Guest Post by: Dave Hompes, Functional Medicine Practitioner
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“Symptoms are like warning lights on a dashboard, they light up to alert you to the fact that something in your car needs attention. Like the dashboard lights, symptoms are merely signals from your body alerting you to the fact that something is wrong and as such, symptoms should be blessed for they are your early warning mechanisms that are simply alerting you to problems before they become serious.”
– Dave Hompes
For example, an H. pylori infection in the stomach, or an allergic response to a food in the intestine, may trigger a migraine headache. Finding relevant imbalances in your body and helping you correct them may resolve symptoms and even some chronic diseases.Functional medicine practitioners view the body as one main system made from other, smaller interconnected systems. We believe that symptoms result from dis-ease or dis-order in these systems. Because each system is connected to the other, a problem in one area of the body may be triggered by something elsewhere in the body.
The Hompes Method is a simple health rejuvenation system that’s based on the principles of Functional Medicine. It’s specifically designed to help you overcome challenges in what I call the Seven Areas of Health:
- Digestion – heartburn, acid reflux, bloating, gas, “IBS”, constipation, diarrhea, oral problems, itchy anus and more.
- Reproductive & Sexual Health – libido, poor erections, imbalanced menstrual cycles, menopause, andropause and more.
- Energy Levels – general low energy, low energy in the morning, energy slumps during the day, poor exercise response, etc.
- Aches & Pains – headaches, chronic pain in nerves, muscles, and joints.
- Mood – feeling low, on edge, irritable, or having mood swings.
- Sleep – having difficulty getting to sleep, or staying asleep.
- Skin, Hair & Nails – unexplained rashes and conditions such as eczema, dermatitis, dandruff, athlete’s foot; rigid, cracking and brittle nails; dull or greasy hair / hair falling out, male pattern baldness.
The Vitality Scale:
Symptoms in the Seven Areas of Health develop because you descend the Vitality Scale. Let me explain.
In western medicine, you’re either considered healthy, or you’re labeled with a medical disorder or disease. There’s nothing in between.
It’s as if you fall asleep on a Monday night in tip-top health, then magically develop a disorder or disease on a Tuesday morning.
But this isn’t the case. Symptoms and disease usually develop and progress due to a steady decline in your body’s ability to function properly.
The Vitality Scale explains this perfectly:
Source: www.hompes-method.com
Lifestyle, including poor diet, inappropriate exercise, inadequate sleep and stress cause an initial descent from an 8, 9 or 10 on the scale. At a 7, nagging symptoms in the Seven Areas of Health begin to creep in and unless Vitality is restored.
The Bad Stuff vs. Good Stuff Seesaw:
The Hompes Method is based on the simple philosophy that you descend the Vitality Scale due to two primary factors:
- There’s too much “bad stuff” in your body.
- There’s not enough “good stuff” in your body.
Source: www.hompes-method.com
You need to find the bad stuff so you can get rid of it, and discover what good stuff is missing or inadequate so you can put it back into your system.
All Body Systems Are Connected:
Western medicine breaks your body down into components and then trains specialists in those components: dermatologists, cardiologists, hepatologists, endocrinologists, neurologists, gynecologists, and so forth.
Each -ologist is a brilliant specialist in his or her area, but may not realize how the area in which he or she is an expert affects other areas!
Functional Medicine acknowledges that body systems are inherently connected and that a symptom felt or experienced in one part of your body may actually be the result of an issue somewhere else.
Let’s use my Olympic Rings Health Analogy as an example:
Source: www.hompes-method.com
The red ring on the far right represents multiple systems, the reason being that problems in bones, skin, muscles, bones, heart, lungs and bones, usually result from imbalances in the other four rings or systems.
For example, we know that:
- All the blood from your stomach and intestine has to go to your liver before it goes anywhere else. So if you have problems in your stomach or intestine, your liver and detoxification will be involved, too.
- Your digestive, detoxification and immune systems are controlled by hormones so anything disrupting hormones can affect digestion, detox, and immune function.
- Anywhere between 60-80% of your immune system is in your gut. Thus, if you have immune-related problems, it makes sense that your digestive system ought to be one of the first places you look.
- The accumulation of toxins in your body interferes with hormonal and neurological function, which control your digestive, detox and immune systems.
The result of these body system imbalances is a descent down the Vitality Scale and the onset of symptoms in the Seven Areas of Health.
Don’t wait until it’s too late. Take action, empower yourself, learn how to look after yourself, whether that’s with functional orientated doctor, an integrated doctor, a nutritional therapist that practices functional medicine, a chiropractor that practices functional medicine.
No matter who it is, arm yourself with a team that is going to help you optimize your body which ultimately is the vehicle of which you’re having your experiences.
Dave Hompes is a researcher, educator, and clinician in the fields of nutrition, functional medicine and human behavior.
His mission is to provide balanced information to empower people to rejuvenate and optimize their health, wellness and performance. Dave’s Hompes Method synthesizes clinical nutrition, functional medicine, genomics and the intricate interplay between mind and body to deeply investigate reasons why wellness has declined.
Individualized protocols help his clients reverse a wide range of health challenges, rejuvenate health and optimize athletic and work performance. To learn more about him visit: https://www.davehompes.com