How To Work With A Health Coach To Achieve Your Goals

Beth's MS Diagnosis Story 0:00

Welcome, Beth. I'm so glad that you agreed to be a part of this little short talk that we're going to do. what I'd like to have you start with is explaining briefly your story. All right, so I am Beth Schultz, and I am a wealth warrior. I was diagnosed with MS. 18 years ago. Prior to getting kind of choked up, though. You know, it was hard. 18 years ago, I was a single mom, and a five year old child. I was a bartender that was on my feet, running around a lot of stuff to remember. And out of the blue.

I lost partial eyesight and one eye. I thought I had a migraine. I went to urgent care about five days after, because a migraine had never lasted that long for me, and my eyesight still hadn't returned. And the one I. And after they gave me a medication for a miss, a shot or for a migraine, a shot, and it didn't do anything. So they sent me right up to ophthalmology and they said, I think you have a mass of optic neuritis. I didn't know what it was, but I thought wheelchair and I thought that. That's crazy. I'm walking just fine.

I just can't see well, what I have my best. And I had an MRI the next day. I got to meet with the neurologist the next day, and I only had that one lesion, so they can't diagnose see with MS. and he said hopefully it you know, this is an isolated incident. Nothing ever will happen again. If it does call us back in two months later, my eyesight returned. I was sure I would be fine. And three days later, I lost partial eyesight in the other eye. the next MRI showed then two lesions in both eye nerve and one on my brain.

And I was diagnosed with MS.

Failed Treatments and Worsening Symptoms 2:06

I followed the standard of care. I tried to abinex, which is an injectable. that was horrible. It was nine months of I couldn't get out of bed for two days a week or two days a week. And as a single mom and a bartender, you can't spend two days in bed a week. I finally got off at about nine months later because my symptoms were not slowing down either. I was still having, a new flare every two months at that time than I had lost feeling in the left side of my body. the brain fog got very bad fatigue.

eyesight just kept going. One eye to the other. I probably had at least 20 cases of optic neuritis. I tried Copaxone, which is another injectable. I didn't have any horrible side effects on that, so I stayed on that for a few years. But still, my symptoms didn't seem like they were slowing down or stopping. At one time, a doctor told me that I should try the low fat diet, that it might, slow my progression a little bit. So I think I followed the diet for about five days, and I it just didn't seem worth it to me because it might help a little bit.

There was no explanation of how it would help, why it would help. so I did do that. And then one day I was scrolling through Facebook, and this is about nine years into my journey, and me and my mom were going through Facebook and a TED Talk pops up. Doctor gets a wheelchair. Within a month. I pressed play and I got up and we just stopped and I said, that's it. I'm going to do it and it's going to work. And I did. And at that time I was kind of getting into alternative medicine. And I did have a belief that your body could heal.

I was, my practitioner put me on a vegan diet and I was feeling a little bit better. I had been a vegan in the past and I don't do well as a vegan. So when I saw your TED Talk and I saw nine cups of vegetables and some healthy meat that really that spoke to me at the time, I hadn't had meat in about nine months, and I had this, stake in Brussel sprouts the very next day. And I started reading up on your Protocol. And I have never eaten gluten in my life since that day. And that was ten years ago, and I have been in remission for nine years.

the last time I had an eye exam, the ophthalmologist said that

Discovering the Wahls Protocol 4:39

he couldn't tell that I had ever had a case of optic neuritis, and was shocked of how healthy my nerves were. So I, I give you all you lost a little bit of weight and you lost your weight too, didn't you? I did, I lost 100 pounds when I first started the Protocol. And you never were hungry? No, not at all. No. Nine cups of vegetables. There's a lot of food. And then you, transformed. your profession. And you since become a health coach. So why, why did you do that? I just didn't want anybody to ever feel as bad as I felt for so long.

Knowing that there is so much hope and there's so much that we can do and so much that we can control about our health. I just had to share that with the world. and, you know, Beth, you're certainly a big part of our clinical practice and our coaching programs. Let's sort of talk through, what role a health coach has for our patients in either my programs or in my clinical practice. What do you do, with these folks? You know, for me, it's all about them and all about them as an individual. Everybody is different.

Everybody kind of works differently, needs different motivations. So my first step is really getting to know them, getting to know their goals, how they work, how they function. I want to meet them where they are at. and so you're helping clarify their goals, their next actionable steps. and, you know, sometimes helping them, I know, make their goals a little bit smaller. So the next actionable step they're going to be successful with and then, how often are you meeting with people, when they're in, to set these goals?

Is this, like, daily or what? What kind of frequency are you are you doing this? it depends on the person and their time and what they have. sometimes for some of our programs, we meet every week. another program we meet every other week for the first three months, and then we do once a month after that.

Recovery, Weight Loss, and Becoming a Health Coach 7:00

I think frequency with a health coach is better, I think at least once a month, at minimum, and preferably once every two weeks. So, again, everyone who's listening, we know that, sports teams, use coaches, business, folks and entrepreneurs use coaches. It makes sense to me that more integrative, functional medicine physicians are using health coaches to help people set goals, to have someone to check in with each, at a grade point frequency, to let them know how I'm doing with, that agreed upon.

Next step and the progress that I'm making then to help me identify my useful next goal. now, another thing that we do, is that we train other health professionals, chiropractors, physical therapist, occupation therapist, physician, social workers, people with a health related license or certificate, so they can use the walls protocol in their clinical practice to support patients in their health and wellness journey. So that's what I'd like to have you do is talk a little bit about our Certification Program and your role, with that.

I am the coordinator for the Certification Program. So if you already have a, like you said, a license or a certificate in a health related field, I personally went to the Nutritional Therapy Association program. I consider I am your health coach and you apply to be in the program. You need to send me your credentials, fill out an application,

Health Coaching and Certification Program 8:43

we review them. if you have everything you need, you get started. Right now we have 17 modules. They are incredible. They talk all about diet, lifestyle, all, behavioral coaching. And because really, you know, your book tells everybody how to do everything. Your diet is laid out very well, but it's. How do you do it? is a very hard part. Our mindset is so important. And and as a health coach, I feel like that's what I do. You know, I help people get their. And if you do not have a license or certificate in a health related field, if you are thinking of being a health coach, reach out to me and, I can help you find some programs that would be right for you.

There's a lot of really great health coaching programs that people can do in less than a year's time. Correct? and the people, once they, apply the, for the program, they enroll, then, these are online, modules. So that works out, really well. now, for all the public folks who are, listening to this, I would think you're like, man, I would like to see a Wahls trained, person who's either a physical therapist, a talk therapist, physician, chiropractor. We have them, all over the world. why do they find them on our website?

on the very front of the website, you will see a place to click on the Wahls Protocol health practitioner directory. You can, search by state, country, city, virtual. That is, the virtual option is a very important thing. If there's nobody in your area, look for a virtual person and they can work on zoom, or any other video platform that they use. And then you can also go into advanced search and you can search by specialty and conditions that people have.

Finding Practitioners and Final Advice 10:51

It's a really great directory, you know, and we I've had a number of people who have been, professions, accountants, lawyers, engineers who lose their professions because of their, MS. or other neuroimmune problem and then discover my work, and work with their practitioner, with their, physician and get their health back. And now they're ready to, to work again, but they don't feel like being an engineer. They don't feel like being a lawyer because that doesn't speak to them anymore. But what speaks to them?

and we're we've had folks go back and, take science and go be a dietitian or, you know, bless them. They go back and want to go be a physician assistant or be a chiropractor, or now go be a, social worker or people decide that, they want to do what Beth did is perhaps a, go to where the nutrition certificate programs or be a health coach, and then come back, reach out and get certified. So, Beth, for anyone who's listening here, what what is the, one message you would like to give them? You know, thinking about where you were at, how how how low life got for you and how rich your life is now, what what message do you have for everyone who's listening?

Believe that you can get better. Believe that life can get better. I really believe, what we think matters a lot and know there's so much you can do. You. You are in control of your health. And you, there's so much you can do for yourself. Okay, so thank you. Beth, this has been wonderful. and again, thank you for being part of the miss. A neuro immune summit. Thank you. Dr. Wahls.