Made for Health | Peptides | Lyme | Chronic Infections | Long Covid | Insulin Resistance | Hypermobility

In this episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman sits down with Dr. Sabine Hazan, MD, a gastroenterologist, hepatologist, internal medicine specialist, and microbiome researcher whose work centers on the human gut microbiome and fecal microbiota transplantation, or FMT.

Dr. Hazan founded ProgenaBiome, a genetic sequencing research laboratory focused on understanding patterns within the microbiome, and she has spent decades working in clinical research. Her journey into microbiome science began through gastroenterology, biologic therapies, recurrent C. difficile, and a fundamental question: if changing the gut can change disease, what exactly are we changing?

The conversation explores fecal microbiota transplantation, stool testing, Bifidobacteria, gut-brain signaling, autism, Alzheimer's disease, long COVID, Crohn's disease, probiotics, microbiome compatibility, and the challenge of studying a biological ecosystem that may be far more individualized than medicine once assumed.

Throughout the discussion, Dr. Hazan repeatedly emphasizes that much of this work is still research in progress, and she frames several of her observations as hypotheses that need further replication rather than settled clinical conclusions.

Key Topics Covered

• Why Dr. Hazan began studying the microbiome
• Her background in gastroenterology and clinical trials
• Crohn's disease and biologic therapies
• Fecal microbiota transplantation
• Recurrent C. difficile
• Why microbiome testing needs validation and standardization
• The limitations of commercial stool testing
• CAP and CLIA laboratory standards
• Why FMT may require donor-recipient compatibility
• Why stool should not be treated like a one-size-fits-all product
• Bifidobacteria and healthy aging
• Bifidobacteria and immune function
• The gut-brain axis
• Autism and microbiome research
• Alzheimer's disease and gut microbial patterns
• Long COVID and microbiome changes
• Crohn's disease and intestinal inflammation
• Calprotectin and mucosal health
• Probiotics and product-label accuracy
• Why “more treatment” is not always better for the microbiome
• Antibiotics and microbial shifts
• Nutraceuticals and microbiome research
• Light, sound, frequency, and environmental exposures as emerging research areas
• Why microbiome restoration may take many months
• The need for longitudinal testing and follow-up

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why Dr. Hazan believes the microbiome should be studied as an ecosystem rather than treated as a single supplement target

✅ How her early work with FMT made her question whether every donor sample is appropriate for every patient

✅ Why she believes microbiome compatibility may eventually matter in a way similar to blood-transfusion compatibility

✅ Why stool tests should be reproducible before clinicians base treatment decisions on them

✅ How Bifidobacteria became one of the central organisms in her research

✅ What she has observed in research involving autism, Alzheimer's disease, long COVID, Crohn's disease, and other conditions

✅ Why the gut-brain relationship may involve both loss of beneficial microbes and overgrowth of other organisms

✅ Why she cautions against repeatedly adding antibiotics, antifungals, probiotics, or other interventions without understanding what they are doing to the microbial ecosystem

✅ Why microbiome improvement may require long-term monitoring rather than one short intervention

Resources & Links

🌐 Dr. Sabine Hazan:

https://sabinehazanmd.com/

🧬 ProgenaBiome:

https://progenabiome.com/

🔬 Microbiome Research Foundation:

https://microbiomeresearchfoundation.org/

📘 Let's Talk Sh!t

By Dr. Sabine Hazan

Dr. Hazan notes that ProgenaBiome's stool testing is conducted within research protocols and cautions that participants should not treat research sequencing results as direct treatment instructions.

Connect With Dr. Sabine Hazan

🌐 Official Website:

https://sabinehazanmd.com/

🧬 Research & ProgenaBiome:

https://progenabiome.com/

🔬 Microbiome Research Foundation:

https://microbiomeresearchfoundation.org/

Dr. Hazan also shares research updates through social platforms including X and Instagram.

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this Made for Health solo minisode, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues his ongoing series asking:

Why are you still sick? Why are you stuck? Why aren’t you healing the way you expected?

This time, he focuses on a less-discussed source of inflammation: endotoxins, also known as lipopolysaccharides or LPS.

Dr. Hartman explains that LPS comes from the outer membrane of gram-negative bacteria. These bacterial products can become relevant through environmental exposure, especially in damp or water-damaged buildings, but also through the gut when intestinal permeability allows bacterial components to interact more directly with the immune system.

For people dealing with brain fog, bloating, autoimmune issues, SIBO, chronic inflammation, or lingering symptoms despite treating mold, Lyme disease, MCAS, and other conditions, Dr. Hartman suggests that endotoxin exposure may be another piece worth investigating.

Key Topics Covered

• What endotoxins are
• Lipopolysaccharide, or LPS
• Gram-negative bacteria
• Environmental endotoxin exposure
• Water-damaged buildings
• Actinomycetes and bacterial contamination
• Chronic Inflammatory Response Syndrome
• Gut-derived endotoxins
• Intestinal permeability and “leaky gut”
• SIBO and bacterial overgrowth
• Immune activation
• Systemic inflammatory response
• Brain fog and neurological symptoms
• Autoimmune disease
• PANS and PANDAS
• Mold and biotoxin illness
• Butyrate and gut health
• Activated charcoal as a binder discussed in the episode
• Oral IgG
• BPC-157
• Testing for immune responses to endotoxins
• Why gut testing may reveal overlooked drivers of inflammation

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ What endotoxins are and where they come from

✅ Why Dr. Hartman distinguishes mold exposure from other components of water-damaged buildings

✅ How gram-negative bacteria can contribute LPS to the environment and the gastrointestinal tract

✅ Why intestinal permeability may allow bacterial products to interact with the immune system

✅ How endotoxin exposure may overlap with inflammatory symptoms such as brain fog, bloating, immune activation, and autoimmunity

✅ Why SIBO can involve more than gas and bloating

✅ How Dr. Hartman connects endotoxins with inflammatory pathways he first encountered in hospital medicine

✅ What testing approaches he considers when evaluating possible endotoxin-related immune activation

✅ Which supportive strategies he discusses for reducing exposure and addressing the gut

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

What if healthy aging is influenced not only by the number of birthdays you’ve celebrated, but also by the ecosystem living inside your gut?

In this insightful episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman sits down with Dr. Julia Malkowski, ND, DC, a naturopathic doctor, doctor of chiropractic medicine, and clinical educator at Doctor’s Data whose work focuses on the gut microbiome and functional diagnostics.

Dr. Malkowski’s path into medicine began with a deeply personal experience. When her infant son developed a persistent skin rash, she sought answers beyond the explanations she had been given. She shares how seeing his skin improve after a dietary change redirected her career and inspired her to pursue naturopathic medicine.

Today, that same curiosity shapes her work exploring “biome aging”—the idea that changes in the gut microbiome may offer insight into biological aging and health across the lifespan. Together, she and Dr. Hartman discuss microbiome diversity, inflammation, estrogen metabolism, perimenopause, menopause, GLP-1 medications, intestinal barrier function, and the influence of food and environmental exposures.

The conversation ultimately returns to a practical message: supporting gut health begins with everyday foundations. From greens, beans, and berries to movement and time outdoors, Dr. Malkowski shares the habits she prioritizes before reaching for more complex interventions.

Key Topics Covered

• The personal experience that led Dr. Julia Malkowski into naturopathic medicine
• What she means by “biome aging” and the gut’s biological clock
• Microbiome diversity and changes across the lifespan
• Gut health, inflammation, telomeres, and epigenetic aging clocks
• Why perimenopause is an important transition in her approach to gut health
• The estrobolome, estrogen metabolism, and beta-glucuronidase
• Menopause-associated changes in cholesterol and metabolic health
• Fiber as a foundation for feeding the gut microbiome
• Naturally produced GLP-1 versus GLP-1 medications
• Why nutrition quality still matters when appetite decreases on GLP-1 therapy
• Fiber, polyphenols, and maintaining beneficial gut bacteria
• Keystone microbes, including Bifidobacterium, Lactobacillus, and Faecalibacterium prausnitzii
• Akkermansia muciniphila and its role in the gut ecosystem
• Short-chain fatty acids and how microbes support one another
• What microbiome testing can reveal—and why repeat results need context
• Intestinal permeability, zonulin, tight junctions, aging, and stress
• The speakers’ clinical experiences and research questions involving peptides
• Questions about food additives, environmental exposures, and gut health
• Dr. Malkowski’s research comparing microbiome patterns across regions
• Early-life microbiome development, birth mode, and maternal influences
• Simple food priorities: greens, beans, and berries
• Movement, outdoor exposure, and social connection
• Vitamin D, turmeric, olive oil, and individualized probiotic considerations
• GI360 stool testing and interpreting findings with a qualified clinician

In This Episode, You Will Learn

• How her son’s health experience changed Dr. Malkowski’s career and approach to medicine
• What she means by a gut microbiome’s “age,” and why she pays attention to diversity rather than chronological age alone
• How she connects estrogen metabolism, microbial diversity, and intestinal barrier function when thinking about perimenopause and menopause
• Why she emphasizes feeding the microbiome with fiber and polyphenol-rich foods during a GLP-1 medication journey—not focusing only on protein or reduced appetite
• How thinking about the microbiome as an interconnected ecosystem changes the conversation about individual bacteria and probiotics
• Why microbiome test results are a snapshot, and how diet and consistency matter when interpreting repeat testing
• Why she considers intestinal barrier function and individual tolerance before assuming a probiotic is the right next step
• How greens, beans, berries, movement, and time outdoors fit into her practical approach to supporting gut health
• What functional stool testing can contribute to a conversation with your clinician, and why results need to be considered alongside symptoms and medical history

Resources & Links

Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Connect With Dr. Julia Malkowski

Professional Website – Doctor’s Data:

https://www.doctorsdata.com/

Instagram:

@drjuliamalkowski

LinkedIn:

Connect With Dr. Julia Malkowski

Facebook:

Dr. Julia Malkowski

Modern Human Podcast – Instagram & Updates:

@themodernhumanpodcast

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this Made for Health solo minisode, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues asking the question at the center of this series:

Why are you still sick? Why are you stuck even after addressing Lyme disease, mold, MCAS, gut dysfunction, nervous-system dysregulation, and other potential drivers?

This time, Dr. Hartman looks at something much more fundamental: Are you actually getting—and using—the nutrients your cells need?

He explores thiamine, or vitamin B1, deficiency, including the possibility of milder functional deficiencies that may not resemble classic severe beriberi but could still overlap with symptoms such as fatigue, neurological complaints, dysautonomia, and POTS. He then expands the conversation to a larger concept: high-calorie malnutrition, where someone may consume plenty of calories while still being deficient in vitamins, minerals, and other micronutrients required for normal cellular energy production.

For Dr. Hartman, this raises another important possibility for people who have made progress but still feel stuck:

What if part of the problem is not another disease—but a body that simply does not have enough of the raw materials it needs to function well?

Key Topics Covered

• Why nutrient deficiencies may be overlooked in chronic illness
• Thiamine, or vitamin B1, deficiency
• Functional versus severe nutrient deficiency
• Wet and dry beriberi
• Thiamine and neurological function
• Thiamine and cardiovascular function
• Dysautonomia and POTS
• Chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia
• Mitochondrial dysfunction
• Cellular energy production
• Why some patients may respond to B1 supplementation
• The concept of high-calorie malnutrition
• Processed food and micronutrient density
• B-vitamin deficiencies
• Magnesium and potassium
• Vitamin D
• Omega-3 fatty acids
• Micronutrients and the Krebs cycle
• Why calories alone do not equal nutrition
• Food fortification and nutrient loss from food processing
• IV vitamin C and the additional nutrients often included with it
• B-complex vitamins
• Nutrient testing in complex chronic illness
• Why rebuilding nutrient status may take time
• Returning to foundational nutrition and real food

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why Dr. Hartman routinely evaluates thiamine and other nutrient levels in complex patients

✅ How vitamin B1 deficiency can affect the nervous system, cardiovascular system, and energy production

✅ Why some symptoms associated with POTS, dysautonomia, chronic fatigue, and neurological dysfunction may prompt him to consider nutrient status

✅ What Dr. Hartman means by high-calorie malnutrition

✅ How someone can eat plenty of food while still lacking essential vitamins and minerals

✅ Why heavily processed carbohydrates may increase metabolic demand while providing fewer of the micronutrients needed to process them

✅ Why mitochondria require multiple vitamins and minerals to efficiently produce cellular energy

✅ Why feeling better after a multivitamin, B-complex, or nutrient replacement may sometimes provide an important clue

✅ Why improving one nutrient may not be enough if several deficiencies are present

✅ Why Dr. Hartman keeps returning to the same foundational recommendation: eat real, nutrient-dense food

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

What if cancer is not simply an isolated enemy to attack, but also a signal to look more closely at the terrain in which disease developed?

In this powerful episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman sits down with Dr. Nasha Winters, ND, FABNO, L.Ac, Dipl.OM, a naturopathic doctor and Fellow of the American Board of Naturopathic Oncology whose work focuses on metabolic and integrative oncology.

Dr. Winters’ interest in cancer is deeply personal. At just 19 years old, after years of unexplained health problems, she was diagnosed with advanced ovarian cancer involving multiple areas of her body and was told she may have only months to live. That experience ultimately redirected her education, clinical career, and understanding of health. Pasted text(20261018-195841)

More than three decades later, she shares how that diagnosis changed the way she thinks about cancer, trauma, metabolism, environmental exposures, mitochondria, hormones, and the relationship between a person's biography and biology.

Key Topics Covered

• Dr. Nasha Winters’ stage IV ovarian cancer diagnosis at age 19
• Why her early symptoms were repeatedly attributed to existing diagnoses
• What changed when one physician recognized that something was different
• Her prognosis and the moment she decided she wanted to understand cancer rather than simply “fight” it
• The unexpected experiences she believes influenced her early survival
• Fasting and metabolic stress in cancer
• Childhood trauma and the Adverse Childhood Experiences, or ACE, framework
• Big-T and little-T trauma
• EMDR and trauma processing
• Psychedelic experiences and confronting mortality
• Psychoneuroimmunology
• The relationship between emotions, stress, nervous-system signaling, and physical health
• Cancer as a disease of the individual “terrain”
• Environmental exposures and the exposome
• Mitochondrial health
• Metabolic dysfunction and cancer
• Insulin and growth signaling
• Hormone metabolism
• Integrative approaches to prostate cancer
• Integrative considerations in breast cancer
• Colon cancer and the rising burden of cancer in younger adults
• Why Dr. Winters believes patients should understand their individual terrain
• How integrative oncology can work alongside conventional cancer care
• Why patients may have more influence over their health than they realize

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ How Dr. Winters went from a 19-year-old pre-med student with advanced cancer to spending decades studying integrative and metabolic oncology

✅ Why finally having someone believe that “something is different” was an important moment in her diagnosis

✅ How childhood experiences and unresolved trauma became part of the way she understood her own illness

✅ Why she considers metabolic health, immune function, nervous-system regulation, environmental exposures, and emotional health together rather than viewing cancer through one pathway

✅ What she means when she talks about a person's “terrain”

✅ Why Dr. Winters evaluates factors such as insulin signaling, hormone metabolism, environmental burden, inflammation, and mitochondrial function

✅ How she approaches different cancer types through an individualized lens rather than assuming every person with the same diagnosis has the same underlying terrain

✅ Why she believes conventional oncology and integrative oncology do not need to exist in opposition

✅ How patients can begin learning about their own health patterns even before facing a cancer diagnosis

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Connect With Dr. Nasha Winters

🌐 Website:

https://drnasha.com/

🎙️ Podcast:

Tend the Terrain

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this Made for Health solo minisode, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues his ongoing series asking a deceptively simple question:

Why are you still sick? Why does your body seem stuck even after you’ve addressed so many other pieces?

After years of working with patients dealing with mold illness, Lyme disease, autoimmune issues, gut dysfunction, SIBO, hormonal problems, brain fog, mast-cell activation, and other complex conditions, Dr. Hartman says one pattern increasingly stands out: the nervous system itself may remain dysregulated even after other contributors have been addressed. Pasted text

This episode explores what he calls a nervous-system triad involving limbic-system dysregulation, mast-cell activation, and vagal dysfunction, along with trauma, multiple chemical sensitivity, the “cell danger response,” and why some patients paradoxically feel worse when given treatments that seem biochemically appropriate. Pasted text

The central idea is not that chronic illness is “all in your head.” It is almost the opposite: your brain, nervous system, immune system, mitochondria, and stress-response pathways may all be communicating with one another—and sometimes the body has difficulty returning to a state that feels safe enough for recovery.

Key Topics Covered

• Why nervous-system dysregulation may keep some chronically ill patients feeling stuck
• Why “it’s all in your head” can be a damaging oversimplification
• Big-T trauma, little-T trauma, and healthcare-related trauma
• Limbic-system hypervigilance
• The amygdala, memory, emotion, and threat perception
• Multiple Chemical Sensitivity and TILT
• Mast Cell Activation Syndrome as part of the nervous-system picture
• Vagal dysfunction and autonomic regulation
• Fight, flight, freeze, shutdown, and overwhelm
• Polyvagal concepts discussed in the episode
• Chronic stress and the body’s sense of safety
• The “cell danger response” framework
• Mitochondria and inflammatory signaling
• Why some patients feel worse from supplements or detoxification protocols
• Reactions to glutathione, methyl donors, and other treatments discussed in the episode
• Brain retraining and nervous-system regulation
• EMDR, somatic therapy, parts work, breathwork, and tapping
• Why trauma work may sometimes need to happen earlier in the healing process
• Why foundational work involving stress, sleep, environment, and nervous-system regulation still matters

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why Dr. Hartman believes nervous-system dysregulation can remain even after mold, Lyme, gut, hormonal, or autoimmune contributors have been addressed

✅ How limbic hypervigilance may lower the threshold at which the body perceives something as threatening

✅ Why sensitivities to foods, fragrances, chemicals, detergents, supplements, or capsule ingredients may sometimes occur alongside nervous-system dysregulation

✅ How vagal dysfunction may influence patterns of shutdown, overwhelm, autonomic symptoms, and recovery

✅ Why trauma does not have to mean one catastrophic event

✅ How illness itself—and even difficult experiences within the healthcare system—can become physiologically stressful

✅ Why some patients can react poorly to treatments that appear “correct” on paper

✅ Why Dr. Hartman increasingly considers nervous-system work alongside detoxification, infection treatment, nutrition, and other functional-medicine strategies

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this deeply personal episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman sits down with Dr. Efrat “Dr. E” LaMandre, a family nurse practitioner, PhD in Integrative Medicine, host of the Medical Disruptor podcast, and a leading voice on medical gaslighting.

What begins as a conversation about why patients feel dismissed when their tests come back “normal” becomes something much more personal. Dr. E shares that she was recently diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer after months of back pain that she repeatedly minimized herself. The experience transformed her from a clinician who teaches patient advocacy into a patient navigating the healthcare system firsthand. Pasted text

Together, Dr. Hartman and Dr. E explore a rarely discussed side of medical gaslighting: the ways patients can begin gaslighting themselves. We may apologize for taking a clinician’s time, downplay symptoms, assume normal tests mean nothing is wrong, or ignore the internal sense that something has changed.

Their message is not to reject conventional medicine. It is to understand what each clinician can and cannot provide, continue investigating when symptoms persist, and build a healthcare team capable of looking at the whole picture.

Key Topics Covered

• What medical gaslighting actually means
• Why normal laboratory results do not automatically mean a patient feels well
• Why patients may feel dismissed even by well-intentioned clinicians
• Populations most affected by medical gaslighting
• Why women may be especially likely to minimize their symptoms
• Fatigue, migrating pain, unusual sensations, and GI complaints that can be difficult to fit into conventional diagnostic categories
• The habit of “pre-apologizing” before describing symptoms
• How patients learn to become “good patients”
• Why people sometimes trust test results more than their own bodily experience
• Intuition as a form of pattern recognition
• The importance of knowing when something is different from your normal
• Why self-advocacy does not mean rejecting doctors
• Understanding the limitations of individual medical specialties
• Why conventional testing still matters
• How to build a multidisciplinary healthcare team
• Choosing clinicians and researchers over unqualified health advice
• Avoiding overwhelm when facing a complex diagnosis
• Why healing plans may need to be implemented gradually
• The emotional and mental challenges of serious and chronic illness
• Hope, family, purpose, and continuing to move forward

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ What medical gaslighting can look like even when the clinician has good intentions

✅ Why being told “your tests are normal” should not automatically end the conversation when symptoms persist

✅ How patients can unknowingly participate in their own medical gaslighting by dismissing or minimizing what they feel

✅ Why Dr. E now tells patients to get concerning symptoms checked instead of talking themselves out of evaluation

✅ Why self-advocacy is not the same as being confrontational or distrustful of medicine

✅ How intuition can reflect years of subconscious pattern recognition

✅ Why every specialist has a particular role—and why complex health problems may require an entire team

✅ How to decide whose medical advice deserves your attention when everyone around you has an opinion

✅ Why you do not have to make every lifestyle or treatment change at once

✅ What becoming a patient taught Dr. E about exhaustion, uncertainty, hope, and the emotional burden of illness

Connect With Dr. Efrat LaMandre

🌐 Website:

https://www.drefratlamandre.com/

🎙️ Medical Disruptor Podcast:

https://www.drefratlamandre.com/e-podcasts

Dr. E shares additional education and updates under Dr. Efrat LaMandre across her social platforms. Her official website describes the Medical Disruptor podcast as a show featuring credentialed clinicians who examine the limits of conventional care while exploring integrative solutions.Dr E.

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this Made for Health minisode, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues exploring an important question: Why are you still sick? Why does your body seem unable to get back into a healing state?

This time, he focuses on dysautonomia and POTS—Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome—conditions involving dysfunction in the autonomic nervous system, which helps regulate processes such as heart rate, blood pressure, temperature, digestion, sleep, and the body's response to stress. Pasted text

For some people, the signs are dramatic. For others, they can be subtle: feeling lightheaded when standing, experiencing a racing or pounding heart seemingly out of nowhere, waking suddenly at night, struggling with brain fog, cold hands and feet, unusual skin color changes, temperature intolerance, or simply feeling significantly better after fluids, electrolytes, compression, or time spent calming the nervous system. Pasted text

Dr. Hartman explains why dysautonomia can easily become one more overlooked layer in complex chronic illness—and why identifying what originally disrupted the nervous system may be just as important as identifying POTS itself.

Key Topics Covered

• What dysautonomia means
• What POTS is and how it relates to dysautonomia
• The sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems
• Lightheadedness and dizziness after standing
• Heart racing and unexplained palpitations
• Brain fog and difficulty thinking
• Waking at night with a racing heart
• Cold hands and feet
• Changes in skin color and circulation
• Problems regulating body temperature
• Sleep, mood, hormonal, and gastrointestinal symptoms
• Why mild dysautonomia may be overlooked
• Fluids and electrolytes
• Compression garments
• Nervous-system regulation
• Dysautonomia after concussion or head injury
• Long COVID and post-infectious dysautonomia
• Lyme disease and nervous-system dysfunction
• Hypermobility and POTS
• Mast Cell Activation Syndrome
• Autoimmune and gastrointestinal overlap
• Why the patient's history can guide treatment
• The NASA Lean Test
• Physical examination findings Dr. Hartman considers
• Why treating the underlying trigger matters

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why POTS is only one form within the broader category of dysautonomia

✅ How autonomic nervous-system dysfunction can affect much more than heart rate and blood pressure

✅ Why symptoms may sometimes resemble anxiety or panic

✅ Why someone can have significant autonomic symptoms without fitting a textbook presentation

✅ How POTS and dysautonomia may overlap with hypermobility, mast-cell activation, mold illness, Lyme disease, autoimmune issues, gut problems, and post-infectious conditions

✅ Why Dr. Hartman asks when the symptoms started and what happened around that time

✅ How concussion, illness, trauma, infection, or other physiological stressors may become part of the clinical timeline

✅ Why fluids, electrolytes, compression, strengthening, and nervous-system regulation may become part of an individualized approach

✅ How the NASA Lean Test can help collect heart-rate and blood-pressure information over time

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this special episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman shares the deeply personal story behind his journey from conventional family medicine into integrative and functional medicine—and why Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine exists today.

The turning point began with his daughter, Anna.

When Dr. Hartman and his wife began caring for Anna, who had cerebral palsy and significant medical needs, they quickly found themselves questioning recommendations from specialists. One of the earliest moments involved a recommendation for a feeding tube because Anna was considered extremely small on a standard growth chart. Dr. Hartman and his wife declined, believing there might be another path. Months later, they discovered a growth chart specifically for children with cerebral palsy—and Anna was right in the middle of the expected range. Pasted text

That experience fundamentally changed how Dr. Hartman viewed expertise, medical decision-making, and the importance of looking at the right frame of reference for the individual patient.

From there, his family continued exploring alternatives when standard medicine seemed to offer only procedures, medications, or surgery. Their search took them into nutrition, genetics, advanced gut testing, functional neurology, rehabilitation technologies, neuromodulation, and other approaches that were often being used elsewhere long before they became familiar in mainstream American medicine. Pasted text

Today, Anna continues to make progress far beyond what her family was originally told to expect. Dr. Hartman shares how that experience shaped not only his life as a father but also his identity as a physician, researcher, and lifelong student of medicine. Pasted text

Key Topics Covered

• How Dr. Hartman originally entered medicine
• The difference between learning medicine and truly learning how to heal
• How adopting Anna changed his personal and professional life
• Raising a child with cerebral palsy and significant medical needs
• Why his family began questioning specialist recommendations
• Anna’s feeding-tube recommendation and the importance of the correct clinical reference point
• Why medical experts can sometimes be wrong
• Medical gaslighting and families with special-needs children
• Looking beyond one-size-fits-all treatment
• Why function mattered more than appearance in Anna’s care
• Exploring nutrition, genetics, gut health, and functional neurology
• Technologies and therapies used in neurological rehabilitation
• Why Dr. Hartman became increasingly interested in root-cause medicine
• His transition from traditional family medicine into functional medicine
• The role of clinical research in shaping his thinking
• IFM, integrative medicine, functional medicine, and advanced training
• Learning about mold, CIRS, mast-cell activation, and hypermobility
• How his understanding of chronic illness evolved over time
• Why short conventional appointments were not enough for complex patients
• The creation of Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine
• Why complex patients need time, curiosity, and individualized care
• Moving the practice to a fully functional-medicine model
• The role of faith, family, persistence, and continuing education
• Dr. Hartman’s vision for the future of personalized medicine

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why caring for his daughter became the biggest turning point in Dr. Hartman’s medical career

✅ How using the wrong clinical reference point almost led Anna toward an unnecessary feeding tube

✅ Why Dr. Hartman began questioning the idea that specialists always have the complete answer

✅ How parenting children with complex health needs pushed him to investigate nutrition, genetics, neurology, and rehabilitation more deeply

✅ Why functional medicine appealed to him as a way of asking “Why?” rather than only treating the diagnosis

✅ How research helped him recognize that many “new” therapies are often built on decades of previous science

✅ Why conditions such as mold illness, mast-cell activation, hypermobility, and complex chronic illness required him to keep expanding his training

✅ Why he eventually realized complex patients needed much more than a 10- or 12-minute appointment

✅ How Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine grew from a personal family journey into a practice serving patients with complex chronic conditions

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this Made for Health minisode, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues exploring the question at the center of this series: Why are you still sick? Why does your body seem stuck even after addressing so many other pieces?

This time, he turns to something that connects nearly every structure in the body but often receives far less attention: fascia and connective tissue.

Dr. Hartman explains that fascia helps support organs, tissues, joints, nerves, and other structures throughout the body. For people with hypermobility, those tissues may be more lax or stretchy, which he believes can influence everything from joint stability and pain to nervous-system activation and complex chronic illness. Pasted text

And hypermobility doesn't always mean someone can still perform obvious “double-jointed” tricks. Dr. Hartman explains that people who were very flexible when younger may become increasingly tight and painful as they age because the surrounding fascia can stiffen and develop areas of restriction—even while certain joints remain hypermobile. Pasted text

Key Topics Covered

• Why fascia and connective tissue may be an overlooked part of chronic illness
• What hypermobility actually means
• Why hypermobility is more than being “double-jointed”
• The relationship between fascia and the nervous system
• Why loose connective tissue may increase sensory input to the brain
• Hypermobility as both a potential strength and vulnerability
• Why hypermobile people may become tighter with age
• Fascia, pain, and nervous-system activation
• Ehlers-Danlos syndrome versus the broader hypermobility spectrum
• The Pentad Super Syndrome discussed by Dr. Hartman
• Hypermobility and Mast Cell Activation Syndrome
• Hypermobility and POTS/dysautonomia
• Gastrointestinal issues and connective tissue
• Autoimmune conditions and hypermobility
• Associations with ADHD, autism, OCD, and other neuropsychiatric conditions discussed in the episode
• Bruising, bleeding, joint instability, and sports injuries
• Nutrition and connective-tissue repair
• Protein and collagen
• Vitamin C and collagen production
• Trace minerals and connective-tissue health
• Bone broth, organ meats, and mineral-rich foods
• Why childhood flexibility history may matter in adults
• The Beighton score as a screening tool

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why connective tissue may deserve more attention when chronic symptoms aren't improving

✅ Why hypermobility affects more than just joints

✅ How Dr. Hartman connects fascia with sensory signaling and nervous-system activation

✅ Why someone can be hypermobile and still feel extremely stiff as an adult

✅ How hypermobility may overlap with POTS, dysautonomia, mast-cell activation, gastrointestinal problems, and autoimmune issues

✅ Why childhood flexibility can provide important clues even if you are no longer flexible today

✅ Why hypermobile athletes may sometimes experience repeated injuries despite being strong and highly trained

✅ Why Dr. Hartman pays particular attention to protein, collagen, vitamin C, and mineral status in hypermobile patients

✅ How the Beighton score can help identify physical signs associated with hypermobility

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings new routines, new exposures, and new challenges for the whole family. Support your family this school year with targeted nutritional support designed with whole-person health in mind. Get 25% Off the Back-to-School Bundle

In this episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman sits down with Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge, a leading psychologist, author, and educator, to discuss how parents and teachers can better support neurodivergent children.

They explore the challenges these kids often face in traditional education systems—and why character, curiosity, and passion can matter more than grades. Dr. Capanna-Hodge highlights the value of hands-on learning, vocational training, and individualized education plans (IEPs) for fostering success.

With warmth and expertise, she offers practical strategies for helping children regulate emotions, build resilience, and thrive despite stigma or misunderstanding. Through personal stories and evidence-based insights, this conversation encourages a shift toward inclusive, flexible, and strength-based approaches to learning.

✅ Show Highlights:

• Why traditional education can overlook neurodivergent kids’ strengths
• The role of character, curiosity, and passion in lifelong success
• How vocational and hands-on learning opens doors for all learners
• Practical emotional regulation strategies for children
• The importance of early intervention and individualized education plans (IEPs)
• How stigma affects children’s confidence and opportunities
• Building inclusive environments at home and school

🎯 Some Questions We Explore:

• How can parents advocate for their neurodivergent child in school?
• What educational changes make the biggest difference for these students?
• How do emotional regulation skills support academic and social success?
• Why should we value vocational skills and creativity as much as grades?
• What can be done to reduce stigma in educational settings?

💡 In This Episode, You Will Learn:

• How to recognize and nurture a neurodivergent child’s unique strengths
• Actionable strategies to support focus, learning, and emotional well-being
• Why flexibility in teaching benefits all students—not just those with diagnoses
• How to partner with schools to create effective IEPs and supports
• Resources to help parents and educators stay informed and empowered

🌐 Resources & Links:

• Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge – Official Website: drroseann.com
• Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine:https://www.richmondfunctionalmedicine.com
• YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine:Watch Here
• LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman:Connect Here

🎧 Closing Call to Action:

👉 Whether you’re a parent, teacher, or advocate, this episode will help you see and support neurodivergent children in a new light. Subscribe to Made for Health and share this episode to spread awareness and foster more inclusive communities.

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this Made for Health minisode, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues his series exploring one central question: Why are you still sick?

Maybe you've gone from provider to provider. You've received pieces of the answer, tried different treatments, and improved somewhat—but your body still feels stuck.

One condition Dr. Hartman believes can sometimes sit underneath that complicated picture is Mast Cell Activation Syndrome, or MCAS.

Mast cells are part of the immune system and are found throughout the body, including tissues associated with the skin, gastrointestinal tract, bladder, blood vessels, and nerves. Because of that widespread distribution, mast-cell activation can potentially produce symptoms across multiple systems rather than creating one simple or predictable symptom pattern.

Dr. Hartman discusses symptoms such as rashes, hives, food and chemical sensitivities, reactions to supplements, heart palpitations, gastrointestinal problems, brain fog, and fatigue. He also explains why MCAS can overlap with conditions such as mold illness, Lyme disease, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, nervous-system dysregulation, and other complex chronic health problems.

Key Topics Covered

• Why Mast Cell Activation Syndrome may be overlooked
• How mast cells interact with the immune system
• Skin symptoms, hives, and rashes
• Food, chemical, fragrance, and supplement sensitivities
• Palpitations and rapid heart rate
• Diarrhea, constipation, and gastrointestinal symptoms
• Brain fog and chronic fatigue
• Why MCAS can resemble many other chronic illnesses
• Mast cells and neurological symptoms
• Interstitial cystitis and other less obvious presentations
• The overlap between MCAS, Lyme disease, and mold exposure
• Why some highly sensitive patients may need mast cells stabilized first
• Challenges surrounding laboratory testing for mast-cell mediators
• Histamine, prostaglandin D2, and tryptase testing discussed in the episode
• Why sample handling may influence test results
• Clinical criteria and treatment-response trials
• Identifying the trigger behind mast-cell activation
• Stress and nervous-system activation
• Food and environmental chemical triggers
• Mold and Lyme disease
• SIBO and gastrointestinal triggers
• Hormonal shifts, menstrual cycles, and menopause
• Concussion, infections, travel-related illness, COVID, and other possible triggering events
• Why understanding when symptoms began can provide important clues

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why Mast Cell Activation Syndrome can produce symptoms throughout multiple body systems

✅ Why someone with MCAS may become unusually reactive to foods, chemicals, fragrances, or supplements

✅ How mast-cell activation may overlap with Lyme disease, mold exposure, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, and nervous-system symptoms

✅ Why laboratory testing for mast-cell mediators can sometimes be difficult

✅ Why Dr. Hartman also relies on clinical history, symptom patterns, and response to treatment when evaluating suspected mast-cell activation

✅ Why calming mast-cell symptoms may sometimes need to happen before aggressively addressing mold, Lyme, or another underlying trigger

✅ Why improving symptoms is not necessarily the same as identifying the root cause

✅ How stress, infections, environmental exposure, gut dysfunction, and hormonal changes may potentially trigger mast-cell activation

✅ Why asking “When did this begin?” can be one of the most useful questions in a complicated chronic illness case

Follow Dr. Aaron Hartman and Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine

🌐 Website:https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

📺 YouTube: @AaronHartmanMD

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings new routines, new exposures, and new challenges for the whole family. Support your family this school year with targeted nutritional support designed with whole-person health in mind. Get 25% Off the Back-to-School Bundle

In this episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman welcomes back Dr. Neil Nathan, a pioneer in integrative and functional medicine with more than five decades of medical experience. Dr. Nathan has spent much of his career working with the patients other practitioners struggled to understand—people living with complex chronic illness, mold toxicity, Lyme disease, multiple chemical sensitivities, chronic fatigue, and increasingly reactive nervous and immune systems.

Their conversation centers on a question that both physicians encounter regularly: Why do some patients improve to a certain point and then stop getting better?

For Dr. Nathan, the answer often requires looking beyond a single diagnosis or treatment protocol. A patient may have already addressed mold, Lyme disease, gut health, autoimmune issues, or nutritional deficiencies and still feel stuck. At that point, he believes healing may require exploring the neurological, emotional, energetic, and spiritual dimensions of illness alongside the physical ones.

The discussion also dives into the growing population of highly sensitive patients—people who may react to light, sound, touch, fragrances, foods, supplements, medications, or electromagnetic exposures. Dr. Nathan explains why these reactions should not simply be dismissed as psychological and explores how the limbic system, vagal system, immune system, and mast cells can become interconnected in chronic illness.

Key Topics Covered

• Why complex chronic illness appears increasingly difficult to treat
• What Dr. Nathan means by a “sensitive patient”
• Sensitivity to light, sound, touch, fragrances, foods, supplements, and environmental exposures
• Mold toxicity and Lyme disease in complex chronic illness
• Environmental chemicals and the cumulative burden of exposure
• Dr. Nathan’s clinical perspective on electromagnetic field sensitivity
• Why some patients improve 50–60% and then become stuck
• Emotional, energetic, spiritual, and physical blockages to healing
• Trauma and neurological hypervigilance
• Big-T trauma versus accumulated smaller stressors
• The limbic system and the brain’s threat-detection response
• Vagal dysfunction and autonomic nervous system symptoms
• POTS, gastrointestinal symptoms, palpitations, and dysautonomia
• Mast Cell Activation Syndrome
• The connection between the nervous and immune systems
• Mold, mast cells, and hypermobility
• Cranio-cervical instability and the “spiky-leaky” concept discussed in the episode
• Thiamine deficiency and mitochondrial function
• Vitamin B1 and autonomic nervous-system health
• Oxalates as a potential source of inflammation
• Why dietary changes sometimes need to happen gradually
• SSRI and benzodiazepine withdrawal in sensitive patients
• Why medication tapering needs to be individualized and medically supervised
• Why Dr. Nathan refuses to use a one-size-fits-all mold-treatment algorithm
• The importance of truly personalized medicine

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why Dr. Nathan believes some of today’s chronic illness patients are becoming increasingly sensitive and complex

✅ What distinguishes a sensitive patient from someone dealing with a single isolated condition

✅ Why mold, Lyme disease, environmental exposures, and immune dysfunction may overlap rather than exist as completely separate problems

✅ How trauma and chronic stress can contribute to a nervous system that remains hypervigilant long after the original stressor has passed

✅ Why the limbic system, vagal system, and mast cells may need to be addressed together in highly sensitive patients

✅ How autonomic dysfunction can contribute to symptoms involving digestion, heart rate, blood pressure, fatigue, and other body systems

✅ Why neurological sensitivity is different from simply labeling symptoms as psychological

✅ Why thiamine may deserve consideration when mitochondrial and autonomic function are impaired

✅ How oxalates can become another source of irritation and inflammation for certain individuals

✅ Why suddenly making major dietary changes may sometimes worsen symptoms in highly sensitive patients

✅ Why antidepressants and benzodiazepines should not be abruptly discontinued and why tapering needs to be individualized with the prescribing clinician

✅ Why the most sensitive patients often require treatment to move slower, not faster

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this Made for Health minisode, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues his series exploring an important question: Why are you still sick? Why does your body seem stuck even after you’ve tried so many things?

This time, he turns his attention to Lyme disease—an infection that can present in different ways and may sometimes enter the differential diagnosis when people are dealing with persistent fatigue, body pain, migrating joint or muscle symptoms, neurological complaints, or other unexplained problems.

Dr. Hartman shares examples from his clinical experience, including patients with symptoms such as chronic fatigue, widespread pain, Bell’s palsy, sciatica, and foot drop. His broader message is that when a patient’s symptoms do not fit neatly into the expected picture, clinicians may need to take another look at the history, exposure risk, symptom pattern, and appropriate testing rather than relying on one isolated result.

He also discusses the challenges surrounding Lyme disease testing, including antibody testing, Western blot testing, immunoblot testing, and symptom-based clinical evaluation. Current CDC guidance recommends a two-step, FDA-cleared serologic testing process and notes that antibody tests can be falsely negative during the first several weeks after infection. IDSA guidelines also recognize that a classic erythema migrans rash can be diagnosed clinically without laboratory testing.

Key Topics Covered

• Why Lyme disease may be considered when someone remains chronically unwell
• Persistent fatigue, body aches, and migrating pain
• Neurological presentations discussed in the episode
• Lyme disease and Bell’s palsy
• Dr. Hartman’s clinical experiences with unusual symptom patterns
• Why timing matters with Lyme antibody testing
• Standard two-tier Lyme disease testing
• Western blot and immunoblot testing
• The limits of relying on a single laboratory result
• The importance of symptoms, history, and possible tick exposure
• Dr. Hartman’s approach when clinical suspicion remains high
• The MSIDS questionnaire discussed in the episode
• Why chronic illness may involve more than one contributing factor
• When a deeper evaluation may be appropriate
• Continuing the search for overlooked contributors when someone feels “stuck”

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why Dr. Hartman considers Lyme disease in some patients with persistent or unusual symptoms

✅ Why Lyme disease does not always present in exactly the same way

✅ How symptoms such as fatigue, migrating pain, and certain neurological complaints may prompt further evaluation

✅ Why the timing of antibody testing can affect results

✅ How standard Lyme testing generally uses a two-step serologic process

✅ Why Dr. Hartman emphasizes looking at the whole clinical picture, rather than interpreting one test result in isolation

✅ How he approaches situations in which symptoms and previous testing appear not to match

✅ Why finding Lyme disease does not necessarily mean it is the only factor affecting a person’s recovery

Follow Dr. Aaron Hartman and Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine

🌐 Website:https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

📺 YouTube: @AaronHartmanMD

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season can bring changing routines, increased stress, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 resources.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman welcomes back Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge, a leading expert in emotional and behavioral dysregulation with more than 30 years of experience helping children and families. Their conversation explores what happens when the nervous system becomes chronically overwhelmed—and why addressing behavior alone may miss what is actually driving a child’s struggles.

Dr. Roseann explains dysregulation as difficulty moving effectively between states of stress and calm. When the nervous system’s “stress cup” keeps filling without enough opportunities to release that stress, children and adults can remain chronically activated. That activation may show up through anxiety, emotional outbursts, attention difficulties, shutdowns, impulsivity, sleep problems, or other physical and mental health challenges.

Dr. Hartman and Dr. Roseann also take a close look at screen time and device dysregulation. Rather than framing technology as inherently bad, Dr. Roseann emphasizes the importance of boundaries, especially because children can have difficulty disengaging once they are deeply absorbed in stimulating digital content.

The conversation then moves into the heart of Dr. Roseann’s work: helping families regulate the nervous system first. Nutrition, gut health, magnesium, neurofeedback, PEMF, and other tools may all have a role, but she stresses that lasting change also requires consistent daily practices that help reduce nervous-system activation and create greater capacity for stress.

Key Topics Covered

• What emotional and nervous-system dysregulation can look like in children
• Why people can appear highly functional while living in chronic fight, flight, or freeze
• The “stress cup” and why accumulated stress matters
• ADHD, anxiety, OCD, PANS/PANDAS, sensory challenges, and dysregulation
• Device dysregulation and screen-time boundaries
• Why smartphones and short-form content can be difficult for children to disengage from
• Why simply removing one physical stressor may not fully regulate the nervous system
• Nutrition, magnesium, gut health, mold, and nervous-system support
• Big-T trauma, little-t trauma, and chronic everyday stress
• Sympathetic nervous-system activation
• Why consistency matters more than searching for one “magic” intervention
• Breathwork, somatic exercises, Tai Chi, prayer, art, and other daily regulation practices
• Neurofeedback, PEMF, and brain-based tools
• Polyvagal theory and vagus-nerve regulation
• Why parents need to regulate themselves before helping a dysregulated child
• Co-dysregulation versus co-regulation
• Generational patterns and emotional regulation within families
• The CALMS Dysregulation Protocol®
• Regulation First Parenting®
• Dr. Roseann’s book, The Dysregulated Kid

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why dysregulation is about the nervous system’s ability to move between stress and calm

✅ Why chronic stress can affect the nervous system even when there has not been one major traumatic event

✅ Why correcting behavior may be ineffective when a child is already highly dysregulated

✅ How technology and device use can add another layer of stimulation for children

✅ Why supplements or advanced therapies alone may not replace daily nervous-system regulation

✅ How simple practices such as breathwork, movement, art, prayer, Tai Chi, and somatic exercises can become part of a daily regulation routine

✅ Why parents’ nervous systems influence their children through verbal and nonverbal cues

✅ How families can shift from co-dysregulation to co-regulation

✅ Why Dr. Roseann believes parents need to stop personalizing a child’s dysregulated behavior

✅ How the CALMS Dysregulation Protocol® gives families a practical framework for responding differently

Follow Dr. Aaron Hartman and Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine

🌐 Website:https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

📺 YouTube: @AaronHartmanMD

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 offer.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this Made for Health minisode, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues exploring a question he hears frequently from patients: Why am I still sick? Why am I not getting better? What has been overlooked?

Sometimes you've seen multiple doctors, received diagnoses, tried medications, completed specialized testing, and even worked with functional medicine practitioners, yet your recovery eventually reaches a plateau.

According to Dr. Hartman, one potential piece worth investigating is mold exposure.

He explains that mold and other biotoxins can interact with the immune system in complicated ways. One aspect of this is Chronic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (CIRS), which Dr. Hartman describes in relation to activation of the innate immune system by biotoxins. He also discusses direct toxin exposure and how mold-related problems may intersect with autoimmune and inflammatory conditions.

The challenge is that mold exposure can be easy to dismiss precisely because it is so common. A water-damaged environment or mold around an HVAC system may look “normal” to someone who sees it every day, but Dr. Hartman argues that common does not necessarily mean harmless for every individual.

Key Topics Covered

• Why mold may be overlooked when chronic illness isn't improving
• Mold exposure and Chronic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (CIRS)
• What Dr. Hartman means by the biotoxin pathway
• Innate versus adaptive immune responses
• Direct toxicity from mold and mycotoxins
• Mold and chronic inflammation
• Potential connections with autoimmune and autoinflammatory conditions
• Water-damaged buildings and environmental exposure
• Why common mold exposure can be easy to dismiss
• Mold in HVAC systems and indoor environments
• HLA-DR/DQ genetics and susceptibility
• Why some people may have more difficulty handling biotoxins
• Mold exposure versus immune-system dysregulation
• Urine testing for mold toxins
• Evaluating the building as well as the individual
• Mold as a possible complicating factor in chronic Lyme disease
• Dr. Hartman's clinical example involving Lyme disease, hypermobility, and POTS
• Binders, phosphatidylcholine, environmental changes, and gut support discussed in his clinical approach
• Why foundational health still matters when dealing with environmental exposures
• RIFM's Healthy Building Guide and mold resources

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ Why Dr. Hartman considers mold when someone with a complex chronic illness stops progressing

✅ How he distinguishes mold exposure, direct toxin effects, and CIRS

✅ Why a water-damaged building may affect different people differently

✅ How Dr. Hartman describes the role of HLA-DR/DQ genetics in the body's ability to handle biotoxins

✅ Why simply finding mold-related toxins doesn't necessarily tell you whether your innate immune system is dysregulated

✅ Why evaluating your home or workplace environment can be an important part of investigating possible mold exposure

✅ How mold may complicate conditions such as chronic Lyme disease, autoimmune disease, mast cell activation syndrome, long COVID, and other complex health problems

✅ Why Dr. Hartman continues emphasizing nutrition, gut health, detoxification, and other foundations even when addressing mold

Follow Dr. Aaron Hartman and Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine

🌐 Website:https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

📺 YouTube: @AaronHartmanMD

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings new routines, new exposures, and new challenges for the whole family. Support your family this school year with targeted nutritional support designed with whole-person health in mind. Get 25% Off the Back-to-School Bundle

In this episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman, MD, and Dr. Jenski, MD, explore Chronic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (CIRS) and the biotoxin pathway. They break down how exposure to biotoxins from mold, water-damaged environments, and chemicals can trigger complex immune responses, and how genetic factors such as HLA gene mutations may influence the way certain individuals respond to these exposures.

The conversation examines the connection between biotoxins, chronic inflammation, detoxification, and seemingly interconnected health problems. Dr. Hartman and Dr. Jenski explain why CIRS can be complex to identify and manage and why treatment needs to be personalized rather than approached with a one-size-fits-all protocol.

They also discuss strategies used to support the body during treatment, including omega-3 fatty acids and curcumin, while emphasizing the importance of addressing CIRS through a thoughtful, step-by-step process. This episode provides listeners with a clearer understanding of the biotoxin pathway, why chronic inflammation can persist, and how a structured approach can help guide CIRS treatment.

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings changing routines, new exposures, and added demands on the whole family. Support your family’s health this season with Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine’s Back-to-School 2026 offer.

Back-to-School 2026:

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman continues his series exploring a question he hears constantly from people dealing with chronic and complex health problems: Why am I still not getting better?

You may have seen the specialists, received the diagnoses, taken the medications, completed advanced testing, or worked with integrative and functional medicine providers. Maybe you've made it 50% of the way—but something still feels missing.

Dr. Hartman introduces the Hierarchy of Healing, a concept he says has existed within naturopathic medicine for more than a century. Rather than beginning with the newest test, supplement, or advanced treatment, this framework asks whether you've created the conditions your body needs to heal in the first place.

That includes your physical environment, nervous system, connection with nature, food and water, and something medicine doesn't always know how to measure: meaning and purpose.

Key Topics Covered

• Why some people improve but eventually become stuck in their healing journey
• The Hierarchy of Healing in naturopathic medicine
• Dr. Hartman's Triangle of Health
• Creating an environment that supports healing
• Why feeling safe matters to the nervous system
• Trauma, chaos, and nervous-system dysregulation
• The relationship between mind, body, and healing
• Connecting with nature and natural rhythms
• Seasonal changes in food and lifestyle
• The microbiome, polyphenols, mitochondria, and the environment
• Nourishing the body with real food and clean water
• Giving the body what it needs rather than only trying to remove what's wrong
• Why meaning and purpose belong in a conversation about health
• The biopsychosocial model of healing
• Why foundational principles still matter in complex chronic illness
• Turning health information into meaningful action

In This Episode, You Will Learn

✅ What Dr. Hartman means by the Hierarchy of Healing

✅ Why the environment surrounding you can become part of your healing process

✅ Why nervous-system safety may matter when your body seems unable to move forward

✅ How natural and seasonal rhythms fit into Dr. Hartman's framework for health

✅ Why nourishment involves more than simply avoiding unhealthy foods

✅ How Dr. Hartman connects the microbiome, polyphenols, mitochondria, and environmental influences

✅ Why meaning, purpose, relationships, vocation, and creativity can be important pieces of a healing journey

✅ Why getting better shouldn't be viewed only through medications, testing, supplements, or procedures

✅ Why Dr. Hartman continues returning to foundational principles even when working with people experiencing significant chronic illness

Follow Dr. Aaron Hartman and Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine

🌐 Website:https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

📺 YouTube: @AaronHartmanMD

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season brings new routines, new exposures, and new challenges for the whole family. Support your family this school year with targeted nutritional support designed with whole-person health in mind. Get 25% Off the Back-to-School Bundle

In this episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman is joined by internationally renowned Lyme disease expert Dr. Richard Horowitz, who shares insights from his 35+ years of experience treating over 13,000 patients with chronic Lyme disease and complex chronic illnesses.

Dr. Horowitz unpacks the 16-point treatment model he developed to address the multifactorial nature of chronic disease—including infections, inflammation, environmental toxins, mitochondrial dysfunction, and immune dysregulation. He explores how chronic Lyme overlaps with long COVID, mold illness, and autoimmune conditions, and emphasizes the importance of personalized, root-cause approaches to healing.

This eye-opening episode also addresses the medical and political challenges faced by Lyme patients and practitioners, the need for systemic change, and how advocacy and collaboration can help reshape the future of chronic care.

Show Highlights:

✅ What makes chronic Lyme disease so difficult to diagnose and treat

✅ Dr. Horowitz’s 16-point model and why it’s transforming chronic illness care

✅ The intersection of Lyme, long COVID, and other systemic health conditions

✅ How toxins, infections, and inflammation fuel long-term illness

✅ The political and institutional barriers to better care and research

✅ Real-world patient stories that highlight hope and healing

✅ Where patients and practitioners can access further education and support

Some Questions We Explore:

✅ Why are so many patients misdiagnosed—or not diagnosed at all?

✅ How can chronic Lyme mimic other diseases like fibromyalgia or MS?

✅ What’s the role of mitochondrial health and detoxification in recovery?

✅ How do we move from symptom management to root-cause resolution?

In This Episode, You Will Learn:

✅ What a truly integrative, systems-based approach to chronic illness looks like

✅ How to use Dr. Horowitz’s model to guide testing, diagnosis, and treatment

✅ Why collaboration between conventional and functional medicine is crucial

✅ How to advocate for better awareness, resources, and policy change

Resources & Links:

🌐 Dr. Richard Horowitz – Official Website: https://www.cangetbetter.com

📘 Book – Why Can’t I Get Better? by Dr. Richard Horowitz

📘 Book – How Can I Get Better? by Dr. Richard Horowitz

🌐 Dr. Aaron Hartman – Richmond Functional Medicine: https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com

🌐 LinkedIn – Dr. Aaron Hartman: Connect Here

📺 YouTube – Richmond Functional Medicine: Watch Here

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

🎒 Back-to-school season puts extra demands on the whole family. Support your health this fall with physician-vetted, foundational supplements from Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine. Get 25% off Back-to-School Support while the seasonal offer lasts.

https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/lp/back-to-school-2026/

In this episode of Made for Health, Dr. Aaron Hartman begins a new series with a question he hears almost every day: “Why am I not getting better?”

You may be doing everything you think you’re supposed to do. You’ve seen doctors and specialists. You’ve changed your diet, tried supplements, addressed your diagnosis, and worked hard on your health. Maybe you’ve improved 20%, 40%, or even 60%—but then something happens. Progress stops, symptoms linger, and you feel stuck.

Before jumping to more complicated possibilities like mold, Lyme disease, mast cell issues, hormones, or advanced testing, Dr. Hartman argues that it’s worth returning to the foundations. In his clinical experience, three of the most commonly overlooked areas are gut health, stress, and sleep.

He explores how nutrition, the microbiome, food reactivity, detoxification, stress and trauma, nervous-system regulation, and restorative sleep can influence the healing process. The goal isn't simply to chase the newest health trend. It's to identify what may be blocking progress, address what's lacking, and build a stronger foundation for healing.

Key Topics Covered

• Why people can make significant progress and then suddenly get stuck
• The danger of chasing the newest health trend or treatment
• Why foundational health still matters in complex chronic illness
• Gut health and the microbiome
• Real food versus highly processed food
• Food sensitivities and immune reactivity
• Protein, minerals, and nutrition in detoxification
• Prebiotics, probiotics, postbiotics, polyphenols, and fiber
• Chronic stress and its impact on healing
• Health-related and healthcare-related stress
• Trauma and nervous-system dysregulation
• EMDR, tapping, somatic therapy, and parts therapy
• The default mode network and established brain patterns
• Why sleep is essential for repair and recovery
• Deep sleep, REM sleep, memory, and nervous-system regulation
• Why the basics should come before more complex interventions

Follow Dr. Aaron Hartman and Richmond Integrative & Functional Medicine

🌐 Website:https://richmondfunctionalmedicine.com/

🎒 Back-to-School 2026: Back-to-School Bundle

📺 YouTube: @AaronHartmanMD

Mentioned in this episode:

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents

25% Off Back to School Support for Parents

Back to school asks a lot of parents, too. Support your body through the season with three physician-reviewed, foundation-first essentials: Twice Daily Multi, Quercetin + Nettles, and NAC. For a limited time, save 25% on the Back to School Support Bundle. Visit the link below ⬇️ Shop the Back to School Sale

Back to School Support for Parents