#15 - Going to the Wrong Specialist

When it comes to choosing a specialist, there are a few things you need to take into consideration. First and foremost, you need to make sure that the specialist is qualified and experienced in the area you need help with. For example, if you're looking for help with your fitness, you'll want to make sure the specialist is a certified personal trainer. If you're looking for help with your health, you'll want to make sure the specialist is a licensed medical doctor. Once you've made sure the specialist is qualified, you'll also want to consider their bedside manner and whether or not they're someone you feel comfortable working with. You may be able to get referrals from friends or family members who have worked with specialists in the past. Finally, don't be afraid to ask questions and get more information about the specialist before making a decision.

Transcript

Unknown: 0:57

Bam, diggity dude. It's been like a few weeks, we've been out. I had the flu. The kids had the flu. You were here as the flu was coming in. And then I was deep in the flu and you got home and then you got sick as well. But now I'm back Apple voice again, which is nice. I'm kind of back as well, I think I last podcast was so good. We had a professional podcast asking us questions, which was Boomer, which I guess makes a difference. But now we're back. And we are professional podcasters. If you can see the video. At least I have a I have a microphone boom. Which is making myself my my voice sound crisp. Yeah, so I want to talk and you want to talk, you kind of want to do one a bit of a rant, which I love Dr. Ed rants because we're very passionate. Let's talk about the finding the wrong specialist. And how I mean, how do you know it's the wrong specialist? Let's start with that? Well, I think I think that's important, because I think the first thing that makes you decide to work with somebody is that trust element. And I think the trust element needs to include understanding maybe the philosophies or the values of the person that you're going to work with. And understanding the constraints in which that person is working within. So that this idea came from two areas, I suppose I can start, maybe the opposite to what I was thinking. But I had a conversation with somebody recently about this phenomenon called Long COVID. Yeah, and it's an interesting thing, because they use the label, they said, or something was going on with my husband for a few months. And we didn't know what it was. And now recently, we've spoken to a doctor, and they said, Oh, it's long COVID. And then they kind of get this sense of Oh, at least we can give it a name. But I think in giving it a name, you almost make it seem like to the person that there is no solution that's available for that thing, because it's such a new thing. And therefore if it's new, then we haven't studied it for long enough to understand, I think it's an important thing to realize is that nothing is really new if you use principles of what we understand about the human body, which I like to believe that both of us use principles that we've come to, after quite a long time of looking at them in the context of humans, right. So those principles would be the first one would be neuro visceral integration, or do I mean by that how the nervous system responds to the body and how that impacts the behaviors of the system. Right. And there's, there's these levels in this hierarchy that impacts the nervous system. And then there's the cell danger response. So when something happens in the environment, you have only a certain set of behaviors that can happen in the cells. And they inform what happens at the organs, and they inform what happens in the nervous system, and then you have an outcome. Right? Let's talk about COVID. If we're allowed to, it's a virus, it tries to hijack the machinery in the cell, one of them being the mitochondria, it's well known that viruses impact mitochondrial function, and cause the cell danger response to activate. So if I hypothetically, and I say hypothetically, I was going to look at something like long COVID, I would say, How's the cell danger response? Can we resolve that? How are the behaviors in the nervous system? Can we make it relaxed? Can we resolve those? Can we express what needs to be expressed? Can we I mean, myself and yourself work together with a client to make sure that those fundamental foundational things that are required for a healthy human being to have behaviors that are functional in the modern world? Are they there? Are they are they available to them? If not, then don't go and see a specialist who isn't going to, at least in some way, look at those things. Because otherwise, you're potentially just wasting your money, you're going to a specialist for a problem that is potentially very broad. Again, when when somebody comes to you for an assessment, you don't jump to a conclusion. You go back all the way to the basics on some meat breathing mechanics. So you're trying to get coherence in the heart and the lungs and the brain, ie the physical, the mental and the emotional systems all in a very simple exercise to see can they create the correct tension in their body, which tells you how their nervous system response to stress, right? Which is what you did with somebody recently. That was a super cool story. And I think that's where I wanted to go with it before we even go there. So you mentioned a couple of cool things about your hypothetical view of long COVID ad, a friend of mine that battled long COVID and overcame it by doing a 10 day fast, I think, or 14 day fast, which again, would go back to the cellular level and the point of these longer fasts to kind of reset the mitochondria, right? It's or at least to get rid of the shit mitochondria or something like that. Yeah, so long fasts. But like, if you think of the mitochondria, it's the place where all of the electrons and protons and things from your food go to be used to create energy. And much like much like a kitchen. If you keep feeding them or putting new food that's not cooked into it for too long, then they get kind of overwhelmed and tired. So if you fast, you induce this thing called autophagy, or mitophagy, which means that you clean all decks. you declutter the kitchen, so to speak, and then they can start turning over much more rapidly, which means they can start shuttling the electrons across much more easily, and then the energy levels can come back. Gotcha. And how long do you I mean, not for long COVID. And we're not giving any prescriptions, but for just for the mitochondria side of things, and mitochondrial health, how long these are just people fast for. So actually, you can I mean, Ted says you can, you can get the benefits from like a 12 hour fast, because some people eat super early, and they eat super late, and they don't actually give their body 12 hours to clear the decks. And then if you still have issues, then you can kind of shorten that to 10 hours to eight hours. So like the intermittent fasting. And then there's other little tweaks and I would give clients in very specific contexts. But even like, a day or two would be a place to start threes, the kind of optimal level if you have issues with the immune system coming in. But again, doing it with some guidance is always helpful. Yeah, for sure. Beautiful. I just wanted to get that out there. So let's talk about the specialists. And I'll start off with what makes somebody a specialist. I think that there's two sides of the coin on this one, there's experience and successful experiences, we should make that very clear. And then there's, shall we say, the academical side or the certification side? You know, and I think that they both go hand in hand, I think sometimes people can be overconfident because they have the certifications, but they don't really have the experience. And I think there's a lot of people that don't have the confidence that have a lot of experience. But the lack of confidence, because they don't have the, the certification the degree, especially when we're talking about working with other humans, I think that's even a bigger one, which I it's starting to change a little bit now. But I know for myself, you know, I don't have any big degree, I don't have anything that kind of puts an MD on my, on my resume. And so, for me, it's taken years and years to build the confidence to speak confidently about how I can truly help people. But that's come from experience of, you know, I would say that I have a very my fail rate with all my clients. I would say it's like point 01. i I'm trying to think of like, somebody that I truly failed. And I would think my failures were more of the there were like lessons learned, but they weren't true failures. Like it weren't like I'm giving up on you, you should just go get surgery, you know what I mean? Like it was we found solutions to what was happening, and it's taken a long time. But so, when we're talking about these sort of, you know, specialized doctors, specialized trainers, specialized coaches, how do you know who you go to? You want to jump in a little bit on that? Yeah, I think it's difficult. I think it comes back to the first few points I made at the start is, let's say you had the best orthopedic surgeon in the world. The best orthopedic surgeon in the world is likely to be a specialist for example in the hand, or or the foot or the ankle or the knee or the hip. In a certain age group probably doing a very certain set of operations. So if you went to this orthopedic surgeon for hip pain, for example, he's going to be very good at giving you a surgical solution to your problem. Yeah, that is a very narrow repertoire of solutions to the problem. Right? So by choosing that specialist, you're choosing a surgical solution to the problem that you have. I think there can be specialists that have a convergent mindset and specialists that can have a divergent mindset. Whereas one might assess the issue and know the principles and think, okay, so I can guess there's a certain things going on, I need you to be assessed in a certain way. If you're an athlete, more specifically, you need to go see somebody that understands movement, as opposed to a surgeon that understands diagnosis and treatment with surgery. Right. And both are specialists. But one is specialized in assessing the problem from a movement perspective. And the other is a specialist in providing a very niche solution to the problem. Right, so that will only benefit certain people, whereas the specialists who can have an open mind and assess the problem without a very, like specific method of how they're going to fix it will be able to give at least more insight. And they might in the end say you need surgery. But as a as a continuum, I think going to the the person who is a specialist in the assessment side of things is probably a better place to start, if that makes sense. Yeah, for sure. It's it's your question. Yeah. And I think it's funny, though, right? There's, I had a friend of mine in the East Coast, and the husband was waiting for a heart transplant. And doctors would turn them down because they didn't want their their success and fail rates to change, because it was a riskier case. So it also goes to show which I mean, fair, like, for me, if it's something that's outside of my comfort zone, I'm always very much open to like the Hey, like, I don't think I can help with this. And that's usually where I reach out to you or I try and find people that do have or might have a solution for what's happening. In this case, in particular, somebody reached out to you. He said, Hey, can you jump on a call really quick, I jumped on a call really quick. We saw the X rays, I was like, where's the structural damage? There is no structural damage. And I was like, Don't you see how the bones are positioned. And just by seeing that, and like the tiny bit of how the hip was sitting. For me immediately, it just screamed, you know, muscle imbalance. And that's where I said, you know, if you can come to Amsterdam, I'll show you that you don't need surgery, and that you can kind of get rid of this pain and discomfort. And that this client was two months away from surgery, I believe. So it was you know, it was it was a crazy. I don't know, for me it just like it all kind of just lined up. But they bought their tickets from Canada, they flew over the next week. We had a sit down, we had a conversation, first time I've ever met them. Five minutes of Swami pain went down from a seven to a two, which is crazy to think that in five minutes, you can get rid of that much pain and discomfort. And then throughout the rest of the week, you're just like, it's just ridiculous that I'm not in pain, because she's been in pain for so many years. And to be fair, the surgeon that they were looking at was saying I don't think that surgery is the answer. But it's the only answer that I can give you again, looking at, you know what a specialist does. But they've gone to see they they've seen everybody, right so from osteopaths, to chiropractors to acupuncturist, massage therapist, you know, the whole name the list and they've done it all. There was powerlifting coaches involved there was training involved. But nobody looked at tension when the person was moving. And that was where, you know, luckily I have my eyes and I was able to see it right away and fix it because now that's somebody that has any kind of surgery and God knows how a double hip replacement with a four year old daughter that's going to only come worse and worse and worse. So yeah, that's that was kind of the story where maybe it definitely gave me a boost of confidence. How to work with people. But this is where how do you start to find the right type of specialist? And you know, the conversation you want to have is like, who should you be looking at if you're looking for, for a specialist? And I think that's a good a good question, maybe you can elaborate a little bit more on how to find the right type of professionals that are going to give you not just the most bang for your buck, but actually give you solutions. I feel like everybody in this world gives very short term rewards, and never looks at the long term solution in the long term value of health with the client that they're working with. Yes, it was a great case. And I think it was, I mean, not to blow my own trumpet. But I see my role as being able to see maybe what somebody might need, because I have a broad scope and what I'm looking at when I speak to somebody, and I draw from lots of different fields. And I'm not just keeping my mind in a very conventional medicine, mindset, but I am allowing myself to think about other scopes of practice. Which is why I immediately thought, well, it's a movement problem. Let's get Richard to weigh in, and then see where that goes. And it went very quickly, very fast. Yeah. So I think searching for a specialist is important. And I think searching initially for somebody who can give you the broadest, most holistic assessment of you as a person, your body and your cells, ideally, from my perspective, that's why I like to use the tests that I use, because I'm not searching for one thing. In particular, I'm searching for everything that contributes to you as a living ecosystem of cells. And to put that into perspective, we, if you look at us as computer programs in a simulation may be or however you want to look at us. We have bio evolutionary programming, and we have social cultural programming. And that's how we function. So if we can, if we can look at both sides, if we can look at the biology, we can look at the evolutionary background, all of our responses to things and we can look at how we're functioning as an ecosystem, which is ourselves, our cells, our mitochondria, the gut microbiome, the people around us the relationships we have and the relationships to ourself, then you can really assess everything. And that will allow you to direct yourself to a specialist that can help you with the imbalances and the deficiencies, maybe subtle toxicities that are in your system, or weaknesses, from the perspective of neuro muscular imbalances, right? Yeah, I mean, it's, uh, I feel that we need to do better. As a whole, right? I think that we start to fight a lot for just wanting I think the ego is what starts to take over and trying to find the solutions. And we forget that we're not doing this for our ego. We're doing it for our clients health and optimization, shall we say? And that's really always the case. I mean, you know, I think that that's one of the great use of having you as a quick text message away is that if I have interesting cases, like a couple clients I've currently acquired we can start to see what they need to be what needs to take place as far as nutrient intake goes and worth their micro micro imbalances are because I think that their cell health is extremely not doing so. I've had a few people that I've discussed might not even discuss they know what I do with my testing. Yeah, they've said they've said things like, oh, I don't know if I want to do it because you'll see how unhealthy I am. And for me, it's it's not. Again, it's it comes back to the way you coach, but there's not a judgement. It's his very objective readout of how things are. And here are the potential solutions to make things better. All I want is better. I'm not looking at whether it's good or bad, because a lot of these things are in health optimization medicine, I'm discussing with a colleague the other day that it's an art. It's not a science, like it's, can you look at these potential imbalances and deficiencies, but then you need to work with the individual person to help correct them? Yeah, yeah, I think it's one of the one of the biggest things is that we don't judge how healthy or unhealthy you are. It's just you are where you are today. And we just need to slowly get better. Right. And I think a lot of people's, a lot of problems stem from people not accepting where they are today, when they come speak to us. Yeah, I mean, maybe you can speak more on that. But the the ability to move in a way that your body will let you today. And then every day going on from there is is an important constraint, as opposed to pushing it past where it feels safe too soon. Yeah. Speaking of which, I just had a client. We've been working together for few months, doing everything. And then out of nowhere, she goes, Oh, I don't have an ACL. What? You just said that at the beginning. That's a win. Yeah. Me if somebody who forgot to mention that they got crushed by a boulder at some point in their lives, and I don't let excuses get in my way of training hard, you know what I mean? But yeah, it's it's a, I think it's a defense mechanism. Because you don't want to show it's very, I think, in today's day and age, it's very difficult to show vulnerability. And when you do have the capacity to show vulnerability, were in a very victimized society. And so they don't want to look like victims either. Like it's a very weird situation for the client to be asking for a service where they can be vulnerable. And again, we're not there. Well, yeah, I'm not a therapist. And that's why I always approach everything through physical and movement and making sure that that's the primary thing that I'm working on. The byproduct is the change of behavior, and the emotions and the traumas and all of you know, mental health, all of that. So that I think it goes the other way as well, in the, the practitioner has to be vulnerable or willing to be vulnerable as well. Right? Why not? We might not have the answers initially, but the it's an exploration to find them to then build the solutions from and I think coming back to the specialists, if the if the specialist is unwilling to be vulnerable, because maybe they're in a super stressed position because of the constraints in which they work. Then again, it doesn't foster that relationship that I think is important in it more towards the complex cases that we've found ourselves working together on. Right. Yeah, I mean, that's, that's gonna be the key. So what kind of specialists do you put me us at? Or your movement specialist, according specialist, I'm a movement shaman, but I had to take, I had to take my movement shaman away. It wasn't special enough. People can say, when they go to MCM, and iOS code, which is coming, right. That's the actions speak louder than the labels. I mean, I think labeling people is also part of the issue, right? I mean, there's always I'm this, I'm that, and then you don't have the answers. And that makes it even harder for you, like a harder pill to swallow? Well, it comes back to that case of the the orthopedic surgeons that were, I think five of them leading up to there being a two month window before surgery, as that need called it this thing, but there's not much information available on that thing. And so you see the orthopedic surgeon, one process to another process to another process to another process to another, and the last one was still unsure whether the solution of surgery was the answer. Right. And yeah, you have, I don't know how many years of pain and surgery in two months, and then within five minutes, you can reduce it from seven to a two. It just seems ridiculous. We're missing something. Right? Well, the best part was that in that first session, I had her running with them with a D ball. And she dropped the ball and she's like, at you like she was in shock that there was no pain. But then the husband was like, you just ran, that she was like, I did just run. Like, I feel it's good. They're like, Yeah, but it's not supposed to, like you could just see like the weird look of like, how is it possible that I was able to run when I could barely walk. So that's it, it was a it was a very cool and that was that was a great case. And I think that will end up going on his podcast and talked a little more about it and kind of exposing the journey a little bit more. But that's the beauty of understanding tension over position. So I think if anybody is having sort of hip issues, back pain, knee pain, there is no structural need for surgery. And even if there is, a lot of the times it can be reverted. I've had a few of those cases with herniated discs and bulging discs where I've been able to diminish the discomfort for quite some time. Because I feel like once they cut into you, like your whole system changes, it never comes back to normal. Again, it's more it's more cell danger response. It's more trauma. It's scar tissue, it's more bigger reactive systems writing material as opposed to energy, which is a weird concept. But yeah, I did get beautiful yesterday. Well, I'm moving. So it's going to be another chaotic month because I have to move in the next two in the next week. Because February only has 28 days it does not have 30 days. So moving is one of them going to Mexico for movement Iosco you have a couple of spots left, if anybody wants to come join, and have a fun, immersive experience where you get to really find out what we do on the experiential level, which I think is one of the things that we'll get into in a different podcast and talk about information versus the experience. Yeah, dude, it's just chaotic. As always, in my life. It's amazing. I love it to keep people busy. In the meantime, if we're quiet on the podcast front, again, if you head over to Richard a service.com, there is an ebook that we've written together, which is the physical guide to emotional well being, which is something that you can pass on to friends and family members who are not in this world, so to speak. For something to try. Yeah, I've had some great results on it already. I had a it's interesting. I'm getting a large population from India. That is coming on to my website. But I had a couple of people that wrote in they're like, Yeah, I tried out your we've been working on it for a week. And it's been it's been doing wonders for my energy levels in the morning. So there's something there. It's beautiful. Perfect. More of that. All right, guys. If this is your first time joining us, make sure to follow us at Dr. Ed caddy and at rare barracuda, Dr. Ed caddy.com. And Richard has set his.com. We'll catch you guys in the next episode. Have a good week.