Take Care of Your Gut, and it Will Take Care of You
Eat healthy and exercise. That’s the key to staying well.
Have you heard this before? These words are ubiquitous, and yet it’s not the whole story. According to the World Health Organization, 60% of people will face at least one chronic illness in their lifetime—and 40% will face more than one. Diseases like heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune disorders, depression, anxiety, and even cancer have become part of modern life. I know this firsthand: I’m more than 20 years past two rare, aggressive, and late-stage cancers. What I learned along the way changed everything I thought I knew about healing. Recovering from chronic disease isn’t about following the latest health influencer or sticking to a strict protocol. It’s about tapping your intuition and healing your mind, body, and spirit all together—the science on this is real.
Start Where You Are.
Healing doesn’t happen all at once, and it doesn’t have to be expensive or perfect. It’s about making small changes—just for today, and then again tomorrow. You’re not at the mercy of a diagnosis, your genes, or your past. You’re in the driver’s seat. So today—just for today—choose something that supports your healing. That’s how it begins. That’s how it sticks.
Meet the Gut: Your Body’s Command Center
Your gut microbiome develops early in life and becomes stable between the ages of three to five years old. That makes nutrition in those early years incredibly important. Diets high in processed foods and low in fiber can disrupt this development, contributing to chronic conditions among children—including obesity, allergies, mental health challenges, and cancer.
Your gut isn’t just a food-processing tube. It’s the foundation of your health. It’s home to over 100 trillion microorganisms—500 to 1,000 different species of bacteria, viruses, fungi, and microbes—collectively known as your gut microbiome, and these microbes aren’t just along for the ride—they are essential to your survival.
Less than half the cells in our body are human. We are, in a very real sense, more microbe than human. Your gut supports 70-80% of your immune system and sends 80 to 90% of the body's communication signals through the vagus nerve to the brain, which is why researchers call it the second brain. And its job description is staggering. It regulates mood, manages inflammation, produces vitamins and nutrients, influences sleep, regulates metabolism, and affects your risk of everything from cancer to cardiovascular disease. It also produces 95% of your serotonin, 50% of dopamine, and 30% of GABA–these regulate your thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. When your gut is out of balance, so is everything else.
What role does gut dysbiosis play in your health?
When your gut microbiome is balanced and diverse, it acts as a powerful defense system. When it’s not—a condition called dysbiosis—the effects ripple through your entire body. Everyday triggers include poor diet, alcohol, stress, medications and supplements, and environmental toxins. Chronic stress shifts your body into survival mode, setting off a loop that looks like this:
Stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline are released → inflammation rises → your immune system weakens → your gut suffers damage → stress worsens.
This loop is fast and powerful—and it’s happening whether you’re aware of it or not. When it’s happening, the door opens for:
Changes in the composition of your microbiome
Increased inflammation
Leaky gut
Impaired nutrient absorption
Neurotransmitter production disruptions
Fatigue
Anxiety or depression
Digestive issues
Hormonal imbalances
Chronic inflammation
Chronic disease
The good news? You can interrupt it.
Do your genetics really matter?
There’s a widespread belief that genetics determine your health destiny, but science says otherwise.
Most chronic diseases—including 90-95% of cancers—are linked to lifestyle and environmental factors, not genetics. Even if you carry a genetic predisposition, your daily choices can influence whether those genes are ever “turned on.” In other words, you have more control than you think.
My two rare, late-stage cancers were not in my genes. Instead, for years I was under unrelenting stress, which created the conditions for disease to take hold. Once I understood the why, I found a way to do something about it. And so can you.
Stop the loop.
Most chronic illnesses are preventable. Your autonomic nervous system has two modes: fight-or-flight (sympathetic) and rest-and-digest (parasympathetic). When chronic stress runs the show, the sympathetic system takes over, spikes inflammation, and puts healing on hold. The two systems can’t fully operate at the same time, so activating the parasympathetic side quiets the stress response. This is why calming your nervous system is just as important as changing your diet.
Act and heal just for today.
What I found on the road back to health wasn’t a miracle drug or supplement. It was something most of us dismiss. Once I stopped waiting for someone else to fix me, I realized I had control over how I ate, moved, managed stress, and cared for my overall well-being. That shift from passive to proactive changed everything for me.
The research shows that people who live the longest share core lifestyle habits that also keep the gut healthy:
Eat mostly whole, plant-based foods
Move naturally throughout the day
Prioritize rest and stress reduction
Stay socially connected
Live with a sense of purpose
No supplement, gym membership, or extreme dietary overhaul required. Just consistent daily habits. The gut is adaptable, and positive changes in diet and lifestyle can restore balance—often in as little as days to weeks.
Eat with the intention to heal.
Eating healthy and eating with the intention to heal are not the same thing. Eating healthy might mean choosing a salad over fast food. It’s general advice. Eating to heal? That’s personal and purposeful—using food as medicine. Every bite becomes information for your body. Ask yourself: What does my body need right now to function, repair, and thrive? Then, sit in silence for a minute and feel the answer.
You’re not just eating for yourself—you’re eating for trillions of microorganisms. Their health, and their ability to keep you healthy, depends on the quality of what you put in your mouth. Most of us suffer from a lack of fiber, which is doing real damage to our microbiome diversity, immune function, and long-term health. You can change that. Aim for 40+ grams of fiber daily because that’s all your microbiome eats and include foods from these groups:
Prebiotics – Colorful, fiber-rich whole foods (fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, nuts, seeds) that feed beneficial bacteria.
Probiotics – Live bacteria in fermented foods like yogurt, kefir, aged cheeses, sauerkraut, and kimchi.
Protein – Plant sources such as beans and legumes, plus fish and seafood.
Healthy Fats – Omega-3s from fatty fish, olive oil, avocados, nuts, and seeds.
When you start thinking in this way, feeling what your body needs turns food into one of your most powerful tools—not just fuel. Whole, colorful, nutrient-dense foods contain thousands of compounds that regulate everything from immune function to brain chemistry, and they are the most affordable meal ticket to optimum health.
Be thoughtful about supplements.
The $180-billion supplement industry isn’t designed to heal you—it’s designed to take your money. Probiotic supplements that supply just one or a handful of species can disrupt microbiome diversity, something many people discover the hard way. Much of what you hear from online “experts” or doctor endorsements is promoting fear and worded in such a way to get you to open your wallet, not grounded in evidence-based science. When in doubt, grow the beneficial compounds your body needs through real food as your body was designed and don’t believe the hype.
Manage stress like your health depends on it. Because it does.
A daily mindfulness practice is not a wellness trend. It is medicine. Meditation, breathwork, gratitude, yoga, forest bathing, Reiki— these all reduce inflammation, activate the parasympathetic nervous system, and signal to your gut that it’s safe to heal. It’s one of the easiest and low-to-no-cost investments you can make to optimize your long-term health.
For me, the missing piece was stillness. For a few minutes each day, I focused on my breath. No distractions. Just being. That’s when my nervous system reset and healing took place. You cannot heal in a constant state of stress or with someone else’s voice in your head. I continue to work with my doctors. But I also use science-backed integrative approaches that support my body’s natural healing systems.
Be still and know.
The bottom line.
There is no one-size-fits-all approach to healing. What works for one person may not work for you—and that’s okay. You’re unique and your healing should be too. It doesn’t have to be expensive, extreme, or complicated, and it doesn’t require choosing between conventional medicine and everything else. It’s about integration. Take the best from the best and create something that fits your life.
You’re in control over every meal, every breath, and how you move each day. When you embrace that control enough days in a row, something remarkable happens. I’ve been successfully practicing this approach since 2006. Given that recurrence rates are high for inflammatory breast cancer, that’s saying something.
There are three powerful truths I want you to take with you:
Your body is designed to heal.
Your gut plays a central role in that healing.
Your daily choices matter more than you think.
Focus on:
Eating more colorful, whole, fiber-rich foods.
Reducing processed foods and alcohol
Managing stress in small, consistent ways: five minutes of stillness or focused breathing.
Pay attention to how you feel and make adjustments to support your mind and body.
Choose movement throughout the day.
Let go of perfection.
Rest.
