#409 Healing from Cancer, Crohn’s & Mold with Dr. Jill Carnahan

This week on The Less Stressed Life, I’m joined by Dr. Jill Carnahan, a functional medicine physician who’s no stranger to adversity. From breast cancer at 25 to Crohn’s disease and mold toxicity, Jill has walked through deep suffering—and shares how those experiences became her greatest teachers. We talk about what happens when your body breaks down, why high achievers struggle to rest, and how healing starts with radical self-compassion.

If you’ve ever felt like you had to push through, prove your worth, or handle everything on your own—this conversation might just offer a new way forward.

 📽️ Watch the documentary: DoctorPatientMovie.com

 📘 Read the book: Unexpected: Finding Resilience through Functional Medicine, Science & Faith

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• Why survival doesn’t equal healing
• The connection between overachievement and chronic illness
• How self-compassion actually creates space for physical healing
• Why your story matters—and might be the key to recovery
• What it looks like to rebuild trust with your body

ABOUT GUEST:
Dr. Jill Carnahan is a board-certified functional medicine physician, bestselling author of Unexpected, and host of Resiliency Radio. Known for her compassionate, whole-person approach, she helps high-performing individuals unravel complex health issues by addressing the root cause. A survivor of breast cancer, Crohn’s disease, and mold toxicity, Dr. Jill brings rare insight to her work—blending science, faith, and hard-won wisdom to help others heal physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

WHERE TO FIND:
Website: https://www.jillcarnahan.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drjillcarnahan/

WHERE TO FIND CHRISTA:
Website: https://www.christabiegler.com/
Instagram: @anti.inflammatory.nutritionist
Podcast Instagram: @lessstressedlife
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@lessstressedlife

NUTRITION PHILOSOPHY:

• Over restriction is dead.
• Whole food is soul food and fed is best
• Sustainable, synergistic nutrition is in (the opposite of whack-a-mole supplementation & supplement graveyards)
• You don’t have to figure it out alone
• Do your best and leave the rest

Transcript

[00:00:00] Dr. Jill Carnahan: we always have a choice of that. And what happens is as that shifts, then we can go out of denial into this centered meaning and purpose and embrace it and say, bring it on. I have what it takes. I'm going to overcome this, and I'm going to learn something in the process.

[00:00:15] Christa Biegler, RD: I'm your host, Christa Biegler, and I'm going to guess we have at least one thing in common that we're both in pursuit of a less stressed life. On the show, I'll be interviewing experts and sharing clinical pearls from my years of practice to support high performing health savvy women in pursuit of abundance and a less stressed life.

[00:00:45] Christa Biegler, RD: One of my beliefs is that we always have options for getting the results we want. So let's see what's out there together.

[00:01:03] Christa Biegler, RD: All right. Today on the Less Stressed Life I have Dr. Jill Carnahan, who is known as your functional medicine expert. She's a board certified physician, bestselling author, and a global keynote speaker. She's the medical director of Flatiron Functional Medicine, where she helps high performing individuals solve.

[00:01:20] Christa Biegler, RD: Complex health mysteries using a root cause, whole person approach as a survivor of breast cancer, Crohn's disease, and mold toxicity. Dr. Jill brings rare compassion and clinical brilliance to the table, often being the first doctor to offer her patients real hope. Her work's been featured in forms MINDBODY Green NBC news and more, and she's the host of Resiliency Radio and the author of a powerful memoir.

[00:01:43] Christa Biegler, RD: Unexpected. Finding resilience through functional medicine, science and faith. And also she has a documentary, I was just telling her I was watching called Doctor slash Patient. I don't know how you're saying it. And I don't know when it came out. When did that come out? 

[00:01:55] Dr. Jill Carnahan: 2023, I believe. Yeah. Okay. 

[00:01:58] Christa Biegler, RD: All right.

[00:01:59] Christa Biegler, RD: I'm so excited for that. Have to have come across my desk. I, but do think everyone should watch it because why not? I just think there's so many beautiful pieces in the story. So welcome to the show and I'd love people to share their story when they get started. And so you had a question on your podcast page about the power of telling your story as the first step to healing your past.

[00:02:18] Christa Biegler, RD: And so often when people ask, what can I do first? I'm like, please write out your story so you're not having to relive it to every practitioner. But I want you to open up with parts of your story, however you want to share. I know that I watched how you were. Not a healthy child. And then it progressed and it's so dramatic.

[00:02:35] Christa Biegler, RD: So I'd love for you to share wherever you want your story about how we got here. 

[00:02:41] Dr. Jill Carnahan: You got it. And I couldn't agree more just on story itself. I wanna just pause there for one second because we all have a story, right? And some of us have more dramatic stories than others. I happen to have a lot of drama in mind, but the beautiful thing is.

[00:02:54] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Spin each of those things, which I'll tell you in just a minute, a little glimpse of my story. What happens is we have this self-discovery and we find things like, I always say, my own experience with cancer and Crohn's and mold related illness was by far a better medical educator than my medical education.

[00:03:08] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And I just wanna. Talk to the listener for a second because some people are like, oh my story's not that interesting or not that exciting, or not as dramatic as yours, and it doesn't matter because each of us have this journey. And what happens is when we find meaning and purpose in that journey, even the really dark, difficult suffering, we become transformed.

[00:03:27] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And then we're able to take that light of transformation and pass it on to a friend of family or for a healer, our patients, and it's so powerful. So I just. Love talking about that. I love that you started with that because I'm not unique. I do have a story, but so do you listening. So my story begins on a farm.

[00:03:42] Dr. Jill Carnahan: We talked about that interestingly little fact in central Illinois. I was one of five children and grew up in really an idyllic, like Norman Rockwell esque setting. Parents have been married over 50 years, just a really good, solid, strong kind of Christian family. And my mother retired to raise this kid.

[00:03:56] Dr. Jill Carnahan: She was a nurse. But what happened for me is I grew up like we had a garden and I would go out and pick stuff and plant stuff. And so I had a very clear sense of our physical bodies and the soil and the ground and the produce and like this connection to health that was deeper than just a medication or surgery.

[00:04:13] Dr. Jill Carnahan: So I would've never in a million years at five or tens that I wanna be a doctor. But the truth was I was a healer. Like I was born a healer and I actually went all these other routes applying to naturopathic school and chiropractic school and osteopathic school, and then as an afterthought, I was like.

[00:04:28] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Maybe I could be a medical doctor and actually change the system. And this was like, at 18 years old, realizing, oh wait, what if, even if the system isn't perfect, which we all know isn't perfect, but there's some good stuff and it's highly reimbursable by our insurance systems and despite all the flaws, it's still the major thing.

[00:04:44] Dr. Jill Carnahan: If you have a car accident or a stroke or a heart attack, you probably wanna be at a major medical center. So all that to say, I had to shift in realizing, oh wait, I could learn the best that medicine has to offer in that realm. Then tried to actually shift. So I went in with a very clear directive, my soul's journey, and I had no idea that part of my education would be in my third year at 25 years old, finding a lump in my breast, not thinking a thing of it, because 25 year olds don't get cancer.

[00:05:12] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And finding two weeks later that I had aggressive. Breast cancer. And so I took off nine months. I had three drug chemotherapy, radiation, multiple surgeries, and it was brutal. Like it was about as brutal as you can imagine for cancer therapies as they are. They're pretty non-specific, especially 20 years ago.

[00:05:29] Dr. Jill Carnahan: So I had lost all my hair. I was down extremely malnourished, my gut was destroyed, my immune system was destroyed. And then I limped back to medical school to finish my last year. And in that bit I still hadn't learned to take care of myself and to be more. Compassionate. I was just all in the work ethic, the farm family, drive and show up and don't complain and I had brothers around me and there is something to that.

[00:05:50] Dr. Jill Carnahan: It made me stronger and wiser in some ways, but that whole ethic of be strong and don't complain and be tough and I was grew up around this mentality on the farm and so I brought that into medical school, which again served me well for survival, but not so well for somatically taking care of my nervous system.

[00:06:05] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And what happened is I went right back to medical school and pretended like I was fine and I was. So far from fine, I started having fevers and abdominal pain and diarrhea and weight loss. And within about six months I was in the er one day taking a patient's blood pressure. I pass out cold on the floor, I become the patient and

[00:06:23] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I woke up the next day from surgery. I had been diagnosed with an abscess and the surgeon said, Jill, you have Crohn's disease. So within this like span of 18 months, I was diagnosed with two life-threatening illnesses. Now in hindsight, I've completely cured myself from Crohn's and I'm free of breast cancer.

[00:06:39] Dr. Jill Carnahan: But it was so powerful as an educator to go through those things and to understand at a different level what it was like to be the patient. Yeah. 

[00:06:48] Christa Biegler, RD: I wanna zoom into parts of that since I heard you tell parts of those stories in the documentary, and so I remember, I think the year is around 2001.

[00:06:58] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Yeah.

[00:06:58] Christa Biegler, RD: Which doesn't feel that long ago. And you felt you were learning about breast cancer in class and you felt this issue and you thought, oh, this is interesting. And you mentioned it to your husband, who you could tell he thought you should do something, but what I appreciated is you said your mind slipped right back into denial of I don't have time for this.

[00:07:16] Christa Biegler, RD: I'm busy, et cetera. And I thought that was so incredibly relatable and it, again, it reappeared those, that rushing woman syndrome. Which is a popular term right now. Yeah. I heard that same theme come up as you were doing, and no, this is just, I'm, it's just so relatable that you started your cancer.

[00:07:36] Christa Biegler, RD: First of all, let's bring up this piece, at your school where you were going, Loyola. You were the youngest person to be diagnosed with cancer at 25. Now that is such an interesting statistic because in 2001 that was a true statement. And nowadays

[00:07:52] Dr. Jill Carnahan: it's so different now. It's

[00:07:54] Christa Biegler, RD: crazy. It was crazy to even hear you say that.

[00:07:56] Christa Biegler, RD: And so I remember you said you thought. You were, I just, I can understand this completely. I remember I had a baby in college and I thought I would just jump right back into school. Yes. No big deal. I was like, and I did take a week off. But it, and it's not the same. It's not the same, but it's just this human nature of believing I'm just gonna keep going to medical school while I'm.

[00:08:20] Christa Biegler, RD: Doing cancer treatment. Like I'll be able to go to the same case that 

[00:08:22] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Krista, I literally was like, oh, maybe no one will know. Yeah, do this on the side. No one will ever know. And again, like after my first chemo, I was so sick, my hair started it was like, oh wait, there is no way I can keep going. And then the same thing like you said, I just thought I could get right back into it and I did.

[00:08:40] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And yet I was looking back at that young girl and this is where the message maybe to your listeners, I would be like, sweetheart. It's okay to take time. It's okay to pause. It's okay to take care of yourself. There's no weakness in admitting that you need help, that you need rest, that you need recovery.

[00:08:58] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And if I could go back and talk to that young girl, 'cause all she knew was I. Achievement means love and performance means love. And I was a high achiever. I was like valedictorian in my class and class president, you name it. I did it as far as the achievement ladder and my parents were wonderful.

[00:09:14] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I know they love me and they didn't intentionally say, oh you, we only love you for achievement. But there was some message I got in that farm. Family ethic of oh, if you achieve, you're gonna, and among five children you're gonna be noticed. You might get more validation. And so that nature in us, Maslow's hierarchy of being loved and belonging is so core that we mold ourselves to be what we think we need to be loved.

[00:09:36] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And it took me 40 plus years to relearn that, wait, I am lovable just for being, showing up here anywhere without doing a thing. And that's so hard to learn for those of us who are in that achievement oriented kind of space. 

[00:09:48] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, you almost have to experience it. And I am only nodding along because I feel as you share your story, I just hear parts of my story.

[00:09:57] Christa Biegler, RD: Also, I'm also an achievement based fifth child, so I understand. Yes, I understand. You said and here's another piece let me start with this Crohn's disease piece. So it's very briefly, after you go through your cancer journey, which has of course, many layers, you end up in a. A trial, yeah. And all of these things. So it's very shortly after that, you go in for the abscess, you get diagnosed with Crohn's disease and. You said to the resident or the doctor, how should I change my diet? And he said, diet has nothing to do with this, which was a wake up call, as you said.

[00:10:31] Christa Biegler, RD: But I love, there's a line in the movie shortly after where you say everything is figureoutable, which I appreciate wholeheartedly. And so the question is, you get a lot of flack for reversing. Crohn's disease. Happy. Oh yeah. Thank you. She brings up a plaque. We have some videos some audience.

[00:10:46] Christa Biegler, RD: I wanna give 

[00:10:47] Christa Biegler, RD: Marie Forlio credit too, 'cause I think that was her book, but like I, I used that term. It's such a great one, so thank you Marie for that. But it's, yeah, 

[00:10:53] Christa Biegler, RD: a good thought. It's a good thought. We need, actually, as I was watching your documentary, I just, it was very helpful for renewal of the mind, and I think sometimes when you're in the trenches, you need a lot of renewal of the mind, right?

[00:11:03] Christa Biegler, RD: And so everything is figureoutable as a. Very helpful thought. Very helpful thought. And so tell us a little, unpack the Crohn, how Crohn's disease was almost like another step as if the cancer didn't hit you in the phase and transform your life. How does the Crohn's disease now transform your life even more?

[00:11:20] Christa Biegler, RD: I. 

[00:11:21] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I think I thought, okay, I got through cancer and I knew I was not a hundred percent. I was sick, I was malnourished. I lost all my hair. Post chemo, and you think about how could we take you to the edge of death and then leave you to survive cancer? That's what the chemo did to me.

[00:11:33] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I, they calculated what's the maximum of this certain drug that causes heart failure? Can we give you before your heart stops. Beating, let's give you that dose, which means my lifetime, I can never ever get that drug again. I've had the lifetime maximum, and that's how it was. Wow. Because I was young, they were incredibly aggressive.

[00:11:47] Dr. Jill Carnahan: So I come outta that and once again, I was in a denial state because should have taken some more time. I should have rested and I didn't. And then again, the stress of that, but it's a perfect storm because. Gut related stuff, it makes sense. A lot of the chemotherapy causes increased permeability.

[00:12:02] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I had a genetic predisposition towards overreacting to normal microbial contents, which means that I'm prone to Crohn's. So that leakage of the gut, contents of the gut going into the bloodstream created this like nasty immune reaction that co. Was, ended up being Crohn's disease, which is an autoimmune disease that attacks any of the guy.

[00:12:20] Dr. Jill Carnahan: So it makes sense. But what happened, which you mentioned that was so interesting, I was just a third year medical student. We did not get a lot of nutrition training. So a lot of it was even in the garden at home knowing that nutrition mattered. And I thought, this is a gut disorder. So the food I put in my body has to matter.

[00:12:34] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And I was asking sincerely, and you said it exactly. The doc just looked at me. I was like, Jill diet has nothing to do with this. Almost with a disdain. Like how could you even ask? And it's that point, and this is the point for your listeners. There's an intuitive sense in all of us whether we are aware of it or not.

[00:12:50] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And the intuitive sense is often more accurate than our science analytical mind. And at that moment, my heart said, that can be true. Now, science-wise, analytical wise, I didn't have the data. I hadn't studied nutrition. I did not know if that was true or not, but on an intuitive level, I thought there's no way that can be true.

[00:13:06] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And my stubborn German background kicked in and I was like, I'm going to prove him wrong. This, there's no way. Diet has nothing to do with it. So I started just going to the, and that was back even before Google, like I was going to the libraries and looking up articles and things, and I found. Elaine got so specific carbohydrate diet and she was claiming to have cured colitis and Crohn's, and I literally was like, what do I have to lose changing my diet?

[00:13:27] Dr. Jill Carnahan: There's nothing more benign. It might be hard work, but it's not difficult. And I did, and within two weeks the fever stopped. The abdominal pain stopped, and I was. Dramatically better now. I always say it took me a couple years to restore the microbiome in the way that the Crohn's was gone. But at that moment I knew, holy cow diet has everything to do with this.

[00:13:46] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And one little piece of that puzzle was that I had Celiac, celiac that wasn't diagnosed. So part of that diet change was taking gluten out, and that was a big player as well. 

[00:13:54] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, and there was some, as you said, I think I wanna underline that piece where you got dramatically better in a couple of weeks because diet is the environment in which your body was allowed to heal.

[00:14:06] Christa Biegler, RD: And then there was other pieces to solidify that as well. And I just, I bring that up because. I'm sure my next question is, do you see this? You bring up this denial around that happens sometimes when we're faced with something that we don't have time for. We don't want to be dealing with.

[00:14:22] Christa Biegler, RD: Which is pretty much everything,

[00:14:24] Dr. Jill Carnahan: uhhuh

[00:14:24] Christa Biegler, RD: any inconvenience in our way. We do not wanna deal with, we do not want to have pain. So I'd love to hear if you sometimes just see yourself as a mirror. Your clients, do you see that denial in your clients that you had at parts of your journey or the thought concept or the thought that once we have something and we solve it, we'll never have that again.

[00:14:45] Christa Biegler, RD: We'll never have to deal with it again? Do you see that showing up? 

[00:14:48] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Yes. So there's a couple themes that come to play here. One is we always have an identity that serves a purpose. So if we've been identity as a chronically ill individual, you're gonna hate me for saying this listener, if you are suffering out there.

[00:14:59] Dr. Jill Carnahan: But there's a piece of that serves you. And I'm talking about myself as well. There's a piece of that I was in a marriage, which wasn't terrible, but I had three stepchildren. I was going to medical school. I was supplying the finances, and I was raising the children. I had a massive burden and I think looking back.

[00:15:14] Dr. Jill Carnahan: There was a subconscious piece of me that this illness came about. I didn't cause it. And again, if you're listening out there, there's no but we aren't victims either. And I think of at that time, that cancer, that Crohn's it shifted my world dramatically and it was probably because I didn't have the voice to speak up in the marriage and this, raising the stepchildren and going to medical school and saying, I need help.

[00:15:32] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I need rest. I can't do this all alone. But my body knew. And your body's very smart. And so it, and maybe it was just a little psychological piece of that. It wasn't like I still had the genetics, I still had all the other stuff. But I like to say that because usually if we have an illness, there's an identity that we're associating with it, whether it's like rest without asking for rest or I mean whatever.

[00:15:50] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And. It's okay to admit that there's a piece of us that is served subconsciously by the illness because we can never completely break through and break away from that until we identify what is the benefit here to me. Even if it's subconscious, which I would say to your credit out there, if you're listening and have a chronic illness, probably 80% of it, 90% of it is totally subconscious.

[00:16:11] Dr. Jill Carnahan: You're not trying to be sick, you don't wanna be sick, but you're also not a victim. And in order to really break free, you have to give the physical, the mental, the spiritual go to all levels and identify. And I think you had another question there that I totally bypassed about.

[00:16:25] Christa Biegler, RD: I was 

[00:16:25] Christa Biegler, RD: talking about denial and then thinking once you have something, will you never have to deal with it again?

[00:16:30] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Yeah, so it took me that first episode of breast cancer. I remember like hearing a preacher on the radio who said something about, there's a verse that says The sickness will not end in death, but is for God's glory. And I did have a faith and kind of a greater and higher power at that time. And so I clunked onto that and was like, okay, there's something great here, even though it's suffering.

[00:16:47] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And what happened is it shaped everything else that came because I realized that if we can look at suffering as a teacher. Whatever faith you are, whatever background you are, doesn't matter. Even if you're an atheist, there's still this lesson in suffering that if we can be like, okay, suffering, you're here.

[00:17:02] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I don't like that you're here. I wouldn't wish it on anyone. I don't wanna deal with this. Then denial. But because you're here. I'm going to take this as a lesson as a teacher and say, what can I find here that's good and meaningful? Because always in the most dark circumstances, and I love my friend my mentor, Victor Frankl.

[00:17:20] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Of course, I joke with that because it's so profound in my life. The man's search for meaning. Because if anyone can talk about suffering. Someone who's been through the Holocaust, I, my suffering will never compare to that, right? And he talks about finding meaning and purpose in the midst of the darkest time, and showing love and compassion and generosity in the darkest times.

[00:17:39] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And we always have a choice of that. And what happens is as that shifts, then we can go out of denial into this centered meaning and purpose and embrace it and say, bring it on. I have what it takes. I'm going to overcome this, and I'm going to learn something in the process. 

[00:17:55] Christa Biegler, RD: That's beautiful. And I wrote down a quote that you said that I found very powerful.

[00:18:00] Christa Biegler, RD: It was, and it's very much mirrors what you just said, which is the deepest lessons and most profound insights come in the suffering come in the dark moments. And self-compassion is the healing transition that shifts inside of us. It's what we need most to heal. 

[00:18:14] Christa Biegler, RD: Yes. 

[00:18:16] Christa Biegler, RD: So what I want to ask as a segue to that statement is that sometimes the concept of self-compassion might be foreign, especially, let's pretend you're 25-year-old Jill.

[00:18:28] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. And you don't, even if someone said self-compassion, you would say, cool. That's for somebody else, right? I don't have time for that. Like I don't even know what the heck that is or means. So what would you say to someone, some people may have had a nice exhale as I was quoting you, and some people might say, but how do I give myself self-compassion and what might you say to that?

[00:18:49] Dr. Jill Carnahan: This is so important because I saw in my own journey, and then now I would say 100% of my patients, there's some piece of this that is powerful in their healing above and beyond nutritional supplements, diet, lifestyle, all the stuff we do in functional medicine, and that is, I. It goes back to my gastroenterologist sitting there and being like, wait.

[00:19:08] Dr. Jill Carnahan: There's an intuitive sense in our body and when we've had illness or cancer or something that's really devastating. Even the loss of a loved one that may not be illness to us, but a really tragic circumstance. There is a piece of ourselves that we don't trust. For me, I'll just say exactly what happens.

[00:19:26] Dr. Jill Carnahan: My body betrayed me when I was young. That's how I thought. I said, body, you are my mind's strong. My body is betraying me. I hated my body for betraying me. And that self-hatred actually affected my cells, affected my body, affected my ability to completely heal until I went to that source and said, oh wait, this is not good if I hate myself for betraying me.

[00:19:46] Dr. Jill Carnahan: So I had to heal that part. And what happens is we cannot really trust ourselves if we don't believe that we're legit or that we have a space in this world, or that we have. The ability to be loved for just being as our conversation started. So we have to first start to heal that. How do we talk about ourselves?

[00:20:03] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And we all have pieces, whether it's personality traits body habitus or things, or whatever it is that we don't like about ourselves. And we have to start by loving ourselves completely because you cannot love yourself completely until you trust yourself completely. And that trust is the pathway for you to get out of your suffering and find healing because your body always knows.

[00:20:26] Dr. Jill Carnahan: The body keeps the score. The body knows trauma. The body subconsciously holds all these memories and patterns. And while you may hire an expert, a coach, a functionalist, and doctor, your body has innate wisdom to heal. But it will not do that if you're shutting it down, telling it. It's not legit. It's not to be trusted.

[00:20:42] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I hate you. So you have to have that self-compassion. And intertwined. It's like a three-pronged chord. You have self-compassion, which is sweetness, kindness to yourself, especially the parts of yourself. You don't really like intuition, trusting that your body knows the way out of any situation, and that if you really tap into those resources, you will be able to get well.

[00:21:04] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And then self love. So compassion, intuition, and love. And you have to have all those three things healing together, and that's when the real transformation starts. 

[00:21:14] Christa Biegler, RD: I wanna ask you, how long did it take you to unearth that lack of trust was there from your little girl, Jill? 

[00:21:22] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Yeah, so it's interesting because I went through Crohn's and Cancer in my 25, 26.

[00:21:27] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Then I started to go I moved to Boulder, started the practice, and then I got mold related illness from about 38 to 42, maybe 45 even, and suffered from that. And in that midst of the mold related illness, I went through a divorce that was unexpected. I have been married 20 years. My husband came home one day and said, I don't love you anymore.

[00:21:44] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I wanna be with someone else. And shock. I never. Anticipated a divorce, but what happened is the divine knew that was the only way to wake me up. I call it the great awakening because I was sleepwalking before that, doing the motions, being the wife, being the stepmom, being the doctor, and doing that and just assuming and not really walking awake.

[00:22:03] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And when that completely tore apart my world, I had to say, oh, who am I without this? Marriage, so I had to go to those really deep places and I had to examine my thought processes and my trauma patterns and my belief systems. And I really feel like I completely reorganized after the divorce to becoming the person I'm today.

[00:22:23] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I could name so many specifics. For example my ex-husband was a very strong, charismatic person. And so in his presence, I always thought I wasn't creative. I wasn't an entrepreneur, I wasn't a leader. Like I really had thought everything that I built was all because of him. When I separated from that divorce, I realized, oh, wait.

[00:22:38] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I am creative. I am an entrepreneur. I went to medical school. I have a pro like. Granted, he was a partner in some of that, but like I had the things that I was projecting onto him and I felt that they weren't mine. And so often we do that in partnerships. We often see a quality that we admire or that we want, or that we think we don't have in someone we love.

[00:22:57] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Or a friend or a partner. And. What happens is usually that's a suppressed part of ourself that is actually there in spades. So that healing was really examining all of these thought processes and patterns and really reprogramming my mind the way I think, the way I think about trauma and the way I love myself, the way I show up with compassion.

[00:23:17] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And the truth is, we cannot really heal or love another person until we love ourselves. 

[00:23:23] Christa Biegler, RD: This was actually a question I had about to get to find true healing. I often find that we have to heal part of this emotional, energetic piece. That needs, I think we all need inner healing. It just depends on how it's displayed to us.

[00:23:37] Christa Biegler, RD: And so I was going to ask you about to get to this healed space. Let's assume in this, at this time, you are in this healed space. I just. I wanted to ask you about what else needed to happen in your mind, a body and psyche, but I think you may have just answered that a little bit. It's and there again was I hate that you have.

[00:23:55] Christa Biegler, RD: Had to face so many challenges on your behalf because it seems unfair. It seems unfair to have to face all of the challenges that you have faced. And yet here you are lifting other people up and being a light and a beacon. And I think there's, it's obvious that there's gotta be a lot of inner healing that happens before that can, that light can shine through.

[00:24:16] Christa Biegler, RD: Tell us I wonder what that was like going through that. Just thinking about that time, that's like the hard, that's the hardest part, especially when we're, we have been, we have grown up with a shell, a protective shell, a performance mentality, right? That's been our identity, and so I just think there's, I don't wanna understate this piece because I find that when we are struggling, our frustrated, it's here.

[00:24:40] Christa Biegler, RD: There's something here around self-compassion, and it looks like I wanted to ask you this part too, so maybe you can go wherever you want. Really, it's. What are some way, what does it look like when people are not having self-compassion? And for me it can look like perfectionism a little bit or like the results are never, it's like it'll, I'll only be happy if this type of thing.

[00:25:01] Christa Biegler, RD: And so wherever you wanna go with this, right? Where it's like, what does it look like when we're not being self-compassion? 'cause the tricky part is when it's unconscious, when it's right below it, which is most of us. And so that's really the trick is like, how do you excavate, how do you pull out this stuff that you don't even know?

[00:25:16] Christa Biegler, RD: Is there. 

[00:25:18] Dr. Jill Carnahan: This is so good. I love where you're going and I love talking about it because I feel like it's so powerful and I'm still on the healing journey, but by goodness I've come a long ways. I think of two stories that'll demonstrate this. So I remember when I was probably eight years old, I'm playing the piano.

[00:25:32] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I had five years of piano lessons, and I wanted it to be beautiful and perfect, and every time my fingers would miss the key. I remember sometimes sitting there and I literally bite my fingers until they'd either be so painful or bleed biting my F how stupid is that? You're biting yourself.

[00:25:45] Dr. Jill Carnahan: But I was so angry at my fingers for not performing to the standard I had set for myself. Like I wanted to be good. I wanted to play beautiful music. And when I missed a note, I was so angry that I bit myself. Like how stupid. But that just shows you like that's an example of this self-hatred or this self.

[00:26:04] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Denial or these things we're talking about. And then another one I remember at, five years old, I'm going to kindergarten for the first day. My mom made me a special bag. She actually sewed it. She sewed some of our clothes. I had this darling little, and, but I was crying because I was going to kindergarten to learn my ABCs, and yet I didn't have them mastered.

[00:26:20] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I was like four and a half, five years old, and I was crying to mom because I don't know them yet. And mom's that's why you're going to school, sweetheart. And so like this idea that, and I remember thinking, I was telling a friend again back probably in my teens or twenties, where like I would set a goal and the goal would be maybe here or here, here.

[00:26:37] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And if I reached that goal, I knew inside that I had not set it high enough. That is like freaking crazy. So these are stories that set up the kind of mentality that I grew up with that I had to shift. And so I get divorced all of a sudden, I'm not married anymore. I'm like, who am I?

[00:26:54] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I had to go deep and I have done you. Probably name any somatic trauma therapy. I've probably done it thought field therapy, EMDR, brain spotting. I've done the work with Schultz and the family systems, and you name it, neurolinguistic programming. I have done it all because I wanted to go deep and find the things that were hidden, and so I would just say for you listening, I happen to be really curious and I like to check everything out.

[00:27:15] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Find something that works, but you must go to the subconscious patterns in order to reprogram your mind and your faith and your health and your everything about that. Subconscious patterns are just that, right? They're under the radar. We don't know about them. So we have to first identify, and how you can maybe identify is, you could start by saying, if it's a mother or a daughter or a sister or a loved one that triggers you and you feel irritated or frustrated, you might first say, okay, what is this about this statement, this personality trait, this thing that is irritating or frustrating to me because the fact that I'm triggered, there's some unhealed.

[00:27:47] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Stuff with me. And granted it might be that person's F fault, they might have been a jerk. It might be 90% them. But we can always say, what in this, what about me? Is this a denied part of myself because that person's stubborn or greedy or arrogant, or something that I believe that I'm not. So I love the idea of thinking of triggers as these teaching moments where we can take accountability.

[00:28:07] Dr. Jill Carnahan: We might still have to set a boundary or say something to someone else who is behaving outta line, but usually when we're triggered, we have to start and say it. Why am I triggered? What is that subconscious pattern that I still believe inside me that needs to change? Because we only ever have control of ourselves, and if we put our happiness on someone else, we're never gonna be satisfied.

[00:28:25] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. I think as you're talking about this happens in layers and it reminds me of someone I interviewed once and I asked him about, because we are in a time where. We're doing a better job talking about how the emotional, energetic, psychological part is part of the healing. Yeah. I personally don't think we get to a hundred percent without it, and I don't know if we get to a hundred percent to be perfectly honest.

[00:28:51] Christa Biegler, RD: I think we get really good and then sometimes things happen and we get to examine why they happened, and when we examine with curiosity instead of frustration is an advancement. In our life often as well. But this gentleman I had interviewed was asking, I was talking to him about trauma, also presenting as physical symptoms and illnesses.

[00:29:11] Christa Biegler, RD: And I remember asking him about, how do you know if a trauma is healed? And he just shared that if something activates you, if it triggers you, and just again, noticing that and not ignoring it. So what you just said, go toward that. Thing that is irritable to you. So often we're just programmed as humans, we wanna avoid all discomfort and everything we don't like.

[00:29:31] Christa Biegler, RD: And I have my own weekly coaching every week. And so it's beautiful. And sometimes I like, don't even wanna go 'cause I don't wanna talk about the right thing. That's whatever. And then I realize that the magic is in the resistance, in the things that I don't really wanna deal with right underneath of it all.

[00:29:47] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And let me go a step further. 'cause what's relevant now? AI is going to change our lives. It's exponentially changing every day. It's interesting 'cause I have a deep thought about this and I'm sure I'm not the first or original on it, but AI is gonna make a lot of things easier writing, composing daily task and it already is.

[00:30:05] Dr. Jill Carnahan: But what about the struggle to write something and the brain power to remember, like I wrote my book before ai, so it was completely me and the publisher, right? But. There was so much struggle in that and actually excavating my own healing and actually writing a book is one of the most powerful therapeutic things you could do that.

[00:30:23] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Now, say I were to go in and do that through AI or do 80% of it through AI and then edit, I would lose 80% of the healing that happened in the book and the knowledge that I can even bring to an interview. It's a known cellular thing, right? Like I experienced all of this and. I'm just a caution. There's gonna be amazing things that happen to our lives because of it.

[00:30:42] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I'm not afraid of it, but there's also a caution because it's in the struggle, what we learn and we understand. I heard a recent story that Simon Sinek said, and this is so good. He said, there was a story of this firemen that were climbing up a hill and there was one fireman that had been in the.

[00:30:56] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Troop for 40 years, and all of a sudden the fire shifted direction. The winds were coming and the fire was like after them and they're gonna go up this hill. They all looked and they knew it was gonna be a lot to climb as fast as the fire was coming, it was gonna be really hard to outrun that fire. So they, but they started running.

[00:31:10] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And this chief who had been around a long time because of experience, not because of knowledge, there was no chat GBT that could have told him this, said, get down. No one heard him. They kept running. He got down the fire actually went right over him. He survived and everyone else died. And I thought that was such, and again, this is Simon saying this, but it was such a powerful story because it was his wisdom.

[00:31:31] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And we can go into chat GBT and say, oh, I had a conflict with my partner. What should I say? But it's the experience that teaches us not someone. So there we're gonna lose some of that. And I just think that whenever we can embrace struggle, it's, our life may be much easier with chat DBT, but there's a power in that struggle because it gives us a wisdom that we would never have by just reading online.

[00:31:52] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Prompts, right? 

[00:31:54] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, no, no kidding. And I'm just contemplating that a little bit because. Hindsight's 2020. So it's easy for us to sometimes say that like through the suffering, through the struggle, this is where the magic happens, and I just wonder if someone's in that struggle, in that suffering right now, if there's some tangible advice or a pep talk or I don't know what it is, as someone who's gone through those things, if they needed to grab onto something, what would you tell them to reach for?

[00:32:25] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Yes. First, I would just say, sweetheart, be kind to yourself. Be so kind to yourself because this is hard and just because you and I, Krista have talked, are talking about it like, oh, we got through this and it's great. No, when you're in it, it is not great. It is not fun. It can be the worst experience of your life in some ways.

[00:32:41] Dr. Jill Carnahan: So I just wanna have compassion to you out there if you are in the midst of struggle, but somewhere there is something of value. I don't know what that is for you, but I know that if I tell you to look for that with all your heart, you have a new P mission or purpose in that suffering, define meaning, and I know that there is study after study and intuition that backs up that purpose and meaning in our life.

[00:33:05] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Give us happiness, give us joy. And so if you can take the difficulties and find that purpose and meaning and even in your life in general it often suffering will redirect you into a better path. And you don't know it, like you said until hindsight, like later you're like, oh, my divorce completely shifted me.

[00:33:23] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And it was the best thing that ever happened, but at the time, I didn't like it. I hated it. 

[00:33:27] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, absolutely. I want to ask you if tomorrow you faced a new. Mountain that felt insurmountable at that time. You've gone through several of these. I feel like you're a great person to look at for wisdom, and that's what I want to share about you, which is funny place to put it.

[00:33:46] Christa Biegler, RD: But before I was preparing for this interview, our, how we got connected was just how things happen sometimes online. Your team is scheduling things back and forth, and I've known who, Dr. Jill Carnahan. Since the beginning of my functional medicine journey, which is some time around 2014, and I always look at her as one of the early leaders in functional medicine.

[00:34:07] Christa Biegler, RD: I still feel that way, but until I started really preparing, I didn't know all of these mountains that you'd gone through. So it was actually. It was very fun for me to understand your story more and connect, with you on this new level just because of your stories, right? We connect with people in these stories so anyway, if you were faced with a new mountain tomorrow.

[00:34:28] Christa Biegler, RD: I just wonder what new innate wisdom healing, like how would you respond? I think back to how we react, look at Dr. Jill's 25-year-old self in medical school, how she reacted to that breast cancer and how she reacted to the Crohn's and as I think about this out loud and I think about the question in general, you did what many very intelligent, high performing, achieving women do, which is you met those trials with action, and then you had other trials that came after it. But if you found a new one tomorrow, you have this depth of beautiful wisdom. Sometimes right now I'm going through this expression where I think, oh, I wish I could bestow some of that wisdom on a previous decade, Uhhuh of myself.

[00:35:10] Christa Biegler, RD: So if you were faced with something tomorrow, what do you think? How do you think you might. Face that. What do you think those steps would be? Because I think what we can learn from is your wisdom through your ex experience and that's been one of the themes of our conversation is like you learn through experience.

[00:35:27] Christa Biegler, RD: And so as Bypro, we're just here to learn From your experience, how would you face something big if it showed up tomorrow? I. 

[00:35:34] Dr. Jill Carnahan: It's very interesting because I'll tell you a short story. So I was under contract on a house and I wasn't sure it was the right house, and I was praying a lot. My God, I need some wisdom.

[00:35:43] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I have till 10:00 PM Friday night. I need some wisdom. I need to know what direction to go. And there's a lot more details that I won't share, but I just needed this wisdom and I do have a deep faith of knowing like I will know in the right time, and this is where the story's going, two o'clock that Friday that I needed to know.

[00:35:58] Dr. Jill Carnahan: By 10:00 PM I had an ultrasound that was a follow up to an MRI that showed this tiny little thing on my endometrium that I was like, oh, it's because of hormones. 'cause now I'm menopausal and hormones. So I ignored it. And then this Friday, four weeks ago, I got this ultrasound and they called back and said, you have a two centimeter mass.

[00:36:14] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I was like, oh, I'm not buying a house, am I? So the first thing that happened was I was praying for clarity, and the clarity came in a very weird diagnosis. That could have been cancer, like it could have been, once again, I've had cancer before. I know my body's prone to it. This would've been highly probable, even maybe likely, and the moment I had that.

[00:36:32] Dr. Jill Carnahan: But the thing is that happened was I was so focused on getting the answer and knowing that I would, that when I got the two centimeter mass on my endometrium, I was like. Relieved. As crazy as that sounds. 'cause I'm like, okay, at least I know when I got A-M-R-I-M-R-I was even worse. It's like you, it's either X or Y.

[00:36:48] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And one of them was cancer. So then I had a biopsy. I just had a biopsy last week. Now what happened in the interim is I'm facing the potential diagno. It's all good. But the truth is I didn't know that until just a couple days ago. And I was once again facing surgical, biopsy, possible cancer and. I talked through it with friends and family and what happened was so different than 20 years ago, I was so at peace, like literally, except for that first call.

[00:37:15] Dr. Jill Carnahan: We're like it might be cancer. I'm not gonna buy the house. That was it. And then I went into that, like the difference was, and this is where the wisdom might come, is I knew worst case scenario and we could say worst case, but maybe it was best case. 'cause as a teacher, I have endometrial cancer.

[00:37:30] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Okay. I know number one, I've been through it before. I can do this and I'll do it differently. I'll be kind to myself. I'll take time. I'll ask for help. I will take time off if I need number two. I know now after 20 plus years of experiencing these difficulties, when I need the resources for healing, for wisdom, for grace, for help.

[00:37:53] Dr. Jill Carnahan: They will be there. I'm so certain that I will have what I need now. We want it ahead of time, right? We wanna know the diagnosis ahead of time. We wanna know that we're gonna have a friend take us to surgery ahead of time. And of course, we probably set that up. But the truth is, in real time, if we trust that we will have what we need, we always have what we need.

[00:38:11] Dr. Jill Carnahan: It may not come as you think it should come, because you have to let go of the how and the timeline. But the truth is, if you believe that, you know that you will have what you need. And so I came through this so differently because I just had, and people were like, aren't you worried? I'm like, not really, because I've been through this before and I know, and again, here I am, just a few days after this, like literally days ago I had the biopsy.

[00:38:32] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And yet I can tell you that I honestly was different in this situation and I know now this is the difference. There is not anything that could come, even death that I could be afraid of in the same way I was before, because I've worked through that. And when you can get to that point where you've suffered and you've met the fear of death or your deepest fears head on, nothing can take you, knock you off.

[00:38:54] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I feel like I'm able to walk through life. Granted, I have my sad days, I have my overwhelmed days. I'm human. But even in that with the self-compassion, there's nothing that I'm afraid of in that same way, and that's the difference. 

[00:39:10] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, and what I want to underline or highlight that's in the middle of all that is that you shared I would do it this way and this way, and I know things would be okay and I would have what I need.

[00:39:21] Christa Biegler, RD: And what I hear from you is you're partnering with these like good thoughts. You've recruited evidence to create the thought that this is true. Whereas sometimes we partner with fear. And then we find evidence for the fear.

[00:39:34] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Yes.

[00:39:34] Christa Biegler, RD: That spiral. And so you're doing the opposite essentially of that is I know I can find what I need.

[00:39:39] Christa Biegler, RD: I know I have those access, or I can access those resources. And if that's not true for the listener, yeah. Maybe ask yourself always if is that true? And then second, I know I can find resources. Because everything is figureoutable. 

[00:39:53] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Yes. And Katie Byron's work, if you haven't done, it's called the Work.

[00:39:55] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I think she's so good. I'm sure you're nodding so you get it. But it's this just questioning, what if this weren't true? What if I'm not gonna die of cancer? What if is that? Can that really be true? And I'm not quoting it exactly, but you go to the depth and keep asking yourself questions like, what if that thought that I have that's scary isn't true?

[00:40:10] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And can it really be proven to be true? And you just really shift your mindset through that. 

[00:40:15] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, no, it's beautiful. And my final question is. I think I remember that you used to mentor practitioners. Maybe you still do. I just remember coming across that once, and so I think about all of this that you had to go through, and I think that something I, I ponder sometimes is that is just the great burnout of all.

[00:40:35] Christa Biegler, RD: Practitioners or doctors. I always tell my clients, don't be mad at your doctor if they don't know much about adrenals. Like theirs aren't working at full speed either, right? And so it's just we don't know what we don't know all the time, but at the same time caring for others is a lot of pouring out your cup.

[00:40:51] Christa Biegler, RD: And so I think that there can be ebbs and flows in how, in burnout and whatnot. And so I guess the question is how do you. Because the other thing is you still see patients, you're still seeing your clients, and and that's a lot, that's a lot to carry sometimes, right? Because when you're working with people who have.

[00:41:14] Christa Biegler, RD: Then dealing with things for decades, there can be a lot of heaviness around it sometimes. And so I ask you how you keep your head above water and how you continue to pour out into others even when you've got a lot of your own stuff or you're dealing with what feels like adversity on your patient list all day long.

[00:41:33] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Yes. That's such a good question. 'cause I know any practitioner or provider or coach can feel this at times, especially those of us who are, so the six traits, one of 'em is conscientiousness, right? I think I ranked probably like a hundred percent on that. And what that means is you wanna show up, you wanna respond.

[00:41:47] Dr. Jill Carnahan: One thing that's helped me is, and this is part of self-compassion, so I used to be the one, if you texted me, if you email me, if you asked me a question, if you asked me to do something for you, it was yes. I would respond, I would until I got. Drowned in the amount of people who needed my help or attention or response.

[00:42:03] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And I have some beautiful friends and lots of them and so good friends that I love and I wanna respond to. But I don't know, maybe six to 12 months ago I really reset as far as letting go of that need to respond. And sometimes there's someone that I really care about that it might be three days till I text back, but before where I would carry the guilt about that and be like, oh my gosh.

[00:42:21] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I want them to know that I love them and I can, I'm there for them. I now just do what I'm capable of. It's really about the self-compassion, right? Because the other way is like working ourselves to the bone and creating a depletion based on what we think we should be to someone else. And the real power in self-compassion is the action to set the limits and boundaries to just be like, or I check some of my email, I have a couple accounts, one of them.

[00:42:44] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Twice a week or once a week. And I've had people before be like, Hey, did you get my email? Did you get my email? I'm like, yeah, but I check it once a week and I'm sorry. You're just gonna have to wait. And I no longer feel guilty about setting those limits so that I have space. So I've really protected the spaciousness because I know, and anyone out there who's a healer knows this, that you cannot show up for other people until you nourish yourself.

[00:43:05] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And the other piece of that is sleep. I prioritize sleep above. Almost everything else, and I feel like that's a superpower. If you can sleep well you can handle a lot. 

[00:43:15] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, no, I think that's really beautiful. And it's just funny because that was my conversation with my coach in general. We're literally having a meeting next week to just find a spaciousness, because that is when you're at your best and when you show up in your best, you're in best service.

[00:43:30] Christa Biegler, RD: And that was really something that I don't know, that I just really reflected on and it hit really hard, is that. When you're burned out, you're not really in best service to anybody. And so even if I have to reverse engineer everything I do to create a situation where actually there was two powerful questions that I used to make most business decisions the last several years, at least three years, and they were what's in best service to the people I'm serving.

[00:43:56] Christa Biegler, RD: While also not burning. Yeah. Yes. And I can make, I could upgrade those questions, but they've served really well. Worked. They're beautiful.

[00:44:01] Dr. Jill Carnahan: They worked right. Yeah.

[00:44:02] Christa Biegler, RD: They've worked really nicely for filters and they're good reminders. And so I always think like finding a powerful question or tweaking that powerful question to help you come up with the right answers is sometimes a really great life hack.

[00:44:14] Christa Biegler, RD: Anyway, Dr. Jill, there's a lot of beauty in this story. I definitely wanna make sure we tell people to go watch your documentary, which I'm just curious how that all came about. But first the question is, where can people find you online? And then actually tell me a little bit about how the documentary came to be.

[00:44:30] Christa Biegler, RD: 'cause it is a curiosity. Sometimes you wonder how people can do it. All right. How can she write a book? How can she go on two retreats, this uhhuh, this spring? How can she write, do a documentary? Pull back the curtains on that maybe a little bit while you tell us where to find you. 

[00:44:42] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Sure. You can find me.

[00:44:43] Dr. Jill Carnahan: My main website has links to everything. So it's just my name, jill carnahan.com. You can get to the movie from there, you can get to the book. From there, you can get to the free blogs podcast episodes, everything is there. If you wanted to go directly to the movie, it's doctor patient movie.com.

[00:44:57] Dr. Jill Carnahan: It's now free on Amazon Prime and on YouTube and Tuby with commercial. Pretty much anybody has access without even having to pay for it. So please do watch it and share with someone who might be impacted. The story, so it's very interesting 'cause it was during the pandemic, I was writing my book, I was finishing the final edit and I had this epiphany.

[00:45:13] Dr. Jill Carnahan: It was January 1st, 2020 I believe. And it was like, oh, people are on screens, they're benching Netflix, and are they even reading books anymore? Like I just thought I wanna impact the world with my book, but maybe no one's. Reading anymore. So I thought why don't I do a documentary again? It was probably some little divine like Tap on the shoulder 'cause I have no experience but talking about knowing all the resources.

[00:45:32] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Even back then I was like why not Step out? I pitched the idea to a few people I knew and pretty soon I had producer director, like a whole team that was like, let's do this. And initially it was about environmental toxicity. When they read the manuscript in my book, they're like, we gotta talk about your story.

[00:45:46] Dr. Jill Carnahan: So they shifted to the story and the best part about this situation was. I said what's the budget? How much does it cost to make a movie? And they gave me the budget, which was just a little under a million dollars, and I said let's just, show up. And again, talking about resources, this is exactly when I first learned that, because I'm like, if it's supposed to happen, we'll have someone who can.

[00:46:03] Dr. Jill Carnahan: And I had no clue about documentaries that you don't typically get funded, you don't get that much money. It doesn't come without strings attached. I just believed that it would happen. Three months later, I'm on the phone, a Zoom call. Someone wanted to buy my clinic, and I realized he was a very wealthy billionaire.

[00:46:17] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I pitched the movie and the rest is history. He completely, he was our sole investor. He put his time, effort, we love him energy into the, to making of the movie and allowed us to film it. So that's how that happened.

[00:46:28] Christa Biegler, RD: That's so cool.

[00:46:29] Dr. Jill Carnahan: It really is just amazing because, people don't know, but the documentary doesn't make money.

[00:46:33] Dr. Jill Carnahan: It's not like profitability thing. It's only right. The joy of being able to transform people's lives.

[00:46:38] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. Is, 

[00:46:39] Christa Biegler, RD: and it's debatable if a book will make you money. Absolutely. Depending on all those pieces. And so sometimes, it's just good for people to know that, hey, the way you are getting sometimes free information from someone Yeah.

[00:46:51] Christa Biegler, RD: Is through their own blood, sweat, and tears. Just so we, you 

[00:46:54] Christa Biegler, RD: know what?

[00:46:54] Dr. Jill Carnahan: I love that you say that. 'cause I have no, I don't need to toot my own horn or talk about it, but like I put way more into the book and the movie than I'll ever give. Back, but the joy of seeing someone's life transformed. And I remember in the very beginning when it was on Vian, it was like, I don't know, maybe $3 to rent and $7 to buy.

[00:47:10] Dr. Jill Carnahan: People were so mad, they're like, we have to pay for this movie. I'm like, oh yeah. And again, it's free.

[00:47:13] Christa Biegler, RD: Kinda hard,

[00:47:14] Dr. Jill Carnahan: but it's so funny. People have such an idea you're gonna profit off of this. And I'm like, oh. Probably not ever.

[00:47:19] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah.

[00:47:19] Christa Biegler, RD: Right, yeah, no, that's really thanks for that.

[00:47:22] Christa Biegler, RD: 'cause sometimes actually when I am hanging out with other business owners, sometimes we're like, how does the person do this thing? Because, you can't find the trail anyway. But. Jill carnahan.com. Thank you for all the things.

[00:47:35] Christa Biegler, RD: If there's a last message or thought or something you wanna leave with the listener, what would it be today? 

[00:47:42] Dr. Jill Carnahan: Oh. You know what? It's the self-compassion and love right now. We all, I still have pieces of myself I don't like, and maybe just today you find one spot, one piece, one personality trait that you're like, and you start to just love that because that will transform your life at a deeper level than any amount of supplements, diet, nutrition.

[00:48:01] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. That's really beautiful. 

[00:48:02] Christa Biegler, RD: Thank you so much for coming out today.

[00:48:03] Dr. Jill Carnahan: You're welcome.