Interview with Emily Cambria
In this episode, we will uncover 3 keys:
- A Key to Lifelong Wellness
- Journeying to Wellness Through Gut Health
- Practical Strategies for Gut Health Success
A Podcast Transcription
Episode 40: New life in 2024 begins with rejuvenating your gut biome system!Occupational Therapist~Emily Cambria
Intro
Odiva Vasell: (00:55)
Welcome, welcome, Emily.
Emily Cambria: (00:59)
Thank you. Thank you so much. I’m really blessed to have you invite me here to chat with you today.
Odiva Vasell: (01:05)
Yes, it is a topic that I’m so interested in, and it is something that is not talked enough about as far as I’m concerned. So I want to start at the beginning with you. Tell me, exactly how did you get started in this industry?
A Key to Lifelong Wellness
Emily Cambria: (01:28)
It was all through a personal journey of mine. When I first finished college at UMass in Amherst, I worked for Wall Street for about 15, almost 20 years as a Wall Street executive. Started out as a Chartist before computers existed. So I’m not a young person. And so my first job was getting little numbers out of a newspaper and putting them in a three-ring binder, and then going and putting the point of that particular indices or number I was tracking on the wall. And I worked my way all the way up to becoming an institutional trader. But then my husband moved us to the Midwest, to the Midwest, and we were only going to be there for two years. We left the Massachusetts area, and I decided to go back to school to kind of keep myself busy. And started in and discovered Occupational Therapy (OT). And I just absolutely fell in love with it. Thought it would be a better fit than a nine-to-five kind of job because it gave you flexibility doing part-time and per diem hours for raising a family. So in my experience of learning to become an OT, I got exposed to tuberculosis. The treatment for tuberculosis is they put you on antibiotics for a year. Antibiotics for a year does a number on your body. I’d have to go in and have blood work done regularly and be monitored, but I had no idea the ramifications that this was going to cause. When you have that onslaught of killing the bad gut bacteria and the bad stuff in your body, it also kills the good as well. And so much studies have come to know that that’s not really the right thing to do because our gut microbiome is the epicenter of our gut. But I’m getting ahead of myself, so let me back up. So after being exposed and being on antibiotics for a year, it caused me all kinds of health issues. It propelled me from a young age into being in my midlife years even. I went right into menopause. It caused infertility. I struggled with a lot of infertility and I ended up adopting two children to become a mom. I never bared my own, which that’s a whole ‘nother story of all that whole journey. And it also, when you start going into menopause at a young age, it messes up your hormones. So I had horrible hot flashes, I had trouble sleeping, I had chronic fatigue, mood swings. Holy cats, my mood swings. And then when we have that change in our bodies, in our hormones, it also reduces our bone density because it’s all tied together. So even though I was super active, I ate healthy, I would have to take a nap every day, raising my little kids just to keep up with life. Then, as all this was going on, my doctors would say, “Oh, well, just take supplementation. That’ll help you. No problem.” I would buy the supplements. I would try to take these supplements. They’d make you feel sick, they’d make you constipated, and then they’d expire and I’d throw them out because I never continued taking them. So, lo and behold I was still active and I love to downhill ski. Downhill skiing is my passion and it’s the closest you can get to flying without leaving the ground. It’s just amazing. So I was an expert skier, but unfortunately, I probably had no business skiing at all because I had the bone density of a bird. If you’ve ever broke chicken bone, they’re very hollow and not very stable and even though I was an expert skier, I got hit by another person snowboarding. And I’m not against snowboarders, but they took me out. And because I was an expert, there’s a thing called the Din, and that’s how tight your bindings are and if they’re going to release. Well, when I got taken down, my leg, actually, my binding didn’t pop and my leg twisted 360 degrees. It was awful. And my leg was shattered into eight pieces. It was like a puzzle. And my surgeon, luckily, was able to put my leg back together. So I have eleven screws and two plates in my lower leg, just below my knee. So I have ten fingers, so I have eleven screws and two plates. The x-ray is mind-blowing. When you see it, you’re like, holy cats. How does your leg stay together?
Odiva Vasell: (05:46)
What age was that?
Emily Cambria: (05:52)
That was eight years ago now.
Odiva Vasell: (05:59)
Around the time that you were on the antibiotics, or had you finished the treatment and were still suffering from the aftereffects?
Emily Cambria: (06:07)
Yes, it had been almost 20 years. And I was still struggling. So for 20 years, I struggled with all those issues. I still had the hot flashes. I was trying to keep myself healthy, but it had deteriorated me to that point. And so then I was still trying to recover. So now I still had all those issues like I described. So then you compound that with the healing. I was non-weight bearing for twelve weeks. I walked around with a walker. My poor husband had to be, he had to take on every role and he has a very demanding career. And so even after two years, I was still limping. I had chronic pain, I was on opioids, still had all the other struggles, hot flashes, anxiety, mood swings, frustration, and poor sleep and fatigue. I actually was crushing. I was still trying to get the dog. I had gone through all my rehab, was trying to walk the dog and I was rushing because the sun was setting. I’m a sunset freak. I have to be outside when the sun is setting and slipped again and broke the same leg a second time. So I also have a 14-inch rod in that leg. And that was the day that I had signed on to take a new supplement program because a dear friend of mine, her husband died tragically in a car accident, killed instantly. And she had always talked about this particular product line.
Odiva Vasell: (07:34)
Tell us exactly how this happened. So you went from having all these problems started in your youth and with the antibiotics, and then you started this treatment. What was this special treatment that you started, and how did you take that on as your business?
Emily Cambria: (07:55)
Sure. The treatment is a three-step program, if you think about a garden. Well, let me back up, let me give you a little education on your gut. So your gut is composed of all the way from your mouth down to your intestines, all the way to where your anus is. And that whole system has another ecosystem, this microbiome system that’s in it. And there’s a ratio of good gut bacteria and bad gut bacteria in your gut. And the gut is the communication pathway from your brain. It’s a two-way directional pathway. And what’s happening is the messages of what’s going on in your body automatically that you’re breathing, your blood sugar levels, what’s happening with your muscles moving, the messages of when to move, when to blink, how to breathe, how fast your heart beats, all that are messages that come actually from your gut microbiome. It sends it up. It’s called the vagus nerve. It’s the longest nerve in your body, and it’s a two-way street. So if you have an imbalance, the messages that are going to be being sent to your brain are, this is what’s happening here chemically in your body. And the brain will send back messages that will make you get offset to try to compensate, to rebalance. So if you have an ecosystem that is balanced, you’re going to be sending the right messages to your body and end up with a homeostasis of where your body should be. And then everything functions properly. If you think of it this way. If you think of it as a garden, if you tend to your garden, if you tend to your garden, you weed your garden of the bad stuff, which is the bad gut bacteria, recede it with the good bacteria, and also feed the good gut bacteria, your garden will flourish. And it’s the same way in our guts. So the system that I used is created by a company that’s located in the United States and Scottsdale, Arizona. It is a program that’s a three-step program. So the first part of the program is a drink, and that feeds your good gut bacteria. It also balances your blood sugar, which is a huge key to health because there’s a ton of studies out there about blood sugar imbalances. As you know, we have a ramp. Type two diabetes is lifestyle. And it’s because they hide sugar in our foods under 57 different names. Our drinks. A lot of it is hidden with sugars. Artificial sweeteners are also an issue. And so the drink itself, you drink it, it balances your blood sugars all day. It’s feeding your good gut bacteria. Then we have a probiotic that’s actually three probiotics in one, and both of those products have a patent on them. They’re created by physicians and a research team that goes out, does the clinical research about how to formulate these blends of ingredients for the maximum results they’re looking for. And then they send them out to be third party tested, and they came back. So that’s the other thing for me as an OT, what I offer has to have clinical evidence. That’s part of my oath as a healthcare provider. I’m not going to send somebody down for a voodoo system or whatever. But anyways, so the probiotic has three products in one, which would cost you three times as much if you were purchasing it. And it’s amazing because it’s receding your gut with the good gut bacteria. However, it’s not going to hit your stomach and get killed by the stomach acid because it gets released down in your lower intestines, where it should be. So it’s time released. Also has an enzyme in it, and the enzyme goes in and breaks.
Odiva Vasell: (11:39)
Are you telling about a product now? Are you telling me about a product? Because I’m getting lost. Because you’re not pausing to take a breath. Are we still talking about gut health or we’re talking about a specific product?
Emily Cambria: (11:57)
I was answering your question. The program that I used, that my girlfriend had recommended, it’s a supplement system. It’s three steps. The first step was the drink that feeds your good gut bacteria. The second step is a probiotic that recedes your gut bacteria with good bacteria, but it also has an enzyme, so it’s going to break up the hard shell of the bad gut bacteria, because the bad gut bacteria has this hard shell, but it also has an antifungal in it, which helps reduce the ability for the bad gut bacteria to grow. So you’re seeding and also weeding the bad weeds out. So that’s your three steps. So you weed, seed, and feed your ecosystem of your garden of life, which is your gut microbiome. And when I did that.
Odiva Vasell: (12:53)
If I’m clear, you’ve taken this on and this is now your business.
Emily Cambria: (13:01)
This is how I help people balance their bodies from within to maximize and optimize their health. Because when you have balance within your body, your systems function properly and you maximize your health, overall wellness.
Odiva Vasell: (13:16)
Right. How’s someone that’s come to you and what their issue was and how were you able to help them?
Journeying to Wellness Through Gut Health
Emily Cambria: (13:24)
I’ve helped people over a variety of illnesses. I don’t claim to cure, treat, or diagnose any disease. However, what I offer is a tool to optimize your health. So I have a lot of clients that come to me for weight loss. I’ve helped people lose, I think one gal, I’ve helped her lose over 50 pounds so that she could have her knee replacement surgery. She had to lose that in order to do that. And I had another girl, I’ve helped her lose 35 pounds. I have a gentleman that lost 30 pounds. So a lot of people come to me for weight loss. However, I have another individual that struggles with hot flashes, and I’ve been able to help her with that, hormonal imbalances, constipation, anxiety, mood swings, depression. I’ve helped with so a variety of health issues, because really, health begins in the gut. It’s the foundation really, of our overall wellness. So everybody experienced the anxiety and stress over Covid not only just the virus itself, but stress in our bodies creates hormone called cortisol. Cortisol kills the good gut bacteria. Then you have that loop of science. So you’re producing cortisol that’s killing the good gut bacteria. And you might drink a sugar drink, or you might have some alcohol. So now you’re really killing more gut, good gut bacteria. And your serotonin, which is the happy hormone that makes us feel happy, can’t get produced as well because we have the imbalance, and therefore, it’s this cycle. Now you’re producing more cortisol, the hormone that comes from anxiety, but you can’t combat it with serotonin because you can’t produce it because you’ve got the imbalance. So once we get balance, then you’re producing the right amount of serotonin, the happy hormone. And I think that’s the thing that most of my clients love best about when I work with them, is that they’re really amazed on how much happier and they feel because they’re finally producing the right amount of serotonin. Other things that kill good gut bacteria is being on our electric devices. I’m certified in digital wellness. The blue light that emits in the amount of time, 98% of people are laying in bed, scrolling on their phones. Sleep. How much sleep you have also affects your good gut bacteria. What else? How you’re born affects your gut bacteria, what you eat and how much you exercise, how much hydration you have. So it’s all so intertwined. But when you get balanced, the optimization of your physical body, it’s incredible. The results that you get increased energy, better sleep, better moods better health reduce your risk of chronic diseases. If you’re struggling with a chronic disease like arthritis, like I have it helps reduce your overall body of pain and inflammation. And those are key components. So one last thing I’ll say is that my three-step system really tackles your blood sugar balance all day, which is really important. Reduces your overall body’s inflammation, which is a huge. We could talk about inflammation and its effects on your health. Reduces your inflammation, and then it improves your gut lining and your gut health, so that, a, you’re absorbing the right nutrients for the foods that you’re eating, and you’re creating the right balance. So you got the hormonal balance, and it just optimizes your health, and you become like the energizer bunny. Like me, like you’re nonstop.
Odiva Vasell: (17:09)
So, Emily, tell us about your program. How does it work?
Practical Strategies for Gut Health Success
Emily Cambria: (17:17)
Well, basically, I will look at the whole person’s situation, learn specifically about. I do like a mini health evaluation. I figure out what their goals are and what is most important to them. Then from there, I will work out and make a recommendation of a basic program using a holistic approach that will rebalance their body from within so that their body’s total system can operate efficiently. And when you get it all operating efficiently, it actually will optimize your overall health and wellness and will be like a special toolkit for your body to maximize your health and wellness, giving you unbelievable energy and exuberance, really.
Odiva Vasell: (18:12)
So you went from being an OT to focusing on gut health. How do you combine those two?
Emily Cambria: (18:21)
Well, a lot of my education as an OT is from the standpoint of habits and what you do on a day to day basis. We’re sort of trained as the experts in your daily activities of living, is what it’s called in our line of work. And what you do over time, be, it can either have a positive effect on your health or a negative effect on your health. Or if you’ve been in a serious injury or have recovering from surgery, you may have to do adaptations to your daily routine so that you can take care of yourself properly and maximize that. So, in using my own personal experience that I went through, combined with my skill set as an occupational therapist, I bring a really great value to my clients.
Odiva Vasell: (19:11)
And so, typically, what is the issues that your clients are going through? I mean, gut health is one thing, but are there any other things you find that people have in common?
Emily Cambria: (19:22)
Well, but pretty much your whole system of your body relies on the foundation of how healthy your gut is. And so there’s so many different health struggles that people can. That I help with. So it could be menopausal issues, weight gain sugar cravings, anxiety, muscle if you’re having muscle issues like fibromyalgia, I.B.S in particular those are some areas that will not. Yeah. So what I do is I don’t claim to cure, treat, or diagnose any particular health issue, but what I call is root healing or root health. If you get to the root issue of why there’s all these miscommunications going on in your body and your body is experiencing all these issues, if you get to the core root and start there, is where people really get the results. But it’s not a quick fix. It’s not like Advil. A lot of people want a quick fix and keeping yourself healthy from within. Like I said, it’s your daily habits that accumulate either positively or negatively. So I look at the whole picture.
Odiva Vasell: (20:50)
And you said there are certain mechanisms that the body communicates to the stomach. What do you mean by that?
Emily Cambria: (21:01)
Well, as everybody knows, that gut feeling, you feel it in your gut and you kind of get a 6th sense. Our gut is also known as your second brain. And the reason they say that is because it’s a two-way directional highway path of information of what’s going on within your body that affects all the systems in your body. And it’s called the vagus nerve, and it’s the longest nerve in our bodies. And there’s a lot of things you can do that will benefit the vagus nerve. It’s called activating the vagus nerve. And I also will give my clients the simple steps. There’s things you can do on a daily basis, a monthly basis, a yearly basis to help maintain a healthy vagus nerve communication pathway. And part of it is your diet and things like that as well. So it’s really important, and science is really coming into the limelight of how important it is. When I went to school as an OT, nobody really taught us or talked about the gut microbiome and gut health overall. So the more and more science is coming out and it’s been fascinating to keep up with it, that’s for sure.
Odiva Vasell: (22:12)
Tell us about some of the results your clients are having, because you apparently went through a tremendous body transformation. How about your clients? How are they doing?
Emily Cambria: (22:25)
Well, my clients are amazed. I’ve helped people lose anywhere between 55 pounds, whatever their goal was. Most of them are looking between 30 and 50 pounds that I’ve had success with. I’ve helped people lower their A1C so they didn’t have to go on any medication. I’ve helped people with their anxiety, constipation issues, menopausal issues, brain fog, and hot flashes in particular. I’ve helped people develop more energy because they had insomnia, and now they’re getting a really good night’s sleep. And then another area is pain and inflammation. I’ve helped people get off their opioid pain medication and I’ve helped people with addiction as well.
Odiva Vasell: (23:14)
Wow. Quite a broad range. And all of that stemming from the gut. I’ve done probiotics. Is that enough to help our gut?
Emily Cambria: (23:28)
So my personal experience and other people are finding that to keep up with it, if you’re not doing anything to help maintain that balance, you’re going to get thrown off because there’s more, like I said, there’s more bad things working against you than you’re able to do good. And the people that have been physically active. And I have several clients who are fitness instructors. And they said, well, I thought I was doing everything right. But then in trying and working with you, I’ve come to realize that now I felt good, but now I feel fabulous and fantastic. And it’s so worth that small step to take because small steps over time will create big results. And that’s what this is all about: helping people live vibrant. I strongly believe that women are the backbones of our families and our communities. We wear so many different hats in our lives throughout our day. And as an occupational therapist, that’s one of our jobs. That’s why we’re called occupational therapists because we want everybody to do the job that they have to do on a daily basis. I’m talking day to day. We address simple things that you can do day to day to help you fulfill your roles of your life so you can become your best self. And women need that. They need that support. We do so much for so many and wear so many hats.
Odiva Vasell: (24:52)
Absolutely. Well, I want to thank you for joining me today, Emily. And just giving us a little bit of education on what we can do to help our lives in so many ways. This whole movement of real nutrition and the body communication system, as you said, is really something that we all should probably take more time to care for and add to our self-health care regimes. So thank you for explaining this to us.
Emily Cambria: (25:35)
My pleasure. Thank you for the opportunity to share about it. Thank you so much.
[music]
Conclusion
As we come to the end of our talk on gut health, it’s evident that keeping our gut happy is crucial for our overall well-being. We’ve discovered how our gut impacts our entire body and heard inspiring stories of people feeling better by paying attention to their gut health. So, let’s keep it simple: listen to our bodies, eat well, and make small changes every day to support our gut. As we wrap up, let’s share what we’ve learned and encourage others to start their own journey towards better health.