Written by: Melissa Deally, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
You are not meant to suffer! Your body has been designed so perfectly, that you shouldn’t be struggling with an unhappy gut, hormonal symptoms, low energy, aches and pains, perpetual nasal drips, regular headaches, auto-immune diseases, leaky gut, Type II diabetes, heart disease, obesity and more. BUT in today’s world so many people are struggling with one or more of these, and if you are looking for answers, keep reading.
Look at how our health has declined over the last century in North America:
Obesity rates are up from 13-14% in 1980 to 42.4% in 2021
Type II Diabetes is up from 0.91% in 1960 to 9.4% in 2015
The first known case of heart disease occurred in 1912, and by the 1930’s it was the leading cause of death and the cause of 30% of all deaths by 2010
In 1900 cancer was the cause of 5.8% of all deaths and by 2010 that was up to 31.1%.
This decline in our health can be largely attributed to our much higher toxic load (read my previous article “Are Your Trash Cans Overflowing?”), as well as the increase in processed foods, laden with chemicals and GMO food products, cheap oils, full of inflammatory Omega 6s and Linoleic Acid. These foods are nutrient deplete, offering on average only 17 of the 90 key nutrients the human body needs to function at optimal levels.
But when you go to the doctor they don’t talk to you about your nutrition or lifestyle factors, such as stress, sleep, or exercise because the medical model today isn’t focused on that. It is simply focused on ‘diagnose the disease, prescribe the drug’. It has become a sick care system, where doctors are limited to 15-minute appointments if you’re lucky and today 98% of doctor’s appointments result in a prescription. It’s driven by Big Pharma and the insurance companies, with the ultimate goal of optimizing shareholder profits, not human health. Meanwhile, the doctors are stuck within this broken model, and your health is suffering as a result.
What if there was another way? A way to get to the root cause of your health issue so that you could actually understand the problem? If you know WHY you feel the way you do, you can then do something about it, right? Understanding the imbalances in your body is key to this understanding. You see “A body in balance, doesn’t hold onto excess weight, get sick or harbour disease.” –Dr Stephen Cabral
Great news! There is a way you can do this! Working with an Integrative Health Practitioner or Naturopathic Doctor, you can get access to these lab tests which are mailed to your home. They will provide insight into these imbalances inside your body and then you can be guided in bringing your body back into balance.
I want to share 6 types of labs with you here that can be used to optimize your health, whether you are already feeling “healthy” or you are struggling with symptoms that you are tired of ‘tolerating’.
1. Minerals & Metals Lab Test:
Benefits of this lab:
Indicates the state of stress the body is under
Indicates mineral depletion (we burn through our minerals under stress)
Shows metal toxins we need to remove from the body
Shows electrolyte imbalances which can be a cause of heart disease.
A recent client ran this lab and found she had mercury toxicity, I suggested she go see a functional medicine dentist about her amalgams. She had them removed, and realized one of them had cracked hence the mercury toxicity. She is very happy to have that out of her body now, rather than not knowing and having the mercury leaking into her body slowly for years.
Another client with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome ran this lab and found she had multiple metal toxicities, while also being depleted in key minerals. Within 2 weeks of starting her heavy metal detox and supplementing with the key minerals, I got a note letting me know she was feeling better than she had in 40 years, with the energy to get her through her days without a nap!
2. Gut Health Lab:
Benefits of this lab:
Answers many of your digestive issues such as candida or bacterial overgrowth or the presence of mold or fungus.
Indicates energy levels
Indicates key vitamin levels and more.
A recent client ran this lab to learn she had some yeast overgrowth and mold. She didn’t know where the mold had come from, but later told me she found tons of mold in her shower drains, that she had no idea was there.
Another client ran it and found he had several markers of candida and bacterial overgrowth, which needed to be addressed as it doesn’t self-correct. He had no idea, although once I shared this news with him, he was able to correlate symptoms he’d been experiencing and thinking of as normal (gas, bloating, sugar cravings, brain fog and more), to the fact he had gut dysbiosis (imbalance).
Hippocrates said over 2000 years ago “All disease starts in the gut”, which modern science has only very recently agreed with. As a result, it’s important to understand the health of your gut, and pay attention to your symptoms, not just accept them as “normal”. Your symptoms are your body’s way of asking you to do something differently.
3. Omega 3 lab:
Benefits of this lab:
Understanding the inflammation levels in your body – is absolutely key to your long term health.
The ability to lower your risk of sudden cardiac death, by balancing your Omega 3: Omega 6 ratios. Given that heart disease is the 1 cause of death in N. America, this is powerful information to have.
Indicates whether you need more EPA or DHA in your Omega 3 supplement.
Over 90% of the N American population is deficient in Omega 3s because they are harder to get through our diet than our Omega 6s. Omega 6s are in just about everything and while we need them in our diet, we need them in a ratio of 5:1 Omega 6: Omega 3 or less. The average person today has a ratio of 18:1, which is highly inflammatory, as Omega 6s are our inflammatory essential fatty acid. Omega 3s are the anti-inflammatory essential fatty acid, and the best sources are wild fatty fish like salmon, mackerel, Pacific halibut, catfish, rockfish, oysters, sardines and anchovies. If you aren’t eating these about 4 times/week, to make up for all the Omega 6s you are getting, your ratios could be out of balance. It’s very easy to bring them back into balance, once you know your levels – is your heart health worth that to you? It is to me! We know that chronic inflammation causes our cells to trigger our genes to turn on disease. When we lower the inflammation, then our cells won’t trigger our genes to turn on that disease, (this is the science of epigenetics).
4. Hormones Lab Test:
Benefits of this lab test:
Understanding sex hormone imbalances that can be causing PMS and menopausal symptoms and infertility (see my last article ”Are Your Hormones Driving You Crazy?”)
Understanding your cortisol patterns throughout the day, impacts your energy levels and sleep.
Understanding all 4 thyroid markers for early detection of an underactive or overactive thyroid (which can be caused by sex hormone imbalances, which are often triggered by stress).
Understanding of your insulin markers which are also impacted by sex hormone imbalances.
This one lab provides so much valuable information for people who have been struggling with hormonal symptoms and possible sleep issues for a long time. When I first ran this lab and discovered my progesterone levels were low, I was able to rectify that and eliminate my migraines.
I’ve had many clients run this lab who get their TSH run by their doctor and are told their thyroid is fine, but when we run this lab we get the early warning signs of Free T3 and Free T4 not being produced/converting properly and we can support the thyroid before it becomes a problem that would show up on your doctor’s lab test. It’s so much easier to bring the body back into balance when it’s just a little out of balance vs when it’s shifted significantly out of balance. Early warning signs are the key to easily being able to stay in optimal health!
5. Food Sensitivity Lab:
Benefits of this lab test:
Quickly learn which foods cause an immune response when you eat them, instead of the long and tedious process of using a food journal.
By removing those foods for a period of time, you lower the stress on your digestive system and inflammation in the body, allowing it to heal.
When re-introducing the foods, you can do so one at a time over 2-3 days to truly ascertain the symptoms triggered by this food.
Many of my clients struggle with digestive issues, which can’t heal when their body is under stress. Removing the trigger foods, lowers the stress on the body, allowing the body to start the healing process. Often they don’t even realize it’s food that is the problem, as they feel they’ve eaten this food all their life. The reality is that as young children they may have known the food was a problem, and they’d try not to eat it, only to be told “eat everything on your plate, there are children starving in Africa” or something like that! This taught them to override their body asking them not to eat it. However, as their toxic load increases over the years, the body can’t keep up and gives louder and louder symptoms of discomfort to get you to stop eating those foods, only it can be hard for them to figure out those trigger foods until they run their labs.
6. Stool & Parasite Lab:
Benefits of this lab test: (available in the US only)
Assesses bacteria and candida overgrowth
Assesses whether you have parasites or H.Pylori
Assesses your digestive function, and whether you have weak digestion.
You might think there is no way you have a parasite or H.Pylori, but 30% of N. Americans have H.Pylori and it’s higher in most other regions of the world, and 1/3 of the world has a parasite, with about 14% of North Americans having parasites. In fact, 90% of people with stomach ulcers have an H.Pylori infection. Many more people have candida and/or bacterial overgrowth and weak digestion. Given that 70% of our immune system is housed in our gut, it is time to stop ignoring our digestive distress, and do something about it. This lab is a great place to start.
I hope this article highlighting the lab test options is helpful to you. I want you to know these labs are available so you have a choice on your health journey in getting to the root cause of the problem, or running labs to be proactive in your health, by getting a baseline for yourself and then running them every year to ensure your body hasn’t moved too far out of balance.
I work with the entire English speaking world and these labs are shipped to many countries around the world, so if this is something you’d like to know more about, please go to my website
www.yourguidedhealthjourney.com and click Book Appointment and I’d be happy to help you choose the best labs for you and provide a quote.
Melissa Deally, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Melissa Deally is an Integrative Health Practitioner & Registered Health Coach, dedicated to helping her clients get to the root cause of their health issues and truly heal. Melissa’s business is 100% virtual, and she works with the entire English speaking world. Melissa uses a 2 prong approach:
Discover your toxic load and lower it
Discover your body’s imbalances and support them with natural supplements and herbs so the body can come back into balance, at which point it will heal itself. This is done through the use of Functional Medicine lab tests, mailed to your home!
Melissa offers a very high level of support, to ensure her clients’ success, as we navigate the path bringing the body back into balance, while creating new lifestyle habits to ensure lasting results.
Melissa is the winner of the 2021 Quality Care Award by Businesses From The Heart, and has been featured in Pursuit 365, and Fresh Magazine, featuring 365 Canadian Women who lead by example in the everyday pursuit of success, happiness, and achievement. Melissa is also the host of the “Don’t Wait For Your Wake Up Call!” podcast, a podcast offering practical education around health, which ranked in the top 5% of Global podcasts by Listen Notes in the first 3 months of launching.
