Mold Recovery Beyond Detox with Laurie Hammer

Introduction and Podcast Disclaimer 0:00

So you call, you make an appointment with me. I don't do blood and urine testing for amino acid deficiencies, I use a symptom-based questionnaire because I've found over the years that we don t need to do that other testing to assess the amino acids first. So let's do your neurotransmitters. We meet over a Zoom call and we go based off the assessments. You actually open up the capsule, put the contents under your tongue, and then we wait a couple minutes, stare at each other, then be like, hey, how do you feel?

Do you notice anything different cognitively, emotionally, or physically? And it really does happen that fast. And so we'll go through the amino acids that I send you, decide which ones are best for you. Start you on those. Then we work on foundations. We bring in some detox and go from there and see what's left over. You've tried everything. You changed your diet, you've detoxed, and you even moved homes. And yet you still feel sick. Headaches, brain fog, fatigue that no one can explain. What if it's not you?

What is your environment? Welcome to Mold Microtoxins and More. I'm John Bode. Each week I sit down with experts uncovering how mold, microtuxins, environmental exposures affect your health and what real recovery looks like. Let's get into today's conversation. The information provided on the Mold Pros Podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Listening to the podcast does not create a doctor-patient or professional-client relationship between you and the Podcast host, guest, and Mould Pros.

The content shared should not be used as a substitute for professional medical advise, diagnoses, treatment, And always seek the medical advice of your physician or qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding the medial condition, potential mold exposure, or health concerns. Never disregard professional medical advise or delay in seeking it because of something you heard on this podcast. And while we strive to provide accurate and up-to-date information, we make no representations or warranties of any kind,

Laurie's Background and Amino Acid Therapy 1:58

expressed or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, and suitability of all the information discussed. A guest's experience and outcomes discussed on this podcast are individual cases and should not be considered typical results. Your situation may differ significantly. As always, if you think you have a medical emergency, call your doctor or 911 immediately. By listening to the MolePros podcast, you acknowledge that you understood this disclosure. I'm your host, John Bodie, co-founder of The Bold Pros.

On this podcast, we explore the real-world impacts of environmental exposure, and not just in buildings, but in the human body as well. And we talk with experts who are helping patients recover from environmental illness. Today, I want to give a proper introduction to our special guest, Laurie Hammer. She is a functional nutritional therapist, host of Take Back My Brain podcast, and creator of The Calm Mom Method. is certified in nutritional therapy. Lori personally overcame anxiety, depression, an eating disorder and credits targeting amino acid therapy with changing her life.

Today, she helps others reclaim brain health, emotional balance and resilience through personal nutrition, neuro nutrient support and coaching. Laurie, welcome to the show. Glad to have you. Thanks so much, John. I'm so excited to be here and I love all the stuff that you are doing. Thank you very much. Well, I'm sure my introduction did not do you justice. So before we dig into our conversation today, do mind to share a little bit about your journey and how you became such an advocate of amino acid therapy and shoot for many of us that didn't do great in science class, what exactly is amino-acid therapy?

What is amino acid therapy? Well, amino-acid therapy saved my life back in the day. I was anxious and depressed, had an eating disorder and I introduced to amino acids therapy and my live radically, radically changed because I'm still here. So, aminos are the foundation to everything in life. They are building blocks of everything. You can't have protein if you don't aminoacids. Amino acids are foundation from your hair, skin, and nails. Most people think of amino acids as building muscle, but you need amino acid for your digestive enzymes, for you hormones, estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, everything in your body.

So amino-acids are key. I focus on mainly amino assets to rebuild the brain and specifically our neurotransmitters. And when I was struggling with an eating disorder, my brain was so depleted. And so it kept that bingeing and purging cycle going, the depression, all of those things. So it was very dark. Then I introduced amino acid therapy and that gave me light again. It lifted the Depression. The anxiety stopped that craving cycle. Stopped the seizures, stopped all those things, and I'm here today.

How Mold Exposure Affects Mood and Neurotransmitters 5:00

So it did. It literally, literally saved my life. And now I have two beautiful kids, a husband and two dogs, two cats, rabbit and horses. Life is good. You got regular Noah's ark going on there. I do. Two by two we go here. That's great. For a lot of our clients or patients, a little of business comes from healthcare referral. So many people are struggling from that anxiety, the brain fog, it's a real deal, insomnia, that emotional volatility. Can you explain how mold exposure, from your experience, have you seen how it impacts the function and neurotransmitter balance?

Oh my gosh, it impacts it profoundly. Like you're just saying the brain fog, the anxiety, people are like, all of a sudden I just have anxiety and they have no idea why. And you go through the health history and stuff, you know, when did it start this and that? Usually you can pinpoint a time, in their life where it started. A lot of times it was an environmental issue going on and a lot times that environmental issues was mold. So I see a lot of neurotransmitter depletion, a lots of sleeplessness.

All of a sudden people have hormone issues that they didn't have before after being exposed to mold. Anger issues, you know, kids all of the sudden are more ADD and you think, oh gosh, what's wrong with my kid? Might have mold in your house. So we always want to check those things. Profound, profound mood changes and cognition changes when there's a mold exposure. You've cleaned, repainted, and replaced filters. And still, you're not getting better. Headache, fatigue, brain fog? The doctors can't explain it, but your environment can.

At The Mold Pros, we specialize in uncovering what's hidden in plain sight. Our environmental testing looks beyond surface mold, identifying bacteria, volatile organic compounds, even microtoxins in the air that you breathe. Then we correlate those results with your clinical data, showing how your space may be affecting your health. Next, we use our patented remediation process to safely remove toxins, restore balance, and prevent them from returning. It's more than just a cleanup. it's a science-based system designed to help your body heal by healing the environment first.

If you're ready to breathe freely again, visit TheMoldPros.com and schedule your free consultation. Because wellness doesn't start in the doctor's office, it starts where you live. Now we talked about neurotransmitter balance. Can we dig a little bit deeper? What the heck is that? Yeah, so we've got neurotransmitters in our body. Specifically, we have neurotrasmiters that regulate our mood and so that we can think correctly. So like serotonin is our inner sunshine. And so when seratonin, you know, amplified and there's enough of it in your body, everything looks sunny to us.

Like life is really good. If you don't have enough serotonin you are anxious, depressed. You have PMS, your angry at the drop of a hat. You have different types of food cravings. It may be late afternoon, early evening, you have a hard time getting to sleep, hard times staying asleep. You're kind of hyperactive in your thoughts. Your kind a rabbit trail all around those kinds of things. So that can be a serotonin deficiency. That is your seratonin neurotransmitter. Another neurottransmitters I deal with is GABA.

GABE is a neurotrasmiter that lets us take a deep breath. And let it all out. And then we respond appropriately to stress. So if you don't have enough GABA, you know, your shoulders are up to your ears, You're tense, tight, overwhelmed, anxious all the time.

Understanding Serotonin, GABA, Catecholamines, and Endorphins 8:40

Then there's our catecholamines. Catechylamines give us our drive, our focus. want to in life. And so when those are depleted, that's when you have the ADD, ADHD, apathy, you know, the apathetic depression, your mental energy is low, lots of brain fog. Then endorphins is the other piece that we love to assess. That's where we just have that inner joy. We just feel good and yummy inside, kind of like a warm sweater and a cup of coffee warm. If you don't have enough endorfins, You cry a lot, you're emotionally sensitive, maybe have a little physical sensitivities, fibromyalgia, those types of things.

And then we balance all that out with glucose. So your glucose has to be stable in order for your neurotransmitters to fire correctly. There's amino acids and stuff that balance, all of those. It sounds a bit more complex than what you would think. Yeah, it's not just about muscle building. Our body is beautiful, it's complex, and yet it so basic at the same time. It doesn't take much for those complex systems to work correctly. Yeah. And I would add it resilient. We'll talk a little bit more about that at tell end of this.

There's kind of a standard protocol or pathway that we see everyone going down. So they suspect they have environmental illness, whether it's mold, mycotoxins, or it could be bacteria or VOCs or whatever. Yeah. And they go through and they'll start the, uh, you know, the detox protocols, right? Whether they can call a styramid or something, whatever it is. And what I was really interested to learn about after visiting your website and seeing some of the work that you do is so everyone's familiar with that detox process, but this is kind of.

an augmented or additional step, right? And so I'd like to learn, or if you could share a little bit about how that brain nutrient support actually helps, how it's essential during that recovery process and that detox process. It is because your body relies on amino acids to help with that detox process And if your nervous system, if you're brain is stuck, so when you have an environmental illness, or any illness for that matter, and your Nervous System is Stuck, your body can't heal. It's not going to release those mycotoxins.

Is not gonna release, those heavy metals in your, body because it's still in survival mode. So what the amino acid therapy does is calms the brain, calmes that Nerve system. So that your body can let go. And that's what we want when we've been exposed to mold, heavy metals, all those kinds of things. Our body will drive those deeper into our body. The more stressed out our. Body is. and so we don't want that to happen. We want the body to be relaxed. we. Want the. To feel safe so that the, body, can release those toxins so.

That you're so, that you can heal and. So, your brain fog goes away, you know, Your body aches and pains, whatever is affecting you from this environmental illness. When we call in the brain first, that nervous system support, then everything else gets easier to deal with. Have you seen, for someone that's kind of going through this, you've been in this for a while, are there any particular patterns as it relates to symptoms that would suggest that maybe someone would benefit from this amino acid therapy or support as relates the mood, sleep, and motivation?

Is it something you recommend for everybody that's going down this pathway? How would they know that this is the path to go down, I guess is my question. Yeah. I haven't met anybody who has an environmental illness that doesn't have an amino acid deficiency.

Why Brain Support Matters During Detox 12:22

Okay. Actually, every single client that comes to me, it would be really, really rare in the last 20 plus years that I wouldn't do amino-acid therapy with somebody. I can't imagine not doing it because everybody has some sort of issue of deficiency that we need to fix. And if you have an illness, you'd have a deficiency and foundation to every deficiency is amino acids. Got it. Understood. So if they're going through these detox protocols and like I said, some of those, someone can be really harsh.

Some people just can tolerate them. Does the amino acid protocol, does it just help them tolerate? Does it help him expedite? What's the value add for adding this to that? Yeah. It allows your body to have better opportunity to detox. So when that nervous system is calm, your buddy can detox better. And I would argue that You don't have to do those really harsh detox protocols either. I don' do that with my mold clients. But I do detox, but I dont push the body beyond where the needs to be pushed at the moment.

And so I take a general approach. So I start with the amino acids. We assess diet, lifestyle, all the basic stuff. Then we incorporate some of those detox things as the bodies able to handle it. As your nervous system is healing and calming down, Then we can detox. Good. It almost sounds like you just kind of use an analogy. Before you plant a crop, you have to get the soil where it needs to be. Exactly. From fertilizing, get it to where you can receive what it's going to to move on to the next stage.

So I guess to wrap my little small brain around it, that seems like that's what you're doing. Just really laying the foundation to Yeah. Okay. Well, that makes a lot of sense. All right. Very good. Is a lotta your work just kind of digging into your, you know, how you help folks? Do you partner with other practitioners or is a you know, patient directly contacting you. How does that, how does it normally work? A lot of it's just patient directs because they'll hear me on a podcast or something like that word of mouth.

So that's how I generally get all of that. But I do work in cohesiveness with a lot other practitioners in the industry as well. And people like yourself or, you, know different mold remediation companies will refer people to me or. You know whatever it may be. I think that's really important. We've long believed that the best patient outcomes happens when it's multiple folks helping out with their individual specialty, right? So it is that collaborative approach that really provides for the most outcome for patients.

Oh, absolutely. And I love to be able to refer out too. So, I mean, that collaboration is huge.

Who Benefits from Amino Acid Therapy 15:30

Like I have a family right now, they'd never had their ducks cleaned ever. They had mold in their house and nobody told them to get their ducts cleaned. I said, how long have you lived in this house? you know told me how long and they got their ducks clean and the wife of course because we women are the canaries in the coal mine so all of you men listening out there if your wife says there's a mold issue I guarantee that there is a mould issue she is affected the kids are affected even if you are not feeling it smelling it seeing it I Guarantee it's there.

So listen to the Canary in The Coal Mine. Okay, so And she's like, I feel so much better. She knows there's a difference in the kids, you know, the dogs and all those kinds of things. Speaking of that, i think you have one in a background. I have two in my office right now. The one likes to appear in that in videos quite often. That is hilarious. Yes. If I were today I'm on the road traveling to one of our branches and, and um, normally if in my office, I would have one as well. That makes a great, great work days having the fur babies there with you.

You know, piling on with what you said, you're right. It's typically, unfortunately we hear it all too often. Ladies just tend to be more perceptive or sensitive to these sorts of things. Yeah. And we do some pretty advanced. testing when we come in, so we'll do standardized mold testing, of course, but also we can do some pretty advanced polymerase chain reaction or DNA testing that is super, super sensitive. And then of, course we do micro toxin testing et cetera, and we get those labs back, we go over it and I can't tell you how many times I hear someone saying, see, I told you I wasn't crazy.

It was, it gives them a scientific validation of what they've been going through. Yeah. Yeah, then I hate, I'm not picking on you hubbies out there, but you kind of hold things up. Especially when it comes to this. It is because usually you can't see it, smell it. You don't feel it but it's there. If it is not your reality, you're not living it? Yeah But it's difficult for people, I think, to wrap their brains around, well, we're here in the same house. So if it were really a big deal, wouldn't we all be symptomatic, right?

Yeah. We all get hit by the sick too, and only one person has Lyme. I mean, it just depends on the person's terrain and how it is affecting them. Yeah, no doubt about it. You know, when we talk about the environmental side of things, the first step is to really, make really good data-driven decisions, let science dictate. And so that's the reason why we do some of that comprehensive testing.

Supporting Detox with Foundations and Lifestyle 18:18

But obviously it makes no sense to treat the body without treating the environment because you're just going to get re-exposed. So that is kind of like step one. Then when you focus on treating that person, are there any practical steps or Simple steps that you would recommend, whether it's for a practitioner or for, uh, a homeowner, to begin to support that brain health along with that detoxification. What kind of walked me through that journey of how you get that path added, added to, or going down.

Yeah, absolutely. So I'm always adding in the amino acid therapy, so we're assessing people where they are, what they're deficient in, and then we support that deficiency with those targeted amino acids. We're going to talk about those five areas, the serotonin, endorphin and catecholamines, GABA, glucose regulation. If your glucose isn't balanced, your brain can't be balanced and you will continuously have a deficiency and are not going be able to detox. So we focus on calming that brain down, balancing the glucose, making sure that you're eating super clean so that your body has the opportunity to heal as well, right?

As you trying to detox, because you can't detox if you are eating a crappy diet and you constantly putting more toxins in your bodies. And so, you know, we'll teach other, maybe it's doing a castor oil pack or going to do some sauna or some ozone therapy, hyperbaric, So we'll incorporate lots of different things into that, but we want to address those foundations first. So diets, amino acids, balancing the nervous system, teaching people how to sleep well. If you haven't been sleeping because you've been exposed to mold, we wanna get you sleeping well so that your body can heal and making sure we're assessing those foundation first, If I were someone that's, again, suffering from environmental illness and not feeling well, What's the pet?

Do I give you a call? Are there tests that get taken? Do your analysis or blood work, how do you get down that path? Do you recommend a CGM for the glucose monitoring? What's that look like? I'm just trying to keep it more simple than that, John. So you call, you make an appointment with me. I don't do blood and urine testing for amino acid deficiencies, I use a symptom-based questionnaire because I've found over the years that we don' t need to do that other testing to assess the amino acids first.

Let's do your neurotransmitters. I send you a kit of amino acids, so samples of the amino acid in the mail, you get a box. We meet over a Zoom call and we go based off the assessments. You actually open up the capsule, put the contents under your tongue, and then we wait a couple minutes, stare at each other and be like, hey, how do you feel? Do you notice anything different cognitively, emotionally, or physically? And it really does happen that fast. And so we'll go through the amino acids that I send you, decide which ones are best for you.

Start you on those. Then we work on foundations. We bring in some detox and then we go from there and see what's left over. It sounds like a very personalized approach. Yeah, that's impressive. You can't deal with mold, mycotoxin illness with a cookie cutter approach, it just doesn't work.

Personalized Assessment and Treatment Process 21:38

And that's some of the challenges, some are very modalities or therapies that are out there. It's, it has to be this way for everybody, right? And, and people, people are just different and how they respond to things. So that makes perfect sense. so you've been doing this for a while. And one of things that I always, uh, you know, in helping folks out, like I said, going on now two decades, sometimes people just feel lost and it's like, this is just my lot in life. This is. Just the way it is, I just have to learn to deal with it.

It's not the case oftentimes, right? So if you could share, is there maybe one takeaway that you would have, one kind of beacon of hope for those listening today? If so, what would that be? That would be that our bodies are designed to heal. And so God created us. He created our body to heel. If we remove the interferences, fix those deficiencies. Our body knows what to do. So if you haven't experienced that yet, I want you to know that it's out there. I know some of you are thinking I have tried everything, you have not tried anything.

Seriously, you want me to do another protocol of something? I'm like, no, I've tried it all. And that's not true. Like sometimes you have to go through the weeds in order to get to the really good fruit. So I just had a personal healing in my life. I was like really? After all these years, this is finally healing, but it was really exciting. Had I not stuck with it, wouldn't have never experienced that. Health is a journey. You know, you just have to keep going. We have be good stewards of our body all the time.

If you're dealing something really hard, just keep growing. There are answers out there. about the calm mom. I love the name of it. And I have flashbacks, I had three kids and I just have a flashback on those days with my wife, Diane. It was like, and so tell me, talk to me about to calm Mom. Well, feel every mom should be able to be calm. Like we shouldn't have to feel like we're losing our minds. Our kids are crazy. They're supposed to But, you know, even the kids do like, why are we crazy? So maybe they need to be, they may need some amino acids to, I work with kids too.

But I want every mom to feel calm in their body. I wanted them to love the environment that they're in, and to the family that God gave them right in front of them. And so if we can balance that brain and you respond appropriately to stress and if you're not like I don't know what to do with these children. You know, that's a win because then we have a ripple effect. We are the calm on the whole, we are, the heart of the home is the mom. And so if we're happy, it is true. Everybody else is happy and we had that ripple affect our family, society, and you know it goes out further from that.

Hope, Healing, and The Calm Mom Method 24:28

So I love working with mamas, but I work with other people too. Well, well, That's what my wife keeps telling me. It's that happy wife, happy life thing. She just pounds it in all the time. But anyway. This has been great. I really appreciate you carving out time. It's a little bit different approach. We understand the need for detox and we understand, you know, the needs to address the environment. So I think this is an additional layer. And if it really helps get people on the road to wellness quicker, fantastic.

That is a great message for those to understand. For people that want to learn more or get in contact with you, and then actually they talk with Okay, wow. So what's the best way and how did we listen to your podcast? I'm sure that we'll get all that information posted up for those that are watching on YouTube or what have you, but what is the way to get ahold of you? So on all social media platforms, I am at Take Back My Brain. Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, all those, YouTube as well. Or you can go to my website, LaurieHammer.com, L-A-U-R-I-E, HammerLikeTheTool.

Perfect. Well, thank you so much. And for those listening as we, it's been a great conversation. We'll have to do it again. For those of you listening, remember mold recovery and environmental illness. It isn't just about fixing a building. At the mold pros, you know, we're committed to addressing both the environment and the individual because true healing really requires both. So through our work and our conversations on mold microtoxics and more, We aim to bring clarity, expert insight, and real solutions for those navigating

Where to Find Laurie Hammer and Closing Remarks 26:08

mold exposure or trying to navigate a recovery. so stay informed, stay proactive. And if you've known someone who needs help or support, but we are here to help. Send them this link or send them Laurie's information as well. If you found it helpful, give us a review. That's it keeps us going. It helps us spread this message. So we really appreciate you listening. And this has been mold, mycotoxins and more, and we will see you next week. Thank you. You've been listening to Mold, Microtoxins and More with John Bodie.

If you're ready to take the next step towards a healthier home, follow the show and visit TheMoldPros.com for your free consultation. Because clean air is the first step to true healing.