How Tom Finally Overcame The Beast

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Welcome to the migraine miracle moment. I’m your host, Dr Josh Turknett. I’m a neurologist, migraines, specialist, migraine sufferer and author of the book The Migraine Miracle. In this podcast, you’ll learn all about how to find your path to migraine freedom, without pills. Let’s get started.

All right, howdy Beast Slayers. So today I am thrilled to have another fantastic migraine miracle story to share with you on the podcast. This one is from Migrai-Neverland member Tom Frankl, who was kind enough to recently reach out to me to offer to share his story with you. As you’ll hear, Tom’s battle with the beast began over 20 years ago, reaching the point where not that long ago he was needing a board of medications on average about 20 times per month. So stay tuned to hear how he’s doing now and how he got there, like so many of the other stories that we’ve shared on the podcast. Not only are you going to find this one to be a source of inspiration, but also a source of great wisdom. So stay tuned. Before we get to that conversation, I want to make a couple of announcements. So first, our next Jump Start challenge launches this Saturday, July 11th. And for those who don’t know, the jump start is our 30 day challenge that’s designed to get you often running with the migraine miracle plan. So it includes a dedicated meal plan for that 30 days, one that we’ve been refining over the years since the book came out. It also includes a private Facebook group for the Jumpstart members who will all move through the challenge together and move through the Beast Slayer Training Academy together. Like all of our 30 day challenges, it is available to all of our Migrai-Neverland members.

And as a member, you can participate in it as many times as you like. So we usually have a mix of new folks and veterans who are looking for a reboot. Also, as you’ve heard from our prior success story, guests, people often find it valuable to go through the B Slayer Training Academy more than once. In fact, you’ll hear Tom mentioned this as well as the things that you tend to focus on are going to change as you move along the timeline of things that may seem less important. At one point become really important at another point. So to become part of the Jumpstart Challenge, all you need to do is become a member of Migrai-Neverland. And the second announcement is that if you register anytime before, before now and Saturday the 11th, you’ll get the first week of your membership for free. So that means you can join Migrai-Neverland. Take a look at all the many resources we built over the years for you. Kick the tires and see what it’s all about. So to take advantage of it, just use the discount code, slay the beast, all one word. When you sign up and to become a member. Just head to my migraines, miracle dot com and click on Migrai-Neverland under the resources tab. Also, at the end of this interview, Jenny and I will share some of our key takeaways from Tom’s story. And now, without further delay, here is our interview with Tom Frankl.

So we are delighted to have on the podcast with us today a special guest in Tom Frankl. Welcome, Tom. Thank you. So Tom is going to share his recent successes with the migrane miracle with us. Hey, before we dig into the details of your battle with the beast, you can just first share a little bit about yourself.

Yes. Yes, so I’m a 51 year old, happily married father of two. It’s crazy to say that both my kids are married, which is much younger than I thought. Right. That is what happened there. So I’m not a grandpa yet, which is nice, but I’m enjoying kind of the second half of life.

I’ve been to a sporting goods owner all my life and I’ve recently retired too, whereas I have a great manager and my son are going to be taking over the business from me in the near future. Cool. And I just kind of a lifetime health person and health nut. And I think I was drawn to your Web site because kind of being 51, like the one thing I was never able to overcome in my health was migraines. And it was kind of a secret story that not many people knew about because everybody that knows me would, you know, I look healthy and seem healthy, but my brain is kind of my secret where I would just go away and be like, I’m not feeling well. And little did they know that I probably have 24 hours in the dark in excruciating pain. And also, I think the other part that I kind of reflected upon is I’ve been thinking about this podcast, is that different than strep throat or bronchitis or some other sort of common ailment? When you have migraines and you go away for a day, you come back the next day and you’re almost better than before. There’s almost for me, there’s almost this elation or manic happiness to be out from that dark place. And so the people in your life, they can’t really know or tell. Like what Migrante actually means, except for those of us that that experience it.

Yeah, that’s a great point. I can relate to that story a lot. And, you know, I was kind of same way I think a lot of people are in terms of just like, you know, it’s this thing and it happens sometimes. And they retreat and they kind of you kind of mixed feelings about how much you want to share about it. Right. And then and then, like you say, there’s no visible signs. And then and then. Yeah, we could I’m sure a lot of people can relate to that elation. That’s kind of like the one little silver I tried I tried to take little silver linings for migraines. Right. But it does make you appreciate just like being alive and OK and not and without pain. I mean, it’s you just you don’t want to take it for granted when you have out of it. So. So how old were you when this first started?

When your battle. Yeah, I do. I love to listen to your podcast. I love to listen to all the stories.

I think one of the ways my story is unique is that I didn’t get migraines unti about twenty five. Twenty six. And there’s kind of no lead up to it. And I trace it back to that at a very young age. I did become a business owner, which really put a lot of pressure that looking back on, I wasn’t ready for that. Right. But being my personality type, I just sort of charged into it and just took it on full steam ahead. And then here I was. Twenty five. I’d been married to Rachel for a couple of years. No health problems. And then also out of nowhere, you know, I would be just down with no warning and you would usually even end up in, you know, throwing up. And so my wife and I were wondering, like, boy, do I have cancer or am I sick? Like, what’s going on? Right. And I went to a regular doc and just told them what had been happening for the last three or four months. And he said, oh, your migraines. And so then from there, I just started taking center and migraines, which was a real game changer for me. And I was able to manage these migraines for twelve or thirteen years just with Excedrin migraines. But then, like probably so many people, there came a point where that drug stopped working for me. And so after after I would have, you know, eight or 10 migraines a month in the Excedrin, only work on two of them. I just said, Amann, I need to go to a specialist.

And at that point, I went and saw a neurologist and, you know, he asked me the questions and Stephanie, he prescribed me sumatriptan.

And like the whole community, like that was quite the game changer. Right. And I couldn’t believe that. Oh, now my problem is solved. And then I just had a couple of good years with that. But then from there, it wasn’t so much that sumatriptan stopped working as much because it probably did work. Sumatriptan for me worked 80 to 90 percent of the time. Well, what was so jarring and alarming for me was that I had gone from, you know, six headaches a month to now 20 attic’s a month. Right. And I had never I never even known about rebound or medication overuse. And so I could always trace migrants to my migrants to very stressful situations. Mm hmm. And so when I just started saying, wow, this drug works, yet I’m just getting so many more. That was just such an alarming. It was very scary for me.

Yeah, that’s an interesting point, because it’s when you’re in rebound like that, there are still triggers. There are still things that, you know, there’s still times when you’re better in times when you’re worse in the environment still matters. It’s just this kind of hidden force in the background. It’s that’s amplifying everything that it’s hard to see. And so you I think you stumbled upon us a couple of years ago, is that right?

Yeah. Yes. So this story for me was that, again, one thing about me is that I’m kind of always selling myself and I’m always proudly telling myself a little bit better story than is true. And, you know, I think when I would go to the M.D. and he said, how many migrants have you ever in a month, I pray would have shaded it. Yeah. And when I went to the neurologist prayed the same thing. And so about two years ago, my wife and I were blessed to be able to go to Europe for two months. And so as I prepared for that, I just noticed myself really putting a lot of effort, energy into gettingkid’s enough sumatriptan, Sustagen. Right. And I started thinking to myself, this is not like you. Like, I’ve always been kind of a happy go lucky guy. That’s like, how do I get migraines? That’s not that big of a deal. And so when I noticed in my own heart that I was really putting a lot of energy and effort into getting enough quantity of pills. Yeah. That was almost like a sign before the sign. Before the sign. And then when we went to Europe again, I’ve always been lucky enough to work close to home and my kids schools close to home.

But when we went. You’re up for it. So my point being that if I was ever at work and I could feel a migrant coming, I just zip home and grab to accept and a husband chipped in. And so when I was in Europe for two months, for the first time in my life, when I got ready to take off for the day, whatever we’re doing, I really just thought to myself, like, I need to have a soup. I assume a trip into my pocket. You frightened me. And that was really alarming to me. And I just said, well, I’m real. My brain is really starting to develop new things that just weren’t there before. And so I told Rachel when we were in Europe, I said it was very weird. I said, when we come home, I need to really do something different. And I said, and I think I need to suffer a little. Why would. That was the thought I had. And so we came home and I told her, I said, I think it’s time for me to quit pills, cold turkey. I don’t know why, but when I said that, I mean, it was like I might as well said, like, I think I need to jump off the Empire State, sleep like I was terrified.

Right. Yeah, I know. Over with over the ten years, I Price said a few times like Kamina Trango Pelfrey and I probably made it four hours without taking a pill and there were four miserable hours. And so so, you know, Rachel’s always just been she’s been my biggest supporter and just such a wonderful resource. And as a lot of the spouses of microRNAs would know, it sucks to be the spouse of someone that gets migraines. So one morning I walked out. We had been back from Iraq about seven days, and my wife had been recently exploring Kitto diet for herself for other reasons. She doesn’t get headaches, thank God. And she just said, wow, I just Googled Kitto and migraines. And then this popped, you know, your Web site of your podcast came up. Right. And so, you know, from there, it was like I didn’t mind, sort of like I didn’t mind if I had something hard to do because I really felt like there was a light at the end of the tunnel or like for the first time, it felt like there was a fight I could actually take on towards in the past. It was like the choices are, you know.

You know, it’s like if you Google around, you’re going to see a lot of migraine help. Right. But it’s more. It just it doesn’t. What I call, like, passed my smell test. And in three things that I really appreciate about you is that one is that you had suffered migraines. Two is that you are a neurologist. So you weren’t just like an Eastern medicine acupuncturist. Right. Three, that you told me it would be hard. Right. And it’s because if I have been if I’ve been having this 20 year struggle and somebody tells me in two or three weeks of this or that, like, I can get you out of this. Yeah. Agnes decis at the age of 50, one like that does. Right. Smell test. Yes. And so. Yeah. So that’s kind of how we found you. And then we just like started devouring all the stuff because it just felt like finally something I can grab on to. And you know, it’s like if someone said, like, you have to run a marathon tomorrow, you wouldn’t do it. But if they told you I give you a six month training to run the right. Right. So for someone like me, that was just very appealing. So that’s kind of how we found you.

Yeah, that’s a great story. And, you know, I haven’t thought about that specifically, but the fact that, you know, that we do that, we say that this is not going to be easy, it’s not going to be easy. And if you’re not prepared for that, then you know it’s not going to go well. But, you know, I think most everyone it comes on the other side of it feels like it was will far well worth it. But it’s still really hard.

Yeah. And one thing I wanted to add into it, I forgot a little bit. My story is then I went to a neurologist, and that was three years ago, three or four years ago. And he was like he was a wonderful guy. He was so Thoreau. I did not at all feel like sometimes you are the doctor. You feel like you just get shuffled and shuffled out. Sure. And I didn’t feel that at all. I felt like he cared for me. And as I reflect back on today, he he there was like zero overlap with what he did and what you’re doing. Like, he had me he was tapping on my knee. He was like looking at my eyeballs. Right. But I mean, like, it was it was so much different than your approach. So I just kind of wanted to add that in there. Yeah. This thing is an interesting setting.

Yeah. And that, I think speaks to one of the one of the points that I try to make is that we as neurologists have a sort of a worry. We have our own skill set. We have our own tools. And and we’re we’re choosing from within those. Rules. And those haven’t worked so well, you know, and it’s not it’s not anybody’s fault. That’s what we that’s the pilot we’re given to work with. Yeah. So it sounds like you were, you know, living a pretty healthy lifestyle, at least by traditional measures prior to finding your way here. What kind of things that you did first or the changes that you that you made?

Yeah, that’s a that’s a great question. And one of the things I wanted to say that I hope would be an encouragement for people is that I really did have to take the long view. And there there is so much information coming. That was so good and such quality. I gave myself the grace not to hear at all or take it all in. It’s like if my story is now almost two years old, it’s like sinking. Starbright came into my life about nine months in. You probably told me that right off the bat. But I hear it because I was so trained to work on my work, on my eating, and then things like intermittent fasting, like that’s something I do just religiously now. Like I just eat between 10 and six. But when I first started doing a program, I prayed eight, eight, eight typewrite, eight at maybe eight at night sometimes. And it wasn’t that, it wasn’t that I wasn’t exposed to that. But it’s just like I would just like people to give themselves time to soak in all the resources because it’s such it can be such a change if that makes sense.

Oh, absolutely. It’s it’s almost like, you know, your experience with a a movie or a book and at different times in your life, and you’ll pull out completely different things. And guess what you’re ready for at any given moment.

Exactly. So for me, you know, one of the biggest game changers was your list of what I can eat, because for 15 years I had heard the word elimination diet, and that just drove me crazy.

Yeah. I eat everything like I love food. Right. And my migraines had nothing to do. It’s like I did pretty early on, learn about alcohol, getting migraines. But the sense that if you tried to ask me, like, what kind of food, getting migraines, I’d say I mean, I couldn’t even start with that because I eat so broadly. And so when I clicked on your list of foods, I can’t eat like I printed that out. And that was such a game changer for me. And there so much I could eat. There are so many combinations I could make. But I also think it just took that it just took a little anxiety out of there right now instead of trying to figure out like. Yes. So that was huge. The other thing that was so hell for me was like, find the perfect day and repeat it. And that’s really changed a lot of my social habits and a lot of how much space I give myself in between different things. So, yeah, that that was really huge. Yeah, I think another huge thing was when I went to the neurologist, they said, like, take a pill at the first sign of a headache. Right. And I mean, if I’ve been doing this two years, you know, there’s there’s times where I still have months where I might have two or three migraines, but in that month I might have 10 headaches that by using the systems that go away after an hour and effort to. Mm hmm. And so that has been like such a game changer for me. You know, my wife and I have a word where we say we say full-blown, you know. Right. Yeah. I’ll say I can get a headache and she’ll give me a nice background where she’ll do lavender oil or do the sink and starve. And it’s just like, hey, it’s like 9:00 a.m. and I get the full day without headache. I woke up at seven thirty with, you know, five years ago. I would just pop two pills right now. So that’s been a real game changer, too.

So have you. Do you recall the first full-blown one that you made it through without taking anything? Yeah, I think that was on day two of the year, right off the bat, you know, and.

Well, yeah, but again, like, OK. And I remember I emailed you dislike the thought that there’s a reason to go through a full blown. Yeah. Gives you every bit of power to do it. Like when you talked about healing your brain because I just thought, hey, I’m 30 and 40 and 50. My migraines are getting more. I must be getting older. My right. I mean, less. You know, it’s like all my health is like not what it was. No, it’s 30, you know. So you just feel. And so when you feel that you can get ahead a nasty go into a dark room and there’s a reason to do it is like it’s an incredible experience to have that instead of.

Like I said, you know, five years ago, there might have been a time when I said, I just want to try this. And after three or four hours of absolute minute misery, you just pop the pills and then it’s like a double loss because a you ad for crummy hours and you took pills, right? Yes. Yeah. So but yeah, the full bloods came right away, too. Didn’t take long.

Yeah. Yeah. And so you mentioned that, that ultimately you started using the starving sink. Is it has that been your main way of dealing with it over over time or have you had other things you’ve used?

Well, it’s really ironic and I hope this doesn’t confuse people, but I’ve found that sometimes the best thing for me is to go into a dark room and try and take like an hour of just like kind of calming myself down. And that has been way to dissipate it. But then sometimes I get the feeling like I’m a mountain biker, so I need to jump on my mountain bike and spread it out for like twenty five minutes. So that’s kind of a weird thing in the fact that each one has been helpful. The one thing I will say is that that would be on the centerpiece.

But the staff piece is 100 percent. I never. All I do is start it like I never call experimentalism carbs now like.

Right. Let’s never go to. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I’ve said I think the most that’s probably the single most important thing to remember about that strategy is that is that eating prolongs the migraines, you know, rather than not eating, you know, ending it right away. It’s just that if you want to in this in the minimum the shortest period of time, you know.

Yes. And just how you know. With you educating us that that gives it energy like that makes so much sense. But we just had never heard that.

Right. Right. So that was so helpful. Paint a picture. Today, what things are like for you migrant wise, but also with, you know, your what your your what your diet lifestyle is like like I’m sure people would like to hear that.

Yeah, well, it’s really exciting. I know it’s fun to talk to you now because it’s a real big thing for me is that I am a little different, that I went cold turkey when you’d when I first heard about it, because being like kind of a competitor, the athlete, I was like, whether you like it or not, Dr. King meant like you became the coach. So it could be right. But if that’s what we’re gonna do, that’s what we’re gonna do. Yeah, I got it. But then, you know, as I mentioned, it’s the most you I did have a few things, like both my kids got married. So there were things, my life where I just said that I’m going to take a pill. And I also want to say you you’ve done a great job with giving us the grace to take a pill. Like you’ve said, there’s no there’s no exact way to do it, right? Absolutely. But the exciting thing here today, and I am excited to share with your listeners is that, like, I’ve had one hundred days now without a pill, and that’s like really incredible for me. Yeah, because I’ve literally since the day started with you, I think I emailed you like September 2018. I’ve Gerrold every day. There’s not been one day. Well and I don’t do long journal some things there. Some days they’re really short, some days they just say no migraines you know.

But I’ve counted how many I get a month and that kind of thing and how many pills I take. And so my last pill is February 15th and it was because my brother is in town from Korea and I really wanted to be present for him. But yeah. So that’s like super exciting for me because I didn’t know if I’d ever be a guy that could just not take pills. Right. And so I really feel now my life now today I feel like when I get a migraine, there’s so much less than that used to be and there’s so bearable. There’s some proved, which is a funny thing to say. But yeah, it’s like, you know, I get a migraine now. I can, like, even walk outside and start gardening. You know, my head’s killing me. But it’s not like the old days, right. Is headlight. Go bury myself in a black room and do nothing. And then a lot of times if I do that by 1:00 or 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon at all. Clear. So, yeah. So that that’s how my life looks now and my eating, you know, I just get cleaner and cleaner and cleaner. I think back to I think back to something I heard you say a few months back where you said you don’t mind putting stevia in a smoothie, but you recommend not doing it just so your taste buds can kind of change.

And so I was left with my wife because it’s like now, you know, I can have cashews after dinner and it’s almost like a soup. And when you leave, right? Yeah. It feels like I’m in the ice cream store, cashew clusters. And they’re just cashews. Yeah. So. So that’s that’s a blast. You know, I make smoothies in the morning and I put a few for us. We raise it just takes so great. You know, I am kind of the the find the perfect entropy guy. So I’m, I’m, I’ve been blessed that I’m Varya. I don’t mind routine. So you know that I’d say we really try and shoot for my last meal by six, six thirty and then I really do. If I start to eat I read eight thirty or nine I will just drink like carbonated water, anything to kind of push down the hunger. I eat between ten and six and I eat a ton of food which I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing to share, but I just don’t want to think that I’ve had to cut back on food quantity right now. I’m very athletic, I’m very active and athletic, and I eat just a crazy amount of calories. And that and that’s wonderful to have the list. That said, it’s like things I can eat.

Yeah. And so, yeah, just my life, you know, it’s like I found you two years ago, but I feel like I’m getting better at the program kind of everyday and. Yeah. And I’m getting the benefits of the program.

Yeah. Every day. Right. It keeps they keep coming.

Yeah. It just keeps coming in. And I do believe in the pillars and I do believe in the phases and that’s like that’s just so exciting and it’s such a miracle. It really is. Like I really do think you can have miracle on your website because. Yeah, I mean my life. I mean before this there, you know, and I really did, I tried twenty to twenty five acupuncture website like and I’m not trying to say bad things about insurance, but for me personally nothing ever did you know. Neurologist nothing. And so here I am just kind of following your guidelines and I just I mean another great word does like freedom. Like I just feel like I freedom, you know, like I can we we do our life and the migration doesn’t hijack our life like it used to.

Yeah, that’s. Yeah. And we took it as a common theme. It’s come up so often too. It’s just like the the measure of control that comes in that you get back from Yefim. It it’s just can’t. Can’t. State, how how important that is. I’m curious, you know, it sounds like you’re lead a physically active lifestyle. Did you ever struggle with exercise induced migraines?

No, I don’t. I don’t think so. Again, that’s it. Be you know, one word I tell people when I talk about your program of sobriety. Like, for the first two years I’ve been. So we’re off pills. So it might be hard for me to know if I ever struggled. Yeah, but I don’t think so. To me, the big triggers before I started reading your material and listening to your podcast and reading the books was we we could trace it so clearly back to stress at work. It was very obvious, like you get a migraine and it’s like, hey, let’s talk about yesterday. It’s like, oh my gosh. Meeting with my manager where I had to really, you know, we really had some conflict or I had that one customer who was just like, drive me crazy, you know? And then the other the other clear trigger seemed to be alcohol, like alcohol was like, you know, rolling the dice and pretty much. Yeah.

So I, I just have cut that out, you know, cut out the alcohol in the sugar and the stresses is the number one reported trigger, but it’s often insidious. You know, it’s often you only realize it in retrospect after some becomes one of those things were even up for me. Well, that’s. This is such a such a great story. And so so we’re happy to hear. It’s just it’s so phenomenal still. It never gets old. Hearing this stuff that we put out there and then like that, you’ve taken it to heart and really implementing it. I’m guessing the same, you know, seeing the same benefits. It’s so rewarding. Anything else that that you would like to share with the audience before we leave?

Yeah. I think one thing that keeps coming up for me is just sort of that, you know, something that I haven’t heard much about on the blogs or podcasts is just the cost it can bring to like those we love. And just how much it’s been or how it can be a rollercoaster for a spouse. You know, if if the spouse or if the two people coming together try and kind of tackle it together. Yeah. And I know, you know, with my wife, it be like we could come to these kind of grips or terms of what we were going to do the next time one came. But then when one comes, my mental state is so off. Yeah. That, you know, it’s like she could be out in the kitchen trying to be as quiet as possible. But it sounds like she’s just making such a ruckus. You know, like every like, shouldn’t you be eating a bowl of cereal, two doors, two rooms down in the clink of the spoon on the porcelain bowl?

I feel like there might as well be a simple someone playing drums in my ears. Right. And so, yeah, I just think it’s it’s an interesting thing to explore. Just when yeah. When couples trying to come together over this and I don’t know, I hope I just would hope that something would come out of it would be more of an understanding for the spouse when they’re trying to be good. And how it’s just how it can be a disconnect. I don’t quite know what I’m trying to say, but.

Yeah, no, I mean, there are obviously a lot of issues there. And and certainly the stories that we hear, you know, when it’s when the spouses are involved in some capacity in the process that, you know, it tends to go a lot better. Yeah. Did you did your wife. Was she also consuming like she also learning about the program along with you?

Possibly more than. Yeah. I see that, too. Yeah. And I think it’s it’s a two edged thing. One, you know, cause she wants to be helpful for my migraines, which I’m so grateful for. But she also just loves health. And so, you know your stuff. Like, I guess one thing I could talk about is how much, you know, there’s so many other benefits, health benefits to it, you know? And so she’s really tracked your stuff a lot because she loves the health benefits of what you’re talking about. Right. You know, within and without headaches, it’s like, you know, if I get four headache days a month, there’s still twenty six days of, like, premium health from your information. Right. Both of us like to be healthy and we like to do stuff outside. And that kind of thing. So, yes, she’s been fascinated. She wasn’t. She was a kinesiology major. And so she’s interested in all kinds of health and diet and that kind of stuff.

Yeah. Yeah, the the the migrating avenues, kind of the the entry way. But, you know, you come for the migraine relief, but stay for kind of the long term health benefits. In my view, at least. Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

And people that have spouses that kind of jump on board and, you know, are eating the same way, that’s just got to be so helpful because, you know, we hear from some people that say, oh, I’ve got to cook, you know, entirely separate meal for my kids and my husband. And, you know, I have to cook something separate for me. So could us, the spouses out there that do get onboard and guess what? Their their family in this way. Yeah. Yeah.

And she’s also very thankful to you, Dr. Quicknet, because since this program started, I’ve started cooking a little bit.

And if they think that that’s like beef before I learned about this program, I’ve just always been the type that can just, like, eat anything and. Right. And so, you know, like, my dad called me a furnace when I was younger so I could just come up hungry and just throw down tons of carbs and then just run out and do my export or whatever. Yeah. And I didn’t realize the link between headaches because I never got an upset stomach craving. And so and I never put on a pound or whatever. And so since I realized that, that what you put in your body is so important to keeping your your headaches at bay. I’ve taken much, much since coming home and preparing a meal off of the off of the two that what I can eat list instead of just grabbing anything to fill myself up as fast as possible. Right. Right. She hated that.

I bet. So has it sounds like to it’s probably changed kind of your relationship to food overall?

Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And I’ve never I’ve never really been what you’d call a foodie or anything. I’ve I’ve just been a hungry person and I like all kinds of food. So I would just I pray the way I describe my eating is pray. How can I do this as fast as possible so I can get up on to the next event? Right. And so, you know, I’d be I’d be working and I would just get to a place where I’m starving, you know, zip home, throw down enough food to fill myself up so I could jump on my mountain bike and then go. And so I never realized the the benefits to taking the time to prepare and to eat mindfully and to slow down. And so, yes, it’s changed my relationship to food a whole lot again.

Thank you so much for coming on, for volunteering to come on and and just hear your stories is fantastic. And as I’m sure you know, these these are super helpful. Probably the most helpful thing that we put out there are stories from people like here who like you, who’ve done and has been through this. Know exactly what it’s like. You know that it’s not easy, but know that it’s so much so worth it on the other side. So.

Yeah. Well, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

All right. Well, thanks again, Tom, for taking time to come on the podcast today. He sounds like about the nicest human being on the planet. Yes. Anything in particular that stood out for you, Jenny, and his story?

Yes, I took a whole page of notes while we were chatting them. So one of the things I always love to point out about people that we interview is that they very often seem to have a positive mindset. And he definitely had a positive mindset. And I definitely think that that’s, you know, something that take someone very far in this journey. And that’s one of the sections in the Beesly are training academy is all about mindset in the first section. And so on. Again, you know, I just think that, you know, if you’ve already got that or you’ve developed that and worked on that, then that’s going to take you far. And he certainly had that. He also was an an action taker. He, you know, latched on to the plan and he took action and he continued to move himself forward. And one of the things that that I like that he said that I hope others will take away from this. And I think a lot of our members have discovered this, is that, you know, when you go through the Beesly or Training Academy or, you know, you consume any of our materials, you’re going to pick up on different things based on where you are in your journey at that time point. And so some of the the different pieces that we put out there may or may not have relevance for you in the very beginning, but continuing to go back and revisit those materials and seeing what else you can take from that over time. And, you know, that’s one of the things that we talk about, too, is the continuing to refine over time. There always, you know, things that you can continue to develop.

Right. Yeah. And that was that was a reason for developing the phases in the timeline, because we get, you know, realizing that what things help the most. Very different point of reference in time. And also, we know what kind of information you need to move yourself forward varies over time. And so trying to provide that, but also provide kind of a roadmap for how to how to put it into action. Right. Became it became obvious that that was really important. And in spirit, still need to see people doing that right for themselves and taking it and and figuring out what what to do when. And, you know, getting the daily point we make is that there is no one size fits all you have to take. It requires taking the information and then customizing it and applying it to your own life. And he clearly did that. And so what we try to do is get the tools to for you to do that. And, you know, ultimately that’s we want to empower the individuals. And this is really a flipping the health care model on its head because, you know, I am not the guru with all the answers. Right. I’m just helping you find your own path. And it’s got to be, you know, only only you really are the one who can do it. Right.

And giving yourself the space to to take what you can now and not feel overwhelmed. Exactly. Just don’t do what you can now and just continue to move your show for.

Right. Right. It’s mainly about what’s the next step. Right. And if you just keep focusing on that. I think, too, that, you know, first he talked about that, knowing that it took the confidence to know that there was a light at the end of the tunnel to then go all in, you know, to commit to it full. I mean, we see that over and over again, too. It’s like once someone says, this is it, I believe in this. This is why we do these these episodes, because we know that if you can get to that place, that’s what’s going to be driving your success. Right. Don’t get to that place, we think. I’ll try this and see. Mm hmm. You know it we know it doesn’t work out the same way, so because it requires that kind of full level of commitment. And would you say that because we just seen that so many times. Right.

I also think it will be worth mentioning what he referenced in terms of the list of foods that you can eat and explaining what that is. Because I know people ask us for that all the time. Yeah.

So the idea there, which he clearly understood and grass, which I was great, was to reframe food. Right. Because because we you know, the whole Magrane store old story that I call it, you know, is this you know, you’re all the things to be afraid of here. All the things are gonna harm you here. You know, Insys sort of, you know, terrible, fearful existence that you live in. And as he pointed out, that that idea is embedded in the idea of an elimination diet. Right. Here are the things you can’t eat rather than hear all the things you can’t. You know what? If we just take that reframe and then think thinking in terms of Magrane, here are all the foods that are nourishing and protective and that help us. And guess what? There’s a lot of stuff out there like that. So it completely transforms your relationship to food. And takes a lot of the anxiety out and realize it’s not a story of deprivation. It’s just as is a story of, you know, finding out what’s what’s what’s so good for you and and appreciating the abundance that’s out there. So we create so created with that idea to kind of highlight the idea, the idea of them of. Migraines, superfoods list, which is, you know, a list of all the foods that I consider to be kind of the most nourishing and protective and, um, and that’s found in the Beesly or seem Baesler training. All right. And it’s not in you know, it’s not to say that foods that aren’t on that list are to be avoided. Right. But it’s kind of like the idea of, you know, a top 10 list of movies. Right. You don’t avoid the onus, really. You’re saying that the ones that aren’t on the list are bad. Right. But you’re saying here are the superstars. And a lot of people have found that to be helpful. But the the one of the main reasons are probably the main reason for you actually creating it to begin with was to create this new idea or just different reframing of how you think about food. Right.

I’d also like to highlight he mentioned the Groundhog Day strategy. You know, he said, you know, find your perfect day and repeat it. And he mentioned it rather quickly. So I wanted to make sure people knew what he meant. That’s also part of the Beazley or Training Academy. Do you want to talk about that? Just a minute.

Right. So the it comes from the movie Groundhog Day. If you’re familiar with where Bill Murray has to repeat the same day over and over and over again. But for the migrant or this can be a really useful thing. And again, it goes back to that same exact reframing rather than figuring out what you can’t do.

Find their best days, figure out what you know, journal what you’ve done on those days, and then you have a day you can repeat. That’s you that you’ve no link to your best odds of success. And, you know, that’s another tool that people can use, especially in the early phases when you’re trying to move yourself down the time, the the timeline of migrant freedom, you know, more quickly. Right. Is just to, you know, lean on the Groundhog Day. People who like Tom don’t mind. Some don’t mind routine. Mm hmm. You know, if we we said this before, that that routine and monotony is an enemy of the beast. Right. So you can definitely use that to your advantage in kind of the most extreme example of that is a Groundhog Day strategy. And, you know, if you’re thinking about the fundamental principle here of of trying to move back towards a more evolutionarily appropriate lifestyle, our ancestors weren’t eating completely different foods from one day to the next or thinking what they had for breakfast today can’t be what they had yesterday or when, you know, they were eating the same thing every day, day in and day out. They had a really tight routine. And and so that’s probably why it’s it’s it’s worked so well.

And another strategy that he mentions that he uses that I think is so important to highlight, because we found it very crucial to success, is the meal timing. And, you know, he keeps a specific window. I think he said he eats from 10 to six. And we’re also very aware of that ourselves. And for example, we were we had booked a cruise last year and they did not have the early dining available. So the only dining time they had available was like eight fifteen at night. And so we, in fact, were going to cancel the cruise because we could not get the early dining and they were able to switch us to the early dining, but we would have canceled it if we had not been able to get that early dining because it’s so crucial to our success. Right.

And again, it gets back to this is the ancestral model, right? We weren’t eating. We were eating when the sun was up. Right. So we started. It’s not a coincidence that all these things that bring us, quote, more align with how we used to live are also the greatest enemies of the beast. Right.

I think it’s also worth highlighting that he said and we’ve heard this time and again that even when he does get a migrant now, they’re not as bad because, you know, you don’t have that rebound factor that really seems to just intensify the headache. And so I think that’s also a point worth mentioning as we’re thinking about breaking rebound.

That was what made me say I would never take another trip down because you get to places there that you just can’t get otherwise. Right. That you just never wanted to get. So and so. Yeah. Now that knowing, like, you know, he’s in the same boat, you know, knowing if something comes, I can handle it.

Right. It doesn’t get through it. Right. And I know what to do. And it’s no fun. Right. And I know you know, I know why it happened. And you know. I know what I mean. So there’s at this this level of control and, you know, you’re protected against the worst of the worst. You know that place you never want to go back to.

Also, one thing that we see often is that people come to us and say, well, I’m already eating, you know, healthy. And so Tom said that he said, you know, I was, you know, seemed to be pretty healthy guy before I even started this. But he was open to still continuing to refine and explore what he could do. And so maybe what, you know, seemed and felt healthy then takes on a new perspective when you kind of look at it from an AM central framework, for sure.

And yeah, that’s been part of the challenge over the years, is that this is, you know, in my opinion, the healthiest way to be. But that does require unlearning or, you know, it goes against what has been traditionally taught, you know, as as what’s what’s healthy. All right. For the past few decades. Fortunately, things are changing quite a bit. And the popularity and acceptance of the ketogenic diet being a big example of that.

And it was so nice that Tom reached out to provide a male voice in this arena, because we do hear more from women who tend to be more on Facebook where, you know, we see them and reach out to them to be on the podcast and tend to be more vocal on on Facebook. But we do have plenty of people that we actually don’t hear from until they’ve gotten into this, you know, phase for the later part of their. You want to share this, their successes with us. So we really do appreciate Tom reaching out and sharing his voice.

And yeah, men do actually do really well with this. We’ve talked about this some in our clinic chats before, but because they don’t have the hormonal challenges that some women do.

Men tend to have a even faster progression. Right. But it’s nice to hear. Nice to hear from another man. That’s right. And so thanks again, Tom. You were filled with many words of wisdom, as evidenced by Ginny’s laundry list of comments that she hadn’t made. All right. Well, thanks so much for listening. Now it’s time to go out and slay the beast.

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