Fill To Capacity (Where Heart, Grit and Irreverent Humor Collide)

Science, Soul, and 2nd Chances – From Saving Lives to Changing Lives

• Pat Benincasa • Episode 127

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What happens when the doctor becomes the patient?

ER physician Dr. Christina Miller spent years moving fast—hospital coffee, vending-machine candy, adrenaline, and crisis care. She was trained to save lives on the edge. Then lupus stopped her cold and forced her to slow down—and listen.

Chris talks about inflammation from the inside out, how food became central to her healing, and why treating symptoms isn’t the same as understanding what’s actually going on. We dig into stress, sleep, sugar, grief, and the quiet signals our bodies send long before they land us in the ER.

Chris breaks down integrative and functional medicine in plain language and makes a compelling case for care that looks at the whole person—not just the problem of the day.

If your health—or your stress—feels like a runaway freight train, this conversation hits the brakes!

Christina Miller M.D.  

Chris Miller MD on Substack 

Today's episode is brought to you by the Joan of Arc Scroll Medal, a beautiful brass alloy medal, designed by award-winning artist, Pat Benincasa. This uniquely shaped medal is ideal for holiday or as a special occasion gift!    Visit www.patbenincasa-art.com


Please Note: The views expressed by our guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the podcaster.

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Pat:

Fill To Capacity, where heart grit and irreverent humor collide. A podcast for people too stubborn to quit and too creative not to make a difference.

Pat:

Hi, I'm Pat Benincasa, and this is Fill To Capacity, Episode #127, "Science, Soul, and Second Chances- From Saving Lives to Changing Lives." My guest is Dr. Christina Miller, an ER physician who spent years saving lives in crisis until her own body sounded the alarm fueled by hospital coffee vending machine candy. She was forced to confront inflammation firsthand and it changed everything diagnosed with lupus and autoimmune disease where the immune system turns on the body itself. Chris had to stop and listen. She stepped away from emergency medicine and into integrative and functional care where food, lifestyle, and biology are used to understand why the body is out of balance, not just treat the symptoms. Today, she helps people move beyond managing illness to understanding what actually supports health. Well, welcome Dr. Miller. It is so nice to have you here.

Chris:

Thank you. Thank you so much for that lovely opening and thank you for having me here. I'm happy to be here.

Pat:

Now, before we start, I'd like to give listeners just a quick snapshot of two terms that we're gonna be chatting about. "Integrative" medicine blends conventional medicine care with evidence-based approaches like nutrition, mindfulness, and lifestyle changes. It treats the whole person not just the symptoms. "Functional" medicine goes one step further asking why illness happens by digging into root causes, genetics and environment, stress and diet. Okay. Now Chris, you've seen medicine, well, let me say from both sides of the gurney. As er doctor and as patient, what did illness teach you about the kind of healing medicine sometimes misses?

Chris:

Thank you. That's a great question. What I learned from this is that medicine is very good at reacting to help us when we're, when something has gone wrong to help us with symptoms, especially in the er. I mean, if you were to be in a trauma or have a heart attack or some life threatening event, medicine reacts quickly and actually gives you quite a good chance at saving you. And so it's pretty amazing in that aspect. But when the body starts breaking down and attacking itself or having this rogue inflammation that's just going crazy, then medicine didn't know exactly what to do for me in a massive level. I was able to suppress my immune system, like all my immune system, you know, that's the immunosuppressives that I was on. Pretty high level, high dose, multiple ways that they were approaching it. It didn't really know what to do, how to get me to actually improve, so, or it didn't. And it also didn't know how to look at the root cause. I didn't feel like, at least in my own journey originally we weren't, we were just reacting to, oh my gosh, you have all these antibodies and you have all this inflammation, let's suppress it. Versus, well, why do you have that? Where is it coming? Why is your body generating those?

Pat:

Now you've said vegetables became medicine. What actually changed for you that made food feel essential to your healing, not just something that you ate?

Chris:

Yeah, so I learned early on that I felt worse after I ate. And so I could tell that food was causing my inflammation and worsening things. So if I skipped a meal, if I went a day, if I fasted, if I were to not eat, I did feel better actually. And I'd wake up and feel not too bad. And then after I ate, I would feel a little bit worse on some days. And so there was definitely a link with food. And so, and then as I started learning and researching the, there's a clear link with the immune system that's inside the gut. And so when you eat, that immune system is ready to jump on any foreign particles that might be coming across or any inflammation that's happening in the gut. So I could, I literally felt that, so I knew there was a clear link. So then the goal was to find the most anti-inflammatory foods to put out that inflammation.

Pat:

And it's interesting that you say that there's so much, uh, written about sugar. For example, when I eat sugar or a pastry, I can feel it in my joints. I can feel it in my body immediately. And so having to be attuned to what we put in our mouth, really it becomes a way of life to be aware of it.

Chris:

That's right. And sugar is so inflammatory for so many people, and I hear that all the time. People come and see me and they say, I just can't eat sugar. It really causes inflammation. I think that's what sugar does. So some people have a little bit lower threshold, they feel it right away, and some people have a little higher threshold, but, um, sugar's really inflammatory. So if we can cut that out, that one step alone is a huge step towards less inflammation.

Pat:

Now I wanna shift gears a little bit after your lupus diagnosis, and here you are the doctor, and not just a doctor, but in the ER where you're dealing with crisis and that's a form of medicine where you are a problem solver. So here you get diagnosed with lupus. What was the hardest adjustment you had to make?

Chris:

So I felt like I was blindsided when I got diagnosed. I thought I was, somehow, I didn't think it would happen to me. I took care of patients. And so I felt I was really sort of surprised when I myself had a diagnosis, to be honest. And you know, in retrospect, why would I be surprised I wasn't taking good enough care of myself? Of course, that's what happens to the bodies, but it did catch me off guard and kind of knocked me down a bit. So yeah, it took some regrouping and thinking of things differently and I had to slow down and make some major changes. And so that, that took some time to get used to and adjust to for sure.

Pat:

Yeah. And that brings me to my next question. You said in your writings and on your website that healing meant digging deeper. What did that excavation reveal? Not about your body, but about your beliefs?

Chris:

I think what happened was I started reading and researching how some people were able to improve their immune system, calm things down and, and turn off those antibody production. And so I started making changes on my own, changing my diet, changing my lifestyle, you know, doing what others had done, but I didn't get the same results. And so I didn't get better right away. I didn't feel better at all actually. I kept, it kept progressing. And so that's where I had to do the deeper dive and figure out, okay, it's not just food as medicine, but why am I, my body doesn't even like this food. You know, these foods are supposed to be the healing foods. Like I'm still reacting to it. And so that's when I had to actually go deeper. And it just, my belief was strongly that the body, its natural tendency is to heal itself. And so if it's not healing itself, there's something in the way or blocking it from it. And so I just, even though I wasn't getting better, I felt like, well, I just haven't figured it out yet. I gotta figure it out. So I was constantly like talking to different people and that's where I went down the integrative pathway and the functional pathway. And I just kept listening to different experts and different research and learning everything I could to like unblock myself so that my own body would heal itself.

Pat:

You know, what you're really talking about is listening. So going down that path, how did that change the way you listen to your patients and to yourself as a doctor? I mean, did that change?

Chris:

For sure. Yeah. So patients are so amazing. When they sit down across from me, they almost always will tell me exactly what's going on. So they're coming to see me and they'll say, well, I feel this, or when I do this, I have this. And they almost always, the story is there in what they say. So patients already kind of already know. And so it's really interesting. And so if you really stop and listen and let someone talk and really think about what's going on, the answers often kind of come to light or, or especially when we go back and forth with it that you can really get answers. So, um, and sometimes you can't, but I still strongly feel that people's bodies, if they're not getting better, there's a reason for that. Yeah. And so that's where we try to figure out what is that? Are you deficient in something? Is there a hidden virus or a toxin causing your immune system to be activated? Sometimes it is a genetic thing, and so those people have to be even stricter or we have to do a little bit more steps to quiet it down. But there's usually something we can do to have our own bodies heal. So helped me when I talk to patients to understand that

Pat:

It seems that nowadays, or in western medicine, people just look for a quick fix. It's like cause and effect. Well, I, I am feeling this. Can you give me an antibiotic or can you give me X, Y, or Z and make this go away? And so how do you help them readjust or see that healing isn't a prescription, it's a practice.

Chris:

Yeah, there are, there's a lot of people that are just like you said, that just kind of want a quick fix. But I will say there are also a lot of people that come to see me that they don't want any medication or intervention at all. They are looking for what they can do for their own bodies to heal. So it is, the message is getting out there, I feel like, to more people that there are steps they can take that they can help themselves get better. But I think that's where the integrative medicine comes in. And the philosophy that sometimes you do need a medication. You know, you just have something going on. Your blood pressure's too high and diet and lifestyle and alone, you're still at risk, right? Or there's, you have too much inflammation and you just need something to suppress it while you're working on the diet and lifestyle.

Chris:

And then you can taper it off once it improves. But, uh, you just gotta use a combination. And so what I always tell people is if you do need a medication, which again, sometimes you do, you also need a diet and lifestyle prescription. So these are the steps that we gotta be taking. We gotta be lowering your inflammation in our diet. We have to be lowering it in our lifestyle by optimizing stress management, sleep and exercise. And then here's also an anti-inflammatory. So it's like a big picture. Yeah. So it's more of a list approach. So I try to have people understand that there's medication and then there's steps that you can take individually and you need all of that to get result. The best results.

Pat:

What's interesting about this is that when folks go to see a doctor, they have a back ache or you know, they'll see someone that specializes in maybe orthopedics or, you know, back trouble medicine is very specialized. So when people get help, it's like the doctors are there to treat that problem and it's about that problem. But what you are talking about when they see you, you are asking about the whole person, what is your exercise? Like, what kind, you know, what's your work like, what are you doing, what are you eating? And you're treating the, the whole person. And in doing that, you're not just breaking it apart into one little thing.

Chris:

Yeah. And that's exactly right. People are often looking for that one thing that they can do to fix it or make themselves better and or they'll like, well, what should I be eating? 'cause I have this. And I, for my first question is, well, what's your stress like? Or how are you sleeping? Yeah. But they came to me 'cause they wanna know about diet, but the diet's not gonna be effective if they're really stressed out. Right. And so, yeah, it has to be a big picture to look at everything. And when everything starts clicking from all different angles of the body, that's when the body feels safe and healing connections start to happen.

Pat:

And as you've said, health is our greatest asset, yet many people don't protect it in the sense like they don't think about what they're, they're grabbing to eat or what they're doing or the stress level. So my question is from your experience, when people don't protect their health or don't think about their health, okay, and I'm not making this a judgmental thing, it's just the way we live so fast going from thing to thing and the stress level, what gets in the way emotionally from people just stopping and saying, wait, my health, I've gotta take care of it.

Chris:

That's a great question. There's a lot of things I think actually, and it's so unique to each person, but things like one fear, people sometimes don't wanna know. So they're a little bit scared to get the testing done or they just kind of don't wanna know. Sometimes they feel great so they think, well, I'm feeling good, so everything must be fine. I don't need to know. Right. So yeah. I see a lot of that they're doing the best they can. Maybe they've cleaned up their diet somewhat, so then they don't really wanna get too much more testing done 'cause they already made some changes or, and also people sometimes are prioritizing different parts of their lives at that time. Like maybe they have an active family and they have a lot going on and their priority is getting their family off every day and making sure that everything's okay.

Chris:

So they don't have the time to think about themselves yet until something makes them stop and do that. Or, you know, they're busy with work long days or they just, you know, they don't address it yet. So we certainly can get caught up in it until a health, I feel like either until we get older or there's a health scare, you know, I was caught up in my own work in life and I never even thought about it. I did think about it a little bit. I wasn't eating tons of junk food all the time and I did exercise a lot, you know, I tried to be a little bit healthy, but I certainly was not nothing like I am now. But yeah, you just get, I think people just get caught up in life.

Pat:

And then there's a flip side to that. Now. I look at packaging when I am at the grocery store to see what's in the food. And I am shocked by the amount of sodium salt inside everything. I'm not talking like 450 grams, I'm talking like 1,280 for like little mac and cheese or whatever it is. The amount of sodium is so extreme. And I also noticed the sugar content in everything. So things from spaghetti sauce to toothpaste, everything they're loading with sugars and salt. And if you're on a budget trying to grocery shop for low sodium or sugar content can feel almost impossible.

Chris:

It can, yeah, it can seem like that. I would say like frozen foods are okay. Like you can buy frozen veggies, frozen fruit, that's a lot cheaper. Yeah, it can be hard. You can buy stuff in bulk depending on, you know, what you're trying to eat. For me, it's about getting more veggies in. And so in the summer, if you have a farmer's market that's not as expensive or to grow some of your own, like lettuce is super eat. I I can grow nothing in my garden here in Colorado, but I can grow lettuce like lettuces, they're hearty, they're like weeds. And so when everything else died, I had my lettuce all summer and so that was, you know, cheap. I got to go, just go out there and cut my bottom of seed super cheap. So no, it can be pricey. It's, it's true.

Chris:

And it's, it's unfortunate that we're not in an environment where healthy eating is the go-to, the easy way to go, but it's not so one we have to put more effort in. We have to override any other choices to, you know, choose more junk food or less healthy food. And it can be expensive and hard to get and prepare and stuff. So, but we have to make that decision, make a plan, figure out what a plan is, how you're gonna do it. And, and I feel like once we each have a plan in place, then we can make that happen.

Pat:

And do you advise your patients- suggesting to them to see a dietician or nutritionist to make a plan?

Chris:

Yeah, it depends. Oftentimes I can help people with their plan, like different foods and possible ideas for breakfast, lunch, dinner, depending on what we're talking about. If it's a medical condition and we're using food, I can often help. But many people, I do recommend a nutritionist or a health coach because they need more support. They need to know what to eat, how to make it, I mean, this stuff is life changing, right? Yeah. If we're not use this, it, it's an overhaul, it's totally different. So for many people, I do recommend something like that as well. So it kind of depends on the person. I did a lot of group work where I joined groups so I could learn myself and figure out what other people were doing, how did they make it work so then I could get tips from them. So that helped me.

Pat:

I'd like to go in a different direction. We're living in a stressful time and the body holds memory, inflammation and sometimes grief. What role do emotions and maybe even forgiveness play in physical healing or the role of coping? What does that have to do with physical healing?

Chris:

Well, it is true. So they have, there's studies now that show that when people feel grief, especially deep grief, real deep heartfelt grief, which we do pe we feel this in life, life is hard so many times that that actually changes at its cellular DNA level. And so it really is, can be held within the cells and grief. It can even be expressed within generations, some of these DNA changes that happen. So we oftentimes will suppress things, you know, terrible, traumatic, sad, horrible things, we'll suppress 'em, but our cells will feel the change and they can cause problems later on for us, whether that be autoimmunity or abnormal cells or, you know, just problems down the road. And that has been documented. So our goal is to not just suppress it, which is a lot of times what we do, but also to like figure out how to deal with it, to release it so our cells aren't holding onto that so that it affects us.

Pat:

Yeah. Well that makes me wanna ask, when intense stress becomes the norm instead of the exception, what do people need to notice?

Chris:

First one is just an awareness, I would say. Because sometimes you're just living a stressful life and you don't even, you're not even aware 'cause that's your new baseline now. So just stopping and saying, wow, this is pretty stressful right now, and how am I coping with it? And if you don't have tools in place to undo that stress, which I didn't used to, not really, except for working out, going outside, riding my bike or something. That definitely helped me. But now I have so many more tools, you know, I'm in the yoga studio, I'm meditating, I'm going for walks, I'm calling a friend, I'm doing these things intentionally to undo stress. So I would say the first thing, if someone's under a lot of stress, is to awareness and start building tools. And even a brief moment, like some deep breaths with a long exhale, even a sigh or breathing in for five and out for five in for five and out for five. Doing that for 30 seconds throughout the day on a stressful day. That that right there immediately lowers your cortisol and all these stress hormones and can tap into the parasympathetic, the vagus nerve and just kind of start a little bit of rest and restore before you go back into the stress. And then you do it again and go back in the stress and you keep bringing it down. And that even that alone can start to make a difference for people.

Pat:

Well, let me ask you, late at night, I don't know if this happens to you, but sometimes in the middle of the night I start thinking about things I'll bolt awake and all these things are, you know, oh, this happened today, or Oh my gosh, and what am I gonna, and I know it's my stress acting out. And I also know that I have to tell myself it's three o'clock in the morning, there's nothing I can do about this. How about I just put it aside. I mean, I'm, I try to make it playful, but it seems that interrupting sleep is a sign of stress. And what do people do that are starting to experience that?

Chris:

Does it work for you? First of all, when you tell yourself to put it aside?

Pat:

Sometimes, okay, I'm an artist, so I have to envision. So when I have something marching through my head like, what about this, what about that? I, I envision a kitchen table and I'm sitting on the other side and I'll say, oh, you're here. Sit down. What do you want? What, what is this about? You want coffee? And I play with it. For me humor, that's my, my, uh, relief valve. If I can bring something to that place, I can calm myself down. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But I, I let it go. I try to let it go. It's okay, this is hanging on. Sometimes I'll start reading a book again until I fall asleep. Or my favorite five things that happen today that I'm grateful for.

Chris:

Yeah, I love that.

Pat:

And so when I start, oh, this happened, that happened. And then I start to get drowsy and I think, wait a minute, did I say one and two? Oh, I better start over. And by the time I do that, I've calmed myself down.

Chris:

There you go. So you're exactly right though. What stress does is if you have a higher level, these stress hormones, oftentimes you're not gonna fall into as deep of a sleep. And so you will wake up more, or you may have high cortisol in the middle of the night where it pops you awake, wide awake, or your heart is even racing. So you can feel that happening too. There can be signs of other things too. So you know, if you have sleep apnea, you're gonna wake up and be wide awake. So there, or restless legs or there's other causes that wake people in the middle of the night. So if that's happening regularly, someone should probably get checked to make sure it's more than just stress. Something else isn't going on that can be treated. But once you've done that and you know it's none of those.

Chris:

Yeah. Dealing with the stress is a big deal and there's all sorts of things that can be helpful and each person is different. So, you know, figure out what works for you of course. But some of the ideas are definitely dealing with it during the day as much as you can. So even just 10 minutes of meditation has been shown to help lower stress and help people sleep. Whether you do it in the morning or the evening can be helpful. For me personally, I was waking up all night long and when I do yoga on days I do yoga, I sleep through the night. On days I don't do yoga, I wake up. And so I was like, huh, I need to do yoga every day. Like it's so dramatic for me the change that happens and there's data to that- that's a parasympathetic, I do about 25 minutes of yoga and that's enough for my parasympathetic to calm down those, all that stress and help me to fall into a deeper sleep where I'm not waking up anymore at night.

Chris:

Tools like going for a walk morning, sunlight, dark at night, you know, all the sleep hygiene tools. Some people journaling at night. So all these stressful things, instead of doing it at 3:00 AM doing it, you know, at 9:00 PM and writing about what you're grateful for, what a great, you know, how amazing, how lucky you are for this day you just had, and anything that was a challenge that maybe you want to, you know, for tomorrow or that what's going on in the world or anything that's worrying you, you can jot it down. So, and once you write it down, it's kind of outta your head a little bit and you can release it so it helps you go to sleep. And then things like that are really powerful are some of the apps, um, visualization, listening sometimes to distract our minds. 'cause our minds are like, oh my gosh, I can't believe this is happening and I gotta do this and la la la la la.

Chris:

But now you turn on a story or something that's progressively and you listen to that and these thoughts just shut up and now you can relax again and get back to sleep. Or the progressive relaxation is like you imagine tensing your toes and relaxing them, tensing your feet and relaxing them. You know, your calfs are fully relaxing and you go up your body all the way to your head and oftentimes by the time you get to their head, you're already asleep. 'cause you're imagining your different parts of your body falling asleep. And that's enough to distract your mind from these thoughts so you can go back to sleep. So there's a lot of tools that are powerful, but starting a program where you figure out what works for you can be very helpful.

Pat:

It seems like bottom line is that we're not meant to absorb tension. We're not meant to absorb grief. We're not meant to keep having these things happen. And then we hold them inside like, we're a fortress, we're not made that way. And what you're talking about is this kind of release, release this, don't carry it, let it go.

Chris:

That's right. And if you think of the stress response, it's designed just for that, right? The stress response is the old, what we used to always say for years and years was the sabertooth tiger is chasing you. And your stress response kicks in. So you can outrun that tiger, sneak away, get, climb a tree, whatever you need to do to get away from that tiger. And when it shifts and goes a different direction, you're free. And so what you did was you exercised it and you got away from it. So instead of just sitting with it, you worked it off and now you release it and you can go back to your life and you're not just holding on. But in the modern world, one, it's not a quick stressor, it's an ongoing stressor. It just keeps going. Yeah. 'cause we keep ruminating in our heads and we keep bringing it up over and over and over and over again and it never dies.

Chris:

So it's not a brief stressor. Like in the old days where it was a quick thing and then it passed, and two, then we were exercising, we were running it away, we were, you know, physical. And now I'm just sitting here ruminating. And so I'm not working off these stress hormones. I'm not, I have no way of dealing with it except to letting it go for, you know, harm myself internally and and be in my head. And so those are things we wanna work on. How can we let it go? What does it take and or deal with it. You know, journaling is a powerful tool too. Yes. If you write, oftentimes I'll write and be like, I can't believe I don't know how I'm gonna handle this. Da da da da. You know, after a few pages, usually by about the third I'm coming up with answers. You know what I need to do moving forward. And you become so optimistic and you deal with it on paper and now it's released, you know, and you figure out answers. So there's, there are tools that, but we, we have to do that. We have to actively look for those tools.

Pat:

And it also seems that as you were talking, I was trying to visualize what would be the opposite of release. And I had this image of somebody clutching and the old, I'll ignore it and it'll go away. Now that has not always been successful for me, that if I ignore something and say, well, it'll go away. No, it doesn't go away. It's just waiting to come in through the back door. So the idea of release is very different than acknowledging, not ignoring, but opening yourself to it. So that when we, when we feel all these things, we can at least let it go through our body. But to ignore it, when I've ignored things, I think I could put a lid on it. And that's not terribly successful. It comes out in other ways.

Chris:

Yeah, absolutely agree. And sometimes you have to do that because you're coping, you have things going on, and that's the best you have at that moment. So we're all doing the best we can in the moments we're in, but at some point it has to be released. And, and if there's a way that, and often we need help, once we really suppress it and it's inside of us, then, you know, and I was listening to you, I think it was Eckhart Tolle and you know, he's just like, things should be moving through you at all times and you know, you shouldn't be holding onto things. And so if you're holding onto it, you know, you need to let it, let it move through you. And so he's like, normally you're walking down the street and things are passing and you're not holding onto it.

Chris:

But if you were to see your ex-spouses, let's say car drive past, you're gonna hold onto them. Think about it like, who are they in the car with? Blah blah. You've held onto that now and now that can internalize if you don't let that go. So the, and so I always think now when something stresses me out or worries me, let it flow through you. Let it flow through you. Yeah. It's what it is. It flow through, how am I going to deal with this but don't hold it, you know? So I, I actively, like you say, visualize it now this, it's just an energy flowing through me. That's all it is. It doesn't mean anything. I'm like, it's not gonna hurt my body. I'm okay.

Pat:

And that also gets in the territory of feelings. And I remember someone said to me once, we are not our feelings. And I never forgot that because sometimes a feeling will come over me like a summer storm, you know, where the sky gets gray, the trees are bending, the rain comes down, oh, hell's breaking loose, you blink and then the sun's coming out. And so the idea that feelings come through us and, but we are not the feeling, but we're feeling it. I think that's an important distinction. Yeah,

Chris:

That's really good. You're totally right. If we can remember that in the moment, that's the challenge. But, uh, when we're really distraught over something, which, you know, I can get myself worked up in a heart, you know, it's like, like you said, the storm one second, I'm fine the next second. I'm so distraught over something and if I can think this is not me, this is just, this'll pass. It's just feeling, you know, and like let it go. And uh, I'd be a lot better off than yeah, trying to co create my own story of all the things that can go wrong now or you know, like those are tools. And I think the first step is just realizing that we do this. I realize I do it, I journal about it, I try, you know, I'm developing tools. So it is becoming less, I do it a lot less now, but yeah, you're, you're totally right. We're not our feelings.

Pat:

Also, I think this has happened to anyone who goes online, you're trying to go do banking or something and you get into the loop and you do step one, step two, click this, you're back to step one, you do 1, 2, 3, 4, you click, you're back to step one. Now I don't have patience for that. I don't, I'm thinking I'm in a loop and so immediately I stop the process, but somehow emotionally I can get into a loop so fast and make your head spin. And so when we carry it inside of us, it's hard to have that clarity. You know, you look at the computer, oh I'm in a loop. But when we carry it and we keep going over that same thing over and over again, it's kind of hard to break the loop or as you say, become aware of it.

Chris:

It is, it can be really hard. It just, it grabs us so fast. Especially certain people are more apt to do that than other people are. And I'm definitely one that can do that. But I would say you can make a change in it, becoming aware of it and realizing that you're in a loop, just like you said with the computer and saying like for me, I'll catch my stuff in my head and be like, I need to go right now and just go for a power walk with no podcast or I'm not listening to anything and I'm just power walking. And somehow in doing that it starts flowing through me and I move on past that moment. But if I can't do that, I can get caught in it. So yeah, becoming aware and trying, there are tools to break it. So yeah, there are so people we need to kind of work on that. I

Pat:

Wanna step out to a macro view. Do you think that the medical profession is embracing or becoming more aware of different healing modalities? Like what you're doing?

Chris:

Absolutely. It is, you know, all the podcasters out there, all the people that are putting stuff out there, I would say a lot of doctors are listening to different things about themselves. Maybe you know, doctors are human, they want all age better or they're trying to get in better shape or clean up their diets or reduce their own inflammation or you know. So I would say yes, not everyone, not entirely. They're still are still caught in the medical school dogma that you know, this is what you need to do. But a lot of them are becoming more open-minded to it and realizing that it does matter what people eat and how they live. Yeah, for sure. There's a lot of hope I would say. Yeah.

Pat:

Okay. So if someone's listening and they feel that their health and stress are like a runaway freight train, like things are just outta control, what's a good first step they can take to start caring for their health?

Chris:

Again, I'm a big proponent of a couple things. One is if they can have someone to help them along that trip. So like if they have a good physician or a nurse or someone that they work with, even a health coach, someone to help them kind of, so they're not navigating it by themselves, family member, um, friend, something like that. But having someone help navigate it with them is one. Um, and depending how much outta control things are, they may really need help. So sometimes you really need an intervention, sometimes you need a medication. So depending how serious or what's going on with that person. But, but one is if you can have someone you know, a good knowledgeable clinician working with you to help give you your next steps. Building tool mind body tools are always gonna be powerful. And whether that means getting a counselor, whether that means working on your sleep, your relaxation activities, do you know, all those types of things.

Chris:

Changing your diet just towards an anti-inflammatory type of foods. But a lot of times you need someone to do this with you or help you. So really finding that person is probably the first step I would say. And then working on mind body making the diet changes and, and sometimes for people it's, it's gotta be an overhaul and for many people it's gotta be just small steps at a time. Whatever small step you can do, one small step can make a huge difference oftentimes. So just being aware that you are on a runaway train and you need to make some changes and just starting somewhere is a good step.

Pat:

So Chris, where can people find you if they want to see what you're doing and get learn more about you, where would they find you?

Chris:

Thank you. So I have a website and it's my name Chris Christina Miller md.com, with a "C"- Christina Miller, MDand then, so that's my website. And then I'm also on Substack and it's my name as well, Chris Miller, MD on Substack, where I shared my story of being ill. And then now I try to share integrative tips for different things that happened to us and with us. And my goal is always each person, we're on different paths. So we're all trying to develop our own tools and find out what works for us. 'cause we're not the same. My problems aren't your problems and how I go about it may be totally different from you, but our goal is for all of us to, you know, find that optimal health and get as as best as we can be.

Pat:

I love your substack talks, your just helpful tips. You're really prolific, you're always, you know, sending things out. Like are you waking up in the middle of the night? And then you launch into a little talk about that and they're really wonderfully helpful. So I will post your website in the show notes and if there's a link to your substack, I'll do that as well. What I love about what you do is you make it, you make it enjoyable to be healthy. I'm gonna say it Chris, when you talk about it, you just make it, um, just enjoyable. Like, it's not a big deal to take care of yourself, to take care of your body. Well, Chris, thank you.

Chris:

Thank you so much. That means a lot to me. Yeah, thank you. I really appreciate that.

Pat:

I think this conversation gets to the heart of what it means to care for your health and paying attention, asking better questions and making choices that support you over time. And I'm really grateful for your clarity today. I mean, you made it so accessible, like, hey, it doesn't have to be a huge thing. You can do it in small steps. Maybe you get a coach, one size does not fit all. And I think that's an important message that you're, you're sharing with us. So thank you so much for joining us today.

Chris:

Yeah, you're welcome. Thank you so much for having me today. It was fun.

Pat:

Until next time, take care. Bye.

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Pat Benincasa

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