[00:00:00] Cynthia Garcia: Knowing one’s family health history allows you to take steps to reduce your risk for those conditions. 

[00:00:11] Welcome back to The Transformational Nutrition podcast. The podcast that is redefining nutrition as anything that feeds you physically, mentally, and spiritually. I am your host, Cynthia Garcia, the founder and CEO of the Institute of Transformational Nutrition. 

And in today’s episode, we are talking about going beyond the gym. That’s right. Going beyond the gym for physical nutrition and physical health. So I want to tell you about this story, this client of mine. So this woman had come to me because she really wanted to lose weight. Now that’s not uncommon for people that I’ve worked with in the past.

Most people just aren’t happy with the way they look and they want help achieving their. But one thing did stick out to me. She came in and she said, Cynthia, I know you can help. I want to lose some weight. I got to get my body back, but don’t give me a diet. Don’t tell me how to eat. I just want to work out plan.

That’s all I want. And specifically she said to me, I’m doing this hundred pushup challenge. And that’s, that’s it. That’s all I wanted. I’m just going to lead me to that healthier life, that body that I want, I’m doing this. And if there’s anything else you can give me, that’s great. I want to work out plan.

I don’t want to die. Don’t put me on a diet. It was like, all right. And I mean, I don’t know, like that’s like playing basketball with one arm tied behind your back and maybe, maybe a leg. I don’t. I was like, um, maybe you don’t know what I do and listen. Exercise is a very important part. If physical nutrition and physical health, it helps with your mental health and your spiritual health as well.

I’m not negating that it’s very important. Should all move, but exercise alone. Is not enough. And that’s what I want to talk about today. It’s going beyond the gym, going beyond workouts and looking at other aspects of your physical health. Listen, it’s not abnormal to hop on Instagram or social media and see accounts that have tons of followers that are just following workout videos.

Now if these people only post about exercise, that can be very deceiving because people who follow them assume that the key to a healthy life and the body of their dreams lies in how much they can squat or how many they can. But even though we prioritize physical nutrition here at ITN, because we see that the pillar of health is about way more than just exercise. And it’s about way more even than just what you eat. And again, that’s what we’re going to talk about here today. 

We love spotlighting the stories and transformations of our students here at ITN. I’m especially excited to share Jared Fisher’s journey from being told he had a debilitating disease and suffering a horrific accident to being a certified transformational nutrition coach with his own thriving product-based business. Let’s meet Jared now.

[00:03:18] Jared Fisher: I was in an accident when I was 17 years old. And I woke up or I regained consciousness underwater. And I remember thinking at the time, like, this is how my life’s going to end. I’ve been a huge surfer my whole life. And I was involved in a surfing accident. I had several surgeries to repair the injury after that. I was always a really small kid growing up. I never really had a growth spurt. And so that was really a source of, I would say, insecurity for me and contributed to an overall lack of confidence. 

And then when I had this injury to my face, that just kind of made it worse because I had these horrific scars on my face. I would say that really started this downward spiral. Well, it turned into alcohol and drug abuse and really just living a lifestyle that was not supportive of good health. And then I found myself in my late twenties, and I started having really bad, lower back pain. And I saw a couple of doctors and they’re looking at my MRI and they’re like, whoa, this looks horrible.

They diagnosed me with degenerative disc disease. There’s really no cure. And basically I was told, yeah, your spine looks like that of somebody in their sixties. From there, the daily drinking continued. I was put on prescription pain medication. Things just kind of continued to spiral and get worse from there. 

[00:04:53] Cynthia Garcia: So, what are some other things you can do to really make sure that your physical health is on point? Right? What are some other aspects that help you think Wolf food and diet? Isn’t that it, no, there’s a lot more. The first one. Is your health history. You should really understand what your health history is.

You see, according to the center for disease control, a study conducted a few years ago, showed that 96% of Americans believe that knowing their family history is important, 96%. It’s a good amount. However, only a third of those people. I have actually gathered their family history. So they think it’s important.

They just haven’t done it yet. Now a family health history is pretty self-explanatory, it’s a record of health information about a person and their close relatives, a complete health history record includes information from three generations of relatives, including children, brothers, and sister. Parents aunts and uncles, nieces, and nephews, grandparents, and cousins.

I know it’s a lot of people, which is probably why a lot of people don’t have this information. However, the reason it’s so important is because families have similar genetic backgrounds and often similar environments and lifestyles, not always, but often because a lot of this is cultural. So together, all of these factors can give us clues to conditions that might run in a family health conditions that might run into a family.

And by noticing patterns of disorders among relatives, healthcare professionals can then determine whether an individual family members or even future generations may be at an increased risk of developing a particular. Uh, family health history can also identify people with a higher than usual chance of common disorders, such as heart disease, high blood pressure stroke, certain cancers, and type two diabetes.

They can provide information about the risk of rare conditions caused by variants or mutations in a single gene, such as cystic fibrosis or sickle cell disease. Knowing one’s family health history allows you to take steps to reduce your risk for those conditions. Right? If you don’t know, then you can’t really do better.

If you know better, you can do better. Right? So for people that have an increased risk of cancers, healthcare professionals might recommend more frequent screenings, maybe, you know, more frequent mammograms or colonoscopies, or starting at a younger age. Many healthcare providers might also encourage regular checkups or testing for people that have a condition that runs in their families.

Especially if we know that the condition is genetic, because the best way to take care of yourself is to prevent these things right. And then the second best way is to catch them as early as you can. So by having more screenings or earlier screenings or checkups or tests you can do that, you can do just.

Now the easiest way to get information about your family health history is to just talk to your relatives about their health. Have they had any health problems? When did they occur? Did they take medications? Did it help a family gathering could be a great time to discuss these issues, right? Or you could just approach these people.

One-on-one Hey mom. Hey dad. Hey aunt Betty. I’m doing this thing. I’m just really diving deep into my health right now. I’m wondering if you could take just a few minutes and talk to me about your health. So I know how that might impact. I really simple. Most people are happy to discuss. You can also get medical records and other documents to have a complete family health history.

And I recommend that you do that too. If that’s available right now, some people can’t get that level of detail, but if you can great, highly encourage it. And then the other thing that you want to do is just keep this information up to date and share it with your healthcare providers right now. Now you might notice when you go to a healthcare provider, they ask you, right.

They say has, do any of these conditions run in the family? And oftentimes they will say mother, father, and then siblings. And sometimes they’ll have grandparents on there. But not always. So you want to pay attention to that and you want to do your own health history so that you can be proactive about that.

Listen in as Jared shares his turning point and what spurred him and his family into action when it came to their health.

[00:09:27] Jared Fisher: I remember one day I was literally laying on the couch. I could barely move. And my kids, they were young at the time and they came up to me and they’re like, Hey dad, you want to go outside and play? And I was just like, it just kinda hit me. I’m like, I can’t even get up and go play with my kids. And so it all kind of came to a head.

I actually went to see a doctor and he told me that I had Andropause, which is basically the male equivalent of menopause. Me going through that my wife come to find out she’s had Hashimoto’s, which is an auto-immune disease. I was experiencing what I was going through, which included drinking every day, eating out every day, taking pain medication every day.

My daughter was having allergic reactions to a lot of the things that she was eating. My son was having anxiety. So my wife was the one who really took the bull by the horns and initiated change for the family by, you know, starting to make all of our food. We stopped eating out every day, and it just went from thinking that we were healthy or doing things that were supportive of good health. But in reality, we weren’t. To making the shift where health became the focal point of both of our lives. And it was no more eating out. It was making every meal that we were eating from scratch and really reinforcing these health habits.

[00:10:55] Cynthia Garcia: Alright. So here are some things that you want to make sure you get when you are compiling your family health history. So the first thing you want to get is that information from three generations of biological relatives, you also want to get the age they were at the time of their diagnosis. You want to get the age and cause of death of family members who died in any other way, other than just a natural death.

And then also warning signs. You want to look for warning signs when you research your family health history, and here’s what those could include. It could include a family member getting a disease earlier than expected in life. It could include several close family members having the same. It could include the disease that is usually uncommon for that gender or for that race.

Even for that culture, it also might include certain combinations of diseases in the family, such as breast and ovarian cancer or diabetes and heart disease. Right. So make sure that you can get this information in any way that you can. It’s very important for me. Once my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer, it was a glaring warning sign to me that I needed to understand health history, the health history of her, my dad, and as many relatives as I could, then I immediately went to get tested for the gene.

To see if this might be something that I needed to be aware of. And now my awareness is even more heightened around that as I get older and, you know, I have a family it’s really important that I stay on top of that and I might not be as aggressive about it, or as proactive about it, if that hadn’t of happened to her. So, but because of. I am again, more aware and take the necessary action. So get your health history. 

Jared is leveraging his certified transformational nutrition certification in a different way than many coaches who become certified do. And we not only encourage that, but we love it when our students use their education in a way that inspires and motivates them to go out and impact the world in a better, healthier way.

[00:13:12] Jared Fisher: I would say I’m definitely not using it in the traditional capacity. A lot of people probably think that this program is designed for somebody who wants to work with clients one-on-one or in a small group setting. And I would say this is a great program for those who want to do that. But I would say it’s definitely not limited to those who want to work with others, one-on-one, myself being an example. 

So my wife and I, about a year ago, we decided to take one of the recipes that she’s been making, which is a pancake and waffle mix and turn that into a food company. It’s called Organically Food. For me, the way I’ve leveraged, that is part of the program was dedicated to nutrition aspect. Part of the program was dedicated to a psychology spirituality, but there’s also this running a business component. 

And although I’ve been running a business in a completely different industry for the past 16 years, I was really looking for some guidance there to help leverage nutrition and health knowledge and translate that into the business that my wife and I have launched. There’s so much of what I’ve taken from that program has been applied to what we’re doing with Organically Foods. The whole business incubator part of the CTNC program. There’s some amazing resources there.

[00:14:56] Cynthia Garcia: Now another thing that goes beyond just exercise and diet, when it comes to physical health and physical nutrition is supplemental. Now there’s a lot of different opinions out there about supplements, but here at ITN, we believe that supplements can be a great way to boost your health when they’re taken correctly.

And when they’re taken as supplement. Right. They aren’t replacements for things. They are supplements. You should absolutely try to get the nutrients that you need. Everything that you need. You should really try to get that through your food and drink and. And if you can’t, because let’s all just admit that that can be really tough to do.

Sometimes then supplements can be a really handy tool because really, I mean, the standard American diet is usually full of refined carbohydrates and sugars. It’s lacking and essential vitamins and antioxidants. I mean, I could go on and on, right. And these key nutrients are needed to prevent chronic disease and to run all of our body systems effectively.

So while a healthy, balanced diet does provide sources of vitamins and minerals and, you know, Amigas and all of these things taking dietary supplements on top of that might be really beneficial to make sure that your body meets the minimum and more that it needs every year. Supplementation can also correct for deficiencies in the very foods that you’re eating, because look chemicals used in farming have really depleted the soil.

Right? For example, USDA tests show that in 1950 spinach on average contained 158 milligrams of iron per 100 grams, 158 milligrams of iron per 100. The average iron content of spinach today for that same 100 grams is 2.7 milligrams, 1950. It was 158 milligrams. Today, it’s 2.7 milligrams. I mean, spinach just, isn’t what it used to be.

And it’s not just spinach. It’s everything statistics like these run throughout almost every fast. At our food supply. So through supplementing your diet, you can make great strides in correcting these food supply deficiencies. 

We asked Jared what he would say was his favorite aspect of the CTNC program, and I love his response. Let’s listen.

[00:17:36] Jared Fisher: From the curriculum to the faculty, I really feel like Cynthia has just pulled together some incredible resources to create a very comprehensive program that you can follow at your own pace. What I also really liked about the program. It’s not just focusing on nutrition. It brings in and ties in the psychology component, as well as the spirituality component.

This program specifically, it’s such a comprehensive well-rounded program and it’s so well done and well put together. I would say it would be nearly impossible to go through this program and not come out with some amazing ideas and have at least a sense of direction as to what is it you want to be doing.

[00:18:31] Cynthia Garcia: Now I do want to say that it is possible to get in all the necessary nutrients that you need without settlements. It’s just with our busy schedules and access to not so great, healthy alternatives. A lot of people in our country and in our world just need some help filling in the gaps. Now the most popular supplements are multivitamins calcium vitamins, B, C, and D, but there are hundreds, thousands of supplements available.

We know that calcium can support bone health, vitamin D helps the body absorb calcium vitamin C and E are anti-oxidants. So they’re molecules that prevent cell damage and help to maintain health. Vitamin B 12 keeps your nerves and your blood cells healthy. And it’s not just vegans and vegetarians who are deficient in that.

By the way, we have a lot of meat eaters who are deficient in vitamin B12. This isn’t meant to be an episode on supplements and perhaps we’ll do that in the future. Let me know. If that’s something that you want us to do, but I would recommend taking a B complex vitamin instead of just a, B 12. So we could go on and on here, research shows that fish oil can promote heart health, but you know, again, if you’re vegan, vegetarian, you might want to turn to hemp, which has a great ratio of omega three to omega six central fatty acids.

You know, there’s a lot of different things that you could supplement for. And since I don’t know your particular health history, and obviously it’s all very different for all of our listeners. I would suggest talking to a professional before you start to supplement. In addition to that, doing some tests to make sure that you’re actually lacking in a specific nutrient before you start taking a supplement for it.

But overall taking supplements can be a great way to fill the gaps and to make sure that you’re getting all the vitamins and minerals and other nutrients that your body needs to function in an optimal. 

We are hearing from Jared one last time as he shares his epiphanes not only from his journey, of reclaiming both his and his family’s health, but also from his personal journey of becoming a certified transformational nutrition coach with ITN.

[00:20:49] Jared Fisher: The realization that I’ve come to, at least for myself, is that health above anything else is my greatest asset. I really truly believe it’s the foundation for happiness, for fulfillment, for a better life. I feel like good health just makes everything else in life better. You talk to somebody that doesn’t have their health and what is it that they want more than anything? They just want to be healthy. 

With good health, I’m able to be a better father, a better husband, a better leader. It’s made such a big difference in my life. I’m so passionate about sharing that with other people, because I see so many people struggling and not knowing what to do, not knowing where to turn. My name is Jared Fisher. I live in orange county, California. I’ve been married for 13 years. I have a son Jackson a daughter Jaycee. And being involved in the health and wellness space I would say that’s really become like the centerpiece or the focal point of my life as of about eight years ago.

[00:22:04] Cynthia Garcia: All right. So those are just two important factors that influence your physical health aside from exercise and. Healthy. And really there’s a lot of other aspects of physical health that we covered it in. I mean, we wouldn’t look at things like hormone health, personalized nutrition, the exposome gut health, and so much more.

But the last, this is only when. But I hope this shines a light on the fact that it’s so important for you to move beyond just thinking about exercise and diet when it comes to physical health. And we talked about this in a previous episode as well. So check out episode seven, if you missed it. But health looks different on everyone as well.

So don’t just rely on the gym or those 100 pounds. Like my client and think that skinny equals healthy right or thin equals healthy, that could not be further from the truth. Take some time to prioritize all areas of your health, especially physical, but certainly mental and spiritual as well. And I hope this podcast episode helped you look more at the bigger picture to see the importance of paying attention.

Other areas of your health journey. All right. That is it for today. Take a look at those other areas. Even if you focus on just one area, like getting your family’s health history, that could completely change the game for you. Staying healthy, staying vital, having a longer life that’s filled with more enjoyment and joy in those special moments that I know we all love and treasure.

So thank you so much. For being here today. If you enjoyed this podcast, I know I always ask, but gotcha. Please take just a couple of moments out of your time and follow or subscribe to the show. Rate and review it again. It helps us so much and getting the word out. I am passionate about this work.

Transformational nutrition literally saved my life. I can’t think of anything better and any other way to pay that forward then to get on here every week and share what I’ve learned with people, just like you. So if you could help me to do that as well, I would be so very grateful. Thank you so much for joining me today. You can see all the show notes and other resources for this episode. Over a transformationalnutrition.com/episode013. And I will see you back here next week for a brand new episode.