Podcast Drop Date: 3/20/2024
Join us on the Functional Medicine Foundations podcast as Licensed Marriage/Family Therapist and Certified Brain Health Coach, Shannon Miles, sheds light on the holistic approach to mental health. Shannon emphasizes the importance of understanding root causes rather than treating symptoms alone. Explore the interconnectedness of mental health and wellness, and gain practical insights for fostering a lasting quality of life.
Transcript:
Amber Warren, PA-C: Welcome to the Functional Medicine Foundations podcast, where we explore root cause medicine, engage in conversation with functional and integrative medicine experts, and build community with like minded health seekers. I'm your host, Amber Warren. Let's dig deeper. All right. Hi, everyone. Amber Warren. Welcome back. We're here this evening with Shannon Miles. Thank you so much for joining us.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Thanks for inviting me.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Shannon Miles has a long standing career in the fields of clinical psychology, therapy and leadership consultation, holding a Master's Degree in Clinical Psychology and recognized as a licensed marriage family therapist. Shannon's more than 25 year career as a testament to her unwavering commitment to catalyzing personal and professional growth with a multifaceted career that has spanned both the corporate and private clinical practice, her influence extends across diverse spheres goodness. Sorry, her grasp of systems theory, attachment theory, behavior, and positive psychology and neuroscience equips her with a unique lens to understand human dynamics and behavior, driving transformative change on individual and team levels. Shannon is also certified in eMDR and Brain Health Certified Brain Health Certified Brain Health Coach. Yeah, so some really amazing, um, uh, resources for us here at FMI. And we're so thankful for you how.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: We got connected. Right. I'm sure mostly because of that.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yes, yes, we share a lot of patients, um, uh, across both all three clinics, really. And we're so thankful to have you in the area. And you're really close to us here in Eagle. Really? Right across the way. Right. Which is wonderful. I love Eagle, I love this community. So we want to spend some time. I'm so excited to have this conversation. I feel like on our podcast, especially as of late, you know, we kind of finished talking about the Covid pandemic, and then we morphed into kind of the obesity epidemic and cardiometabolic health just because so many of us providers here, um, share that passion and it's so important. But here tonight, um, of equal importance. And some people might think, more important, we're here to talk about mental health and specifically focusing on anxiety, depression and a little bit on ADHD. Um, so I'm really excited because I think that this is a conversation that has to be had and has to be shouted from the rooftops on how we can get people feeling and existing better. So what? Let's just start with the general approach. How do you approach those topics?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: It's interesting you were talking about metabolic health. Yeah, because my approach is a whole health approach. I've had people come to me who are really interested in not being on psychotropic meds, and some people.
Amber Warren, PA-C: What's a psychotropic med for?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Psychotropic medication is anything that treats a psychological or mental health disorder. And it's qualified as a disorder so that insurance can cover things, which is helpful for people who need and want to use insurance and need those resources. And some people come in not knowing what's going on. They just know they feel anxious all the time. Right. And so I take a whole health approach, which there's a standard eight questions that I ask people that revolve around whole health and behavioral health, which feeds mental health. Yeah. And people don't understand that some of the smallest tweaks they can make can have such a huge impact on their psychological and mental health. Mhm.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Amazing. So I consider and I know we have a lot in common about what we consider priorities. And I actually with my patients call those non-negotiables. What are non-negotiables that like it is kind of a waste of your time to be here and a waste of your money if you're at least not willing to try and meet me somewhere with this topic. So where do you usually start?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: It's interesting that you ask that question, because for the first time I had someone who we worked really well together and there were very clear things this person needed to do in order to move forward with their mental health, and they were not capable at that time of doing it, and unwilling because of the other risks that it were implicated for their life. And I said, well, our options are I can support you through that, but you won't be getting your biggest bang for your buck, meaning how you're spending your time. And you might get bored in here. And the non-negotiables in therapy really are for you to show up wholly and completely and honestly. Yeah, a lot of people will come in and they'll say, I know I'm just crazy. And I'm like, I actually don't work with quote unquote crazy people. And I really struggle with that terminology. I know it's default language for people. They don't know how else to describe what they're feeling, and I work with really healthy people. Otherwise they wouldn't be showing up in my office.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah, they wouldn't be seeking your help. Correct?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Correct. And so the non-negotiables at the end of the day for everyone is you have to be willing and capable, right? If you're showing up, you're you're very willing to show up to do the work. Are you willing to do the things that we suggest? There's a give and a take in that relationship, because there are some things that they're not able to do, whether it's financial constraint, time constraint, lifestyle constraint. But we work around those things. And often people, I may give them suggestions or recommendations on health changes that they can make to feel better. And they don't do them, which is information. Right? Right. That's just information for me about what's going on because that's the add piece often. Will show up and I watch them try and try and try and they can't. And it's it's a diagnostic indicator. Often. Not always but often. Right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So. What do you see? Are you seeing more? I mean, my husband and I were listening to actually a sermon yesterday, and they were sharing some really? Like, I knew these statistics were staggering, but he was focusing more on the adolescent population coming out of Covid. And I was it was so sobering to hear some of these. So what are you seeing that I mean, is it anxiety? Is it more depression? Is it a beautiful combination of the both in our adolescents and young adults? What are you seeing in clinical practice?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Most in particular, I work with the young adult population as far as those ages are concerned. And absolutely without question, it's anxiety, okay. And that's one of the primary focuses. So maybe my lens is skewed in that respect. That's what people come to me for. Yeah. Uh, but it seems I have said. It's job security. Yeah, because there's so much going on. Sad truth. Yeah, right. There's so much going on with our food socially, with social media, with how people do or don't take care of themselves and the attachments that we have in our relationships. Right. You throw Covid on top of that and people think Covid is over. But there's that butterfly effect where things just continue to fall out years later. And I think there's a particular group of people between probably 20 and 28 that have a different kind of effect than anybody else who was like out in the working industry and just living life.
Amber Warren, PA-C: And that's because they were like in college, in first time jobs, entering into these relationships at a time.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Where they're supposed to have social relationships, right, right. Missing out on information of daily life and really hooked into what social media is telling them they have. Yes. Right. So people self-diagnosing because of what they see on social media.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So you're seeing that a lot. Are people coming in way off kilter as far as what their actual diagnosis?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: No, is not way off kilter. Okay. But the extent to how intense they experience it. Is different than how I view it from a diagnostic perspective. Okay, so you can have symptoms of anxiety or depression or A.D.D. or any of these other things. You can have symptoms of them. That doesn't mean you qualify as having a disorder. One of the things that I see happening, particularly with anxiety, is there's a whole population of people that would rather just take a pill than feel it, develop skills around it and figure out how to go through it, and then have developed those skills for later on in life.
Amber Warren, PA-C: And so what do you see as the main issue with just taking a pill? Well, to fix anxiety.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: This is this is the wheelhouse here, right? Yeah. Yeah. Um, what do I see as the main issue? It's a Band-Aid. Um, I'm never going to say that psychotropic medication isn't valuable because it is hugely valuable. And sometimes it is absolutely the magic bullet for some people. But there are so many other things that we can try first. Yeah. And so my approach and people that work with me know that this is my approach. We try all the other things first and we don't drag it on. Right. We try all the other things and when it's not working, then we make sure that you get seen by an appropriate professional. I prefer that people who actually need psychotropic medication work with a psychiatrist.
Amber Warren, PA-C: I figured you did.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah, rather than a general physician. I think a general physician is amazing. When you're in a crisis and you need to kind of get out of that crisis quickly. But for someone who works specifically with the brain and medication, you want them to see the things that somebody who doesn't have that specialty can see.
Amber Warren, PA-C: I would agree, yeah, when that's all they do. So even offline a little bit, we were talking about how similar we are on like as simple as a topic. It sounds simple, but it's not sleep, right? Optimizing sleep. Why is that so important when it comes to mental health.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: So as you're well aware it doesn't affect just mental health, right? It affects your physiological health. It affects your metabolic health. It affects your gut health. I mean, it's all the things. And I start when I do what I call I label the whole life assessment just so we can understand what's going on. And it's different than a mental status exam where we're trying to understand what someone's experiencing psychologically. Right. The whole life assessment is for me to understand how you move through the world behaviorally, right? And the things or the ways that what you're doing may be fostering symptoms of anxiety or depression. And sleep is the number one, particularly because so many people lay in bed. They're on their phones till 12:00. I have so many people that say, well, I wake up for 3 or 4 in the morning and that's hormones or liver function or cortisol. And I get on my phone, I know, or I get up to use the bathroom and I get on my phone and.
Amber Warren, PA-C: I just want to see what time it is. And I'm like, oh, just buy a clock, buy a clock and hanging in your bathroom. Right?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And so, so it's just such an it's such an addictive thing, even for me. I'm not really on it. But it's so easy once you get on it to just get lost in the sauce. Right, so to speak. So I really focus on having people figure out what is their optimum level of sleep, and they'll say, oh, I can function on six hours of sleep.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So everybody knows when they feel best. Yeah, they know that threshold.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: You might be able to function on six hours of sleep, but when you're talking about long term brain health, which I also is, a huge passion of mine, is to ensure that we have healthy brains as we age. Right. If you aren't getting the right amount of sleep that you need, not only are you putting yourself at risk for all of these things that we've already touched base on, but you're putting yourself at risk for. I was going to say diabetes, which is true, but I had them mixed up in my brain. Yeah. Um, diabetes. Dementia and Alzheimer's.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Significant.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah. And you can't miss out on all the sleep and then crash on the weekends and think you're going to make it up. Right. Um.
Amber Warren, PA-C: I think it's still true. The number one, the most significant time for people to die of a cardiovascular event is that spring time flip, right? When everyone's robbed of that hour of sleep. So that is so telling.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Is this Sunday?
Amber Warren, PA-C: Oh, goodness. Don't tell me that it is. Okay. We gotta prepare for that. But it's so telling that that shift in our circadian rhythms and that sleep deprivation, how significant that is on our system.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Well, and you look at the other indicators like car accidents go up. Oh, right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yes.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: It has a huge impact on the nation financially because of the impact on insurance companies and whatnot. So it's across the board. Oh my God, a great thing.
Amber Warren, PA-C: And on that same topic, I and I've said this to a fair amount of patients lately with what we're doing in the skill sets that that I'm going to say, you and I and the wonderful team that we're surrounded by have and how we can help to optimize sleep and hormones and just cellular functioning in the body and where you come along and help us with all of that. How many marriages can we save? How many relationships between parents and a teenager adolescent could we help and potentially save? How many lives could we suicide? I mean, suicide, like, I just it's really, really astounding when you start to think about and who is I having this conversation with changing a marriage and how that impacts multiple generations? Correct.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Absolutely.
Amber Warren, PA-C: And it's just so, um, so significant when you think about it that way.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: There's a number of things that when I talk about sleep, only what people end up realizing is they have more energy, they're less grumpy, right? They're more tolerant. They can employ any of the skills that they do learn. They feel better in general. And again, you're spiking your cortisol if you're not getting enough sleep. One of the most interesting things that I had learned when I was going down this path of my education, and and this is post graduate school when I started diving into this. They don't talk about this in graduate school, at least not when I went. But that was a really long time ago stuff. And and so just changing your sleep by a 30 minute window spikes your cortisol.
Amber Warren, PA-C: It's wild.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah, it really is. And you can see it.
Amber Warren, PA-C: That's why I tell my patients like don't no, there's no snooze. Like whoever created the snooze button is the devil.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Like so this is a key point.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Actually have your alarm go off and get up.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Well, I'm gonna jump in on this. And I don't know if you know this firm or not, but I am all over this news button because of sleep inertia, okay. Right. Yeah. So you hit the snooze, your brain wakes up and you go back in and you hit, your body tries or your brain tries to hit another sleep cycle. And that sleep inertia ends up making you feel drunk, more hungover, sluggish, angry. Some people wake up, they're angry about it. Yeah. And you're missing out on really a key sleep stage. The beginning of the night. We have a lot of our deep sleep and some REM, but a lot of people get the majority of their REM in those morning hours. And if people will say, oh, I'm dreaming all night and it's stressing me out, well, what's actually happened is you're waking up from your dreams, right? And your your processing. That's what you're doing in your sleep. Mhm.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So what are some skill sets that you use to help people not only fall asleep. Because I always ask so so let's talk about more of your insomnia that you mentioned the paperwork. Is it falling asleep or staying asleep or waking up too early. Right. Um, so let's talk about some of the resources you give to patients to help with either of those issues.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Well, I have people start with sleep hygiene because that's one of the hardest things for people to employ is just having a sleep schedule and a routine before sleep. One of the best ways to be able to have the routine is also something that positively impacts sleep, which is to put your phone away a minimum of 45 minutes before you're doing lights out, right? Good. And so if you're doing lights out at 11:00, then your phone is plugged in away from you. It cannot be on your nightstand if it can be in an en suite bathroom, it can be on your dresser, but at least ten feet away from you. And so starting there and then creating a sleep routine, are you a person who would thrive on having an Epsom salt bath to relax you? Having a really great skin care routine? Wouldn't that be fabulous to make sure you incorporate, right? You know, taking the time to brush your hair, your teeth, those kinds of self care things. It can even be meditation. Yeah, those kinds of things that indicate to your brain it's time to quiet down. It's time to calm down. And so if they get in bed at 11:00 and it's lights out and and you're asleep within five minutes or so, that's a good thing. If you hit the pillow and you are out, you are overly tired. You're sleep deprived.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: You're sleep deprived. I agree. Right? Yeah. So if you lights out 11:00 and you find yourself kind of restless and laying around, you can utilize progressive muscle relaxation. So I'll walk through people good through with people with that exercise. Looks like there's a lot of fabulous YouTube videos on it. Um, and or breathing techniques for meditative breathing that will help people's bodies relax. One thing that I will have people do is really practice this breathe in, breathe out technique. Good. When you breathe in, you say, breathe in. In your mind. When you breathe out, you say, breathe out in your mind. And there's an interesting little pause before you breathe in again, and I'll have people pick a word or multiple words sleep, breathe, relax. And you just get in this rhythm. It can create anxiety at first for people because they're trying to remember my breathing. How do I breathe? Um. When a thought comes up, just look right at that thought and just say, see you. I'll deal with you later. It's time to sleep. Let it pass like it's floating by on a cloud. And then tell themselves to come back to breathing. And typically, most people will report back the next week that employing those things together, their sleep is better. The kicker is did you get enough protein? Mhm. And did you cut your caffeine? Yes. I've got people that.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Go to food next.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And I would say more than 75% of the people that I work with that come in and they say that they have anxiety. The first thing I ask them is how much caffeine they're drinking.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Oh really. Mhm. That's great.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And they're off the it's off the charts. It's off the charts. The amount of caffeine people drink. And people don't realize that caffeine is actually a depressant. Right. As much as it is it gives you energy and it provokes anxiety. But it is also a depressant and it has.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Such a long half life. Right? So I'm like, wait, you're doing what, at 3 p.m. with like to pick up your kids at school?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Caffeine after noon. And the majority of people have some kind of effect from it. Mhm. Not to just totally jump tracks, but the Mthfr gene defect for people who cannot methylate certain things, which is a large percentage of people, 25 to 40% of people have this gene defect, can't methylate the caffeine can't methylate the alcohol, can't methylate just the coffee bean in general, and that will negatively impact sleep as well.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah, absolutely. So on that topic of foods, we've got caffeine. You mentioned protein. Protein. What do you recommending a protein and why when it comes to.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: So it depends on the person. Everybody's different and everybody's physiological needs are different different preferences I'm a person who I need a high protein diet. And I would say for the most part during the day I'm probably 75% plant based, including proteins, dinners. Really the only place that I'll eat like a meat protein. And. For most people, they're not even getting 100g of protein. I know they think that 25g is a lot. And I have this woman. She keeps sending me these. So she social media videos where it says here I thought I just needed to exercise more, but no, now I'm spending all my time tracking protein, right?
Amber Warren, PA-C: I mean, it's true. It is like a part time job. It is a part time job to get it in. It really.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Is. Yeah. And so, um, yeah. So I usually and I have a nutrition background.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Oh, wonderful. I was a bodybuilder back in my 20s, and so I calculate it based on brain and physical health. So 0.8g per pound of ideal body weight. Um at minimum minimum. Yeah. Minimum.
Amber Warren, PA-C: And so I'm just curious from a mental health perspective the importance of protein. Why is that so important.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Well, it's the building blocks for your body. And I don't actually know. You probably know this part way better than I do. And you can educate people way better. But what I see is it has an impact on brain function and decreasing cortisol and building muscles. And I see it way more important, a way more important factor for depression. And Add like add folks need even more protein. Mhm. Um, because their brains crave carbohydrates that they will often just binge on the carbohydrates to get that dopamine hit. And for people with anxiety, it's just a lifestyle benefit to make sure that they add it as a focus. Yeah I'm curious what you would have to say.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Well yeah I mean you hit it. You hit it spot on with saying it's the amino acids, right? Because we build all those neurotransmitters that calm down our body and our brain from these amino acids. Right. Um, so it's kind of the offspring of that, but. You're. I think the secondary reason is also that you're going to feel satisfied. You're going to feel satiated. You're fueling your brain, you're fueling your cells. And so you're not going to reach for the more toxic foods and toxic choices that are going to cause the further anxiety and the cravings and the sad mood. And, um, I mean, let alone we need the protein and phytonutrients for gut health. And that's where 90% of our serotonin is made, too. So if we're seeking to boost serotonin in the body, like we have to start with gut health, and we have to start with nutrition when we're trying to fix the gut. So, yeah, um, so many of those reasons.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Well, one of the things I will talk to people about is vitamins that I consider lifetime vitamins. Yeah. That's great. Right. Yeah. Um, that they're just great for whole health. Some people will say, well, I took it and I didn't feel anything. I'm a pretty functional stable, and I take my vitamins, whether I feel it or not. I don't really ever feel them right. But I know that they're really vital and it shows up in your blood work if you're paying attention to your blood work. Right. And so I often talk about perfect aminos, actually, as a brand. There unless you have a better no like.
Amber Warren, PA-C: No, they're they're the best. No, they're the best.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: They are hiding up there.
Amber Warren, PA-C: We have we I mean I think they're like our top seller here.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah. So perfect aminos particularly people that have ADHD. And as I'm saying that I can hear people asking me what the difference between Add and ADHD is. Yeah. And I think that's an important thing to qualify.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Let's go there.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Um, so ADHD is the standard old school DSM diagnostic and statistical manual diagnosis, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. And for people that have the H, the hyperactive peace sleep is really just something they're constantly chasing. And it is very frustrating to them. Yeah. And so you approach sleep a little bit differently for those folks and too much to get into because it's very person specific. But A.D.D. itself, attention deficit disorder, it's without the age and if you have ever heard of Doctor Daniel, Amen. He types different types of AD. He says there's six or so types inattentive, hyperactive, limbic, ring of fire, impulsive type. And there's temporal lobe I think is the other one. There's always 1 or 2, I forget. And the most common one that I see, particularly with women and particularly perimenopausal and menopausal women, is just inattentive ad. Mhm. Right. That's the most common one. And they'll get diagnosed and they'll say, oh I always thought I was just a problem or I was the weird kid or I got told I was lazy. But you see this cycle of inattention anxiety, depression um in women often. And so those are some of the things that I kind of keep track of and perfect aminos to bring it back to that. Yeah, I love it is one of the core vitamins that I would recommend to people when they have that.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So do you think you're seeing it more in these pre and post menopausal women because of estrogen deficiency? Yes, because of what estrogen does to the brain.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And a lot. This is one of the reasons I refer to FMI so often is because you guys are willing to dig deeper and to look beyond. You're within the normal range on any of your hormones. You might be in the normal range, but how about just.
Amber Warren, PA-C: To check hormones?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Not normal for I do have some people that refuse to check their hormones. Not not clients, but their physicians refuse to check hormones. And that is shocking to me. It breaks.
Amber Warren, PA-C: My heart. I'm like, oh my gosh, are we missing on this? Like vital information on the importance.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: I ended up referring somebody to you who I've known for years and this person. Worked their butt off in therapy and said something very key. Hadn't seen her for a while, said something very key, and my ears perked up and I started to ask more questions. They came in to FMI and finally understood how estrogen shows up for them. It can make you look like your ad. If it's too low or too high, you end up looking like you have anxiety if it's too high. So just the imbalance alone. And because of the age that I am and watching myself, my friends, my clients go through it, it is. It feels like the needle in the haystack sometimes.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah. We need to recognize that more often, that's for sure. And and knowing even that now perimenopause can last or sorry, premenopause Pre-and Peri can last up to a decade. So it's like, oh my gosh, we have to capture these, these women and get them help.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And so if I send somebody when I see something and I say I really think you should talk to your physician and get your hormones checked, and they come back a week later and they're like, they refuse to check my hormones. And they say it's just a spot in time. I'm like, that's that's cool. Um, let's go to FMI. They need to know when to do a saliva test. You can do the Dutch test, which frankly, I love the Dutch test. That's just great. Yeah. Because it measures the cortisol and how you actually metabolize the hormones and whatnot. So yeah, it's amazing. And the Dutch soapbox for me.
Amber Warren, PA-C: No it's great. And I love the Dutch. You're referring to the Dutch complete because it also includes, um, some markers of oxidative stress and B6 and glutathione, which is your body's master antioxidant. So to me it's like people are like, should I spend the extra money to look at cortisol? I mean, yes, because you also get ten other biomarkers that really help us look at cellular function. So it's wonderful.
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Amber Warren, PA-C: So food. Um, I want to talk more about the relationship between food and mental health because I think this is so significant. So what else are you recommending on how food impacts the topic?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: People eat. Yes.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Eat. Oh oh that people actually consume. Okay, so not just protein but other aspects of food okay.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Eating in general. Yeah. Right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Great. And get the micronutrients in.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: It's so busy. Yeah. Life is so busy right that they forget to eat or they've got to hurry up and jump on a call for work, and they end up neglecting basic nutrition.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Well, and we're in this era where intermittent fasting, you can take a lot of pride in it, right? Yeah. And that's pretty.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Dangerous about intermittent fasting depending upon how they do it. Well.
Amber Warren, PA-C: And everybody's different. Right. So not everyone should follow someone on Instagram and jump in the bag. Ban in right of jumping into a 16 or 18 hour fast, not knowing their hormones, not knowing their cortisol levels. Yes. Not knowing where their nervous system is.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Difference. I was an aggressive, faster around 45 ish and I was in the healthiest body I have been in my entire life. Yeah, and that changed dramatically when I was actually going through menopause. You cannot do that to your body because it spikes your cortisol, and you don't want to be doing that when you're menopausal. So it definitely changes. Yeah. Um, and, and people will say, oh, I do intermittent fasting and I have to ask them what that means to them. Yeah.
Amber Warren, PA-C: That's yeah, that's a really good point.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Because you can.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Do it in so many different ways.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: What they're really saying is the majority of people say, well, I am eating between these hours and they consider that intermittent fasting. That's true. Right. And that's in well, I restrict it to an eight hour window or six hour window. I haven't met a single person who was doing it the way I was taught to do it, which was very aggressive.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah, because they're not they're following someone on social media.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Exactly. Yeah. And I think there's amazing benefits. Oh, burning the toxins off your liver, kind of doing an internal cleanse. You have so much energy, right? You burn off that visceral fat. Your mind is so much more clear. But it's really about burning the toxins off. Yeah. And I, I do really focus on people. I don't care how often they eat. I think that's a very individual thing. But making sure that they're having kind of a stable blood sugar are not crashing good. And I talk about the difference between hunger hunger and hunger. Good. Right. Good. So if your stomach is growling you might actually just be dehydrated. Mhm. Right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Or not consuming enough protein.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Or not consuming enough protein. I described kind of the foggy feeling people get when they're not eating enough protein. Or they feel a little anxious. They don't have enough protein in their system.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Do you ask your patients, I'm curious to read labels and look at chemicals. Or do you rely on our team to do that for you?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: So I don't I am a huge proponent of that. I was thinking of a funny story for you before. On my way in here when my son was five, I made him read labels wonderful and I had five. It is like it was yesterday because he's 16 now. Yeah, he would pick up. He wanted grocery store, granola bars, not homemade ones. Yeah. And so he would pick up the boxes and I said that's fine. But it can't have this, this or this. And, and if you could find a single granola bar that doesn't have these things in it, probably.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Can't do it.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And he couldn't one of the things he would pick up and he's like, soy lecithin again. Yes, he would put it back on the counter. Right. Yeah. And these two ladies were shouting. They're like, is he really reading that? And I was like, yeah, yeah he is. You have to learn how to read what's in it. Educate them. Mhm. I do talk a lot, particularly when I used to work with children a lot. I don't really work with children at all. I would prefer to work with the parents to educate them. Has to start there on how to support their child. Um. Dye, corn syrup.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Good.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Gluten and not gluten in the sense that wheat is evil. But the Americanized version of wheat is not great, right? And so talk about. How to find other things that their kiddos can eat, and referring people out for allergen testing, which can tell you some things, but not all things. But it's really trial and error. I've got one person who I've worked with and her child was absolutely, without question, allergic to red dye, and it showed up as rage. Um, yeah. So but do.
Amber Warren, PA-C: You think that's a true allergy, or do you think that's just like more of a sensitivity that the body just doesn't know?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Like that's how she would describe it would be an allergy. Well, you.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Have to describe it as that. So the schools keep it out of them. And so when they go to birthday parties because it's I mean, I'm in that world where I have to say like my kid. Yeah, I agree, kids allergic to.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Hives and anaphylaxis. It's yeah. Behavioral.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah I view it as like and I've explained this before to patients. It's like a conveyor belt. Right. And the body knows okay, here's protein here's gluten. We know what to do with this red dye. Blue 40 yellow 70. Yeah. High fructose corn sirup. We don't know what to do with this. And it just gets overwhelmed and overloaded and the body just freaks out.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: I used to work in a residential care facility when I was in my 20s. That was a step down from a lockdown, and it was for kids who had anywhere. Some there were residential, so they went to school there and they lived there, but they had severe behavior challenges, severe developmental disabilities, and anything from nonverbal autism up to learning disabilities or high functioning autism. And there was a child there that was actually allergic to corn. Just corn. Wow. So that's tough. It was. Really ugly what would happen for this person? And it was a physiological reaction. And then it would then affect their behavior because they didn't developmentally have the tools to be able to communicate what's going on for them.
Amber Warren, PA-C: That's so hard. Yeah. So this is actually a really good segue talking about children in two screens. And not that we need to focus on screens, not just we all have. Yeah, we all have issues too. You're talking about, you know, it's like this addiction of just looking at your phone to see what time it is, what happened to looking at a clock? Um, but I was at my nine year old's basketball game a couple of weeks ago, and there was this little boy next to me and next to my son who had his own iPad. You know, it, like, makes me sad. These colorful iPads are, like, for kids to hold. I'm like, what?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: But they hold them like.
Amber Warren, PA-C: This right in their face. So he was watching, his older brother was playing basketball and he had an iPad and then like three candy bars next to him. And I just it just breaks my heart. And I think I live in my own little world where I'm like, this is. So I think this is probably more common than I think. But I, I do life with people who are like minded and kind of live a life like we do. But I'm like thinking, it's so sad to me. Why can't this little boy, who was probably 6 or 7, watch his brother play basketball? It's not like we're at a church sermon or a boring lecture or there's, you know, an appoint a counseling appointment where mama just needs to listen and you have to entertain them. You are at your siblings like it's exciting. There's a bunch of boys playing basketball. Cheer him on, son. Like, where are we at?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: I, I have to play the devil's advocate on this one. I'm not a fan of screens, particularly for kids. Not a fan of candy, obviously. Um. There are times where a kid may have a behavior challenge that we don't know of.
Amber Warren, PA-C: I love your perspective on that.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Don't have a place for them to be on that particular night. And he actually can't. And so maybe the kiddo does have Add. Let's use this as an example. Yeah. And they need to hyper focus on or maybe they're.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So that mom and dad can watch their son's basketball.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Or maybe they're on the autism spectrum. And that amount of stimulation is too much for that child. And they need to excuse me hyper focus on. I love that it's just a different perspective because we don't know what goes on in somebody else's home. And I mean, it would it would be great to say, I can't believe that parent left that child. But we don't know, I don't.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Know, I don't have an autistic child. I wouldn't know how to handle that.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: We wouldn't do that for our child because a we started them off that way. Right? It's really hard once you do give kiddos screens to train them to be in social settings or to be socially appropriate in settings. It's hard. You end up having to engage in behavior modification effectively in order for them to be able to do that and have pro-social skills.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So I'm going to play a little bit of devil's advocate as well. Don't you think that what that child was engaging in is part of the reason that we have the autistic statistics that we do today? As far as root cause, I actually.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Don't, having worked with autism. Okay. Since like 95. Okay. Um, no. And I was in the era. In 95 where it was autism is caused by immunizations. Right. And we know that the physician that came out and started that lost his license because he lied. And so I am a proponent of people making their own decisions about immunizations and what's right for their family. Yeah. Good. Um, and the environment that we lived in at the time, people weren't immunizing their children and they were getting really sick. And so you have to make the decision for your family. Absolutely. I know that that was misinformation. And what I will say, having worked in it in so long, is it may look like the rates of autism are going up because of screens, when in actuality they took all these different diagnoses and folded them into the umbrella of autism. Okay, so it used to be okay. Asperger's, which is high functioning autism. Autism Rett's childhood Disintegrative disorder. And one other that I never ever could remember the name of and they collapsed them into one umbrella, which really helps funding for those kinds of disorders.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Do you think it's also that we're recognizing and diagnosing these disorders?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Absolutely. And here's what I think is so interesting is to see people who my son always goes, you think everybody's autistic. And I'm like, that person's autistic. And here's how I know. And he's like, how do you know that? Yeah. And somebody we know I said, how how do you guys handle this type of, you know, social engagement? This is why he thinks going on for this person. And he denied it. And then it turned out that that person actually was diagnosed. And it was just such an eye opener for them to see. People can be really just typical look like typical functioning. But how they're experiencing the world is very different on the inside. Yeah. So I think autism is actually out there to much higher rate. And I feel like it has more to do with the toxins and our gut health.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Okay. So you think that that's more of it.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: I think it's more of that. I don't think that screens help anybody for any diagnosis. Yeah. Right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Absolutely. Yeah. So what toxins do you think are playing a role. Can we say autism anxiety and depression. Have you been able to identify or you just think it's this total toxic burden? I mean I.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Think there's a toxic overload for sure. But I know that what's in our food and what's on our food is probably the worst thing. Like we had the fortune and most people don't to be able to choose to eat organic. It's not a thing where we lived at the time, it was all farm fresh food. We went to the farmer's market, right? And it was all organic farmer's market food, 20 bucks. We would fill up the basket of my son's, um, stroller and walk there and walk back. It's just where we lived. It was a dream in that respect. But not everybody has access to that. Not everybody really understands how much better they feel when they're not putting that in their bodies.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So you said anxiety is probably the most prevalent diagnosis. You're seeing. Would you go as far as to say. Our toxic world is driving the anxiety, and that's why we're seeing so much of it.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: I just had a huge reaction in my head when you said that, um, because I think it's emotional toxins. Yeah. Fair, right? Yes. And what I'm thinking about is that the anxiety is from lack of secure attachment with people. Okay. Right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: What's causing that.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Family starts in your family.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Family dynamics. Family of.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Origin? Yeah. Family of fu. Family of origin. Um, lack of secure attachment. One of my favorite books, I think, is by Levine is just called attached. Okay. And it is a red and white book. It looks like two magnets in the shape of a heart, and it really dives into and lets you do a little bit of an assessment on your attachment style. Cool. And there's so much anxious attachment. If we don't have secure attachment as a child, and there's a number of reasons that that could happen, you could have the most loving, kind, amazing family in the world. But dad has to travel a lot and that generates a sense of abandonment or fear, right? Yeah. There's so many different reasons that that would happen. Yeah. Um, but also just the trauma that people perpetrate on each other is horrific. Yeah. It's really there's big trauma in small trauma.
Amber Warren, PA-C: I know, big trauma. T like, I've almost come to hate using the word trauma clinically when I'm talking to my patients because it's such a trigger word and they're like, no, like, I hate that everyone keeps trying to tell me I've had trauma and I'm like, okay, let's word it a little bit differently because it dramatically impacts your health. And I need to know this.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And I talk to people about big T, little t the way you said it too. I use the same language, and big T might be a single car accident that you thought you were going to die in, right? Right. Little T might be you were being ostracized from your friend group in middle school because you wore the wrong shirt that day or something, right? But it still has an impact on your sense of security, because all of that emotional security is based in safety, in relationships, because we need attachment to have safety in the world. Yeah, right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So true.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: So you think about the caveman days, and if you don't have somebody that cares for you and you're left behind, you're toast. Mhm. Right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: And what that does to your nervous system as it develops. So this this hits home as a mom of young boys and just on that same topic of like changing generations, what can we do as parents of young children to make sure that our children have.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Secure attachment.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah. Confident attachment. Secure attachment. Yeah. What would you recommend?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: You know, it's interesting. I was doing this before I knew what it was. But when you follow attachment theory, attachment parenting is, in my opinion, super valuable. It doesn't mean you wear your baby or breastfeed them till they're five years old, right? It's some variation of what works for you. Yeah. And it's. If they're crying, you support them. You don't spank them, right? Right, right. And that includes the concept of sleep training, right? There's a lot of information about what sleep training is or isn't, and how you can do that in a way that promotes secure attachment without.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Crossing that line of abandonment.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: I have, um. I use this example often. When my little guy was probably 18 months old, we were walking to the park with my husband's college best friend, well, childhood best friend. Their parents went to college together, so they've known they're like family. And for whatever reason, I couldn't even tell you what it was. My son started crying and he didn't want to continue to walk. And so he was having a tantrum and I just sat down with him. And I just reflected the emotion. Even at 16, I reflect the emotion to him. Right? I know you're angry and you cannot act your anger out on people. I know you're feeling sad or you're disappointed, or you're frustrated and giving them emotional language to be able to understand it, how it shows up in their body and what to do with it. And just validating and reflecting is probably one of the biggest gifts you can give them. Oh, I couldn't into adulthood.
Amber Warren, PA-C: It reminds me of the book that I it's been a while since I've read about the whole brain child.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yes, I love that book. It's so good for anybody that has a child with any type of behavior challenges, or any type of diagnosis.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Even a little bit of anxiety here and there.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Absolutely. So good. That book is fabulous. Yeah, I.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Know you feel scared and here's here's it's okay to feel scared, but here's why you shouldn't feel scared right now, buddy.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And we often default to our parents parenting style. Right. And so my friend said, well, at what point do you just smack his butt and you tell him, let's go and I said, well, first of all, he's 18 months old. Yeah.
Amber Warren, PA-C: He won't he doesn't understand.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: He won't understand that. And that will evoke a power over message, right? Where he is only behaving out of fear. Right? Right. We want to establish power with. So he has an implicit way of being in the world that he does things because it's the right thing to do, not because he's afraid. And he didn't have kids at that point. He was like, oh, okay. Yeah. So we had a really cool conversation out of it. But to be able to be with your kid when they're having difficulty, because mirror neurons will tell you that what your child is feeling is yours, and you will actually experience the feeling that they're feeling physiologically and psychologically. And then, of course, anger evokes anger, right? But we have to be able to call it out and articulate it and reflect it. And that's a skill most people don't have. I usually say people cut themselves off from the neck down. They don't know how to label.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah, what's going on.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: They don't have the emotional IQ to label things outside of mad, sad and glad. Right? Right.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah. No, it's so interesting. I'm thinking about I was talking to a young couple doing premarital counseling right now, and just having this conversation makes me think, as a society, we I like to think we place importance on premarital counseling. Maybe it's not a thing anymore, but what about pre parental counseling like hmm, what an amazing concept. Like I could recommend.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Should be a pre parenting screening at this point that.
Amber Warren, PA-C: But you tell me how we're going to pull that off and I will get on board girlfriend. Pull that off. But like giving these young these young I mean I wish I would have had access to that before I had my first little boy. I was all I wasn't doing functional medicine yet. I wasn't practicing functional medicine and clinical aspect and I yeah, I read all these books from pediatricians on sleep training. And I know it's why he doesn't cuddle. And he he feels anxious, like like, you know, like a bad guy is going to come and it's like, so is it too late for maybe parents that maybe didn't, didn't follow those trends yet? Like, are there because I've heard things.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Like, what do you mean by too.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Late? Well, like I've, I've had girlfriends recommended me a motion code for like, my little boy that maybe has some of those more abandonment type thought processes or issues like so is like to help. I mean, I know how to help his nervous system, but too late. Yeah.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Good, good. I've had, um, when my son was really little, something happened to me in labor and we were separated, and my husband and I never talked about it. I mean, like eight years because we were just living life and, like, trying to get by. And I finally called it out and I was like, hey, I thought I was dying, by the way. And he's like, yeah, me too. And so we hadn't talked about it in so long. And, um, it made me think back to when my son was probably four and he would come out of the house in this primal stance screaming because he couldn't find me in the house. And we went and we did a eMDR on it.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Good for you, right?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah. And again, the challenge is you have an audience of people who want to learn. Yeah, right. Want to do things different. And when you know better, you do better. But there are so many people out there that don't even know that there is a different way to do it. I know, and just because my version of how I do it doesn't mean that my version is right. It's right for my family. It's right for me, right? It seems to work for a lot of people. Right? Mhm. And you'll find what works for your family. There might be some tweaks. Yeah. Right. So true I could I lucked out. My kid is so much like me and I understand him completely because of that.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah. You get.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Him right. Yeah. But if you have a kiddo who displays fear based tendencies, then eMDR. He was little when he did it. Good for you. And I had him lay on me and I tapped his chest or tapped it, tapped his back while he did eMDR because his bilateral stimulation and it desensitizes your amygdala. Mhm. Right. Which is that fight or flight mechanism. And you want to do that when they're little because we go through so many things that evoke fear and you don't want. 25% larger amygdala when you become an adult. Nope, you don't want that. So along the way, it's counseling is a resource. Trauma informed therapy is a resource that you want to use as often as you can, and let them be able to bounce back. It's it's just a resource for them.
Amber Warren, PA-C: No. That's a wonderful. So you don't work with children under humans under 18. You're adult only.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Uh, every once in a while, I'll have a 16 year old come in. Okay. Um. But I don't see children anymore. And a lot of it has to do with divorce and just trying to understand and manage court orders and things like that. Like I do not want to miss stuff in that department. It's a lot, right? I don't want to mess it up for the child or the parents. And yeah, so that's really the main reason that I moved away from that.
Amber Warren, PA-C: No, it sounds wise. Yeah. So I don't think any we don't we don't want to end this conversation without talking about some of your favorite supplements for anxiety, depression and AD because yeah, it comes up all the time. So what do you like? What do you see working up.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: About lifetime vitamins like.
Amber Warren, PA-C: You mentioned that. Yes. Great. Right.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah. And um, D3 with K2 for sure. Right. Um methylated B complex. Right. Um. I'm trying to think of always fish oils, always for people that have Add higher loads of fish. Oils are really important and it helps behavior and it helps your system calm down. And then there's a variety of different things. I am actually not a fan of melatonin itself because people overdo it. They abuse it. They don't understand what they're doing. I had somebody who was like, well, I take like 15mg of melatonin and I just about fell over because that's going to destroy your liver. I'm pretty sure it goes through your liver. And so you know more about that part. And so I always tell them like if you need to do that, yeah, it only helps you fall asleep because they'll say, well I can't stay asleep. Yeah. Right. And so melatonin paired with l-theanine because often the reason they can't fall asleep is their mind is racing. And l-theanine is just fabulous. Whether you take it in the morning or you take it for bed, it just kind of softening the noise right? I love L-theanine and my favorite is magnesium glycinate. I figured you were gonna go there. Yeah, or magnesium three and eight, depending upon what you're dealing with.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Three and eight. Yeah, yeah. Oh. So good.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: But I do talk a lot depending upon the person and what they're going with. Um, because some of these other things can exacerbate anxiety. But five HCP or CME. I stopped talking about ashwagandha.
Amber Warren, PA-C: I was going to ask about Adaptogenic herbs.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah. So I stopped talking about valerian root and ashwagandha. Um, mostly because I'm not well versed enough on the impact it has on your organs, and I'm just as concerned about that as I am your brain. Mhm. Right. Yeah. But I do talk about Saint John's wort. Good. Yes. Quite a bit. Right. And Saint John's wort is so interesting. It's so interesting that you can use that with L-lysine for ad. Mhm. Yeah. Right. Mhm. It's so interesting to me and I'm very aware of um serotonin syndrome actually I have somebody I'm working with who has serotonin syndrome. Really. Yeah. It's the only time I've ever seen it in, you know a very long time. Yeah.
Amber Warren, PA-C: It's very rare. You kind of you have to talk about it. But I've never actually seen it in clinical practice. Right. What was the cause of the serotonin syndrome in this patient? Um.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Things outside of supplements. Okay. And outside of medications. Yeah. Okay. So you can get that from illegal drugs, right? You can get it from stress. It was just all of the things. Lots of trauma for that person. Wow. Um, so I pay very close attention to that so people don't get overloaded because L-lysine L-tyrosine and Saint John's wort are great together. But my concern with using the l-tyrosine is that serotonin syndrome, if they have anything else, it's a no go. Yeah, good. If they're on anything for anxiety. Absolutely. We're not talking about those vitamins at all. And that's when I, you know, I'll say. Because I'm a certified brain health coach. I can talk about those things, but I often will say, don't touch that until you talk to your psychiatrist. Yeah, good. Don't touch that until you talk to your you have to know all.
Amber Warren, PA-C: The interactions and. Yeah, yeah, it's a lot. Yeah.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And sometimes people will show up and they've got a slew of things and I'm like, oh yeah, don't, don't take that one because you have anxiety.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Yeah. Or just the brand like the people, the, the quality is.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Huge.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Supplements that people are buying. I'm like, oh yeah, that's definitely doing more harm than good.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Because of people come to me for a reason. And the majority of people are pretty well versed, I'm sure. Do you trust this brand? They literally will ask me that. Yeah. I'm like, here's what I know. These are kind of the top three that I talk about.
Amber Warren, PA-C: You can't know about all the different brands out there. There's just too many.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Of them to, uh, custom medica cosmetica. They are so well versed at those things.
Amber Warren, PA-C: They know those things. Yeah. We carry very similar brands as cosmetics. I'm like, hey, if you're buying it from us or Customedica, you can pretty much trust. So people don't.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Really realize the impact of magnesium specifically because our food is so depleted, because our soils are so depleted. The example I was given, I don't know where I heard this was, you know, probably 15 years ago, you could eat a bunch, a small bunch of spinach and get the magnesium that you need. And now you'd have to eat a truck bed load of spinach to get the magnesium you need.
Amber Warren, PA-C: It's so disheartening, I know.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Right? Yeah. And so magnesium. Good for your brain, good for anxiety, fabulous for deep sleep. If it's magnesium glycinate. Mhm. Muscle repair your heart. All of these things. It's just a building block.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Does it all.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah. It does all these really great things.
Amber Warren, PA-C: It's wonderful. Yeah. It is really disheartening. People that say well I really love to just eat whole foods and get my nutrients. And I'm like, I wish I could tell you that. I think that's a good alternative. Yeah. Unfortunately, nowadays it's just not. Yeah, yeah. Anything else you'd like to share with our audience on the topic?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: It just popped in my head when you were saying that. Yeah. Uh, that people want their Whole Foods to provide it, which is great, I love that. Show me where you're growing. Those. Yeah. Where is that? Yeah. Right. Yeah. Um, there are some times and we kind of started off in this path where medication is appropriate. Yeah. And A.D.D. is one of those places, because untreated A.D.D. is a dramatically increased risk for dementia and Alzheimer's.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Why is that?
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Um, so I talk about A.D.D. as not inattention, but inattention problems. It's intention and memory problems. Okay. And so why it shows up? Is it the Mthfr gene defect? And you're not methylating vitamins, is it memory? And it's already starting, but it's really important to treat it to get the appropriate dopamine. And a lot of people who are diagnosed with dementia specifically are finding that it actually is depression, which is a dopamine related disorder. Right. And so if you don't have the right amount of dopamine, your memory goes sideways. You look like you have dementia, but that's not what it is. Right? So I really highly encourage people who have Ed to get the right amount of exercise. Number one protein and supplementation or number two and three like if, if that's the only thing you can do right. Exercising every single day. Yeah. Would be key.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Absolutely. Yeah. Well yeah you're right. We didn't talk about with the importance of protein usually a lot of high protein products. Animal products are higher in dopamine. So that's the other reason why protein is so important.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Yeah that is really thank you.
Amber Warren, PA-C: That's also why protein is so important for for mental health. Yeah. You look at like full full full fat dairy. Um that's higher in protein or uh red meats and animal protein high in protein. So you are such a blessing to have in this community. And you're such a wealth of knowledge and even just the way that you deliver information is so calming. And so I'm like, thank you, Shannon, will you come read me a bedtime story? Just such a lovely way of delivering your words. So thank you so much. We're so thankful to have you here, and thank you for sharing your knowledge.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: And I was excited to be able to meet you and have this opportunity. Yeah, I was telling anybody that knows FMI, I was like, oh, I'm so excited to go do this because you have a different perspective of some of the things that I do.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So yes, we do, and we're so thankful to partner with you to help heal this community. Well, I'm glad you're doing this.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: People love FMI.
Amber Warren, PA-C: So oh thank you, thank you, thank you. We feel we feel the same. Thank you so much.
Shannon Miles, LMFT: Thank you.
Amber Warren, PA-C: Thank you for listening to the Functional Medicine Foundations podcast. For more information on topics covered today, specialties available at the FMI center for Optimal Health, and the highest quality of supplements and more, go to funmedfoundations.com.