What is a Functional Medicine Health Coach?
As a Functional Medicine Health Coach, I combine my training and knowledge of Functional Medicine principles and approaches with my expertise in coaching psychology, behavior change and more. My work is aimed at empowering people to take charge of their health, and guide them to make lasting, sustainable changes to optimize their wellbeing.
In my years of working in Functional Medicine, I witnessed a gap that some people experienced. While these folks invested their time and money into meeting with highly qualified practitioners who provided them with very comprehensive treatment plans, they couldn’t figure out how to take that plan and make it work in their lives. They understood the directives they were supposed to follow to get healthier, but they couldn’t figure out how to go about doing it. This gap often resulted in frustration and struggle, impeding their success in reaching their goals for improved health.
This spurred me to create a Functional Medicine Health Coaching practice to address the need for support and guidance on 1.) how to implement treatment protocols, along with 2.) how to make Lifestyle changes that would successfully lead to reaching goals, and 3.) how to cultivate potential for greater fulfillment and wellbeing in life.
What does Functional Medicine Health Coaching offer me?
Studies show that people have much greater success in creating positive, long- lasting changes when they have the support and guidance of a professional wellness coach. Coaching improves the efficiency of your journey and ensures a greater outcome achieved. Athletes and high-performance professionals wouldn’t think of trying to achieve their goals without the guidance of a coach.
What can you expect from Functional Medicine Health Coaching?
- Mentorship and guidance
- Education
- An objective perspective
- Opportunity for self-discovery and growth
- Strategies to support habit changes
- Empowerment to change and progress
- Tools to support motivation
- Accountability
- Individualized action plans, and much more…
These would be difficult to access if trying to do this alone.
* My personal style blends knowledge and science with intuition and wisdom derived from many years of working with patients in healthcare. I employ many holistic tools, modalities and techniques based on individual needs and presentation.
Get Support from a Functional Medicine Health Coach
Functional Medicine Health Coaching is useful whenever you’re attempting to make changes in habits and patterns aimed at improving the quality of your wellbeing. Taking steps to upgrade Lifestyle habits is an investment in your health. Simple changes can lead to huge strides in feeling better, having more energy and vitality, improving the quality of your health, being more content in your life, and ultimately living with greater fulfillment.
What exactly are “Lifestyle Factors?” These are the choices you make every day that define how you live, impacting the quality of your health and your life.
There are nine pillars that lay the foundation for our health and well-being. They include:
- Nutrition
- Exercise and Movement
- Sleep
- Stress Management
- Positive Relationships
- Creativity
- Meaning and Purpose
- Connection to Nature and Environment
- Avoidance of Toxic Substances
If I’m working with a Functional Medicine healthcare provider, why do I need a coach?
Functional Medicine providers are highly skilled at identifying the root cause of your ailments and devise brilliant treatment plans to alleviate your condition. However, they commonly don’t have the bandwidth nor the skills to help guide you on how to make behavior changes or integrate treatment protocols into your life.
Collaboration with a Functional Health Coach expedites the process. When these two professions are employed in tandem, it creates a synergy that makes a recipe for success and the results are beyond impressive.
Changing habits and patterns can be complicated. It becomes easier when you have someone who is knowledgeable on the nuances of your treatment plan - a coach to guide and educate you how to carry it out, support your motivation, provide accountability and help keep you on track. Results are often accelerated, and more lasting levels of change are achieved. It’s your willingness and dedication to the process that brings the alchemy to fruition!
Meet Health Coach: Catherine Willows, RN, BA, FMC-HC, NBC-HWC
Catherine is a Registered Nurse and a seasoned healthcare professional with years of experience in a wide variety of clinical settings. Her long-standing passion for integrative and holistic health practices led her to studying and certifying in many holistic modalities, including herbalism, energy work, somatic therapies, and much more. This eventually led her to serving as a leader in the Obesity Prevention Initiatives in Chicago, and brought her to Functional Medicine where she worked as Clinical Services Director for Dr. Mark Hyman’s clinic, the UltraWellness Center. Catherine is a Functional Medicine Certified Health Coach, and a National Board-Certified Health and Wellness Coach.
If you really know me, you would know that…
I am dedicated to personal growth. I believe we’re all here to become our best version of ourselves. My purpose is dedicated toward helping others become their best version of themselves too!
I deeply value Creativity and Creative Expression. I believe everyone is inherently creative, even though many people have lost touch with it. Through Creativity, we have the opportunity to express our unique gifts in the world. I make it a practice to carve out space for Meditation, personal Freedom, Creativity and Inspiration - as these are essential to my wellbeing.
I love the arts. I love to engage in art-making, painting, fiber arts and more.
I love Nature - the Beauty of Nature - all its seasons and elements, plants and animals alike. I believe that the Essence of Nature has much to teach us about how to live in greater balance, and our individual health is intimately connected with the health of the planet.
I am a life-long learner with burning curiosity that drives me to continuously expand my knowledge in many areas of interest.
I enjoy riding my bike through the backroads of the Berkshires, kayaking, gardening and spending time with my Australian Shepherd.
If I could snap my fingers and be anywhere in the world, I would be
along the coast in Portugal I love to travel, and being seaside is one of my favorite places - among natural beauty, in a place rich in culture and arts, with healthy food, a temperate climate zone, and a more easeful lifestyle.
New Functional Medicine Health Coach Program
Have you heard about my new group coaching program yet? This hour-long virtual gathering will be offered to current clients twice monthly and hosted by Catherine Willows. Its aim is to provide you with greater support in making lifestyle choices and habit changes to bring your health to a better place. Catherine’s next session is February 1st – get the full scoop here.
What Working With A Functional Medicine Practitioner Is Really Like (Patient Case Study)
You’ve been to the doctor. He runs some tests and he says nothing’s wrong.
But you know you’re not you right now. Maybe you’re dealing with digestive problems that have taken the fun out of eating. Every dinner out is a potential threat.
Or maybe it’s your hormones that seem off. Your once predictable cycle is suddenly erratic. You feel like you’re in puberty all over again.
Or maybe you’ve never had a happy gut or healthy hormones. The doctors have thrown up their hands. They can give you The Pill or suggest you try a fiber supplement, but that’s all they’ve got for you.
You’ve always trusted your doctor - but right now it feels like there is nothing they can do to help you.
Where do you turn?
This story is how so many women end up looking for a Functional Medicine Practitioner. I know it well, because this is my story, too.
What Is Functional Medicine?
Functional medicine is an evidence-based approach to health that focuses on finding the root cause of health problems. Functional medicine looks at the body as one system - meaning that is something is “wrong” in one area of the body, it is likely having an impact on other parts of the body, as well.
Functional medicine incorporates both Western and Eastern approaches - the latest technology and ancient wisdom.
The #1 misconception about Functional Medicine is that it denounces modern medicine in favor of healing crystals and water fasts. Not true!
Listen, I won’t knock anything until I try it - including crystals and fasting - but the majority of work I do with clients in my clinic is much different than that. You might not know that though, because you’ve never seen a FMP before!
What Is It Really Like To Work With A Functional Medicine Practitioner?
Today, I want to walk you through the process of working with a Functional Medicine Practitioner. I’ll share one of our amazing patient’s own journey (yes - including test results!) so that you can understand what it’s really like to work with a FMP.
Before anything else, I always do a free 15-20 minute prospective patient interview. This is just a chance for us to connect (without any pressure) and be certain we’re a good fit for working together. From there we’ll go to official first step: the case review appointment.
The case review is like a deep-dive interview. I want to know as much about you as possible. I might even ask some questions about your childhood! Here I’m looking for clues as to the root causes of what is troubling you now.
Next, we’ll order some testing - depending on your unique symptoms and history. I don’t want to waste your time or money, so we’ll only order the tests that are relevant for you.
Once test results are in, we’ll meet again to develop a treatment plan. You’ll implement the plan (usually diet & lifestyle changes, plus supplements) and we’ll have check-ins to see how you’re progressing and if we need to make tweaks to the plan.
Finally, we’ll re-test to check your progress. (This is the best way to know treatments are really working.)
I’m excited to share this story with you - let’s dig in!
Step 1: Marina’s Case Review
Marina met with Amelia, one of the clinicians who works in my practice, in January. At her first meeting, we learned a lot about her!
She was 22 and was working as a paramedic with her local fire department. She wanted to become a helicopter medic (how badass is that?) but was struggling with health problems that were holding her back. Digestive problems and brain fog were zapping her of the energy she needed to go back to school.
First, Marina told us about what was going on right now: serious digestive problems. She was having oily stool, undigested food in her stool, and couldn’t tolerate eating meat at all unless she took her “meat pill” - a prescription anticholinergic medication. The digestive problems were wearing her out, and she was dealing with brain fog.
Then we went back in time: when did her health problems start?
Marina told Amelia that when she was younger, she had developed a cyst on her heart. Her doctors had treated it with back-to-back rounds of antibiotics.
As a side effect of the antibiotics, she developed neuralgias (a kind of nerve pain that causes severe pain) and vertigo. The vertigo led to 3 concussions in a row and she was ultimately diagnosed with a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).
It was at this time that the digestive problems started, too. Bloating, nausea, food intolerances, and fat malabsorption (which was causing the oily stool).
Her doctor told her the digestive symptoms were just Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) and gave her the prescription for the “meat pill.” That was all he could offer.
6 years after the cyst on her heart, and Marina was still dealing with the repercussions of it. That’s how she came to see us.
Based on her history of antibiotic use and her current symptoms, we suspected Mishana was dealing with a gut infection. We suggested she start with a GI-MAP - a comprehensive stool analysis that can test for many gut infections at once.
Step 2: The Test Results Are In
Marina agreed to the test, and a few weeks later, results were in:
Marina tested positive for:
- C. difficile
- Enteroinvasive E. coli/Shigella
- Enterotoxigenic E. coli LT/ST
- Salmonella
- Entamoeba histolytica
- Enterococcus faecalis
- Streptococcus spp.
- Candida spp.
- Chilomastix mesnelli
- With relative elevations in other markers
You might be thinking these test results are crazy - but it actually isn’t that uncommon! Even in the United States, gut infections and parasites are fairly common. And if you have used antibiotics or have a compromised microbiome for some other reason (like you’ve been eating the Standard American Diet) you are more susceptible to picking up gut infections.
Why don’t doctors test for these infections?
Some Western-medicine doctors do - but many others don’t. They either wrongly believe that gut infections are unlikely or they think they are “non-symptomatic” infections - meaning they don’t cause problems, and don’t need to be treated.
In my experience, (both personally and with my patients) clearing gut infections makes a huge difference in how you feel.
For Marina, we started treatment with a prescription anti-parasitic, alongside a natural bacterial protocol. After she completed those treatments, we used a prescription anti-fungal. Finally, we completed a re-seeding protocol with both probiotics and prebiotics (the most important step after any type of clearing treatment!).
After treatment, I always recommend re-testing to be sure that all the infections have cleared. Feeling better is a great indicator that infections have cleared - but it can’t replace seeing the results on paper!
Step 3: The Second Test Results:
As you can see from the results - Marina was able to clear all her gut infections!
(Note: She did have some low beneficial flora that we worked on next.)
The results on paper back up what Marina experienced day to day: her digestion has improved. No more bloating or food intolerances.
Not just that, but after years of brain fog, Marina is finally thinking clearly again. She was even able to pass her paramedic cardiac program and enroll in medic school.
Now that the infections are cleared, Marina is working on improving her habits - especially around eating foods that support gut health and getting enough sleep - so that the infections don’t have a chance to come back. I’ll keep working with her to make sure she keeps improving.
It’s Black, White, & Gray
I like to say that I look for “black, white & gray” results with my clients.
I want the black and white stuff - the test results that prove the treatments we’re using are working. And I know those results are important to you, too.
But I also want the “gray” - I want to hear that you’re going out to dinner with your boyfriend and you don't get sick, that you’re finally able to be back in school, that you don’t have to press snooze five times every morning before you drag yourself out of bed.
For Marina, we definitely got the black and white and the gray - and I am so thrilled to see her thriving again after years of struggle.
I hope this has helped you understand what it really is like to work with a Functional Medicine Practitioner. And if you’re ready to take the next step forward in your health, I’d be honored to work with you. You can book a free prospective patient interview anytime here.
