My Journey into Holistic Healing and Integrative Wellness

You may be wondering why all of a sudden I am so passionate about holistic healing, essential oils, hemp oil, and so committed about whole food nutrition?

It may sound surprising to some of you, and you may even wonder what has caused this shift in our practice, so I wanted to share the big “WHY” behind it.

Seven years ago I had a life-changing injury. Many of you saw me go through it, and some of you never even knew. I fell down and broke my ankle, which required emergency surgery.

That was just the “tip of the iceberg”, and I’ve come to realize, a kind of “blessing in disguise”  as it was the thing that UNCOVERED all kinds of things that were not working well in my body, but I was completely unaware of.

This injury took forever to heal…6 months later I was put in a hard cast, and 6 months after that, when I was beginning to walk again, I had another issue, my legs swelled up and had unbearable pain to the point my mobility was impaired. I became disabled again almost overnight. I couldn’t stand for more than 1 min at a time, I couldn’t shower, put on my makeup, cook, walk or anything like that. I was diagnosed with compartment syndrome.

This is a severe condition that compresses the vessels and capillaries in your legs due to inflammation and can become severe enough to cause necrosis. I had surgery on both my legs on all 4 compartments to relieve this pressure. Before going into surgery I was told there was a chance one of my legs might be amputated due to the high-pressure readings.

It was devastating. It felt like the entire world was crashing down on me all at once. Having been a ballerina and a highly abled body, I had taken for granted the freedom and abilities I had.

The whole order took around 3 years in which I was in and out of crutches, boots, casts and surgery. It felt like a nightmare.

And those were just the external issues. The fact that my body wasn’t healing, made me and my husband Shayn go deep into studying all kinds of things.

At some point I was working with 9 different practitioners and physicians and no-one could give me the right answer!

Through our research I discovered I was taking a medication that had severely impacted absorption in my gut, which made it seem that no matter how much Vit D I was talking (at some point it was 7000 IUs a week!) my levels were still low. My gut was destroyed from all the medications, pain killers, antibiotics, etc, but no one ever told me I needed to do things to restore my gut health.

Intuitively I began changing my eating, only to later confirm I have had celiac most of my life, and I’m severely intolerant to a few other foods. I had no idea how eating the wrong foods was affecting my gut flora, and consequently my ability to absorb food, my energy level, my mental clarity, and my ability to focus.

Many of you know that both my parents are physicians, so I was brought up under a western model of medical care. You feel sick, you take a pill. That pill gives you side effects, then you get another pill to combat those side effects. Are the side effects too big? Then you search for another pill. And this is a merry-go-round that never ends.

Now to be clear, I don’t have anything against the medical model, and I am alive because of competent physicians who know what to do when I broke my leg or had appendicitis. I also know that some of us have mental health or health issues that might need us to take a prescription medication.

However, no prescription is without side effects. Doctors are simply looking to minimize the impact of these side effects, or to hope that the therapeutic effects are stronger than the side effects. Most of western medicine is centered around treating symptoms. And when symptoms pile on top of another it is extremely difficult to untangle one from the other.

Through holistic and functional medicine we are seeking to address issues at the root. And we are learning that many of our health issues can be traced back to one of two things: spiritual/energetic/emotional issues and gut and digestive issues.

So, both Shayn (my partner) and I have been immersed into understanding the interaction of the body, mind, spirit and finding natural solutions to many of our common ailments with a goal to empower our clients to make choices that allow them to feel in control and empowered

I have regained functioning in my legs and I can walk normally, and I even started doing aerial dance once I completely overhauled my nutrition, added high-level supplements and vitamins, found a powerful detox, etc. Adding essential oils and hemp oil has resolved any of the lingering “neurological” effects I had in my feet (burning, tingling, numb).

At one point in my journey, my medical tests and inflammatory markers were so high, doctors were afraid I had MS, lupus, arthritis or something worse. I couldn’t make a fist and I often was dropping objects. All of these things feel like a faint nightmare.

Doing aerial dance requires me to have a very strong grip and incredible upper body strength, as I’m literally holding my life in the balance, and letting go could be lethal. I couldn’t be doing this, had I not gone through this journey and committed to changing my life and my health habits to create the outcomes I now enjoy.

Even “strange” things have improved: my vision has improved (my correction decreased by 1.25), and my body “bounces back” quicker than it ever did before. I don’t remember when was the last time I got sick with a cold. My energy and my mood are more often high and light. I want the same for each one of our clients and everyone else in the world.

Needing to go see a physician to get a prescription, keeps you tied to a system. Learning to identify symptoms and how to trace them to a root cause, and learning a multitude of multi-disciplinary natural solutions empowers us to take control of our health from the comfort of our homes and to maintain it for the long term.

We are constantly exposed to toxicity from all kinds of material and energetic “clutter” that ultimately have a negative impact in our energy, health and livelihood.

Shayn has been so fascinated by how food and supplements can heal the body, that he has gone back to pursue his Naturopathic Medicine Degree to provide a deeper level of support to all of our clients.

So we will be sharing several alternative modalities for your healing, through classes, workshops, seminars, retreats, and our 1-1 work. We encourage you to attend as many as you can, as we will be sharing information that most physicians and insurance companies would never want you to find out.

We will simply share from our experience, the research and give you tools and opportunities to access some of these tools, products and services.

We are excited to be able to share the knowledge, tools and products with you to give you access to a safer, effective and affordable way to maintain your mental, physical and spiritual health. Ultimately, we hope to empower you to make the choices that are most congruent for you and your family.

I hope that me sharing my journey, can serve both as an example and inspiration for you, that no matter where you are at, things can be improved when you have the right support. So keep listening to your body, your intuition and seeking an integrative approach to your health and wellness.

So go and check out our lineup of EVENTS and join us for a great experiential education.

With much love,

Dr. Elena Estanol.