Introduction – Serial Entrepreneur Gone FDNP
[00:00:00] Detective Ev: What is going on my friends? Welcome back to another episode of the Health Detective Podcast by Functional Diagnostic Nutrition. My name is Evan Transue, AKA Detective Ev. I will be your host for today’s show with serial entrepreneur, Becca Kyle.
She is an FDNP who’s been doing this for a few years now. Even though it’s only been for the last few years, and she’s done a variety of other things, including be a teacher, she now does FDN full time. This is the only job that she needs for money and she’s able to do it successfully. That’s pretty cool.
What’s also interesting is, like all of us, she has a relatively extreme health story, going through different things, the cycle of trial and error, all stuff and concepts that you guys have heard before, so I won’t bore you with that. But her story itself is very interesting. I always find it cool how these people go from these health challenges, then go on to do FDN. They learn a little bit more about their health and voila. All of a sudden, they’re able to do this as full-time, legitimate income from anywhere in the world.
If you’re a new listener, this might seem like I’m going through a little too quick. The point is, we consistently put out these stories and there’s been quite a few people that listen to the podcast who are still a little hesitant about whether it’s right for them. I mean, all you have to do is listen to about 10 or 15 of these things, and we have maybe 130, 140 interviews at the time of recording this, to realize there are a variety of personalities that do this, a variety of backgrounds.
Love What You Do for Work
Some had large amounts of business experience, some had literally none and had worked a job their entire life, nothing wrong with that. But many FDNs go out and do start their own business. So, it’s certainly different that’s for sure. Yet all of them have been able to take this and do this as a full-time thing.
Some are going to get there quicker than others, but the point is, it’s a system that is good enough for anyone to be able to do this and make a reasonable living. That sounds pretty cool to me. Make a reasonable living, get your health under control, and actually help people do something meaningful instead of just clocking hours somewhere.
It’s kind of how I like to live my life. I can’t even imagine the idea anymore of going out and doing things that I don’t want to be doing for money. I think so many people have been just completely indoctrinated with the idea that work has to be something that we resent, it has to be something that we’d rather not be doing, it is just this essential part of life that everyone’s got to do. We all complain about it and then we go home.
We use forms of escapism to get away from the work that we hated and then we wake up and go do the exact same thing tomorrow. Well, I don’t know about you, I’m planning on dying one day. That doesn’t sound like a particularly good way to spend my limited time here until I do die.
Make a Good Living and Make a Difference
Maybe we should try to work our way out of that and figure out something cool to make money. There’s people in life who do think of that, and they try to weasel their way out of it. They have no interest in providing good service to other people and they’ll do anything for a quick buck.
Then there’s people like FDNs. There’s millions of people out there like this in different industries that say, what I’m going to do is become highly skilled in something actually useful, something that provides service to others. Then I’m going to go out and charge accordingly for it.
People are going to pay it with a smile on their face cause they’re getting something of value, and I’m going to be able to make a good living doing it. That is a smart way, in my opinion, even as someone who’s young, to live our lives. Seems to be working for me and I hope that it starts to work for you if you’re someone who’s considering it.
So, today’s cool because, again, you’ll hear about Becca’s health story, but then you’ll also hear how she was able to turn this around rather quickly into a very successful business. Without further ado, let’s get to the episode.
All right. Hey there, Becca. Thanks so much for being here with us today.
[00:03:35] Becca Kyle: Hey, happy to be here. Excited to be here.
Serial Entrepreneur – A Medical Mystery from the Beginning
[00:03:36] Detective Ev: This is always cool. I say this all the time on the show, but everyone knows these are my favorite types of podcasts. It’s when I get to talk to a fellow Functional Diagnostic Nutrition practitioner who, I know we’ve seen each other plenty of times throughout the world of FDN.
But it’s not like we’ve ever gotten to sit down or get on the phone and actually truly talk about how we got into this. It makes for a fun conversation that the audience ends up loving. So, what we’ll do today is we’ll start in the same way that we usually start on this podcast. I would like to know, when did your health symptoms start and what did they look like at the time?
[00:04:07] Becca Kyle: Ah, well, my health symptoms started as a child. I was a medical mystery from the beginning. Lots of chronic low-grade fevers. I got tested for lupus and leukemia, all the things, and nobody could figure anything out. Got better as an adolescent, somewhat. Then probably post college is when it really started to tank because I just ran myself ragged.
My lifestyle choices were not the best. My body started to take a hit there with adrenal symptoms, fatigue, migraines, and whatnot. So, it’s kind of been a lifelong journey for me.
[00:04:42] Detective Ev: Same boat for me. It happened at a young age, and I think that makes it even more confusing.
Serial Entrepreneur – Driven, Interested, but Not Rested
It’s thankfully getting a little better nowadays. I think parents are more open and aware of holistic stuff. But as we know, we got a heck of a long way to go.
I’m always curious too, of like the perspective back then. You were a medical mystery, I get that. But as a young person, let’s say even like early teenage years, were you under the impression that this is just something that happened to you? Did you think it was weird? Did you think it made sense? Like what is your mindset back then when this is going on?
[00:05:09] Becca Kyle: I think I just felt that, well, this is me. This is how I am. This is my lot in life. I need to figure out how to just function and deal with what I experience. I didn’t see there being a simple fix or lifestyle fixes or the opportunity to really make a whole lot of change at the time.
I also too, as an adolescent, I’ve always been very driven, interested in too many things sometimes. Even in high school, I didn’t get a lot of sleep. I was active in a lot of different types of organizations and really started to burn the candle at both ends at that age and never really stopped until I really realized how detrimental that was to my health.
But no, at the time, it was just like, this is just my life. This is how it is.
Be a Balanced Hard Worker
[00:05:52] Detective Ev: I think yeah, we’re already even more similar than I would’ve thought. Because I feel like Type A personalities are overrepresented in FDN and in our clients. I don’t think it means that because you’re Type A, you’re going to get chronic disease. I just think it’s one more stressor on the body in an already toxic modern world.
So, of course, these people are going to be more likely to get this stuff. I completely understand that. Like, I was dealing with these symptoms and then, I’m a hard worker, I am driven like you. You’re trying to do these things that you think you’re supposed to do. Like, I’ll lose a little sleep to work, or I’ll wake up earlier and earlier. And it’s completely the opposite of what someone with chronic health issues should be doing.
It’s cool now that people like us are out there that help people balance this. You can be a hard worker and driven. I got goals, man. That’s all good, but we don’t have to kill ourselves on the way to do that. You know, it’s not going to make the goals so worth it if you’re dead.
[00:06:40] Becca Kyle: Well, and then it’s going to make it harder. It’s going to make the effort being in strain, it’s going to take five to 10 times the effort to do the same thing as if you weren’t so adrenally challenged.
Serial Entrepreneur – Cutting Out Food Sensitivities
[00:06:49] Detective Ev: Sure.
I asked about the perspective with the thing cause I think it’s an important point as a kid, especially if you grow up with something. There’s kids, unfortunately, I’ve talked to before (cause I do a lot of work with kids), that they’ve had abuse when they were younger and they didn’t even realize that was abnormal, until they went to their friend’s house and realized their dad doesn’t talk to them that way. They didn’t understand that.
I think we grow up with these things. We do think they’re normal. For some of us, for whatever reason, we have a moment or an influence that allows us to think outside of the box. So, as you’re going through these years and years of health issues, what was the point where you finally started maybe thinking outside of conventional medicine and thinking maybe I need to do something else?
[00:07:29] Becca Kyle: It was the summer after my senior year of college. I got my first food sensitivity test done and realized that I had these foods that were driving a lot of my symptoms. When I cut them out, I felt so much better. I thought to myself, while it wasn’t easy, it was simple. I started looking for more little simple bio hacks for being able to function better.
I was probably about 22 years old and thought, huh? Well, if this works so well, what else is out there?
Serial Entrepreneur – Slowing Down, Listening to the Body
[00:08:01] Detective Ev: I don’t want to just seem like I’m honing in on that point, but to me it’s so interesting, these moments. Cause I want to provide them for people somehow, even with this podcast or social media stuff that we do at FDN. I’m like, how can we get this mindset to happen earlier so that people don’t have to go through years of this?
So, you got the food sensitivity test, that’s great. But what made you do that? Was it like good advertising? Not everyone that gets advertised, that’s going to do it. So why did Becca do that?
[00:08:27] Becca Kyle: You know, it was really slowing down enough to listen to my body. I realized, when I ate this and this, I felt terrible, but I wasn’t sure why. You know, we are going, going, going so fast and doing so many things that we don’t have the capacity to just listen to our body. Because symptoms are just our body’s way of communicating to us.
My body had been communicating to me for a while. I just finally slowed down enough to listen to it. I think it’s just a matter of realizing symptoms aren’t normal, and they’re how our body communicates with us. Listening enough to be mindful enough to understand there’s something going on here and I want to dive deeper into it.
[00:09:09] Detective Ev: That listening to your body, you intuitively knew I’m not reacting well to certain foods. Then I’m sure we see the food sensitivity test and logically makes sense, I’m sensitive to foods and then we get it connected.
It was about the same age range for me as well, where I was like in my late teens, early twenties.
Moving the Needle Towards Healing Is Powerful
I had a moment too, where I’m saying this doesn’t make sense. Like I didn’t even get how I could be this sick. I didn’t know a lot of people who were like that other than my family members.
Of course, I’m being told in science class. I remember at 16 is when I had the first thought, although, I didn’t act on it as a 16-year-old at the time, admittedly. But the first thought I was having, Becca, was when my science teacher was teaching us about natural selection and evolution and stuff. I’m like, okay, cool. This is interesting. I like science.
But what didn’t resonate with me is I was being told that I was in this classroom right now because my ancestors had the best of the best genes and I am the product of that today, and all of us in that classroom were. I’m looking around the classroom (and I always specify this, not saying this in a judgment way, I’m just being objective), I had cystic acne. There’s a kid, super overweight, over there. He needs an inhaler. This kid gets medication every morning otherwise he is going to die.
That is the best of the best genetically? I’m not saying I didn’t believe the natural selection thing. I’m saying, I didn’t buy into the idea that this was the best and we were all sick. I’m missing something. I don’t know which piece is missing here, but we’re missing something.
So, you do the food sensitivity test. Thankfully, it’s doing something right. And that’s what’s really powerful for so many of us, even if that only helped someone 10%. Once you start moving that needle in the right direction when you suffered as long as you did, it’s empowering.
Serial Entrepreneur – The Motivation to Have Children
I know that you had kind of already mentioned those things, but what were some of the next, most helpful things? Like, how did that evolve from just food sensitivity testing?
[00:10:47] Becca Kyle: You know, it was really getting to the point where I wanted to start having children. I just assumed that it would be easy. This is what we do. This is something that women can just do.
It wasn’t, and I struggled with fertility, had a lot of miscarriages, and it really gave me pause. I thought, what’s going on here? What underlying dysfunction is happening in my body to create this disconnect with being able to have children? Then, I just dove right in because it was such a motivating thing for me.
Before then it’s like, I’ll just make it through, and I’ll be okay. I’ll just sleep late on Saturday, and I’ll deal with it. But it wasn’t until this moment in my life where I thought this is so important to me. I knew I wanted to be a mom since I was a young child. The thought of that not happening, just devastated me. So, I dove in deep. I dove in deep to genetics, to gut health, to stress reduction, to all the things.
I think that’s very common for a lot of us is that all of a sudden something motivates you. Whether it’s someone you know gets really sick or you have an opportunity for a new job. But you know at this moment you don’t have the capacity for it, cause you’re so exhausted. Whatever that is that motivates you, that was my motivation at the time.
Getting Pregnant & Making it Stick is Biologically Fundamental
And oh, it was quite the education. It just changed my life. That’s when I fell in love with this whole concept of functional health. I was like, cool. It just shifted my whole world in such a positive way.
[00:12:12] Detective Ev: Turning pain into purpose. I love it.
I appreciate you bringing up the miscarriage thing, cause that’s not an easy thing. I don’t care how many people talk about it. That’s not easy to talk about. It shouldn’t be underplayed just cause it’s common to deal with nowadays. Especially as a male, I always want to be sensitive with how I word this. But from a biological perspective, I really hope people think about this.
Again, I’m a spiritual person. I know some people are religious that listen. I’m not talking about that right now. I’m talking about from a biological perspective, let’s call it what it is, guys. There’s about two things that we’re here to do. We’re here to have fun with another human being and ideally create offspring in some way and help that offspring thrive. So, it’s a very essential thing.
I think we need to really, again, most sensitive way possible, we need to all use our heads and think, if I’m 27 or 25 or even 30, and I’m having multiple miscarriages or I can’t get pregnant, you need to think like, Becca. This doesn’t make sense; I should be able to do this. In fact, biologically, as a man and woman creating this, it’s the main reason I’m here. If I can’t do that, that would probably be a big clue that something’s going on.
Serial Entrepreneur – State of Stress Isn’t Safe for Making Babies
I admire you for that and I hope that that message is well received for people because it’s a healing opportunity. You can change these things around as you did.
Did you get into FDN right away or did you do any other certifications first? How did you approach this from a truly educational standpoint?
[00:13:29] Becca Kyle: I kind of self-educated. I have a dear friend who’s a functional nutritionist and I was just like, hey, what about this? Hey, what about this? I just got into full tilt research mode, started doing some testing with her and really realized how long I had been living in sympathetic dominance and fight, flight, or freeze.
When you’re in that, when you’re in that constant stress activation, your body is not interested in making babies because it’s not safe, it’s not biologically safe. I’d been telling my body for years, hey, it’s not safe to make a baby right now. Let’s just jack up your hormones a little bit so that can’t happen.
It really wasn’t until my last miscarriage. When I talk about miscarriages, I do it wholeheartedly because I don’t ever want any woman to feel alone in it. I think it should be common conversation because it is so common. Yes, it is devastating and heart wrenching, but the more we talk about it, the fewer women will feel alone in their own experiences.
Serial Entrepreneur – Using Experiences to Help Others with FDN
It was after my last one that I was like, I can’t not do something about this anymore. I was able to conceive my last child and I was so led to help other people with these issues. I had, kind of, not fixed myself, but I’d done enough on myself to get to where I wanted to be in a lot of ways.
I’ve always felt that I go through experiences so I can help others. It’s always just been a thing. Like if something really not fun happens, I think, well, that’s cool. I can use this to help somebody else on their journey. That’s when I dove into FDN and thought, I experienced this lifetime of craziness – health things – for a reason.
Now I can take all of that experience, all that drive, all that motivation, and all that tenderness I feel, especially towards other women in these situations, and I can dive into a program that gives me the capacity, the ability, the education, and the tools to change the world for better.
FDN was the perfect fit. Before I really started researching, I didn’t even know something like this was an option for me. I mean, I have an undergraduate degree in public relations. I have a graduate degree in elementary education. I’ve always loved health related things but didn’t know it was an option.
When I realized I can do this, it was a no brainer. It was an absolute, no brainer. I was like, sign me up right now.
[00:15:40] Detective Ev: I admire so much the idea of really embodying, because you can tell with your passion that you actually use the whole “everything happens for a reason” thing in your life. It took me a while to do that.
Changing & Sometimes Saving Lives With FDN
I encourage people to do this. What’s the biggest argument? Well, you can’t prove that everything happens for a reason. You do not need to believe in it to actually use it. That’s the best part. If I just act like everything happens for a reason, this is all about the mindset of it. You can shift the mindset without actually even believing it. That’s the beautiful part.
Now I’m actually more prone to believing that because of, again, just certain beliefs that I have personally. But I started out as someone who did not have those beliefs at all. I said, I can either be miserable about this and sit on the pity potty all day, or I can say, all right, where is the opportunity here? Can I actually use this to serve someone else? It creates a richness to life that I don’t think many people get to experience.
For some people like us, I mean, just all of FDN, let’s be honest, these people have the craziest stories. Yet you get people on this podcast who are some of the happiest, most passionate, fulfilled people you’ve ever met.
So, it’s tough to say, would I go back and change anything? I don’t think so because I’m really happy with where I’m at now. We serve this role in the world where we might help five people, we might help 5,000. It’s nothing to do with the number, it’s just the impact that you have on those people’s lives, from the work that we get to do. I mean, you’re legitimately changing lives, if not saving them sometimes, depending on what we’re offering here.
How long did it take, Becca, from the last miscarriage to being able to have a successful pregnancy?
Serial Entrepreneur – It’s Made Me the Passionate Person I Am Today
[00:17:06] Becca Kyle: It was in an April and then I got pregnant in August.
It was at that time that I really started to support my genetics. I mean, I’d known about some stuff, but it was like, okay, I got to dive into this. It turns out, of course, I had an MTFR variant. I had all these things that were impacting my hormones. When I really just dove in to supporting my genetics, which doesn’t get much more foundational than that, it shifted so many things for me. I had taken it sort of seriously before, but not like really seriously.
It’s one thing that I work with women with today. I try to do a genetics test on every person because it is so fascinating. Once you know what your genetic predispositions are, you can support them with lifestyle. You can honor your body. So, I really chose to dive in and honor my body and support it on such a foundational level.
When I did that, I had no problem getting pregnant. I could get pregnant all day long; I just couldn’t make it stick. So, I got pregnant, made it stick, and now I have a beautiful, my third boy. He completed our family.
I’m like you, I don’t think I would’ve gone back and changed anything, even if I could. Everything I experienced, every little bit and piece, heartbreak, and success really created who I am today. I don’t think I’d be nearly as driven or passionate to help people if all those things hadn’t happened to me.
Serial Entrepreneur – Creating a Generational Legacy
What I love about this is it’s not just helping five people or one person, it is to me about creating (and this is why I love focusing on women), it’s about creating a legacy of generational health for families. Once one person in the family learns this stuff, has the tools, has the capacity to change their health, they change their children’s health. Then these children, this generation of children, grow up understanding these things and pass it on to their own children. So, it’s about a generational legacy to me, not just about 1% or five people.
Commercial Break – Try the FDN Course for Free
[00:18:53] Detective Ev: Well, if you’re trying to do something that can help that generational legacy, then you might want to consider the FDN course.
What you can do is go to fdntraining.com/tryfdn. It’ll let you try the course completely for free, there’s no credit card required. It is literally a way to try the beginning of the course for free. I can pretty much guarantee it’ll be clear one way or another as to whether or not this course is for you based on just doing that.
So, if you’re someone that’s interested in this, you could rule it out, or in, pretty quickly by doing that. That’s fdntraining.com/tryfdn.
Okay. Now back to the episode.
Generations of Health Issues
Interesting perspective with that. I feel like that actually happens a lot with the moms. Because my grandmother, on my mom’s side, Type II diabetic for 40 years, Becca, somehow has never had like anything removed thankfully, but she has had a heart attack. It’s even more amazing when you realize she still drinks Pepsi.
She has no interest in changing and has not had an interest in changing in 40 years. When she calls sometimes, I love this woman to death, but she’ll call and she’s talking all crazy. I’m like, Pie Pie. That’s her nickname, by the way, is Pie Pie. That’s how I identified her when I was a kid, because she would eat these Tastykake pies all the time. She loves the name. She embodies this.
I’m like Pie Pie, did you check your blood sugar recently? She’s like, no. I’m like, can you please check it and just stay on the phone with me? Becca, I swear on my life, I cannot even tell you how many times we’ve had these calls where she’s pushing a 400 on her glucometer, walking around the house.
I’m like, God is watching you. If God exists, He is watching you because I do not know how you have maintained this for 40 years. My point is, she had a lot of illness. Then she had my mom, and my mom was pretty sick from, not day one per se, but like, 10 years in, 15 years in, starting to deal with stuff. Getting all these root canals before the age of 29, teeth decay, whatever.
Serial Entrepreneur – Looking at Health & Wellness Related Genetics
Then I came out and I’m obviously not a woman, but five years old, I’m already having panic attacks. I’m having severe GI issues. So, I love this aspect that you have of the generational thing, because you’re right. Because of someone not getting the proper information at one point, it affected the next one. She didn’t get it either. So, we’ll remove her thyroid eventually. Then we’ll go to this next one. Thankfully we have the education to break the cycle.
I want to touch on the genetics if we can, because that’s not something that comes up a lot on the podcast. I find it interesting. I actually believe in that as well and use it too. Let’s just break it down. For someone that maybe is thinking, genetic testing, and they’re like, is that like 23andMe? How is the standard stuff different from what you do in your practice?
[00:21:11] Becca Kyle: I’m not interested in genetics that tell you if you have a widow’s peak or if your eyes are blue or brown. That’s not what we’re talking about. I’m talking about, kind of think of as like the top 40 of health and wellness related genetics. We’re looking at predispositions for nutrient and mineral deficiencies, at how your body responds to certain foods, at really, what are the best carbohydrates and types of fats for you?
We’re looking at how your body tends to have an abundance or a deficiency in neurotransmitters, which impacts your mood. We’re looking at histamine. I think a long time ago people thought, well, my grandpa had a heart attack, so I’m going to have a heart attack. It’s not like that anymore.
Serial Entrepreneur – Connecting More Health Dots
You know, you cannot change your genetics, but you can change how they present in your body. It’s like switching the light switch on and off with lifestyle. It’s not 23andMe. It’s not going to give you a lot of information that makes absolutely no difference in your life.
You can look at your face and say, yes, I have blue eyes, who cares. It’s really about dialing it into the genetics that you can do something about to create better health. It’s like when I realized I had a PEMT variant. Just like you can have leaky gut, you can have leaky cells. Once I started supporting that PEMT variant, that impacted my energy levels, my ability to detox, that also impacted my methylation cycle, which we can go to that a whole other time.
But it’s so fascinating to me. When I look at someone’s genetics test and then look at their functional lab works, it’s like, well, yeah, you’re predisposed to low B12. Oh, look here, you’re B12 is low. And it’s not always tit for tat. That’s why I love looking at genetics. You always want to see here’s your predispositions, but now here’s how it’s playing out in real life currently for you. It’s just such a beautiful way to connect more health dots.
The beautiful thing is too, you only have to do this test once. Your genetics aren’t going to change. I recommend it for families. I’ve had all three of my boys tested. It’s a cheek swab, it’s noninvasive. But I know how, as a parent, to support my children’s genetics and I’m going to teach them along the way.
FDN Grads Have Access to Genetic Testing
Oh, you’re having anxiety. Well, you’ve been having a lot of high tyramine foods lately. It’s like teaching them those little tips and tricks to create their own best health. I want my children to leave the house (someday, they will be leaving my house), and have such an in depth, powerful understanding of how to create their best health.
So, when they are 18, and they go off, they’re not starting at zero, like I was. You know, they’re starting maybe 50. It just gives them; I think the best opportunity to have an amazing life.
[00:23:46] Detective Ev: You mentioned the correlations that you’re seeing between the foundational lab testing that we run at FDN and the gene testing. That’s one of the reasons that I have utilized it in my own practice.
Because we have a lot of trainees that listen to the podcast, Becca, and people that haven’t even taken the course, just to be clear, in the FDN program (and we’ve talked about this in a separate podcast, so go back to Episode 149. Reed Davis is on, it says, Founder of FDN Explains All Five Labs, check that out), we do teach a foundational set of labs, which are very useful.
But we also give you access to a lot of different things, and you have the flexibility to take different routes with this. Because of our friend Piper Gibson, she was on the podcast before, we actually have access to genetic testing, as FDNs, even if you’re not a doctor, once you graduate through our medical director program.
Genetic Testing Shows the Extra Hidden Healing Opportunities
That’s where I get it and I find it is really useful. I had a client, Becca, and she shares this publicly so I’m using her name, her name’s Shannon. She had this ankle pain for 13 years. This is a thin woman, fit, in shape, but she could not dull the pain without severe steroids and medication.
We ran the test and then I got the consult with Piper cause I was still pretty new to the gene testing at the time. She said, all right, well you have a couple interesting things here, Ev. First of all, Shannon cannot produce glutathione as well as other people. It’s an antioxidant for the sake of the conversation today.
Then she said, but here’s something really interesting and I don’t see this one a lot. This genetic SNP right here is actually the ability for the body to get glutathione into the joints. She said, you have someone that can’t produce as much as the average person, if they’re not healthy, and then can’t get it in as well to the joints.
I said, wow, this is crazy. We got her on OmegaIgG2000 just to help with extra toxins in the body. Then I also said, do me a favor and try this glutathione. She was using this liposomal glutathione and I think she got an IV at one point. Did it fully get her? No. I mean, this is a severe case, but it was like 50% better in a matter of weeks. She didn’t need the medication to get through her day anymore.
I’m like, wow. Where else would I have seen this? So, I really believe in what you’re doing here. I mean, I wouldn’t have seen that on any other functional test personally.
Serial Entrepreneur – Data Driven Action Steps That Are Life Changing
[00:25:43] Becca Kyle: Yeah.
It’s such a sneak peek into pieces of someone’s biochemistry that you aren’t going to get otherwise. It goes right back to that “test don’t guess” philosophy. You know, someone’s in chronic pain for a majority of her life. Well, why? You can’t figure it out and that’s that one test, those two markers, like just mind blowing, how eye-opening that is.
It gives the data. I love data. I am so data driven. I am a self-proclaimed science nerd. The data gives us the tools to take very strategic, very specific action steps. Yes, there are foundational aspects of health that can benefit everyone. But it’s those data driven action steps that really are life changing for people.
[00:26:27] Detective Ev: Now, I’d love to hear your philosophy on this. I don’t think there’s a right or wrong. I hear debate about this and that’s why it’s cool to have different perspectives on the podcast. Some people believe that if we were doing everything right, they claim that this is possible in today’s world, that the genetic testing wouldn’t even really be necessary.
Do you believe that the genetic testing, because of the state of today’s world, is always (cause you said that you’d like to run this on every woman that comes to you), now they’re also sick, do you think there is a benefit to having it ran on everyone? It might just not be possible to live “perfectly” quote/unquote in today’s world.
I’ve heard that argument and I honestly think that’s kind of a solid one. So, I’m curious what you think about that.
Serial Entrepreneur – Understand How to Support Your Health Genetically
[00:27:04] Becca Kyle: I think every person, regardless of how healthy they are or if they’re doing everything right can benefit from understanding their genetics. Maybe you spend five years doing everything right, being super healthy, then life happens. You have a life changing stressful event, a death in the family, or a job loss or whatever. As we know, stress cascades into all these potential health issues.
While life might be perfect for whatever amount of time and you’re doing everything right, life is going to happen. Understanding how to support yourself in those seasons, I think, is really helpful. Just because you’re doing everything right, according to what you think that might be, doesn’t mean you’re not going to get exposed to toxins. It’s in the air we breathe. I mean, you can do everything right and still build up a toxic burden. You can do everything right and still get exposed to something that can drive inflammatory processes in the body.
Then doing everything right isn’t necessarily genetically appropriate for you. I have histamine intolerance, genetically based and then lifestyle exacerbated. But so many high histamine foods are health foods, avocado, spinach, tomatoes. I’m doing everything right; I’m eating all these healthy foods. If I was to eat all of those healthy foods, I would have extreme fatigue, chronic migraines, joint pain, itchy skin.
Because I know, genetically, I’m prone to histamine issues, I know those quote/unquote “healthy foods” aren’t for me. So, yeah, I think there’s always a place for understanding your genetics no matter how healthy you think you are or how knowledgeable you are on quote/unquote, “healthy lifestyle.” There’s always something to learn about everything. If someone’s telling you, I don’t have anything more to learn, well, that’s a whole other conversation.
FDN Gave the Tools to Turn the Education into a Business
[00:28:57] Detective Ev: Us FDNs have the opposite problem, right? There’s some of us that don’t, thankfully it seems like we overcame this, but I know these brilliant people that got like 10 certifications, including FDN. Which in and of itself could be enough for starting a practice and they still have never taken a client. I’m like, my friend, you have enough knowledge to help a lot of people, you know?
You should always keep learning, I still do this to this day, like you said. But we also have to draw that line of like, okay, we can go help people now while also improving our ourselves. So, it’s kind of funny how that gets drawn.
I’m curious about FDN. From my understanding, we’re probably in a completely different career path than at one point.
Becca Kyle: Yes.
Detective Ev: So how did FDN impact your ability to do this as actual work? From my understanding, you’re doing this full time, right?
[00:29:35] Becca Kyle: I am doing it full time. You know, prior to FDN I was researching, posting, sharing, and people were already coming to me. Hey, Becca, what do you think about this? And, oh, I just read about this, what do you think? Like, I was already someone that just was a supportive person for those kinds of topics, cause I’d done hours and days of research and learning. I love reading, like published medical journals and all that stuff.
But what FDN did is it gave me, one the certification. So, I have the education, the business savvy. I mean, I can science nerd it all day long, but how do you actually run a business? It gave me the tools and the capacity and the confidence to turn this into a business.
Serial Entrepreneur – I Finally Figured Out What I Wanted to Be When I Grew Up
There is absolutely no way I could be doing what I am right now, supporting the women I am right now, living my best life. Because let’s face it, not everybody gets to make an income and a good income at that, doing something they love. I mean, I feel so blessed. Sometimes I kind of get to price, I’m like, is this really what I get to do – support my family and create this amazing career where no one decides the hours I work?
I’ve always been a serial entrepreneur. I’m not going to lie. But this gave me finally my dream career, my dream job. There’s absolutely no way it would’ve happened without FDN. I was looking at different programs. What I loved about FDN that to me was a complete game changer is the ability to integrate the functional labs to help my clients really get to the bottom of those root cause heal healing opportunities in the body. I wanted to bio hack someone’s biochemistry. How do we do that? We do that with data which is going to look different for everybody else. So, FDN completely changed my life.
It changed the trajectory of my career, like seriously. I was a nonprofit fundraiser in the PR world. I was an elementary school teacher. I’ve had my own photography business for 10 years. I like to dabble. But this is the best way I can explain it is I finally figured out what I wanted to be when I grew up. This gave me the ability to do that. It funnels everything in, all of my life experience, and kind of gives me this beautiful outreach to the world.
Loving Your Work is An Essential Part of Health
[00:31:46] Detective Ev: That’s a heck of a testimonial. That’s awesome.
I was thinking this earlier too and now you brought it up, when we were talking in the beginning about just loving our work and stuff. I think it was a very worthy tradeoff for the things that we’ve dealt with. For me, and I don’t mean to be dramatic, but this is kind of how it felt like. I really did not like my life for the first 18, 19 years of it. It kind of sucked.
Many people though, that’s what they consider, unfortunately, the most fun times. You’re a kid, you’re playing, you’re doing all this stuff. You go to college; you drink and do all this stuff. And it’s supposedly the best years. Then I’m not saying universally, but I know too many people that they check out at 24, 25.
They’re going to not really like the next 40, 50 years of their life. They’re doing something they don’t care about, they’re not passionate about it. Maybe at best it pays the bills. At worst, it’s not even covering the bills and you don’t like it. Les Brown, motivational speaker, says most people die at 25 and they’re buried at 75 and that’s really true.
It’s kind of a sad way to think about it. I’m not trying to be pessimistic or negative here, but I’m actually encouraging people to think in the opposite way. I think this is an essential part of health that’s not talked about a lot, I guess. You need to find something that you love.
There Can Be a Beautiful Other Side to Health Challenges
I feel like the most spoiled 20-something ever. Like you said, it’s genuine, Becca. You can’t fake what we’re doing right now with our voice and our energy. It’s something that happens naturally when you’re telling the truth.
I don’t even know what it’s like to wake up and not go do what I want. Every day is just cool. I get to go help people. I love talking to people like you, I’m getting paid to do that. That’s a blessing.
So, if you’re out there listening and you have health challenges, which I’m assuming every listener probably has, otherwise you wouldn’t be clicking on this. There is a beautiful other side to this. Whether it’s through FDN or something else, that’s fine with me. Just don’t live in that negativity and the sickness. There’s a cool side to this where you will have more joy in your life and fulfillment than I think most people will ever get to experience.
It’s because of the things that we dealt with and then getting to that other side.
[00:33:30] Becca Kyle: Yeah, I’m someone who has had multiple jobs that I hated and would literally be miserable driving to work or stuck in traffic for two hours on my commute. I’ve lived that, I have lived that life of a miserable job, a miserable commute. What am I doing with my life? It’s depressing to have that experience and to get to do what I do now. That’s why I just kinda get shocked by it sometimes. Like, this is my life? What’s going on, you know?
Becca’s Target Clients
[00:34:00] Detective Ev: Very special. Becca, who do you serve now? I know you said women, but like obviously people have a niche usually, and then conditions that they prefer to work with, even though FDN addresses everything.
Who is that niche for you? Like who do you serve?
[00:34:11] Becca Kyle: You know, I love kind of my fellow Type A, driven woman. I do work with some men, but it’s primarily women. I help go getters, like people who are just going after their life, but maybe who are experiencing some roadblocks in their path because of health issues.
I give them the tools to reach their peak performance in order to conquer those health issues that are slowing them down or holding them back. I work with a lot of high-level professional women who are like, I’m up for my next raise but I’m so tired. My brain is not functioning, my productivity is less, my creativity is out the window. Or entrepreneurs who are like, I really want to take my business to the next level, but I feel stuck because I don’t feel well. Or I really want to go to all of these networking events, but my IBS is hijacking my life and I don’t feel comfortable doing that.
So, just a go getter, a driven passionate person who wants to be a total badass in life and have it all. I do believe you can have it all in your professional life and your personal life if you have your health. If you don’t have your health, you’re not going to have anything. So, I help women reclaim their health.
Creating Programs that Provide Fast Results
This is also typically a target market who has tried all the things, all the gurus, and not had success, and she wanted results last week. The programs that I design for them are created to get fast results, to basically be able to fast track them towards the life that they dream of. It is just so much fun.
[00:35:45] Detective Ev: Nice. The good news about the Type A people like us is once you can show us a path that’s actually going to work, we’re going to do it better than anyone else. That’s the advantage of this personality type is we will do that thing that you told us to do and that’s that.
To the degree that you’re able to share, cause I understand privacy and stuff, are there any, like, one story or maybe a couple of stories of just great client testimonials or transformations that have happened throughout the years that you love sharing with people? I think it’s amazing what we’re able to do as FDNs.
[00:36:10] Becca Kyle: You know, I love one of my clients who came to me, she’s an entrepreneur, has her own business. When she first contacted me, she said, I spend most of my days on the couch. I’m so exhausted. My anxiety is insane. I hurt. She had just chronic pain. I have two small children and I literally can’t do anything. I’m not present for my family and I’m certainly not growing my business.
Successful Client Testimonials
She said, I want to take over the world in my business. I said, let’s get you there. We ran the functional labs, and we did the lifestyle. She actually posted the other day, it’s about a year later. She said, a year later, I still feel better than I ever have in my life. She is literally taking over the world in her business. Her children are thriving, and she is just such a light in the world.
I have another client, another entrepreneur. So, I work with a lot of entrepreneurs. She said she’d been dealing with chronic debilitating anxiety, like full crushing, can’t function, anxiety and fatigue for really the previous, like five or six years.
We did the foundational labs; we were looking at food sensitivities. She shifted the way she was nourishing her body to reduce those high, sensitive foods. She texted me like a week later. She said, Becca, I did what you said, but I feel worse. I said, that’s interesting. What did you shift from? We know what you were taking out. What did you add in, what did you shift to?
About that same time, I got her genetics test, and every single one of the foods that she shifted to was a high histamine food. She had all the predispositions for histamine intolerance. I said, client, this is going to get a little bit crazy for a little bit. We’re going to restrict you, just short term, just for doing a little experiment. Within one week of her getting those high histamine foods out of her diet, the soul crushing anxiety she experienced for five or six years was gone, was gone.
Sometimes Little Tweaks Make Massive Impacts
Sometimes it’s not this major thing. Oh, we found all of these crazy things on your labs. Oh my gosh. You know? Sometimes it’s those tweaks. Those tweaks that unless you have the data, you can’t do, you can’t suggest, you can’t encourage.
Most of my clients experience such an uptick in energy and mood. Most of them are dealing with some form of anxiety or depression or just irritability, the ability to live their life on their terms without their symptoms holding them back. You know, these are go getters. These are women who are going to change the world. Once I give them the tools and the capacities, they do the work. I mean, they have to do it. I just give them some tools and some data, they take it and run with it.
I get so excited because I get to see now because of the work they put into themselves, how they can go and shift the world for the better. Again, that ripple effect of all the amazing lives they’re going to impact. I have goosebumps, it just makes me so excited.
[00:38:51] Detective Ev: I love that you work with entrepreneurs because as one myself, I don’t think there’s anything. That’s why I take the health stuff so seriously, Becca. I know you do too. That’s our life, man. I love creating it and doing these things and engaging with people and all that stuff. It takes a lot of energy. It’s perfectly okay to live that way. But like you said, if you don’t have your health, good luck.
Support Your Health First
First of all, you’re not going to be thinking about that anymore, cause you’re going to be too worried. Second of all, you’re just physically not going to be able to do it. So, it always comes first. And perhaps it’s a blessing in disguise that we learn that at an appropriate time.
Many entrepreneurs, they get too involved, they have their feet in so many different places, and they’re just running around. Then they get sick. Now they do not know how to live a life where they can manage all these businesses and stuff with the sickness. It’s almost kind of a little better to have it first, so then I never get sick again and I never take on too much. It’s a good thing.
We have a little more time than I expected. I wanted to know if you’ve seen any common patterns on the tests and it doesn’t have to just be the gene ones. I know that genetics are different and that makes sense. Let’s be honest. A lot of mental health patients have MTFR things or OMT stuff.
So, I’m curious, like with the people that you’re working with, these super highly driven individuals that also happen to have anxiety, other things, do you notice any patterns on the functional labs, whether it’s the genes or otherwise?
Patterns of Health Issues Seen in Clients
[00:40:02] Becca Kyle: Most of them have some sort of leaky gut going on, some sort of dysbiosis in the gut, overgrowths of opportunistic bacteria or parasites of that nature. Most of them have some sort of neurotransmitter imbalance that’s impacting their mood. Most are not doing the little lifestyle tweaks and hacks, optimize digestion, maximize nutrient absorption. Almost all of them have pretty significant hormone imbalance.
It’s just these patterns that come over and over. The most common thread is high stress and they’re not taking the time for rest and play. They’re living in that fight or flight, in that sympathetic dominance, which then of course, creates more gut dysfunction. It’s just this vicious cycle.
One of my favorite genetic tests, when it comes to genetics, marker is the MAOA genetic variant, which can lead to either higher levels of neurotransmitters or deficiencies in neurotransmitters. What I love about that one is you can totally bio hack that one with food.
It could be something as simple as staying away from high tyramine foods, which is anything aged or fermented. If someone’s like, yeah, I eat a smorgasbord of a meat and cheese tray every day, because that’s easiest. All that’s doing is driving their anxiety.
I see a lot of actual mold toxicity, a lot of mold issues with my clients driving cognitive issues. On pretty much every single person I test has got pretty significant mineral imbalances as well. You know, minerals are the spark plug of life. If you’re macro minerals aren’t balanced, that’s going to create so much fatigue, your metabolism’s going to take a hike. Something as simple as being deficient in potassium can impact the ability for your adrenal and thyroid hormones to get into cells.
Where to Find Becca Kyle
Again, sometimes it’s big things. But oftentimes it’s these little tweaks you can make that have such a massive impact.
[00:41:47] Detective Ev: Yeah, absolutely. Well, where can people find you, if they’re interested in working with you?
[00:41:53] Becca Kyle: My brand is Holistic Obsession. My website is holisticobsession.com. It took me a long time to come up with my brand name. I love the word holistic just cause it encompasses so many different aspects of what I love to do. Then one day I was in my kitchen. I was mulling over some concept, and I was like, Becca, you are obsessed with this stuff. I thought, oh, there we go, Holistic Obsession. I literally am obsessed with this type of thing.
You can find me on Facebook at holisticobsession. My Instagram is myholisticobsession.
I did a short attempt at TikTok. Haven’t quite really worked that one out yet. But you can access me, pretty much anything you need, through my website. I would love to see you on social media.
I have a free Facebook group, Holistic Obsession Gut Health 101. Check that out. I’m always posting and doing live videos and stuff in there. I just can’t say enough how much I love what I get to do. I am literally that girl at the party talking about gut health. So, if I’m at a party with you, I apologize because I’m like, doesn’t everyone want to talk about your gut at a party? Apparently, that is not the case, but that’s okay.
The Love of Public Speaking
[00:42:55] Detective Ev: Yeah. Us FDNs are definitely known for bringing up these topics unprovoked then somehow wrapping these people into it. Now what’s cool is if you’re a passionate person, you can get some people that might not normally care. Maybe they don’t care afterwards, but they at least respect it. That’s what I find.
There are certain people that I know they’re never going to do a thing, like my grandmother. She’s going to keep drinking her Pepsi and eating her cakes and candies and that’s fine. But I respect what you do, Ev. You know, I like the information so thanks for sharing it with me.
Well, before we ever got on here, Becca had posted the other day about loving public speaking. I got to say, as a speaker myself, you just got it. You know, some people just have it. It’s that energy, it’s the fluency. It makes for a really engaging time. So, it’s cool.
I want to wrap up today. Of course, we’ll have all those links in the show notes by the way, guys, so you can reach out to Becca if you’d like to work with her. But what I want to finish with is our signature question on the Health Detective Podcast. It’s always an interesting one. I eventually thought this was going to burn out and that we’d be getting too many repeats. 160-something episodes in, I have literally almost never gotten a repeat. Certainly not more than like two or three times.
Health Detective Podcast Signature Question
The question is this, if I could give you, Becca, in this case, a magic wand and you could wave it and get every single person in this world to do one thing for their health, whether that’s actually do one thing or stop doing one thing, what is the one thing you’d get them to do?
[00:44:12] Becca Kyle: I would say make more time in your life for rest and play. They are not luxuries; they are necessities in your life. If you are going, going, going and not resting and not playing, it’s like being in this stress-based tunnel vision. You’re missing really great answers to the problems that you’re having.
Creativity is in your peripheral vision. You can be like a racehorse with its blinders on. You’re not seeing simple solutions that are just right outside those little blinders. When you activate that parasympathetic nervous system, that rest and digest, when you rest, when you play, when you add some expansiveness into your life, is when things start to shift dramatically. It’s all about reducing stress.
Two of the easiest ways is making time for rest and making time for play. That looks different for everybody. It could be a 10-minute walk, a coffee date with a friend, literally locking yourself in your bedroom away from your children for a 10-minute nap. It could be painting a picture.
There’s no right or wrong way to rest and play. Figure out what that looks like for you and actively participate in it. I know when you’re stressed out, it’s the typically rest and play are the first thing is to go. You stop doing all those things that used to delight you. But when you bring them back in, everything starts to shift for the better.
Conclusion
Everybody, I don’t care how much money you have, how busy you are, what you’ve got going on in your life. Rest and play don’t have to cost. It doesn’t have to take up hours of your day. It could be 10 minutes here, five minutes there. It’s just a matter of doing it.
[00:45:40] Detective Ev: All right, guys, that’ll do it for today’s episode with Becca Kyle. I hope you enjoyed this. I hope you liked the mix of just a really interesting story of success in addition to achieving the health results that so many people have been able to get from the FDN system.
If you like the information that we are sharing, please be so kind as to consider leaving us a five-star review on Apple and or Spotify. If you would do that, we would love ya even more than we already do.
I’m looking forward to talking to you guys again next time with yet another interview. But until then, take care.
You can always visit us at functionaldiagnosticnutrition.com. To hire a coach, go to fdnthrive.com. For a free health review, go to fdnthrive.com/match.
