CIRS (Mold Illness) Symptoms & Nervous System Healing After MS — Christine Ruch, Holistic Transformation Guide

Hello there, fearfully and wonderfully made human, and welcome back to the Holistic Counselor podcast, where we explore the intersection of faith, brain science, and whole-person healing. I'm Diana Esrice, licensed mental health counselor, consultant, and your host. Today's conversation is for anyone who has lived inside the confusion of chronic illness, especially autoimmune and inflammatory conditions, where the body doesn't follow neat categories and healing rarely feels straightforward.

So many people find themselves moving from diagnosis to diagnosis, Hashimoto's, Graves, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia I can never say that word. Fibromyalgia, lupus, multiple sclerosis, running labs, reading books, following protocols, spending time, energy, and money, all while still asking, "Why don't I feel better?"

Autoimmune and chronic inflammatory conditions don't just affect the body. They impact the nervous system, the brain, mood, anxiety, depression, identity, relationships, and often faith. And when answers are unclear, people can begin to feel dismissed, discouraged, or even disconnected from their own bodies. This topic is a personal one for me.

I've walked my own journey with chronic inflammatory illness and nervous system overwhelm, and I've sat with many clients who are exhausted from trying to make sense of symptoms that don't show up cleanly on labs. So today's conversation is both professional and deeply human.

My guest today understands this journey intimately. Christine Rook is a holistic transformation guide who spent over two decades navigating and healing through her own experience with multiple sclerosis. Through whole food nutrition, trauma-informed work, spiritual practice, and what she calls nervous system restoration, Christine came to see chronic illness not only as something to manage, but as an invitation to listen more deeply to the body's wisdom.

Today, we're going to talk about autoimmune illness, how it can affect the body, and the brain, and why nervous system healing is such an important, often missing, piece. We'll explore anxiety and depression as symptoms, not failures, faith without self-blame, and gentle, practical ways people can begin supporting healing when they've already tired.

Christine, thanks for being here. Thank you for having me. I'm excited for this conversation. It's so important. Oh, tell me about it. There's so many It seems like more and more young young people, especially young women, I'm seeing them in their 20s, in their 20s, being diagnosed with these things.

So, before we even start there, can you take us back to the early days of your MS diagnosis and share what you were experiencing experiencing physically, emotionally, and spiritually as you tried to make sense of what was happening in your body? Sure. Um it was a long time ago.

It was 2006. So, it's been 20 years. Um and yeah, I was a young mother. I was 38. I was a young mom. I had two children under the age of five. And um but I was also incredibly busy, you know, just as many young mothers are, chasing around after their babies.

Um and I also was trying to fit in time for, you know, self-care and all the things that that meant 20 years ago, even though I thought like I was still pretty much like I was very much at the forefront of like the natural wellness movement at that time 20 years ago.

But um but also it was still a long time ago. Uh and so yeah, I had my first like MS flare in it was actually yeah, almost exactly 20 years ago. It was in January. Wow. Um I don't know the exact date, but I know it was January on a Wednesday.

Um and I went to get out of bed and I got this electric shock down from the base of my neck down my back down my legs and into my feet, which is like a Lhermitte's sign. Okay.

Um it's like a French word for barber barber I don't know. It's like a barber syndrome. Mhm. Where you put your neck down and it precipitates this electric shock down the back of your neck all the way down your back and down your legs.

Wow. And it was super profound and like visceral. Like it was so shocking to me. I almost like knocked right back to my knees and I had this terrible gut reaction. Like I don't know what that was, but whatever that was was like not right.

You know, like that is outside of the realm of like normal physiological experience. And so [snorts] I spent some time there. I thought like I reached out to my acupuncturist. Like, "Hey, like my chi is off." And I reached out to like a physical therapist.

I was like, "Maybe I have a like a pinched nerve in my neck or something." And both of them were very professionals and they were like, "Mhm." No. It has nothing to do with your chi being off. Well, before before we keep going many in my audience have no idea what chi is honestly.

And so I want to explain to them I understand it cuz I go to acupuncture too and I had to learn. And that's basically your life force or or your mitoch or your mitochondria, you know what I mean? Like your energy that's in your body.

So for those that don't understand that, I think I'll try to find a a link to explain just terminology that we're probably both going to use. Exactly. Sorry.

Cuz a lot of people, you know, we a lot many listen and they're very into the conventional things and I know we're going to touch base on that. So the chi, the life force, the energy that we're in her body cuz we are electrical beings and I don't want to sound woo-woo or make it sound like we're like robots.

Yeah, but we really are electrical beings.

Exactly, exactly. So then what ended up happening? Like Yeah, it was just like a whole I my health deteriorated quite significantly between January and March when I actually all the way until I started treating um in which was July actually. Uh but I my my symptoms worsened to Oh my gosh, my legs it was mostly in my mobility.

I had very limited mobility. Lots of fatigue. Yeah. Um my legs could barely hold me up. I felt like I was walking through quick quicksand. Or like that my legs were as like big as sequoias and um yeah, it was a lot of disconnect um and I had an MRI, neurologist, and the whole nine yards and I was diagnosed thankfully pretty quickly relatively speaking to everybody else who struggles to get a proper diagnosis.

I was diagnosed in March of that year because it was pretty clear by the MRI that Okay. I had lesions in my brain and my spinal cord. Did And that to me, yeah, that's that was quick. Mhm. Good. That was good That's good medicine because I don't want to put down the medical field at all because you know, it's like you they know what they know from the training they received and whoever funds the different the different schoolings, you know.

So, to me, where are you located again? At that time I was in Arizona, but right now I'm in Colorado. Okay, so in Arizona and in 3 months, goodness. But, that must have been so scary cuz I know with my situation, I know the fear.

I'm like, am I having a stroke? That was my number one. Right?

Yeah. Yeah, I was like I couldn't understand because I just deteriorated so quickly. And I I was like, there is something significantly wrong with me. And I went to the regular doctor first because my insurance had to go to regular doctor and then get a referral to neurologist.

And he was the one who was like told me it could be three things that were so ridiculous. And the first two I was like I I don't have either of those two conditions. Like, that's clear I don't have that. And then he said it's often a first presenting sign of multiple sclerosis.

Wow, so they they nail okay, good they nail

I was like, okay, I'm going to go home and research that because that is the only thing it could be. Cuz the other things were stupid like diabetic kind of situation for late stage late stage you know, diabetes like a neuropathy kind of thing and I was like, I don't have that.

And the other one was like AIDS and I was like, I don't have any AIDS. Wow. And they do they some throw some stuff out. I know for me, I had a goiter growing inwards, but you couldn't tell and the doctor and my TH levels were normal.

And so they're like, you need to go to see a psychiatrist. Oh my gosh.

It is anxiety disorder. And I'm like, I know I'm anxious, but I don't think you know, you could because I started listening. I started listening to my body and being still going, okay God, you created me. Like, what's going on here? I'm freaking out cuz all these people are telling me all these different things.

So, in in your experience, like what was it like navigating the medical system with a with a complex chronic condition, especially during seasons when symptoms were real, but clear answers were hard to find? Yeah, that's such a good question because I was definitely encouraged to begin, you know, conventional pharmaceutical treatment right away.

And as luck would have it, I mean, in hindsight, I call it luck, but um I I actually had a whole lifetime of being very sensitive to pharmaceutical drugs. Like allergic to just about every pharmaceutical that I would go on and antibiotics and everything always had like if I wasn't allergic to it, then I was completely intolerant of it.

And at that time, 20 years ago, the treatment was uh injections um for MS. And I was very nervous about having to like use a needle and I would self-inject. I don't know, with young kids, it just felt like and the side effects were really drastic.

And I was really nervous about that and I thought like I'm afraid that I won't be able to tolerate like the side effects and like the intensity of the drug. I was really concerned about that and I was thinking, gosh, could those things be more be worse than the actual than than the symptoms I'm feeling now, you know?

effects, you mean? Yeah. And so, thankfully, I had as as yeah, as the universe would have it is as I was divinely guided or as just pure luck, I happened to have a naturopath that I had was working with for a while and she had been the one to actually encourage me to have a food sensitivity test.

Yeah.

And even though I felt like I was allergic to life, I would always joke that I was allergic to everything. I didn't think I was allergic to food and I didn't understand 20 years ago how what I was eating had anything to do with like why I couldn't walk, you know?

Exactly. And um so yeah, I did that and I thought like I am just going to pursue this like cleanse to make me stronger to withstand the the assault of the medication. Mhm. And so I did this like food elimination diet. At that time was also when I was diagnosed with celiac disease through this this whole sensitivity panel.

That would make so much sense. Right. Word. Totally.

the thing like people I hear you, girl. Like for me, the goiter went away when I went to Dr. David Bernstein, which he's on an episode I I I asked him to come on. And and that was it. He put me in a gluten like a no gluten, no sugar, no dairy for 3 months, gave me supplementation, had me do all these different things.

My husband's like, "This this guy is a quack." And let me tell you, after a couple of months, the goiter went away, my skin cleared up, I felt better, I was able to it was I had I didn't have those heart palpitations anymore and I'm like And this was about 20 20-something years ago, too.

And I'm like, "Yeah, this makes sense." Right?

It makes so much sense. It was like my life completely turned around in that 6-week elimination diet. And yeah, and everybody thought I was crazy, too. I mean, they were like, "Really, you can't treat MS with like a diet." And I was like, "Look, I'm not trying to treat MS with a diet.

I just don't feel like I'm healthy right now and I feel like if I can make myself healthier before I start taking these drugs, then I don't know, it just felt like that's what I needed to do." And then, you know, as just like a year experience, like the shifting of my food, even though I thought that I was eating a healthy.

I ate organic and natural and clean. I thought I was doing all the right things. Like and I was, I just not for me, you know?

Right. And but when I changed my diet was really when the door opened to this whole other world of the way the body actually wants to heal and how to best support the body. And so yeah, then I was down another road and I never actually needed to actually pursue pharmaceutical intervention.

I kept saying to myself like if I my health ever declines below my baseline and what I considered my baseline at that time was my first presenting symptom of MS. Okay. And if I was to get worse than that, then I would then I would be open to pharmaceutical intervention.

But I mean, I definitely had lots of dips and lots of twists and turns in the whole wellness journey. But thankfully, I I didn't ever feel motivated to pursue a pharmaceutical drug. Yeah, I mean it's a hard one because so many clients or people or friends or people that go through stuff like this, you [clears throat] know, this goes to show how unique and individually we are all made.

How we have our own specific fingerprint and how cuz what happens in the conventional westernized medicine is it's like one-size-fits-all. And then you have all the side effects and everything. I when before they figured out it was a goiter, I had to go to the to an emergency ultrasound and then they found the goiter.

It was It was that was what's choking me, not me having a psychiatric situation, okay? And they and they put me on um what was it? Oh, see, I'm having a little cuz I'm I'm in the middle of like moving and stuff like that.

So, it's like things are uh flaring up now as we speak, but that's the thing. It the medication itself though gave me the side effects and I was just like, "No, I can't do this." And then they said they were they were going to remove my thyroid with uh radioactive iodine or just remove it and put on Synthroid.

And that was that scared the the poop out of me. I was just like, "Oh my gosh." And then that and people trust That's the thing. People trust the system. So, now I say, "Have you gotten a second opinion and a third?" I know it might cost you money, but it's going to cost you either way.

Either way it's going to cost you. 100% and I think that you're pointing to something so important that people start to pay attention. Like everybody thought that I was so nuts and all I thought at the time was that I wasn't dying of like a disease where an instant decision was was incredibly important.

I knew I had time on my side to be super educated and super informed and also to really sit with what resonated with me internally. And it was very hard at that time 20 years ago to push back against my family, my community, my doctors and take a totally different path and Yeah. it was kind of radical 20 years ago to do that.

But um but as luck would have it, I I don't know why I was just guided to just trust myself and believe that I had the time to educate myself and be empowered to make the best decision for me and I think that this is where some people you get pulled into this loop of fear and doubt and uncertainty and you're not completely in touch with your own body and your own symptoms and all of those things are normal and they're not to be dismissed

Right. because that is a very real human way of of reacting to like diagnoses or when your body's doing things that are are frightening, you know? I mean, it's normal. But but we also have it within ourselves to choose a different path. Not necessarily natural, but the path of listening to yourself or not being super reactive or just sitting with like all of it in a different way.

I don't know. Yeah, no, that makes sense. So, that would be a tool set that you must have learned and I had to learn, too, the hard These are like lessons we learned the hard way and I think that's why you and I are both in these spaces, in these healing spaces to teach others like, "Hey, list like it's okay.

Please listen to your your body. Please listen like and how do you do it?" So, let's talk about that a little. How did you do that? How did you like what were the first Going back, let's go back 20 years ago. What were the first things that you started seeing the shifting?

You said the diet. And you went and got um Did you do allergy testing? Like was it the allergy with the like the 90 pins on your back? No. Oh,

that to me.

was actually a blood test. It yeah, it was actually a blood test testing different like IG markers in your bloodstream more than it was like a because that skin prick is like a histamine response, you know what I mean? And I wasn't I never had any histamine responses.

I had like a food sensitivities that would die that would manifest like 24 to 48 hours later. It wasn't like a histamine response with food is like an immediate sort of thing where you have rash skin, you know, your throat constricts and things like that, which is from ingestion to about 12 hours later.

Whereas a different type of of immune-mediated responses anywhere from 24 to 48 hours later and it doesn't always affect like your breathing or your skin. It affects your digestion. Yes. And um and and and yeah, it manifests in a different sort of way.

Yeah, I remember the first time when Dr. Bernstein was like, "You should be um eliminating, you know, going to the bathroom, number two, after every meal." And I was like, "What? Dude, no. That doesn't happen in real life." And he goes, "If you If you ate what your body needs, because everybody needs different."

Like this is the thing, you can't just put everybody on the same exact diet. Even though he he was eliminating, so let's talk about eliminating diet elimination diet like and what it did for you. Like Oh, it changed my whole life. Yeah, me too.

How did you learn about that? And do you And what else What other things did you learn that helped you? Because you never know, someone right now is scared to death if they saw they're listening to this podcast cuz they heard about MS or CIRS, which is chronic chronic inflammatory response syndrome, which is something I'm uh had to deal with because my house was full of mold.

Mine, too. And And so I think that's why Christine's here. Another chapter we have in common. Yes, another one. And Yes. And but it's like I'm in a I'm in a better space now, you know, and and but I had to gut out my house.

I had to I mean, it cost a lot of money. And what's sad at times is you feel really lonely when you're going through this, because the people in your family or under the same roof don't have this situation going on in their system.

Or it they might have it, but it their symptoms are different. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So, tell me about the ill you know, from the beginning of the MS now all the way to CIRS and let's explain that to the audience, but I want to hear the things that you have done that worked for you and that helped you go through it and maybe what maybe they'll be the same things as I did too.

I don't know for sure, but You talk about

Yeah, I mean it's like all a big journey, right? So, so first it was the food and the food was incredibly powerful. And it was I think with the as it relates to this type of like backing all the way up really quickly around the food and the food that's right for you.

I think like uniformly across the board there are certain things that are common to every person and I like to reframe the conversation around people get all worked up about the food that they can't eat or whatever or eliminating foods that they feel like are crutch or like I can't imagine never eating that.

And I and I think it's just really about well I mean the whole another da rabbit hole around what do you want more?

Like to eat your pizza and then to be debilitated or to give up your pizza and live in the fullness of like your vitality, but putting that aside I also feel like it's more about creating a different relationship with your nervous system and calming and soothing your body and removing things that are triggering your your whether it's your gut or your it's your immune system or it's your nervous system cuz they're all pretty interrelated.

That's like psychoneuroimmunology and that all they're all very intertwined. But we're creating a place of safety in your body and your nervous system can start to rest and so we eliminate some core things like sugar, refined sugar, gluten, dairy. Those are like three like bulletproof things.

Yes. And then I think this is where like individual testing is important because especially I've met so many people like let's say so many people with MS. And all of us have a different diet. Yeah. And all of us are able to thrive in in life.

And my diet is gone through many evolutions in 20 years. Mhm. So especially as I started working with my nervous system, um my diet has shifted again. So I just feel like what is important for people to understand is what you do first to begin with as a way to create a different relationship with your body and your nervous system isn't necessarily the way it's going to look forever.

Exactly. And your body will change. Everything is Everything changes. So it's an evolution and it's not like something that's fixed in stone in in time. So as you work through your healing path, your food choices will shift as well. Your food needs will shift as well.

Yeah. So having said that No, it's so right on. But for sure like the time that I was most debilitated with food was when I was living in this home. My husband and I moved from Arizona to Colorado shortly after I was diagnosed with MS.

And we moved into this mold house that they did took us about 10 years to to really figure out uh the depth of it. Boy, it's quite an education to be uh that whole environmental sensitivity.

How did you learn? How did you learn? Like did you Which websites did you go on? Or did you find out? Because to me it was like the Shoemaker protocol. I had to go through that whole website and everything. I mean the whole right?

And I'm just sitting there like oh this is exhausting.

Yeah, I mean it was definitely I I actually I actually had those two really bad MS Well, I've been really struggling with my health quite a bit and became super super intolerant and sensitive to a variety of different foods. Like the list of foods that I was sensitive to back in my gosh, 2010, 2012 was just like shocking.

And um and then I had really bad MS flares. I I but they were different, right? It wasn't my legs again. Can you tell me a little more about MS because I I never been down that rabbit hole before. So maybe for the audience and for me to explain like I know it's multiple sclerosis and there's plaque in the brain.

Is that what what it is or what?

Well, it's you have you have this demyelination. Your myelin sheath is like the fatty substance that surrounds all of your nerves in your brain and in your spinal cord. And then you have this demyelination process with that fatty sheath starts to be like neutralized or diminished by the immune your your autoimmune response.

Targets the myelin sheath and then that ends up being attacked by your nervous system so to speak and then you end up having all of these nerve related um physical symptoms. So you can experience blindness if it attacks your optic nerve. So that's what I did is I went blind in my right eye.

Um and so that's why one of the challenges of MS is that you have intermittent symptoms depending upon where in your brain and your spinal cord your myelin sheath is deteriorating. And so and because of that nature of those symptoms being coming and going and being in all different parts of your body and expressing in a variety of different ways, mainstream medicine just wants to look at one symptom to equal one diagnosis.

And it's harder for them with MS because it's a nervous system disorder and it affects your whole body. Yeah. So, you can have changing symptoms all the time. So, I've never experienced I mean, I I do still Well, not I not still, but I have had nerve pain in my legs, but I've never experienced again the same level of debilitation in my legs as I did 20 years ago.

But, I did go right blind in my right eye Yeah. for a while and that was um trying to figure out and then my neck was frozen Right.

and uh so, I had this frozen neck and blindness in my right eye and I just couldn't figure out what it was and all these food sensitivities and my digestion was just like completely shot. Mhm. And I was doing all this work on my digestion.

I was just like fanatical about my digestion. As you probably know. And uh yeah, and then I found the mold actually like and it was so obvious and it was like, "Oh, Wow. that's what it is." Yeah. And then we were able to track down like how that started and then we went through the whole rabbit hole as well of like remediating and

Yes, which is a lot of work.

and a lot of work and yeah, everybody thought I was crazy because nobody else Although, they all had symptoms, they were all very different symptoms. Yeah. But, it was hard to pin on it being mold. Yeah.

You know what I mean? Well, it's mycotoxins and and you can't see them really unless you get your house tested, which we did and and but then we removed panels and all of a sudden it was just black and filled and I was like that's what killed especially when 2020 happened.

I had to work from home. And that's when I started getting really sick even though I was feeling and that and that's the thing healing and health is an evolution because we have we live in a world with so much so many different living things.

I don't know how else to explain it, right? Like even the mycotoxins are bacteria and they they're living things and so I want to go back a little more with you though because what else helped you besides the food? Like how what else did you learn?

What tools? Because I think if like I said if someone's listening and they're curious or they're like wait there's a better way. How like even though our ways might not be the healthiest for them, but we can help someone think about like oh, I could take a step back and listen.

I had to learn to meditate. I had to learn to breathe. I had to learn that um my body keeps the score like the book The Body Keeps the Score that book like it was uh revolutionary for me and my practice, right? What else what other tools helped you through all this?

Through that mold journey? Mold MS because I mean I know like I know someone that had MS and it was diet Coke it was diet sodas that were doing it and when they removed all the diet sodas their lesions went away. Isn't that fascinating?

Well, that's like the interesting thing is that your body really wants to heal. Amen. And it really does know how and I think we've lost sight of that and that trust and faith in our body and I think that you and I have been in similar places with our health where a lot of people are where you can go down this deep rabbit hole where everything seems to be falling apart.

Yeah. And nothing you do is working and it leads you to a bunch of dead ends or more discouragement. And then it's like this this cycle that happens, this mental spiral that happens, where your body is failing you. What did I do wrong?

Um and then you have these self-reinforcing sort of like anxiety, fear, frustration, sleeplessness that only compounds the the symptoms that you're experiencing. Mhm. Yeah. And so I think Well, thankfully my husband and I at the time we ultimately decided after this whole long journey and and some remediation and things like that to sell our house and move.

Like we remediated so it was like sellable and proper. Um and then we moved and uh that changed my health so dramatically just removing myself from that environment. It was shocking. Yeah. Um it was completely shocking. But what I think was really important is I had this healer who suggested something radical to me at the time that I stopped me in my tracks.

And she said that I needed to break up with the frequency of mold. What? And I was like what does that mean? And she said cuz you will find it everywhere. Yeah. Mold is everywhere. Yeah. And we can't ever be rid of it entirely.

It needs to live It thrives in an imbalanced ecosystem. Mhm. And so how can you learn to live in a balanced ecosystem? And what are the things like how can you shift your relationship with mold? Because if I'm living in a state of fear all the time, there's going to be mold around every corner, under every refrigerator, behind every like washing machine and dryer.

You go on vacation? I mean like a hotel.

Everywhere.

[cough] [clears throat]

And it's like I had to learn like this whole idea the body keeps the score. I had to learn that I could be in control. Before I wasn't, mold was controlling me, the fear of my environmental my environmental concerns were controlling everything. Every everything I did and then I lived in this heightened state of like vigilance, hypervigilance.

Yes. And doubt and fear and like scrutiny and um doubt and like that whole entire that all of those emotions create a vibrational field. Mhm. And you are living in that vibrational field and everything has a vibrational match. And so mold has a vibrational match.

And a lot of environmental toxins, not just mold, but a lot of environmental toxins have a vibrational match. And it sounds radical but it's true. And it doesn't matter whether you think of it or not, whether you think it's radical, it doesn't mean it's not true.

Right. And so I think once I learned that I could actually control my environment by having a different frame of mind around that I was not afraid. I was just not going to be afraid of mold. And then I was going to learn everything I could about balancing my system.

It doesn't mean that I'm going to move into a moldy house.

Right. But it and it means that I'm going to take proactive steps when I recognize that there is, you know, something that needs to be remediated. But I mean I just lived for a year and a half in Costa Rica. Talk about mold.

Yeah, anywhere tropical. Yeah, I put myself in an environment that was in naturally, you know, could be have a lot of mold system, you know, a lot of mold going on. And I had a lot of mold experiences there. But I think it's about like taking ownership of that and not creating all of this fear and that weighs on your nervous system.

Yeah, it sounds like the DNRS Dynamic Neural Retraining System and Gupta Program. And for those that don't and those that don't understand that, I will put links in the show notes of everything we talk about. Um but that DNRS helped me. I cannot believe it.

First at first I was like, this is so weird. And then I read the book I mean, I read the book Wired for Healing and that she wrote and I was just like, oh this makes sense. And then Norman Doidge uh his book um and now I'm forgetting it cuz I'm having a brain fart.

It's early. Uh anyway, but see that's the thing when you start learning and then you start practicing or connecting your your brain together like the it is just really impactful and understanding how we are created to heal. And and it's a an evolution.

Like we're all growing together as we're you know, we're all you know, whatever year you are in on this earth right now walking this earth, it is about learning and processing and growing and understanding. And then to me it's helping others as well, right?

So tell me a little bit about you and your company and what how what what made you start it? Thank you. Yeah, I I So I call myself a transformation guide and not a coach Okay. because I think coaching is a very linear process of change and change is not permanent.

We can change our mind, we can change our hair color, we can change our diet. So, change is something that can be changed at any time. And transformation is permanent. It's a permanent state of being that you evolve towards and you never go back to what you were before.

Mhm. And like I will never go back to the previous iterations as of who I was on my on my wellness journey to wellness. And I think that I love to trans- I love to support people in this process of recognizing that your own body has an innate ability to heal and it's about creating the space within ourselves to allow that healing to naturally unfold.

It's not something that we need to go outside of ourselves to find. It's something that's already infinitely available within us. Mhm. It's not Not to say that there isn't a place for for health care providers such as you or doctors and tinctures and diagnosing and there's It's not that there's not a place for that.

Yes. Right, there is a place for all that, but it's about coming home to yourself and and developing your own inner trust and inner awareness, reconnecting with your body, shifting your mindset, and understanding that it is all within you. Everything that you seek outside is available within.

Mhm. And how do we hold space for that or how I hold space for that? And I use the nervous system as kind of like the doorway in to this vast reservoir of healing that's within us. Okay. Because I believe that we all live with this disordered nervous system.

Mhm. Especially nowadays nowadays more than ever.

I mean, well, then also back to that vibrational field, right? And and we are all part of this vibrational field and frequency. Um especially as we see all of the things that are happening in the world today and we're just so like distraught over it and that's all really normal, right?

Um and so I love to work with the nervous system and and I just got guided into this experience personally myself. And the change that happened was so deeply profound. And it was so transformational in every sense of the word that I just knew that as I've always tried to help and support other people on their healing path I recognized immediately that this was something that was super missing from our conversation.

And now I will say that like the nervous system in general is starting to gain this greater awareness like you and I read The Body Keeps the Score. I mean, how old is that book? Like a decade old, you know? And that was so radical at the time, you know?

Bessel van der Kolk, I mean, he was super way ahead of himself and and even Gabor Maté jumped in he also has a beautiful body of work but even before either of them, Carolyn Myss, like what about her, you know?

I mean, she has a lot of she was way before her time in some as this idea that our body holds on to these old traumas and these old things and our they're they live it within our body and then unseen and unrecognized they turn into disease.

And so ease how they love to say it, yeah. Yeah, they turn into disease. And so it's a matter of of recognizing that first. Yeah. And starting with that first and going into your nervous system and recognizing that it is within our right, our ability to create a totally different relationship with our nervous system.

Right now, we either have this continuation of the nervous system. On one hand, you're afraid of everything, you're triggered by everything, you don't feel safe at all. Yeah. Or the other hand, like you're very into this work of somatic experiencing or like the Hakomi method or a lot of these other things where you're going to go in or vagus nerve reset or polyvagal theory and you're going to go in and uh fix your nervous system that way.

Right. Right. And I like to go into this idea that you can go from you create your own safety within. Mhm. And your your nervous system knows how your system knows how to release everything that it holds that doesn't serve them anymore. If we create the right environment and allow that allow space for your nervous system to discharge everything that it's holding.

So, what do you mean by that? Because I'm I'm just thinking of like some some people that will be listening and they're we speak it like because we do it. I've done it for myself and for my clients, you do the same. But what do you mean by that?

Releasing it? Like like I can imagine like an 18-year-old right now listening going, "What's Rice? Why are you making me listen to this podcast episode? What what do you mean release what? What am I really Am I spitting something out? Am I sneezing?

Am I

What am I releasing? How's that work? Like I What I tell my clients, my especially young people that don't understand this cuz we're we're women who have had experience in life and wisdom now. Right? And we're trying to pass it on. But I'm thinking of my my Gen Z'ers right now where or even the Gen Alpha's coming up because who knows how long this these episodes will be out in the ether.

So, to me, it's like trying to get them to understand that their intuition and their and and because I'm a woman of faith, like the Holy Spirit that lives inside of you is always talking. But, what happens in our society, our Westernized culture is everybody else is talking.

And we're listening to everybody else. So, how do you, Christine, help your client to like what are the first couple of things like say I say my 18-year-old Gen Z'er is like, "Okay, I'm calling I'm calling her up. I want to work with her."

What would be the first things that you would try to get them to do to

Yeah. Totally.

you know, to to chill? They're not. See, that's I love everything that you said. Well, first of all, I don't go into your diagnosis or your stories. There's no need to do that. That is not even relevant. Wow.

Because your body will take care of all of that if you start with this first. And the first thing I do is I believe that we don't have any emotional capacity. We don't have the capacity to hold our emotional states. What happens generally is that we feel an emotion and then from that emotion, we create a story and then from that story, we create a belief structure and then from that belief structure, we make decisions and none of it's true.

And what if we hold space for this idea that there's nothing wrong with you and there's nothing to fix? Mhm. And what if we begin to build emotional capacity? And what I mean by that is the capacity to hold the emotional experiences that come through you and leave, right?

Because emotion is energy in motion. It's an emotional state that comes and it goes. You are not your emotions. That's right.

You're just not. And so we began by teaching and holding space for ourselves to just sit with an emotion for 30 seconds. And that's it. And for 30 seconds you don't do anything but feel all that. And a lot of times you want to ruminate or cuz it's very It's like very natural to then be like, "Ah, you know?"

And like, "I'm mad." Or "I'm sad." Or whatever that emotion is. And then we want to react from that emotional state, right? And then so like starting really slow, 30 seconds at a time. And then during that time you have a mantra and the mantra is there's nothing to fix.

That's it. And you learn this over time. You build emotional capacity. And what actually ends up happening as you build emotional capacity and that is the capacity to hold all that is. Everything that you feel as a human, we are meant to be feel We are feeling sensing beings.

But that doesn't identify us. It's not who we are. We are so much more than that. It is just an emotional experience we are having in that moment. Right. In that moment. In that moment.

to remind people. It's just a momentary thing. And so there's a lot of fear that comes in and a lot of distrust that comes in and it's like if we can just start really slow and really small and I hold the space to love you for everything that you are with no conditions.

Right.

And you are feel totally held and supported by me. But you also can learn to do this all by yourself without me. Just like we all should be able to hold all of the emotions that we have without them identifying us. Yeah. And as we build emotional capacity and we're able to hold these emotional states, you'll notice two things.

One is the little tiny things that would trigger you don't trigger you anymore. Right. That's how you know you're growing. That's how you know you're growing. Like you'll be like, "I thought I would be so mad when she said that." And now I don't even think about it.

Mhm. So one on one hand, the small things will be just just fade away. But you also have the space to make room for these bigger emotional states and take aligned action.

And so that's a part of listening to your body and building that intuition and that faith muscle and that trust muscle and that intuition, but all of those things that you and I just already identified that live within you, I think that they're underneath the nervous system and our ability to hold space for everything that we're feeling.

Mhm. And if we can create this opportunity for them to trust that their body, they are not their emotions, and the emotions want to come and go. Because when we hold on to them, Yes. like then that creates a distortion in our energy field.

Mhm. And we don't need to hold on to it. We need to feel it, Right. not deny it, not push it down, not get on our phone, Oh, goodness, yes. not get on like not jump on YouTube.

Right. We just not bypass it, Yeah.

not fixate on it, Right. but just be with it. And let it teach you. time, you'll start to discern things that will come and go and you're not mad anymore. And then things that have a deeper meaning, like that relationship truly does not serve me.

Mhm. Or that job.

no, or that job, or like no, my body really is responding to something in my house.

Mhm. And you'll sniff it out. I'm telling you, I was able to pinpoint it to it, and my husband's like, "How did you know?" I'm like, "Because I sat still, and I was like like I said, I pray a lot, and I'm like, 'Lord, please just show me, show me what is happening right now.

Is it my work? Is it this? Is it that? Is it Am I whatever?'" And finally, it throughout my whole time even with the thyroid situation, I had to be still, and and just pray. And and it is the rest and digest. You will I- We don't want to be uncomfortable.

That's the problem. And so we're trying to ignore it, we're trying to go around it, we're trying to like numb it out. Um and I tell my clients, I'm like, "I'm going to teach you to be comfortable in the uncomfortable." Yeah, exactly. Right?

Because the only way out is to go through. Yes. It's the only way. The obstacle is the way. You have to, right? And that's the thing is if we recognize that that's actually the shortest route. Mhm. It's actually the fastest way, it's the shortest route.

It might be painful. Yeah. Painful? But we can do hard things. Yes. No, like And that's the resiliency and the post-traumatic growth, the PTG. This is what I tell people, like, "Okay, we've been here for 6 months now." Cuz I don't want you to be my client forever.

I'm sorry, I don't. I want you to get better. Yeah, that's why I say like, "I'm not healing you, you're healing you." I'm just guiding you to that place within you to allow that healing to naturally emerge. And then it's like so beautiful, and you're exactly right.

I think like our society and culture, we create this idea that there's no sorts of discomfort, and discomfort should be avoided at all costs, and hard things shouldn't uh even arise for us. And then, we're not able to actually handle life when the hard things actually happen.

Mhm. Exactly. And we're not here to live a life of complacency or softness or gentleness. I mean, God bless America. Like, we all want that. Yeah. But but that's not that's not

reality. That's not reality. This is why like I told you, I I'm a woman of faith, so I study the book of Ecclesiastes at least once a month, because it Ecclesiastes is a reminder of what we're talking about. Mhm. There's a time for everything under heaven.

I mean, I can start singing that song. A time to be born, a time to die, a time to, you know, gather stones, a time for war, a time for peace. And when you start understanding that you have a purpose, right? Because this is what people need.

A purpose, understanding, community. Yeah. And and understanding holistically, like you said, our nervous system. We're electrical beings. We are connected, interconnected with this whole entire world while we're alive. You know, cuz see and it's just it fascinates me every day. I'm in awe when I'm in my quiet time in the morning, and I'm like, "Well, who you going to bring to me today?"

Or what's happening today? And being still, because that's what helps me be healthy and strong. And I could tell now. I don't know about you, but if you don't have your like inner I don't know how you do quiet time or whatever you do to breathe breath work or meditation or mantras or whatever, but when you don't do that, don't you feel your day is a little like discombobulated?

I All right. I feel like it definitely sets my day. I mean, I definitely have my sacred time every morning the moment I wake up.

that. Um and I can't imagine actually starting my day without it. I feel very incomplete if I don't have that. Mhm. Um for sure. Um and I feel like I what I love that you said about that there's a time uh for everything.

And I what I love about that is like this whole idea of like we are nature. And there is a time and everything happens for a reason in its own time. And we we disconnect our healing from that kind of experience and wreck don't recognize that our healing is a path that unfolds in its own divine way.

Mhm. If we allow it and trust the process to unfold for us. Yeah. We want it not hold space for the wisdom of our body. And to actually guide us in telling us what it needs. Yeah. And learning how to build that strength and that trust and that resilience um it's like the biggest honor of my life to witness somebody else coming into their truth.

Yes. It is I mean, it's just like I can't even imagine. Um

Oh, I can't even express like how beautiful it is because we are all so beautiful and sacred. It is just like mind-blowing. Yeah. But for someone to touch that within themselves and then let that be the thing that guides them Yeah. the whole world will change if we can all start to do that.

And I feel like this is where we start with the nervous system because

system humility and dealing with the ego. Because that to me has a lot to do with like when we get so scared and the fear and what we were talking about earlier, it's like understanding you know, just a bunch of different things. Like I could keep going on and on.

But if somebody wanted to work with you, how would they find you? You can find me on my website christinerock.com and I have a mentorship program. I have a three different ones um and it's a container where I hold you for this entire time.

It's not like we meet each other once a week for an hour. It's 300 and you know, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for 9 months straight. Wow.

Um so it's a deep container uh that is an immersion into all of you and everything that you are. And um yeah, so you can reach out to me on my website. I also have a Substack that I write a lot about the nervous system and healing and all the different ways in which we heal and can support our body during our healing process.

And so yeah, you can find me online. I love that. And so from anyone around the world? Yeah. Oh, wonderful, wonderful. Everything will be in the show notes. Is there anything you would like to say to the audience before we say goodbye? Oh, I just want to say we're all just such beautiful beings and like our health journey is part of our journey in life and and it's an incredible opportunity to get to know yourself at the deepest level and that you can do this.

Like you are so much more than your diagnosis, you're so much more than your illness, you're so much more than any emotional state that you identify with as being you who you are. You are so much more than that. And I just encourage people to want to step into their strength and their vitality and live in the fullness of themselves.

Yes. Yes, I love all of that and to remember that you're fearfully and wonderfully made. And we and and we're made in the image of God. We're not God, but we're made in his image. So, on that

We are a fractal of the divine. Amen. So, on that note, please do not forget to trust in the Lord, guard your heart, and renew your mind. Bye. And now for the disclaimer to make sure you understand that you are responsible for you.

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