65: Nervous System Restoration for the New Year with Christine Ruch

Alysia Thomas:  Welcome back to Autoimmune Adventures. As we move to a new year, there's always this loud messaging that we receive that we need to reinvent ourselves in the coming year and we need to set some big goals and we need to have the best year ever and push harder and be better. And when you live with chronic illness or autoimmune disease, that pressure can feel really overwhelming um before the year even starts. And today's conversation is going to be about doing something a little bit different. It's going to, we're going to talk about grounding our nervous systems and remembering that we are more than our diagnosis. Um as we enter the new year from a place of safety instead of a place of force.

And we are joined, we are so glad to be joined by Christine Ruch. She's a holistic transformation guide who works with people navigating chronic illness through nervous system regulation, nourishment, and somatic practices. I am so excited to talk to you. I am into all of this, and I, I would I want to learn. So, it feels to me like the perfect way to start to close out our old year to step into the new one with a little bit more kindness to ourselves. So, thank you so much for joining us, Christine.

Christine Ruch:  I am so excited to be here. This is going to be such a great conversation.

Stacy Griffin:  Yes, we're excited to have you here. So, Christine, here's our first question.

Christine Ruch:  Yeah.

Stacy Griffin:  When people think about the new year, they're usually thinking about goals. So, versus that, why do you think that approach can actually backfire for people with chronic illness?

Christine Ruch:  Oh my gosh, so many reasons. I mean, talk about setting yourself up for failure, you know? It's just like really high bar. And um I don't know, sometimes we're not fully resourced enough for the aspirations that we have. And we often of, I think a lot of us love to I have this idea of greatness which is amazing. That's like my work is like to bring everybody who works with me into their greatness. But I think if you don't have all the other things in place to set yourself up for success, then it can be like an over-hype and kind of bring you some let down and some disappointment. What do you guys think?

Becky Miller:  I agree with that 100%.

Christine Ruch:  Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of putting a lot of expectation on yourself.

Becky Miller:  Yeah.

Alysia Thomas:  And when when you live with chronic illness, you don't know what your resources are going to be every day. So, you have to be flexible.  

Becky Miller:  Yeah.

Christine Ruch:  Yeah.

Alysia Thomas:  Um, because one day you're going to wake up feeling great and have some energy and the next day you're going to wake up feeling miserable with some pain. and you don't know, you don't know what you're going to have. So, it's a little different, I think, setting goals for for people like us.

Becky Miller:  Yeah. But I, I love that you talk about nervous system restoration instead of like a reset like so many people the whole "new year, new me" thing. It's, you know, um, do you mind explaining to our audience what the differences between the restoration and the reset?

Christine Ruch:  Yeah, that's such a good that's so wise for you to say that because yeah, reset is like a moment in time, right? You're going to do one thing. It's like a modality like going to get a massage or something like that. And a restoration is a complete rewiring of your nervous system.  

Christine Ruch:  And not just your nervous system but it brings harmony to your nervous system and when you have harmony within your nervous system then you have harmony in all other areas of your life. So it's a practice that bringing by bringing restoration and and harmony to your nervous system. It it impacts your health positively your relationships and it brings more alignment to your self like mind, body, spirit. You're in alignment. you're acting from a place of truth and authenticity. And so, yeah, it's a it's a much deeper um thing than just like a moment in time to just do a reset. I think actually I disagree. I don't even I don't even think that the nervous system works like that. I don't think that you can reset your nervous system. I think it's a process especially when you have a chronic illness because you know we know all four of us are like experts at autoimmune disease but there's so many different illnesses that have a disregulated nervous system at the as the foundation and I just don't think I think it's a much um deeper process than just like a quick like button like reset you know it doesn't work like that we wish But it doesn't.  

Alysia Thomas:  No...

Christine Ruch:  No.

Alysia Thomas:  ...not at all. So, you've said that there's more to life than just your disease. And that really lands for us that that goes very much along with with our uh, philosophy. So why is that so important especially on a nervous system level?

Christine Ruch:  Because you know it's just like so much of our time we I think our culture kind of brings this into us as well. It's like we create an identity based upon our our um diagnosis and then that di, that identity, you know, there's all sorts of like businesses that are willing to step in to like prop up your identity, right? And so it's just like it's not it's I, I don't think it's about I don't think it's about that. I think like you can't create an identity around your diagnosis and um, seeing yourself as whole and not who your, what your diagnosis is, but seeing yourself as a whole and complete person um, I think is really foundational. It's like how what your mindset is is the most important part of the healing process, you know, is to have the right mindset.  

Alysia Thomas:  Absolutely.

Becky Miller: Yeah.

Stacy Griffin:  I, I completely agree. I know that you and I chatted before the interview and we talked about how I spend a lot of time working on mindset practice with my students, but I I feel like that's what our podcast is about is getting your head wrapped around the kind of mindset that is going to allow you to thrive instead of drown. And as you said, the system just doesn't make a place for that. So, I'm so grateful that you do. Um, I want to ask you, what are some gentle ways that people can start to reconnect with who they are beyond their symptoms, even if they're still very much in the midst of trying to figure things out?

Christine Ruch: Yeah, I, I love that um question because one of the things that struck me about what you said was this whole, you know, we were talking about mindset and yeah, of course, like what we think of ourselves is really important, but I want to talk about the wisdom of your body, right? Because a lot of our nervous system is in our body. It's in us both within us and it's outside of us. And it's our sensing, feeling way in the world, but it also is within us. And it's the everything that we hold in the world and everything that's ever happened to us. And so I like to work from a period place of embodiment. So we go from your mind into the body. And because sometimes, you know, your mind isn't always in service of your best interests, your mind can mess you up really bad and lead you astray. And so I kind of like to say that like we're post knowledge. And um because like there's knowledge you can go online and find information about anything. And but the body holds so much wisdom. And so I like to kind of transcend the idea of a mindset. Mindset's important because you got to start somewhere, right? but also hold space for this idea that we're going to shift it so that your mind isn't in service of your body, but your body your your mind is in service of your body.  

Christine Ruch: And your body is actually the thing that's leading the way and not your mind. And I think that that's really great. A lot of times we live our whole life with our brain in charge and our body is just sort of like along for the ride. And so it's like finding your body and becoming more embodied in this in this practice of regulating your nervous system.

Stacy Griffin: I love that you say that because I always think about if I can just get out of this overthinking spiral and listen to what my body is telling me, then I'm going to do what's best for me. But if I am stuck in this spiral of "what if, what if," and if I'm always up in my intellectual space, then I don't pay attention to my body. And that's where autoimmune disease starts to come into effect. Because if we ignore our body for too long, it starts to get our attention in less than delightful ways. So, thank you for that. Coming back to the body is very important.

Becky Miller: Yeah, it is.

Stacy Griffin: It's very important.

Becky Miller: I was going to say I think a very simple illustration of that is literally just the other night I woke up in the middle of the night and out of nowhere I was having anxiety and at first my first inclination was oh, I'm having anxiety because I need to do this and I need to do that, but like you said, your brain is going to fool you sometimes because my brain was telling me I needed to do all the things and my body was like you're tired girl, go back to bed, you know. And and I listened to my body and by the time I woke up in the morning that anxiety was completely gone like it was, you know, I think you're right, I think sometimes our mind is is not our friend when it comes to taking care of our body.

Christine Ruch:  Yeah. And I love that. This kind of goes back to even what Stacy asked me actually that I don't think I fully answered, but Becky, you did too. You kind of answered it for me actually. And this idea of like creating a relationship with your body and recognizing that our body is actually talking to us all the time, right? Whether it's an anxiety in the middle of the night or whatever. And it's it's like not just about not ignoring your body, but learning to connect with it and listen to it all the time. And not just listen to it, but take aligned action. And and then what's happening is when you start to take action, your body is talking to you. "o what if you're not your disease? What if what if what if that doesn't exist at all? It's just this deeply disregulated nervous system expressing itself as these whole range all four of us have a whole range of like bodily symptoms that express themselves as an autoimmune disease. But what if it's not that at all? It's just the way our body is expressing and telling us that like, "help me, help me, my nervous system is shot!," you know, and um, what if we can create a new relationship with our nervous system not just with our nervous system but with our body, and then that kind of creates this positive feedback loop when you start trusting that your body is not failing you, but actually it's holding all of the wisdom that you need to thrive because a lot of times in autoimmune disease, like we love to hate on our body.  

We feel like it's failing us. Uh we feel like we're never like we're always hating on our body. And what if that's not true? Like let's just pretend for a second it's just not true. And it's just a matter of like having a different relationship and a different paradigm and a different mindset um around what it is that your body is trying to tell you. And then you create a positive feedback loop by making positive changes by listening to your body and being like, "Oh, I'm trusting you. You're actually telling me something I need to know, and I'm going to go back to sleep or whatever it is." But then that creates this positive feedback loop where your body starts to trust you and then you start to trust your body and then your body's like, "Oh god, she's listening finally." And then it gives you more hints and then you're get become a better listener and you become like it's like learning a new language. You know, you're like, "Oh, I think that that's what that means." It doesn't mean that I'm a failure, but actually it means, you know, whatever. I need to change what I'm eating or I need to change any number of things. But I don't know. I think that's an important mindset.

Alysia Thomas:  I love that. I love that so much because we talk a lot about listening to our bodies on this podcast a lot, because as you know, when you have a chronic illness, you have to listen to your body. And it's interesting that you're saying we can create a positive feedback loop, because I think at least for me I know in my journey in those early years where I was trying to figure out what was wrong it was a lot of negative self-talk. It was a lot of um gaslighting from my doctors and to myself as well and a lot of, "I'm broken. I don't know what's wrong. Everything's wrong. Something is wrong." you know, instead of saying my body's trying to communicate something with me here and and you know, I, I think I went down the negative feedback pathway for a for a good number of years and what do you know? I just kept getting sicker and sicker and sicker, you know.

Christine Ruch:  Of course.

Alysia Thomas:  So, it's interesting when you say it's like learning another language. That is 100% true for me.

Christine Ruch:  Yeah.

Alysia Thomas:  I feel like I'm still in the process of learning how my body is communicating with me. And like you said, um, acting in accordance to those communications. That's tricky. So, I think that's where a guide like you comes in to help people understand how to learn that. You think it's, well, it's my body. You think it would come intuitively to me. It doesn't. It doesn't come intuitively...

Christine Ruch: Yeah. It doesn't.

Alysia Thomas:  Especially when our brains are dealing with um anxiety, you know, of of the unknown. Because when you live with chronic illness, there is anxiety. you don't know how you're going to do one day. You don't know. You you just don't know.  

And so I love love that you're that you're putting it the way you're putting it. Reframing it, I feel like is, is what you're doing here. So kind of creating a a space of safety within yourself. And so when you do that, how does safety - emotional and physical - actually change what our bodies are capable of doing?

Christine Ruch:  Yeah, I love that you brought in safety because one of the things that I was thinking when you were talking Alysia was um about fear too, right? like found fear is at the foundation of all of the things that we tell ourselves when we are hating on our body and there our body is expressing symptoms because like a lot of times autoimmune disease has scary symptoms. You could have ulcerative colitis and you're bleeding. You can have multiple sclerosis and you can't walk. Your optic nerve makes you blind. Do you know what I mean?

Alysia Thomas:  Mhm.

Christine Ruch:  Like scary scary things.

Alysia Thomas:  Scary stuff.

Christine Ruch:  Scary stuff. And so yeah, it can it can spiral into a fear a, a fear-doom cycle really, really quickly. Um, and so I think like this whole idea too of safety is really important. You know, we're living in this society right now and and that everybody's like, I don't feel safe. You know, you're you're triggering me. I don't feel safe. That's not a safe environment. like we want everybody else to make us feel safe and um appreciate when we're not feeling safe. And we don't actually realize that actually we create our own safety within. And it's how we have this um capacity to hold all of our emotions. And like we don't also have any dialogue in our culture around around emotions and how to hold the emotions and that you are not your emotion. And so you can feel scared but you're not a fearful person. You are just feeling fear. And so it's just like I love it this shifting of your paradigm around things. And I like to have this idea of like one of the things about safety and this internal feeling of safety is having a um a bigger capacity to hold everything that you are feeling without identifying with it and recognizing that you're sovereign.  

Christine Ruch:  And emotions come and they go and you can observe your emotions. You are not your emotion. And that's a practice that takes time, but it's and dedication to recognize like, oh, you're right. I am not that and I am a sovereign being that is having an emotion.

Alysia Thomas:  I, I want to jump...

Christine Ruch:  So, I think it's

Alysia Thomas:  I want to dive into that. I want to learn how to do that. And I know we don't have time, but that's I'm I am an emotional person. I connect to the world emotionally. I always have.

Christine Ruch:  Yeah.

Alysia Thomas:  All three of us are actually. And it can be the emotions can be a lot.

Christine Ruch:  Yes.

Becky Miller:  Yeah.

Alysia Thomas:  And they can take over. So, I love the idea of observing it. Oh, I love all of that. I'm super fascinated, but if there's someone who's listening that just kind of needs a a how-to, just a little brief, they feel like they can't do anything, for instance, because a lot of times people, like you said, there's the fear cycle or there's the genuine, they're in the physical side of things where they're really limited and they're trying to figure out what they can do. What is a small way that they could a small practical way that they could support their nervous system?

Christine Ruch: I think a really small way that they can support their nervous system is to just sit with what is. That's it. For five minutes, for 10 minutes. A lot of us will bypass. We'll get busy. We'll go and make dinner. We'll pour a glass of wine. We'll get into a conversation.  We'll get on our phone. We'll scroll. We will bypass when there's something that's uncomfortable coming up. Um to get out of our head so we're not like creating a story or I'm not going into the fear place, but actually what if you just sit in silence and learn to hold what it is that you're feeling and that's it. You don't have there's nothing wrong with you. There's nothing to do. There's nowhere to go. There's nothing to fix. There's nothing wrong. Everything is perfect exactly the way it is. It's just a practice of holding it. And so if you can only hold it for three minutes, then that is a huge that is huge. If you can hold it for five minutes, that's huge. And that's this idea of building capacity and and you become familiar with like the sensations of the emotions moving through your body and they don't become frightening anymore. They don't become something that you have to bypass or ignore. Um and so I think just allowing yourself to feel whatever it is that you're feeling and there's nothing wrong.  

You could feel rage. You can feel horrified. You can feel despair. You can feel anything it is. But just allow yourself to just feel all that you're feeling without acting from it, without identifying with it, um without becoming it, without telling a story around it, without any of those things. Just holding whatever it is and just holding it and that's it. You don't have to do anything else.

Alysia Thomas:  So it starts out that simple, huh?

Christine Ruch:  Yeah,

Alysia Thomas:  You just learn how to sit in.

Christine Ruch:  It starts out that simple.

Alysia Thomas:  So I always am telling myself like feel your feelings.

Christine Ruch:  It is that simple.

Alysia Thomas:  Just feel your feelings, you know, because but because emotions are just that. They are emotions. They come and go. They pass. They are not forever. And I I think I remember reading somewhere that an emotion will last 90 seconds if you just sit with it and then it will start to dissipate.  

Christine Ruch: Yeah.

Alysia Thomas:  So that that's that is a very practical anybody can do that.

Christine Ruch:  Anybody could do that.

Alysia Thomas:  Anybody can stop and just stop and sit in it.

Christine Ruch:  Anyone can do that. And yes, just sit in it and sit in all of it all the time. And you do you slowly end up building capacity.

Alysia Thomas:  That's, that's power.

Christine Ruch:  And you actually I wonder too what you guys think of this, but I mean for myself when I started this journey with the nervous system work, I realized that I didn't really feel the full range of emotions that humans are supposed to feel. I had like happy and then I had pissed and not a lot in between, you know, and it took me a long time to recognize that I could feel all of the layers of all the different emotions. And I even had a therapist who gave me this whole wheel of emotions at one time and was just like this big rainbow of all of these emotions. And I was like, "Oh my god, you mean I could feel all of that?" I was just like completely dumbfounded, you know. And so I think what ends up happening is that when you're able to just hold all that is, feel your feelings, but hold all that is, it's kind of built safety though too because then you realize like you are teaching yourself to feel safe in that moment because you're holding yourself. You're holding all that is and you are creating the safety for yourself to to have the strength to hold whatever it is that you're feeling.

Becky Miller:  I loved how you also talked about us recognizing that we're sovereign and we can observe our feelings because I think um, like you said it's interesting because today's society whether it's they feel like other people have to make our safety but I also feel like a lot of times it's a society of blame where it's like well this person made me mad or this person made me cry and...  

Christine Ruch:  Yeah. Yeah.

Becky Miller:  ...it and you will blame your emotions on somebody else you know and How powerful is that to be able to say,

Christine Ruch:  Exactly. Yeah.

Becky Miller:  "No, they're, they're my emotions.

Alysia Thomas: Mhm.

Becky Miller: I recognize it. I can, like you said, I can sit with this." That is really something anyone can do. It's great practice.

Christine Ruch: It's a great practice. And then no one makes you feel anything. You decide that you're going to feel that way. You can create enough emotional energetic space that no matter what anybody else is doing, it doesn't touch you at all. But we're the ones who have no boundaries. We're completely permeable. We allow everything to permeate us and take it personally. And that's like over-identifying with everybody else's feelings instead of being in your sovereignty and recognizing that like you can have whatever feeling you want to have that has nothing to do with me. You know, you can't make me feel anything but I only I can make myself feel something.  So, so I think that these are these are these very subtle things that we're talking about, but they are all really pivotal to the proper functioning of your nervous system, I feel like.

Becky Miller: Yeah.

Christine Ruch: And uh by extension then your health because when you're busy walking around getting triggered by everybody's feelings because you're so porous and you can't even hold your own feelings and don't even know you're sovereign and then you're don't feel safe and you're always triggered.

Stacy Griffin: Yeah

Christine Ruch: Well, then your nervous system is a wreck and you have high blood pressure and you're have inflammation and you have all kinds of you have all kinds of symptoms. So, and people don't recognize that when they're in that state of being that that affects their health and then they go to the doctor to like figure out why they have high blood pressure and get on high blood pressure medication when instead it's like, well, but do you see the way you live your life? Like you don't need to be on high blood pressure medication soon, you know.  

Christine Ruch: You need to shift all of all of your way that you that you hold emotions and then suddenly your blood pressure is going to be just fine. You're not going to have any blood pressure problems.

Alysia Thomas: Is it isn't it so interesting that it starts out that simply just shifting how you hold your...

Christine Ruch: Yeah.

Alysia Thomas:  ...emotion and it does impact your physical body and your mental health like your physical health and your mental health. That's it's wild.

Christine Ruch: Yes.

Becky Miller: Yeah.

Stacy Griffin:  I think there's something that a lot of people don't realize which is when you are fully in your body when you're fully paying attention to your body even when it is ill when you acknowledge that when you acknowledge I'm not feeling well what can I do you know whatever the case may be but when you are in your body it calms your mind your mind has to shut up because you're dealing with what you are physically feeling and in that moment when your brain shuts up is when you can really kind of connect with okay how should I move forward what is best for me how can I proceed So I think there is a level of kindness that we don't give ourselves because we don't slow down enough to hear what our body is saying.  

Christine Ruch: It's the truth.

Stacy Griffin: So we're we're living for the hustle and living for the hustle. And the more that happens, the more disconnected we become from our bodies. The more disconnected we become from our bodies, the more this takes over. when our brain is taking over, it's it's not ever going to end well. Like you've said, it, it always leads to disregulation.

Stacy Griffin: I think that a lot of our listeners and I think people in general really struggle with being disconnected from their body, whether it's illness or trauma or whatever the case is. So, where do you think the safest place to begin rebuilding trust in the process of being in your own space with yourself is? Can you give us maybe a practice or something that you think would really help people to center in?

Christine Ruch: Yeah, it's such a it's so tricky, right? Because um yeah, we are all so disconnected from our body. We don't we just don't we don't have a way to teach that in our culture especially when then we're parents and we have children and then gosh I mean I, I have two children you know like I would always say like god I can't even believe I'm saying this now but I would be like no whining crying or  

complaining you know what I mean it's like you we teach our children to like push down their emotions and not even feel it themselves like you know we we have um so it's very tricky to start to unwind, right? Because there's so many ways in. And so I think though there's some things that we were all talking about, whether you're sitting with yourself and listening to your body and then taking action or whether you're sitting and just holding all that is and trusting that you are not that you're not that identity, you're not that emotion. And even just those two subtle little simple things, it's like you want more, but what if there isn't necessarily more? You could go in and do a lot of traumatic release, trauma release. Like that is super important. A lot of times our nervous system is disregulated from childhood, from childhood coping mechanisms and learning things that we've learned in our childhood. And we don't process childhood trauma. And that trauma is stored in our body. And so you can go and go and do some traumatic release, which is another very important part of restoring your nervous system to harmony.  

Christine Ruch: Um, but that's something that you would really need to have somebody else. You know, you'd need somebody else who can help you with that. Um, and um, but I think all of these ways in all start to do the exact same thing. You all, it's like a million different doors that all lead to the same place. And then it's kind of interesting because you open one door and then you're like, "Oh, I'm actually getting good at this like listening to my body thing." And then you create that positive feedback loop like I said and then you're finding your body that way because your body's listening to you. You're listening to your body and then you're developing self-compassion, right? Like that happens as a positive byproduct of listening to your body and taking aligned action. Then suddenly you're in a space of like full self-compassion because you're like, "Wow." Or even in a trauma release thing, you're recognizing like, "Oh my gosh, my body really held all of this for my safety." Like that is so profound that that that is so mind-blowing, you know? So I think like any number of these things I think it really depends on the person because all four of us could want we all want let's say harmony in our nervous system but all four of us could be called to a different way in, right? One of us could be like. "oh I had some shit...

Alysia Thomas: Mhm.

Christine Ruch:  ...go down when I was a kid. I really want to figure that out," and somebody else could just be like, I want to sit and hold all that is I want to figure out that sovereign thing, right? Like it doesn't really matter, because everybody's really different. There's no rules necessarily. I think that the only rule, if you want to call it that, is just this commitment to yourself and committing to yourself and committing to your own self-worth. Like you are worthy of this experience. You are worthy of this journey and your health is depending on it.

And not just your health, but your family, your community, your job. Like everybody who is in who is in your realm is counting on you to choose yourself first and figure out figure out your own way in.

Stacy Griffin: I love that.

Christine Ruch: But all, all doors lead to all doors lead to the same

Alysia Thomas: So I love that.

Becky Miller: I, I think that's great. I was gonna say, do you mind sharing with our listeners your personal story because this this is obviously this this journey has been very personal for you.

Christine Ruch: Yeah, it's been very, very personal for me. Um, yeah, I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2006 and, um, I started my health journey. I've only treated it naturally, thankfully. I've never taken any pharmaceuticals to treat it. Um, soon after my diagnosis, I already had a naturopath and was already doing some natural work. And so I had a food sensitivity test and that was profound and then I was diagnosed with celiac disease um through that process. Um and then I did a food elimination diet and that was so profound and that changed everything that like opened the door for me to be like oh my god this is huge and um and then from there I got a degree in holistic nutrition and then I opened a natural food best restaurant.  

Christine Ruch:  I opened three businesses and had a business for 10 years in Boulder and that was amazing and I thought like I was crushing it. I mean, and I was like my business was a huge success, and, and I loved every second of that chapter, but I was a nervous wreck. I didn't even know like I, I kept my life in such a tight lockdown, right? Like every single thing had to be so perfect, and I was hyper vigilant and I was a hyper-achiever and everything was so intense, and I was like type A on overdrive, you know what I mean? And I thought I was winning. I thought I was thriving and I thought I was living my best life, you know, and um and then it all came crashing down, and uh and I dismantled my whole entire life. I closed all my businesses. I got a divorce. I sold everything I have. I sold my house, and I moved to Costa Rica. And um but through that though was a lot of healing and um and then learning this work and then going into this work and then found two healers.  

I don't know how far you guys get into the woo-woo stuff, but I mean for sure the universe brought me two amazing healers. And um and I didn't even know that my nervous system was shot to be honest with you. I, I still my health was still great. It was just like everything else was like a wreck. You know what I mean? And uh because I still had such a tight grip on my life and but that all of that is so constrictive and tight and um it's not expansion. It's nothing, but just you know anger and tightness and fear, and it was just like such a mess. I was a ball of nerves. And um yeah, so then I went through this incredible process um these healers and they teach other healers this process and so that they can spread the word because more people need to know this as as Stacy, you know, as well because you teach this as well.

Alysia Thomas: Mhm.

Christine Ruch: Um and maybe you and I teach differently because there's a lot of beautiful practices and a lot of beautiful ways to do it. But um and then in so doing then my health changed and everything everything just everything changed. Uh, my like for example I had like chronic insomnia. I, I would say I had done absolutely everything under the sun to sleep a full night full night through, and I couldn't figure it out for the life of me. And I had like the most perfect sleep hygiene ever. I had like a latex bed. I had no EMFs. I had like the perfect blackout things. And I just like ah and my whole family like my whole orbit was about making mom sleep well, you know. And um and it was like well no wonder I didn't sleep.

My nervous system was completely shot. Of course I didn't sleep, you know, but no one ever told me that. No one ever told me well you can't sleep because your nervous system is a complete disaster, you know. So um, but as I went through all this work and then likewise like I had this story around all the things I couldn't eat because I had such a tight diet and I had all these stories around how like perfect my diet was but also how much stress is that to like keep this lock on your diet like it's like so vigilant and now I have so much freedom like it's not about my diet it was about my nervous system but my nervous nervous system was so chronically inflamed that it saw all of the food that I made, even if it was holistic natural food in my holistic natural food restaurant that was gluten-free. Uh, it still it still was pissed, you know what I mean? And so, but then I told all these stories around the food. It was all the food,

Alysia Thomas: Okay.

Christine Ruch: But no, it was never the food. It was my nervous system. So, it was just like really profound for me to see firsthand in the healing that happened in my own body and not just my health, but everything like my my temperament, my stress, my my joy, and my living with full vitality, my truth, like so many things, changed when I started to really deeply work with my nervous system.

Alysia Thomas: But for people that are stuck, they know they need to change. They know they need help. They know they need to do this work, but they're scared. It's hard. It's scary.

Christine Ruch: Yes.

Alysia Thomas: What, what do you, what do you do for that? What do you do for that? How do you how do you get how do you get how do you convince yourself that it is worth it to do the work?

Christine Ruch: Okay. Well, I'm going to do a little tough love, tough mom thing here, because life is tough. You can't go through life without hard things happening. It's just not possible. We're here on this Earth school to learn how to do hard things. And you can stand in the face of fear, and you can stay there forever, and you're gonna just get sicker and sicker and sicker. And the only way out is to go through. You can't bypass it. And then you build resilience. You build strength. You build belief in yourself.

You build so much by actually committing to go and do the hard thing, do the scary thing. Because what's the worst that's going to happen? You die. You're not going to die. You're going to actually be better on the other side than you've ever imagined yourself.

Alysia Thomas:  Right.

Christine Ruch:  But you have to go through the hard stuff. You just have to. I mean, there's no way to sugarcoat it. There's no way to make it look pretty because it isn't. But this is life, you know? How much do

we keep ourselves so pampered and like, like back to this whole idea of like, "you you trigger me, and I want everything to be easy," and we have a life built of convenience and we bypass difficult things. But life isn't supposed to be easy. Life is hard. So but you know then you don't have faith or trust in yourself and if you don't have trust in yourself, well then who cares right?  

And so when you do the hard things, you develop trust in yourself. You develop resilience. There's so many gifts that come from doing the hard thing. And I think that that's that's just it. You just have to recognize like it's going to be hard, but I'm going to fucking do it, because I owe it to myself to do it. I want a better life so badly. I'm going to do the hard thing. You just have to.

Alysia Thomas:  I like to tell my kids like, and I think maybe this applies, "It's hard to change. It's hard to learn how to change. It's also hard to stay the same and live with the trauma or whatever it is that you've got. Pick your hard."

Christine Ruch:  Yeah.

Alysia Thomas:  "Pick your hard."

Christine Ruch: Yeah.

Alysia Thomas: Is it going to be this hard or is it going to be this hard?

Christine Ruch: It's the truth.

Alysia Thomas: Which one's it going to be? Because either way, it's going to be hard. And we can do hard things.

Christine Ruch: Yep. That be hard.

Alysia Thomas: We know. I have that on my wall.

Christine Ruch: We can do hard things.

Alysia Thomas: We, we can do hard things. it really comes down to it's a matter of pick your hard. Which which hard is it going to be?

Christine Ruch: Yeah. Yeah. There is no...and then especially if you get to the point where you have a chronic illness or you have an autoimmune disease.

Alysia Thomas: Okay.

Christine Ruch: Well yeah.

Stacy Griffin: Your body already picked the hard for you.

Alysia Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

Christine Ruch: Yeah.

Alysia Thomas: You can you can just Yes...

Christine Ruch: You are already in hard, you know.

Alysia Thomas: you can choose to to try and live with a positive outlook.

Christine Ruch: How much harder do you want it to get?

Alysia Thomas: Yeah, exactly. Okay, so I, I have loved this whole conversation. This has been awesome. But what we really we want to make sure we give people the information that they need to connect with you as a coach.

Christine Ruch: Yeah, sure.

Alysia Thomas: So, how can people do that?

Christine Ruch: Yeah. Um, you can come and find me and you can find out about more about my work and how I work um on my website, www.christineruch.com. And then I also have a Substack that's linked on my website that I write all about the healing path and all the different ways that we heal and I, you know, I'm still a chef at heart. So I have a lot of recipes on there and and conversation around food and alignment and resonance and um and then I have stuff in there about plant medicine as well. I've done a lot of plant medicine and I think that's another really powerful healing modality and nervous system reset. uh if somebody while we're talking about all the ways in if somebody's interested in in like exploring that as an option or a modality.  

Alysia Thomas: I love it.

Stacy Griffin: Christine, we're so happy you came and joined us today. We're we're happy you're here.

Christine Ruch: Thank you.

Stacy Griffin: If this conversation felt grounding to you, please take that with you into this new year. You don't need to push harder. You can start by feeling safer in your own body. Thank you for being here with us where we could have this very important discussion and we will see all of you in the new year.

Remember that you are worthy of joy. Disease does not define your life. You do.

HELPFUL LINKS:

Christine' website: https://www.christineruch.com/