Why most therapy doesn’t work: Real psychological solutions

Introduction to Integrative Mental Health 0:00

Welcome to the Bio Optimized Summit, where we explore the next level of physical and mental health you can reach through intentional and targeted optimization. I'm Doctor Amy, your host, and today we have Doctor Roseanne Kapono Hodge. I am so excited for this interview because she is really going to tackle mental health from a different perspective than what you are used to. She is the director of the 360 Reboot Intensive Therapies program, which is amazing and she's going to be talking to us about what are some of those components in her program today?

She runs a center for Integrative Mental health support. She's been working for over 25 years now in the field. And so she does neurofeedback, biofeedback, counseling, a whole host of holistic therapies, somatic experiencing. This woman does it all. And what I love about her, of course, is that she is focused on doing things that actually work and are effective and can help people get results as fast as possible, which is what I love to do as well. So today we're going to be talking about the four books that she recently wrote in the last few months during this pandemic, and these are coming under the Global Institute of Children's Mental Health all around.

This idea of it's going to be okay. So welcome, doctor. Roseanne Kapono Hodge, thank you so much for your time today. Well, thanks for having me. And thank you for that lovely intro. I'm pretty darn excited about what I do. So when I meet somebody else like you who, you know, I'm really into not just integrative methodologies, but really proven integrative methodologies and teaching people about how, not just how effective they are, but how quickly they can work. Is really exciting to me. And I could talk about it all day.

Awesome. Well, let's get started with talking about the eight pillars to reverse mental health. Let's start with that. And then we can talk about the 360 reboot program. But what are these eight pillars that you teach? So, you know, over these 30 years that I've been involved in mental health, you know, I grew up as somebody, daughter of Italian immigrants. So I've always been holistic. So when I came in in mental health, I didn't understand that mental health wasn't really holistic. I really believed over this time that it would evolve because we have so much great information about the efficacy of nutrients and exercise and all that other stuff.

All you have to do is just Google and look up research. And so what I've been doing during this time is teaching people about what everybody in functional medicine and functional mental health teaches, that there's pillars, there's things that we have to do that

The Eight Pillars of Mental Health Recovery 2:51

are lifestyle components, that we have to integrate into our daily lives. It's just what it is. So, you know, it's nutrition. It's looking at, you know, the impact of genetics, which we really have advanced in the last ten years. You know what happens? You know, one of the big ones is MT GFR, but there's a whole bunch of other genetic mutations. You know, it's, sleep. It's your stress levels, you know, and using brain based therapy. So it's really taking a really, a wide approach and integrating these different components, which can feel overwhelming for people.

I always start with nutrition, and that is key. Key, key. You know, what you put in your mouth actually affects your brain. I mean, it just does. And, you know, you have to stop thinking about food as it's I'm not going to be able to have X, Y, and Z instead of thinking, I get to have this. And this is how it makes me feel, right? So, you know, teaching people about that and making it actionable. So, you know, in the books that I'm doing, I have, a parent book called It's Going to Be okay. And it's that's really where we do the deep dive into the eight pillars and, and it walks to step by step approach to healing your child, you know, mental health issues.

And and really, even though this is a parent book because parents are feeling really overwhelmed, our level of issues, Amy, with children is extreme. You know, 1 in 2 children in America have a physical or mental health problem. So that's really what it's about. And it's applicable to people of every age. And for people that are experiencing that journey and walking through these different lifestyles changes, it's pretty exciting because they actually see the difference. And I love to start with food, even though it's I always say it's easier to change your religion than your diet.

It's true. It is. I see the fork come over that when I'm like, getting rid of gluten, you know? And I want to say, I don't want anybody to think that you should. That if you can tolerate gluten and you're having organic gluten, good for you, right? But most people are coming to me, and there have high levels of inflammation. I can see it on a brain map. So one of the things that I do is very, very different is diagnostics. And in mental health it is based on guesswork. People come in, they sit down, parents and people are often shocked at how quickly you can diagnose people with ADHD or whatever ailment is going on.

Depression. And people are often misdiagnosed, right, because they'll go for that treatment for that issue. And not only a lot of times things will get better, they often worsen. So we have two sets of amazing tools for diagnostic that are virtually ignored. In our field, they're evidence based. One is shaggy brain map. And that's what I do. And the other is functional testing. And, you know, you shouldn't ever ignore lab work, basic lab work, nutrient level theory. But we also have lab work that looks at your neurotransmitters.

You know this doctor Amy. And so we have to start with that. And when I start with that and a brain map, it's a visual representation of the health of the brain. We know exactly what the brain does. There's no guessing. You know, your frontal lobes are low activity. Guess what? You can't focus your limbic system is high. Guess what? You're going to be very emotional. Yeah. So I do a brain map. I look at it and I'm like this, this and this and this is going on. Anybody who's ever had one with me, it's it's unbelievably accurate.

And then you can look at what are those most effective treatments prove and treat that work for them. And that's why I love what you do, because you're able to be very intentional and targeted in your approach. You're you're not guessing. You're not saying, well, you're having some anxiety. You're having some focus problems. Let's throw this at it and just see what happens and come back in six weeks and let me know. Right. Like, yeah, no. Third eye is usually where people start. And you know, we're you know I hope this resonates with people.

You know, that anything can impact your attention. Trauma. You know, chronic stress, you know, thyroid deficiency. You know, Epstein-Barr. And so jacking yourself up and ruin for some people may give an immediate relief, but it quickly decompensated you. And it could be some of the worst things that can happen for you if you have a history of trauma, you have adrenal fatigue. It's only going to worsen it. So what I love about the brain map is, you know, I'm so skilled at this now that I can see certain nutrient deficiencies, physical or emotional trauma is very evident in the brain.

So it's very common when I work with an adult, that sometimes, you know, people actually forget that they have head injuries all the time. There's. I got some really funny stories about that, but, emotional trauma. So people don't always bring that to the table. Napkins are hiding something because sometimes people don't. It's really even get how much something impacted them in their life. You know? Oh, yeah. My dad was an alcoholic. He yelled all day long, well, so did a lot of people mail equate that to impacting their physical health today or their mental health?

So the brain map really shows you that because there are certain areas that will activate or deactivate based on different experiences that you have, and they're long term experiences, I'm not going to see if you just had a bad week, you know, the brain takes a long time to, to have its rhythm. So it's it's very, very powerful and affirming for people because you can say this is what's going on. You can see Lyme disease, you can see concussions. And, you know, for example, males, most males have had a history of concussion and they may not be terribly affected by it, but also may have been something that was the beginning of The Undoing.

And people don't connect that. And yet now today, they're diagnosed with anxiety or depression or addiction.

Brain Mapping and Functional Diagnostics 9:39

So it's a wonderful starting point, doctor Amy. It really is. And I mean, as you're saying this, I'm having these memories of when I was first exposed to Doctor Daniel, a men's work and being able to actually see in the brain scans where a person would have hit their head and it was like, oh my goodness, you're right. Like that does cause a compromise. It does cause lasting change on a cellular tissue level. Of course, we're going to need to address that when they then start to have any kind of mental health symptoms, because we're having to work with an unbalance, an insult, an injury that hasn't been able to fully repair.

And that the last talk that I went to that he did, he actually showed his latest scans where he's able to now, as you're saying, that you're able to see, the areas in the brain where, emotional trauma has permanently affected those tissues on a cellular level. And again, it was just kind of like, oh my goodness. Like, if people only knew that this was a real thing, they wouldn't be, you know, disregarding its value and significance in their life and know that, no, like, this is something that you need to actually nurture your nurture your body, nurture your cells, nurture your nervous system in order to get back to a place of thriving because it causes a permanent, compensation, a permanent insult if we're not being able to address it.

And with your work, you're able to see exactly where it is and often the degree to which it's being affected. And so being able to be very intentional and targeted then, and accelerate them getting back to a place of thriving, even if you're working with something like anxiety. But if this is part of their history, we've got to work with that. I mean, it's, you know, our what's functional medicine is all about root causes, right? So we have to really identify and and that even when I look at the brain, I might not, you know, know the exact root cause, but you can narrow it down.

So like a really good example would be most brains I see have inflammation. We're living in a world where we have lots of things that create inflammation. And so depending on where it is, the degree of what it is, because, you know, when when somebody has an extreme amount of information, for example, they have a lot of excessive low frequency brain waves, which which are called delta. And they shouldn't be out predominantly during the day. So you can have people that are more than two standard deviations out diffusely, and it doesn't look like a head injury.

But then you have to go out through the list. Rule out. Right. And what are the symptoms paired with it. So it's a wonderful it's there's still clinical interview because you have to understand what could be. But then you can do further diagnostic. So for example with Lyme disease I never had a patient where I said this is Lyme disease, where it wasn't Lyme disease. So, you know, it's prevalent and it's not just people coming to me in the northeast with people flying in all the time. So, and it's we have to start thinking more about the, you know, we say all the time in, in mental health, you know, mind, body and spirit.

But we're not changing what we're doing since I've been in it for 30 years, are still doing the same things that they were doing 30 years ago. And in fact, I believe the quality of care has gone down because 30 years ago, what let's say somebody was getting medication, which is not shouldn't be your first line of defense. It should be the last line of defense. Right. After you've explored other more effective methodologies, people used to go into the hospital to get titrated on medication if they were really had a lot of chronic issues.

And that's just not happening today. So so they were able to say, oh, look, this person reacts with this dose or maybe that. And I used to see that things were more effective. But we're in a state where we need to really look at, you know, the right diagnostic. I always say check under the hood and get a check under the hood, and then pair those treatments that have the best research, that without it, you know, particular issue or problem. And it has to be the right treatment at the right time, in the right order, because that's the other part of things.

So I'm, you know, I do this 360 reboot my trademark program, and it's it's an all in program. It's an intensive, and why I do an intensive is that just hacking into the brain and not knowing what we know about neuroscience in the brain? If I can act in a very methodical, synergistic and bio individual way, what each person needs a combination of brain based therapies, neurofeedback, biofeedback, even specific physical exercises. It could be brain gym, it could be occupational therapy, it could be yoga, could be bodywork.

We everybody does Reiki and a lot of different types of psychotherapy, including somatic experiencing, EMG tapping. We've even done, you know, we have hypnosis, with somebody who doesn't knows is on staff. Whatever is appropriate and unique for that person in this incredibly detailed and synergistic manner, including diet and neck in a physician functional physician care people make very, very rapid changes in two weeks. It's pretty mind blowing when you apply the science and you make people do the work, because the other part of this in mental health is that we've now told people there's a quick fix.

Yeah, they're expecting a pill to take it away. Doesn't work right now. Yeah, yeah. It doesn't work like that because you and I wouldn't be so busy doing what we're doing. Right? And I just don't see medication working for most people. That's not to say that I haven't ever. I'm actually saying it's rare. Think it's really rare that I see people take a pill, because guess what? If you have a few issues, if you have behaviors that need to be unlearned, then only happens through therapeutic work. It just becomes a whole lot easier when you hear what I do is, you know, we pair with neurobiology math and we start with the right therapy, which is basically never talk therapy.

It's never CBT, it's never DVT. And most therapists are doing a lousy job with CBT. And I'm saying this as a former college professor and somebody who's mentored people for over 20 years, and supervised a team of therapists, so right now my first book is Tell Therapy Toolkit. It's virtual therapy techniques, for therapists who are working with adolescents, children and adolescents because

The 360 Reboot Intensive Program 16:48

I was pretty mortified when I looked at what people are doing. And really, it started with that. I was looking for more support for my therapist, who always have done virtual work, but not predominantly. Right. So now there's the switch. And so, in the Facebook groups and I see people saying they're playing Minecraft with the clients. No, sorry. That's not therapeutic. No. That's going to keep people stuck. Like, how is that actually going to change the nervous system and the wiring and how it's connected.

And communicating to change anything. And what skills are they learning right. So so I wrote a book that has real therapeutic techniques that are easy to use, because I also want to say that when I started, I was a therapist. Right. Okay. I had a so I had, you know, a or a doctorate and you I had a higher level of training. Right. Plus, being, you know, when the teacher said if you want to get these for other books, I mean, they're not in the course. You know, I got the for the books, you know, and you need and, and I was just the way that I am a very nerdy, I love information.

I still spend time every single day. There's not a day that goes by that I don't do some level of training, whether it's a book or a podcast or whatever. It's just who I am. So when you start out just like in medicine, you're kind of thrown in and depending on who your mentor is, it sort of depends, right? So when I entered, you know, my first real full, full, full time job after my doctorate was working in a school system and the people that I was working with were supervising me, really only saw me as somebody who was just going to take work from them, like to take their work.

They didn't really care about me. They didn't care about growing me. You know, I asked every question I could and try to pick people's brains. So I gravitated towards a style of therapy, which was awesome. It was called solution focused therapy. And it's a great therapy for people working in a school because you're doing a lot of quick intervention course, I saw some kids for the whole four years that they were there. And, you know, even did couples counseling like there is great. But, you really don't have good information.

I think what's happening now in the world of tele therapy is the majority of therapists, we're not doing tele therapy. This is, like, completely new to them. Yeah. So I wanted to create something that really can help, you know, help turn the dial for them and for their clients. Right. Even like, especially especially right now, more than ever now we need to be focused on what is effective, what's actually going to help people. Because there's a growing mental health crisis with isolation, with quarantine, with the changes, with having to wear masks and feeling like you can't breathe well, and then that's causing anxiety.

Like there's a growing mental health concern. And then providers are now being asked to do more telemedicine. They how do they translate what they do in person with somebody and still have it be effective and actually get results and get solutions with the people they're working with? So yes, this is this is specifically. Exactly. Yeah. It's actually going to be the first book ever written, on this topic. And I'm glad that I'm doing it. There'll be a follow up course with APA, you know, seize on it, too.

But, you know, I think that's the hard part is, you know, therapists, well-meaning people, you know, is, is that training component about what's really brings the efficacy to the treatment and also how do we monitor it? What are the metrics? Right. So how are we measuring this? How are we tracking this? How are we tracking it. So prior to me having brain maps you know I always, always did my own Likert scale or a formal pre and post. For a lot of reasons because sometimes clients lack insight into their own progress.

And I want them to celebrate and see those stats. Right. So I think the first thing we need to do in mental health is tell clients. And I tell them this all the time, and most of my clients are so motivated that they do the work. It's rare that people discontinue treatment with me. And let me tell you, I'm like, this is how it's going to go. We're going to do a lot of different things. We're going to support you in that. Right. And that's what's different. It's not like, oh yeah, here you go. Go go ahead. Right.

I mean, I wrote my, my it's going to be okay book. With, with a cookbook to go with it and a gratitude journal and some fun stuff. Because I wanted people to have that information. There's a lot people can do. Adults, parents, they can do a lot of the stuff on their own. But that's therapeutic work. You need a partner and there's never shame with it. You need to be walked through and you need to be seeing what your progress is like. What what are your goals? Right. So I always do an individual behavioral reading of brain maps.

So I do a pre, I do a mid, I do a post. And it's just so cool to actually see what happens in the brain. I mean I've even had people do Q with me and they remove just gluten and they do counseling and remove gluten. Go in and they're like, we do pre and post. I've had people do grains, so they do qigong. Like it's just incredible. If people want to use that. It's really an objective tool to see what actually is happening. In the brain and, and for all my pans pandas a Lyme folks, we a lot of times, I mean, there's a lot of different treatments that I do with them, and they have to have like some of the strictest diets,

Therapy Training and Measuring Progress 22:48

because their system is so reactive and so we have to just get the healing, kick it kick start the healing, you know, and I always say, don't look at it as what you can't have, right? Look at it. What's actually going to help you and lift you and feel better. Right. That's what you have to shift in your mind. And I do all these things, so I'm always like, oh, I hear it, you know? And if I can get a mother with three autistic kids to go paleo, I want to hear your story. You know, and she's not a wealthy person like, she she figured it out.

So, you know, there's always barriers and there's lots of little steps. And people need to understand that there are steps and that healing looks like this doesn't look like this, right? Even though these tools that I use absolutely accelerate it like it's incredible how much it can, you know. Right. The tools that we use like bring change much quicker. And that's why I started doing this is because I what I was seeing was people being stuck in some type of therapy or on medications for years, and they just kind of would settle with that, expect that to be normal.

And and I didn't want that for myself. I didn't want that for my son. So it was like, no, like, what can I do to actually change this? What can I do to rewire this? And then follow up question to that was, and how do I do that as fast as possible? And so being able to being able to objectively measure we do that. And on the medical side of things, and how much more important when we're dealing with mental health where there can already be discouraged, mean and motivation issues, if we're not actually being able to measure their progress and say, look, this is how the changes that you have made are making a difference, then, yeah, it's it can be very discouraging because it's not it's not a direct line up for healing with mental health.

It's no, it's not, it is. And, you know, a few weeks ago I had a mom with, I mean, some of the parents I work with. Oh, my God, they're just so amazing and so many things I've learned over the years. And I work with all ages. I just work with a lot of parents because guess what happens as moms rate my own kids. You know, I have one child with with wine, another who who's, dyslexic. But, you know, it's like I'm taking marriage offers now, he's that often. He's only nine and joke around. Anybody who knows me knows I like to have fun, right, too.

So, but, you know, parents are discouraged, and I recently had a mom who was. She went and she her child has fragile x, and, you know, and I'm giving you I never tell you the full story. Just so you know, everybody's confidentiality is preserved. But basically what happened is the nurse told her, your child will never you won't go to college, you won't get married. He's not going to do any of this. And she was like, what? What? I mean, three years old. They're telling this kid, right? She was like, I'm not doing that.

So she got to me and I'm like, what does that even possibility? I mean, what are you talking about? And, you know, he's got a normal IQ. I mean, so there's a lot of things to do to do. And even if he didn't have a normal IQ, he's only three years old. I mean, the excitement for me to work with a three year old, I can still help you at 81. But the neuroplasticity of a child under age eight is so different, and I can do so many formative things. I mean, we're not telling people, people get angry with me.

I mean angry other professionals because guess what? You can reverse your stuff. People like you shouldn't say that. Absolute. You can at least reduce. But I work with people all the time. My friends who are integrative help people reverse mental health symptoms. Yep, all the time. And so we need to turn that on for people. And we need to stop pretending like that can happen. You know, like, you know, people say to me like, why? Why are more people doing well? There's a lot of reasons. You need a very high level of training.

The system was set up with cuz we're kind of like literally one man was sort of running it. There was that part of it that's kind of monopoly's broken up, but it also wasn't covered by insurance. So now there's research being done indirectly because of me, at Jefferson University in Philadelphia. And they will have research, that is going to permit in the next few years for it to be covered. So it's that's one part of it. But we still have functional medicine testing and people need to realize that mental health is not only the result of genetics and neurotransmitters.

You know, we have inflammation, we brain, you know, brain structure. There's just a lot, you know, brain waves, there's a lot of things that impact your mental health. And many of them are physical, which means you have really an ability to turn things around. Which is why I always tell every parent and why my books called it's going to be okay because it's going to be okay. You can make things better, and we can't get eclipsed in the sphere. And, you know, when you're working with an integrative provider and you're making that stuff, you have to trust them and you have to partner with them and you have to be in it for the long haul.

So even though I can accelerate things, Doctor Amy can accelerate things. There's work. It's there's no magic wand. And many times I do have a magic wand in my office, and I do pull it out when people say I can't do sessions on their own, I don't notice anything. And I'm like, who the hell told you it's going to change in two sessions? It's not. You'll feel. You'll feel something. You'll feel relief. I mean, especially if you're really wound up. But there's so so there's a mismatch expectations.

But it's by driven by people who want to profit on keeping you on this medication cycle. And you know, like you said, it's so sad when somebody thinks, oh, you know, I have to, you know, always be at a very high level. Depression. Can we, can we imagine, like pushing it down where you have very minimal levels of depression? I mean, I'm sure you're like me. I've seen people turn their lives around and just have a completely different trajectory, completely different. Yeah. And and I feel grateful to always be a part of that journey.

And you know for parents, parents come to me because

Family Healing, Hope, and Nervous System Regulation 29:24

what do we want you more than anything. We want our kids to be happy and well so I can whole family change. Right? Because they're invested in this one kid, you know, and I'm like, we got to do the whole diet for the whole family, you know, this kind of stuff. And, and, and I talk about diet just again, because it's easy. It's not the only thing. It's you might need to meditate together as a family every day, you know, doing somatic experience. These are things that everybody can share and do EFT tapping.

Like, you know, I drive like this around here in traffic, but, trying to regulate my nervous system because that's my petty annoyance in life is the people that drive in the passing lane. You know who you are and you share. But those are the kind of things that build in our life and that we need to teach people about it. They can turn those around and like, you're right, Doctor Amy, what a what a time that we're in. Right. And things were already bad for people before. It just feels worse. Right.

So this was my current creative period, and I wrote more books and did a lot of other things. So let's not go into that. And but it is there's a collective sadness like, you know, recently Michelle Obama came out and I was so grateful that she did that. She's feeling depressed because of this sort of collective sadness with the pandemic. Our current administration and racism. And I and I think she did so much for mental health. But really what she's highlighted is that everyone is kind of feeling off moms and dads are feeling very overwhelmed.

They're working from home, you know, these kids that they're are going to go to school. You know, it's going to be some kind of hybrid, if not full home learning. We're not equipped to be teachers, you know? And, so, you know, it's those daily things that we can do for ourselves that can support our nervous system, that will help, for our children and ourselves. These are stress inoculate. So you don't have to live in this clinical, you know, distress of whatever happens. And, you know, for, for most people, it builds and.

Right. And so there's a lot of things we can do. And that's what I always wanted. That's my you know, my mission is to change the way we view and treat mental health. Right. And particularly for children because parents are really motivating for, for their families, you know, and, if that makes a mom or dad change it for themselves, that's just a win, right? But I wish more parents did take care of themselves just because they feel like they deserve it. Well, that and as you mentioned, just the stress level and the kids are home more and parents are working from home more.

Just the nervous system of a parent is going to affect the regulation and the nervous system of their children. And so now many of them are going to be forced to do this kind of work and learn about their nervous system, learn how to shift it, whether with somatic experiencing, tapping, I mean, there's a whole bunch of different things that they can learn that they can do safely at home, but they do. They have to be more mindful now of where their system is at, because that's going to be affecting the emotional mental state of their children just by that regulation effects that we get from each other's nervous system.

I mean, it's so true. I mean, you know, I always say to my mamas, you know, we got our stuff together. Our kids do too, not to make any of anybody feel worse, but it's I just say that's a kick in the butt to take care of yourself. Like self-care is such a buzzword and we think it's a privilege, right? Like, I know when I was in the throes of my son in the early stages of his Lyme disease, he got it at 22 months. I kept thinking that it was a secret because I didn't know that we were going to be dealing with Lyme disease.

Like, you know, he's 15 and and we still have how we manage it. Right. So I didn't understand that. So I let self-care go, right? I let it go and it's not healthy, you know, and when we do things like meditation or daily like heart mass biofeedback. Yeah. Easy to right love. Marcus and I do PMF every day. So I, you know, I have all this equipment. So I joke every you know, I joke constantly that, yeah, I'm like a junkie to this stuff. So, you know, I just, I just sessions of neuro. In all fairness though, that's probably what's allowed you to use this as a creative period and write for books rather than being overwhelmed and, and depressed and struggling.

Right. Like you've got all the tools and you're using them and look at look at the results. And I don't have a perfect life either. So I am very passionate about what I'm doing. And that certainly brings a different quality to your life when you, I'm very this was my calling and, I was guided to do this work as a very, very young child. And so how blessed am I to be able to be helping? And, you know, I am pushing this out on a much broader level. You know, the the media that I've done in one year has reached over 1 billion people.

Awesome. Yay, yay. So I'm bringing integrative mental health yes to the masses. And that's really my intention because I want people to feel hopeful. And I think and that's why I start, you know, people come to see me, right? And they're like, my world record. I was the 55th person that somebody had seen. But it's pretty typical for me to be for provider 12. Exactly. Pretty far down that list. I'm okay with that, you know? You mean like, really? Really. And you know, what the research says is that 30% of all child wellness visits are parents asking for help about their kids behaviors that are dismissed? Yep.

So they're asking and I'm not getting directed. I'm not I'm not criticizing pediatricians. It's I it's here's what we're asking. Let's give pediatricians the ability to direct people. So, you know, with neuro feedback, the American Academy of Pediatrics says it's a level one intervention, the same as psychostimulants for ADHD. But yet almost no pediatricians are recommending it. I have not seen that recommended. Yeah. And it's their American Academy of Pediatrics. It's their recommendation for 2012.

So why isn't that happening I don't know I mean that's part of why it's not how they're trained, like they're trained in conventional medicine and medications and pharmacology. That's what they know. That's what they how they've been trained. Yeah. And yet some of my strongest refers are pediatricians because once they see what happens right back with our clients and how how you can turn things around, you know, it's I have a ton of teachers that come to me too, because they'll see the kids in their class and they'll ask the parent what they're doing.

They're always ask the kid. They always ask. Going back to school typically is one of my favorite times of the year, because I get a lot of kids that do neuro intensity intensively over the summer, and we pair it with psychotherapy and things. And so when they go back, I always get like ten parents who call me up with a chuckle and say, you know, they asked, I want to know what minutes they were on, you know? And I tell them, no, I mean, what we did. And, so it always fills my cup. I mean, really honestly, to see what has happened to so many of the individuals that I've worked with over the years and how, well, you know, they've sustained themselves.

I mean, I grew to neurofeedback just like you because I saw people struggling and I had a client who did it, and it was truly the worst case of ADHD I've ever seen in my life still. And he was so dramatic, I said, I must get trained in this. And, you know, the research is just, you know, there's over 3000 peer reviewed studies, but there's tens of thousands of studies and there's research that shows that as far as ten years out, these changes are lasting. So you know, and that's what I'm seeing anecdotally, which is pretty darn cool.

But, you know, I think that people need to realize that no matter what is going on with them, there is a way to turn things around. And they need to look beyond traditional allopathic medicine. They need to really look at what's happening. Then they need to pay for the right therapy and they need to partner. They need to do the work. You can't just pop a pill and expect it to change because it's not right. And you have all of these integrative approaches that are evidence based, that can accelerate this process and create this lasting change in the nervous system.

And at the same time, we have to have the foundation of these eight pillars that you talk about in order for these therapies and approaches to be effective. Because if we're fighting someone's biology, we're not going to get that progress. And those results that we would otherwise if their body if their biology is also well managed and not struggling with nutritional imbalances, deficiencies, inflammation, injuries, whatever, whatever it is that we can address with the lifestyle and diet and sleep and exercise movement, all of that so important really, it's it's so important.

And, you know, people should really feel empowered. Then they can they hear there's eight pillars. But guess what? You do it a little bit at a time, and each one brings you into another level that makes it easier to do the work. And I think when people are so stop, which many people are, and even young children, I see them treatment resistant, treatment resistant, you know, and, you know, activated nervous systems are not able to move forward. So if you've had trauma, you've had chronic stress. Who hasn't had chronic stress?

You know what I'm saying? Your nervous system in a hyper state will not allow your body to heal itself, whether it's physically this you're in neuroscience in the in the survival system. It is stuck there. Yeah. The great news is there's lots of ways to manage lots of what you have neurofeedback, all those other things. They all are effective. And so it's not one thing. So there's lots of ways for people to heal themselves and really to have a much happier and better quality of life. And that's important for people to really feel that hope.

Yes. And that's what I'm really getting from this interview today, which I really appreciate from you, is this hope that there is so much that can be done. They don't have to settle for a lifelong struggle with depression, anxiety, loss of focus, whatever it is that they are struggling with and that actually through being very intentional in how you measure things going into it, you can create a very individualized program for them that will help them accelerate this process, get them these results so that they're experiencing significant shifts relatively quickly compared to how long it took them to get there.

Definitely. Good. Well, thank you so much for joining us today. Like I said, I am I'm walking away with with just a shared, passion for yours with bringing hope to people who are looking for answers when it comes to mental health for themselves, for their children and wanting solutions. And that's exactly what you've provided today, and I really appreciate you taking the time to be here with us. Well, thanks for doing this, doc, for me, because this is really going to help a lot of people. Awesome.

And thank you for joining us today. Together. Let's find that next level of health and aliveness.