balance at the source on all levels, physical, mental, emotional, um certainly spiritual as well.
00:37:44
Speaker
But everyone experiences Reiki differently. um There's no right way. Some people like feel something, some people feel nothing. right Some people experience detox-like symptoms. And this for me was was something you know that that has been something that I've experienced at different points, and especially when I first received Reiki. And it probably surprised me the most.
00:38:07
Speaker
Primarily because you have to think I had done a lot of work to heal my gut health, right? So I am the healthiest that I've ever been. When I received Reiki later on that day after not having any gastrointestinal issues for like an entire year, okay, nothing. When I received Reiki later on that day, I had what was a very clear gastrointestinal detox.
00:38:32
Speaker
which blew me away. and And so there, and there were other kind of detox symptoms too. Like I had a very, um, it was almost like a caffeine headache, like a very powerful caffeine detoxing kind of headache, even though I wasn't detoxing from caffeine. Right. But in the other thing that I experienced, um, and what ah a lot of people do, not everybody, but a lot of people do experience, um, is dreaming. And so for me, you know, I immediately started doing a Reiki practice every day.
00:39:00
Speaker
and Whereas in the past, I would occasionally you know remember a dream. For nearly three months straight, I had dreams that I remembered when I woke up. and you know Sometimes they were just as dreams too, where it didn't really make any sense. Yeah, as as they often do not. Yeah.
00:39:20
Speaker
And then other times it was you know my deepest fears right coming to life. And and you know the thing about Reiki is that Reiki enables your body, mind to release whatever stored energy is in it that is not for your highest good. And that you know again can be physical, mental, emotional, whatever it is.
00:39:42
Speaker
um And so for me, you know, when I was having these dreams, I mean, sometimes it would be quite disturbing to have so many that I remembered, but I was very aware in the process that my body mind was detoxing in a sense, and I didn't have to direct that process. It was just happening. Whatever stored energy was within me, my body mind was just able to release it through dreams, through other ways as well. But this is one way that that my body mind was um was releasing the things in my body that didn't need to be there. Well, Lauren Callahan, thank you so much for joining. It's been great. Yeah, thank you.
00:40:23
Speaker
Swen Your Labs is a show about sleep, memory and dreams. For more content, visit our blog at SwenYourLabs.com and connect with us to learn more about how you can share your story related to brain health and the daily habits that help us to rest and live better.
00:40:41
Speaker
Thanks for joining, we'll be back soon.