Beyond Wellness Culture | Women Over 40, Nervous System Regulation, Burnout, Listen to Your Body

You can be doing everything right and still not feel like yourself. That's the conversation Dr. Brook has with Ariana Thacker, a chemical engineer, venture capitalist, and founder of MoldCo, a health tech platform built after her own health crashed from hidden mold exposure.Ariana shares what her recovery actually looked like, from unexplained brain fog and hair loss to gut issues and fatigue, and how she eventually traced it back to mold hiding in her HVAC system.They talk about the environmental signs worth paying attention to, like musty smells, past water damage, and...

Dr. Brook Sheehan sits down with Cassandra McKenney, a fitness coach and registered nurse whose fourteen-year health journey took her from a controlled, obsessive relationship with food and exercise to a place of genuine peace in her body. Cassandra opens up about the eating disorder that began in middle school, the years-long binge and restrict cycle that followed, and how chasing the "right" protocol, the right supplement, the right test, and the right coach never actually gave her what she was searching for. What did change everything was recognizing that the fear driving her behavior, not the food itself...

This episode closes out the four-part Body Theology series with the topic Dr. Brook has found hardest to live out herself: rest. For weeks this series has built the case that the body was designed with intention, and this final piece asks whether we actually believe it.If optimization without reverence can slide into idolatry, then rest is the practice that proves whether that belief is real or just something we say. Dr. Brook walks through the biblical foundation for rest, starting in Genesis with God resting not from exhaustion but to establish a rhythm, and moving...

In part three of the Body Theology series, Dr. Brook Sheehan takes us back to Leviticus to look at something most of us have never studied closely: the internal organs God asked the Israelites to set apart in their offerings. Not the visible parts. Not the parts anyone could evaluate from the outside. The kidneys, the liver, the hidden fat and connective tissue. This detail alone says something about how your body has always been regarded, inside and out, as sacred rather than incidental.This episode draws out the difference between two vocabularies we live inside of...

In part two of this four part Body Theology series, Dr. Brook Sheehan takes on a word that shapes so much of modern wellness culture: biohacking.She's honest about her own fifteen year journey through it, from complete disconnection from her body to full blown wellness zealotry, and what she found in the middle ground once she came out the other side.This episode isn't an attack on supplements, wearables, or trackers. Those aren't the villain. What Brook is naming is something subtler, the moment care for the body quietly shifts into control, and control...

Welcome to part one of a four part series called Body Theology, where Dr. Brook Sheehan builds a full biblical foundation for why the way you treat your body actually matters to God.This episode starts at the very beginning, asking a simple but important question: was your body ever the problem in the first place? Drawing from Genesis 1:27 and Psalm 139:14, Brook makes the case that your body was designed with intention, not defaulted into existence, and that listening to it is not in conflict with the biblical call to deny yourself.The key is...

Dr. Brook sits down with Caroline Alan, co-founder and CEO of BEAM Minerals, to talk about the missing piece so many women overlook when they're exhausted, hormonal, and stuck in a cycle of trying everything without results. Caroline shares her own health story, from an autoimmune condition and mold exposure to flatlined adrenals, chronic insomnia, and years of struggling with fertility, and how she finally found relief not through another protocol but through plant-based minerals. Within months of adding them to her routine, her gum health, sleep, and adrenal function all began to shift, and within less than a...

In this episode, Dr. Brook explores a pattern that shows up far beyond physical health: the instinct to chase certainty by forcing control over symptoms, schedules, relationships, and even rest.Building on the symptom chasing conversation from episode 53, she widens the lens to show how this same instinct drives overworking, overscheduling, obsessively checking bank accounts or social media, and rereading texts before sending them.Underneath every version of this behavior is the same root cause, the discomfort of not knowing, and the belief that forcing an outcome is safer than trusting the process....

In this episode of Beyond Wellness Culture, Dr. Brook sits down with Bekah Yawn, a fertility coach, birth doula, and host of the For the Love of Hormones podcast, to talk about natural fertility, hormone health, and the faith journey that runs through all of it.Bekah shares her own story of pregnancy loss, including a fifteen week loss and two chemical pregnancies, and how that season led her to fertility awareness education and hormone coaching.She explains why tracking apps and devices are not enough on their own and why pairing them with real...

In this episode, Dr. Brook unpacks why we've lost the ability to let a symptom just be a symptom, and why that instinct is costing us more peace than the symptom itself ever did.She introduces the idea of a self-limiting symptom, one your body resolves on its own without any intervention from you, and walks through real examples: a fever running its course, a day of loose stool, a stretch of constipation, a headache after stress finally lifts, dizziness from standing up too fast, appetite dips, muscle twitches, itching with no rash, and even random yawning.<...

In this episode, Dr. Brook sits down with her dear friend Victoria Lane, founder of Elephant Buffet Coaching, to unpack one of the most overlooked conversations in the wellness space: micro traumas and why they may be quietly doing more damage than the big ones we can actually name.Victoria brings a unique perspective to this conversation. With seven years of law enforcement experience and three years of leadership and business coaching, she has sat with people in their darkest moments and learned how to process trauma, both personally and professionally. She is also the...

Have you ever woken up feeling off, pushed through the day, and then hit an unexpected wall right around four or five in the evening? You are not imagining it, and you are not falling apart. There is something very real happening in your body, and once you understand it, everything changes.In this episode of Beyond Wellness Culture, Dr. Brook Sheehan breaks down the physiology behind what she calls the evening spiral, that moment when symptoms you were managing just fine seem to pile back on all at once. The culprit? Cortisol. Not because it is...

Episode 50 is here — and it's dropping on Dr. Brook Sheehan's 42nd birthday, which makes it extra special. But instead of a celebratory episode, Dr. Brook is doing something far more powerful: getting radically transparent about the debilitating anxiety she walked through for two and a half weeks in May.This isn't a clinical breakdown of anxiety. This is a deeply personal, faith-filled account of what it looks like when someone who knows the body — hormones, cycles, nervous system and all — still gets knocked flat by something she can't immediately explain.In this episode, Dr. Brook shares...

What if your gallbladder was never the real problem?In this episode of Beyond Wellness Culture, Dr. Brook Sheehan sits down with Jami McQuivey, host of Gallbladder Gone? Now What?, to talk about what women need to know before and after gallbladder removal.Jami shares her personal story of being dismissed by doctors, being told her pain was “all in her head,” having her gallbladder removed, and then getting worse instead of better. What followed was a long road of digestive issues, infections, SIBO, H. pylori, chronic E. coli, and a deep desire to understand what...

Hair loss is not always a hair problem.In this episode of Beyond Wellness Culture, Dr. Brook Sheehan sits down with Sara Banta, founder of Accelerated Health Products and host of Accelerated Health with Sara Banta, to talk about the deeper body signals behind hair loss, fatigue, gut issues, thyroid struggles, liver stress, mineral deficiencies, and wellness overwhelm.Sara shares her personal story of walking through PCOS, gut issues, metal toxicity, hair loss, and her son’s serious health crisis. What began as pain became purpose, and it now fuels her work helping people understand ho...

What if the reason your body still feels loud is not because you need another supplement, routine, or wellness tool?What if your environment is the missing piece?In this episode of Beyond Wellness Culture, Dr. Brook talks about the environmental inputs that impact your body more than most people realize.Your schedule.Your pace.Your screen time.Your relationships.Your work environment.Your connection with God.All of these can shape how your body responds, heals, and communicates.<...

What if your health routine is not creating peace anymore?What if it has quietly become another place where you feel pressure, fear, and control?In this episode of Beyond Wellness Culture, Dr. Brook talks about the hidden control patterns that can show up when you are trying to take care of your body.After spending years moving from disconnection to obsession with her own health, Dr. Brook shares why more information, more protocols, and more tracking do not always lead to more peace.Sometimes they lead to more fear.<...

What if the thing you keep trying to silence is actually the thing your body needs you to hear?In this episode of Beyond Wellness Culture, Dr. Brook talks about one of the most common patterns in both conventional health and holistic wellness: trying to quiet symptoms without understanding what they may be communicating.Whether it’s reaching for medication, stacking supplements, adding another protocol, chasing weight loss, or trying to make discomfort disappear on your timeline, the deeper issue is often the same.We are trying to make the body be...

Welcome to the first official episode of Beyond Wellness Culture.After 43 episodes as your body speaks, Dr. Brook is stepping into a refreshed direction with the same heart: helping you understand your body, quiet the outside noise, and rebuild trust with the way God designed you.In this episode, Dr. Brook shares why the podcast rebrand matters and how Beyond Wellness Culture will help you move out of health confusion and into a calmer, more grounded relationship with your body.This episode is for the woman who...

Trauma does not always look like one massive life-shattering event.Sometimes it looks like emotional needs not being met.Sometimes it looks like learning to perform.Sometimes it looks like codependency, control, numbing, people-pleasing, or living in survival mode for so long that it feels normal.In this episode, Dr. Brook sits down with Julie Conkle for a powerful conversation about trauma healing, faith, boundaries, equine connection, and what it looks like to become a generational chain breaker.Julie shares her story of growing up in a faith environment that taught...